Intention and Attention - The Pathway to Making a Lasting Difference

In my profession as an educator, I am surrounded by incredibly caring people who want to make a difference. For years, as an ice breaker in a meeting, an introduction in a presentation, or as an interview question, I have asked the question, ‘Why do you want to be a teacher, a counselor, a principal, a superintendent, or an educator?’ For years, the universal answer has been and is, “I want to make a difference!”

With few exceptions, I can say that my colleagues have each made or are making a difference. I wonder though, if those educators I have encountered throughout my career, have found themselves in moments like I have in periods of self-doubt, periods where you really wonder if you are making more than a difference in the moment, that you are actually making a lasting difference.

Casting doubt aside and refusing to fall prey to negative self-talk, I search for examples of lasting difference among the tapestry of lives that have been woven together in a career that now spans decades and thousands of lives across dozens of communities. In that reflection, I pause in my rumination to consider the heroes among my mentors and the students I taught early in my career who are now accomplishing their dreams. Among them are doctors, attorneys, teachers, bankers, investors, real estate agents, landscape artists, etc. Beyond career success, I witness them succeeding as friends, spouses, and parents.

My own life bears witness to the lasting difference made by the public school teachers who taught and loved me as a child. My career, now in its latter stages, demonstrates the lasting difference made by the teachers and administrators who took me under their wings and nurtured me as a young teacher and later as a beginning administrator. Perhaps the success of former students shows the “paying it forward” desire I have always had as an educator. What then, can I find in these exemplars of differences made can be found as keys to making a lasting difference?

From my reflections, I believe that there are two key requirements to making a difference that lasts: intention and attention.

At the start of a new adventure, a new career, a new year, a new position, a new opportunity, or a new journey, it is important to be able to state in a clear manner the intention of the work. For example, a teacher might say at the beginning of a school year, “This year I will help each of my students grow in their reading ability.” At the highest level, this might be stated as a S.M.A.R.T. goal (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Time-bound.) That might sound like, “This school year I will help each of my students improve their reading proficiency by five percentage points on the state assessment.” Writing goals down, whether personal or professional, forces an intentional consideration of what might be.

Being intentional in purpose is not and should not be limited to some typical metric of the work you do like a reading assessment score for a teacher. We should also be just as intentional in those things that are really important like developing relationships. “This year I will really get to know my students or my colleagues.” “I am going to spend more time with my family.” “I am going to be more involved in the community.”

Reflecting on, stating out loud, and ideally, writing down your intention makes it more likely that you will accomplish your goal or achieve your purpose. Intention increases focus and cause us to not be pulled from our goals by all of the distractions of life.

The intention to make a lasting difference or accomplish a goal is simply not enough. It fails if not accompanied by attention. The best-laid plans are meaningless if attention is not paid to the intention (goal) along the way. If my intention is to get to know my colleagues, I need to spend time with them regularly and routinely. I need to take the time to inquire about their family and interests. If my intention is around being more involved in the community, I need to regularly schedule events on my calendar. Failing to pay routine attention to the steps required to achieve the desired outcome ensures a failure to achieve.

If my intention is to help students improve their reading proficiency, I have to daily accomplish the tasks that bring that to fruition. I cannot expect that a student will magically improve if I have not informally and formally assessed along the way and most importantly adjusted my instruction based on the results of those check-ins or assessments. In my classroom, in the days before smartphones, I kept checklists in my lesson plan book and notated every check-in while tracking a student’s progress. I could quickly see who I had not spoken with recently. Today, technology makes this tracking much easier. However, if we fail to pay attention to electronic reminders, we will still fail to accomplish our goals.

On a personal level, a particular goal of mine in the realm of self-care and exercise has been a testament to the power of intention and attention in my life. For years, I had paid lip service to wanting to be “in-shape” or healthier, but I was not making any progress. It was not until 2012, challenged by my son Joshua, that I determined to actually do something, to begin to accomplish this goal of being healthier. I vowed to be more intentional. It was not easy. I struggled to run to the stop sign at the end of our road, less than a half-mile away. I started to use mailboxes as goals - "I can make it to the next mailbox, I can make it to the next one..." After a slow first month with halting progress in terms of actually getting out of the door and running, I hit upon a strategy that would work for me: tracking my accomplishments and competing against myself.

I opened a new Excel worksheet and created a tracking chart for my exercise. For me, that means running and riding my bike. I set a goal for the miles I would run and ride that year with a plan to record each month what I accomplished. Using the Map my Run application on my phone I began to track every run and ride. Each week, I opened the Excel chart and updated my progress. The Excel chart is now a Google Sheet that shows line graphs and bar charts of ten years of progress. I compare month-to-month trying to set new records for that month of the year. I accept that I will log more miles during the spring and summer and less when cold weather appears, but I keep going. For the record, some years are better than others. I accept that I may have short-term setbacks, but I also know that I am making long-term progress because I pay attention to it.

I know that without the intention at the outset and the attention throughout, I would still be simply talking about what I would like to accomplish instead of actually making a difference in my health and well-being.

In the end, only time will tell if we have made a lasting difference, but I just cannot imagine that we have a hope of accomplishing that lofty goal without intention and attention.

Photo Credit - The photo used at the top is used with permission from Unsplash. The photographer is John Salzarulo