Extended Definition-Intention

The word intention connotes a well thought out plan or idea with purpose. Intentions are not by accident and an individual should be aware of their purpose. Locke states, “Intention is when the mind, with great earnestness, and of choice, fixes its view on any idea.” Humans have the innate ability to focus and adapt their minds to new situations that may come to pass. But as humans, there is deeper meaning behind our intentions; they may be positive, negative or sometimes be mixed. In conversation for example, one party may have positive intentions but more often than not, the other party will decide that they are negative intentions.

Intention can obviously be associated with being either positive or negative connotations however; intentions have the ability to be mixed. For example, when asked what the word intention suggested to her, the librarian responded, “When I think of intention, I think of them as positive….But they don’t always have to be good; they can intentionally harm you”. When a person has the intent to do an action, there has to be reason behind that intent; positive, negative, or mixed; there is no such thing as an accidental intention. Apart from having a reason to act, a person has also manifested an aim for doing the action. Aim can range from a course of action taken to get a hold of what they want or on a larger scale where their aim is to emotionally cripple another person. Intentions are powerful things that have influence over conversations and how relationships continue afterwards.

A deceitful aspect of intention is, “they do not happen by chance”. Intentions are manifestations of our wants; therefore, an individual has “carefully [thought] of something before [they] do them”, says an educator. It should not be considered an intention if the outcomes haven’t been carefully considered. However, context is also an important characteristic of intention. Obviously not all individuals are the same; a “good” intention may be seen as an intention in the midst of malice and vice versa to another.