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Some say we have power to create our own reality, that through belief and intent we can and should specify our personal future. And yet experience shows reality is already predicated upon a design more elegant than anything we can specify through our ephemeral desires.

Others therefore say we should go with the flow and accept what comes. And yet experience shows that while some things are destined, more mundane things are left to choice—if not choice, then chance. The law of chance is without design and without mercy, and abandoning the responsibility to choose invites the law of chance into one’s life with often unpleasant consequences.

The bigger things in life we cannot change. The smaller things we can. Life is a river whose flow we cannot reverse, yet we have freedom to navigate within that flow. Near the shore we move slowly and roughly; near the center we move quickly and smoothly. We can humbly accept the bigger things and still actively direct the smaller things. We can and we must. But how?

For what is within our power and wisdom to specify, we may intend. For what is beyond our power to direct or wisdom to specify, we may make a request. Intending and requesting are two of the most powerful tools we have for shaping our experiences within the framework of destiny.

Intend for the mundane things you know you need. Intend for a good parking spot, intend for the perfect product or service at the perfect price, intend for a good job when you’re looking for one, intend for a positive and exciting day, intend for anything that is inconsequential to destiny and respects freewill. Intend or it will be left to chance.

Be specific when you intend. Mentally outline or visualize what you want. This sharpens the focus of conscious energy upon that selected probable future. If you want a blue shirt under ten dollars, then visualize the blue shirt and intend that it be under ten dollars. If you want compensation for the money you just spent on a book, then intend that you be doubly compensated. If you want a safe road trip, then go over each potential complication and intend that it not arise. Whatever your intent, be specific. You are projecting your own energy into the matrix of probable futures and selecting a particular one to manifest.

For the more important things, make requests. Request knowledge, wisdom, insight, guidance, protection. Request an answer to a puzzling question, request illumination, request that you learn your lessons as smoothly and efficiently as possible, request that you are given the best opportunities for fulfilling your potential. You cannot intend for these because they are beyond your wisdom to accurately specify. Therefore leave their fulfillment to the discretion of wiser forces like your positive Higher Self, the Universe, and divine forces. Be general and earnest in your request, and have faith and patience. By being general you leave the outcome entirely open and thereby allow possibilities to manifest that you could never have imagined.

Intending is commanding, and when done wisely commanding is the proper exercise of spiritual power. Over time reality will tell you what is mundane and what is significant, and you’ll get better at intending for what is within your place to intend.

Requesting is humbly knocking on the door to assistance by wiser forces. Such forces respect freewill and only assist when you request. Never requesting anything keeps the door closed. Disappointment means reality has something better in store for you at a better time.

Requesting when you should be intending is a form of wishing and only robs you of power. Intending when you should be requesting spits in the face of higher wisdom and is a display of spiritual hubris, while intending for what clearly goes against destiny and freewill is black magic. The lesson: don’t pray to Jesus for a new car, intend for a new car; don’t command reality into unraveling for you a mystery, request it or else you might learn the right thing at the wrong time or wrong thing at the right time. To intend is to command, to request is to ask.

Requesting is easy. When you feel like you need assistance, call up from within the feeling of gratitude and humility, then state your request verbally while paying full attention to the meaning of your request. Remain silent for several seconds and wait to receive a feeling of comfort that your request has been acknowledged. Then go away in certainty and relief that your request will be answered in the right way at the right time.

Intending is also easy. Just hold in your mind exactly what it is you want and then go do something else. Just like ordering something through the mail. In between intending and manifesting must be a temporary period of forgetting. If you want a good parking spot, give yourself enough time to forget about your intent before you get there. If you are intending for a good day, do it when you first wake up. This gives reality some breathing room to reshuffle the timeline.

The only real difference between intending and requesting is whom you address and how specific or general your intent. By intending, you acknowledge yourself as the source of power influencing reality. By requesting, you humbly address forces wiser and more powerful than yourself.

Attention freezes the object of attention, so restlessly anticipating something will put it off. This is simple quantum mechanics. The sooner you think about something else the sooner reality can get to work. Anticipation kills the future – it is better to have doubt than to anticipate, it is better to have patience than doubt, and there is no easier way to be patient than keeping yourself busy with other things.

These are metaphysical tools to catalyze the flow of experience and assist rather than undermine destiny. Most people only understand the physical side of life, that getting anywhere requires planning and physical action. Of course, doing is central to getting anything done, but direct action is only part of the equation. To summarize the rest: intend wisely, request earnestly, and go with the flow gracefully.

By Montalk