"intention" Illustration Friday March 2/2012

"Intention"
- inspired by the Illustration Friday quote:

"Intention involves such a small fragment of our consciousness and of our mind and of our life".
- Jasper Johns

This quote and what it seemed to be saying sloshed around in my mind every which way I turned this past few days.

Really?? REALLY?!??

That seems a bit like saying gasoline is such a small fragment of a car. Hardy necessary for car-ishness, except, of course, for the 'transportation' part of a car. Negligible, really.

Can't really judge a quote this brief - perhaps Mr. Johns is saying that we need to exercise other aspects of our selves, our consciousness, mind and life, and not worry so much about intention. I'd like to ask if this was what he intended with his words. Perhaps it is, like art when it is finished and available for view, that the intention might be less important than the interpretation of those who see it. Perhaps. I wonder...

...as I wonder how far Itzhak Perlman would have come as a violinist without intention. His own, his parents', SOMEONE's intention was that the thing be taken out of its case, tuned, the bow rosined and then stuck under his chin - day after day and year after year until, I wonder now, is it part of him, and can he even imagine putting it aside?

The mind wanders without intention - and yet our intention shapes those thoughts as we become aware of them. Intention is the self directing aspects of the inner orchestra, to play louder, softer, longer... and the music we create, the lives we live, the imprint of our consciousness on our own lives and those around us, is a creation of our intention - what we allow to flourish in our selves, the words we speak, actions we take.

Intention is perhaps the opposable thumb of the mind. We're pretty nifty creatures, even without it. But calling it a small fragment of who we are?