Intention Check
Use an Intention Check to clarify the purpose of your own or another’s behavior. Use it when you expect current behavior to result in other than a positive outcome. Intention Check assesses the integrity of your own and another’s intention in a given case.
Steps
- Ask the person whose intention you want to know “What is your/my intention with X?”, where X equals some type of actual or pending behavior.
- If it would be helpful, ask “What response or behavior did you want from whom as a result of X?”
Commitments
- Be aware of your own intention before checking the intention of another.
- Investigate sufficiently to uncover the intention of the person or his actions.
- Make sure you have the intention to resolve any possible conflict peacefully before intention-checking someone else. If you do not have a peaceful intention, check out.
- Do not be defensive when someone asks you what your intention is. If you can’t do this, check out.
Notes