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Intentional living is any lifestyle based on an individual or group's conscious attempts to live according to their values and beliefs. These can include lifestyles based on religious, political or ethical values, as well as for self-improvement.
In the first chapter of Christopher Isherwood's My Guru and his Disciple, written in 1940, the writer tells of conversations with Gerald Heard concerning Heard's spiritual values. In their conversations, Heard explains that he follows a lifestyle called "intentional living" (Isherwood put the phrase in quotes). Heard said that one of the hardest parts of the discipline was to be aware of one's own pretensions. "You may rid yourself of all worldly addictions and aversions… the most deadly pretension may raise its head. You may begin to believe you are a spiritually superior person…"
Intentional living requires one to be aware of one's fundamental beliefs and to be willing to make an effort to have one's behavior reflect these beliefs, in a form of integrity in relation to one's conscience and environment. In some cases, such changes[ clarification needed ] are drastic enough that like-minded individuals group together in intentional communities.
According to the writer Joshua Becker, the steps involved in adopting intentional living can be summarised as: [1]
Some examples of intentional living include cohousing, ethical living, frugal living, moral community, simple living, sustainable living, as well as many religious lifestyles. Intentional communities, such as the Simple Way, the Bruderhof communities, [2] and the Community of St Anselm [3] are intentional communities based on Christian values and beliefs.
While not necessarily representing distinct or actual lifestyles, many themes and areas of human interest, activity, and study exist that contribute to intentional living. Examples include appropriate technology, conservation, ecology, environmentalism, humanism, humanitarianism, and socially responsible investing.
Chastity, also known as purity, is a virtue related to temperance. Someone who is chaste refrains either from sexual activity that is considered immoral or from any sexual activity, according to their state of life. In some contexts, for example when making a vow of chastity, chastity means celibacy.
Hutterites, also called Hutterian Brethren, are a communal ethnoreligious branch of Anabaptists, who, like the Amish and Mennonites, trace their roots to the Radical Reformation of the early 16th century and have formed intentional communities.
The Schleitheim Confession was the most representative statement of Anabaptist principles, by a group of Swiss Anabaptists in 1527 in Schleitheim, Switzerland. The real title is Brüderliche vereynigung etzlicher Kinder Gottes siben Artickel betreffend ....
Simple living refers to practices that promote simplicity in one's lifestyle. Common practices of simple living include reducing the number of possessions one owns, depending less on technology and services, and spending less money. In addition to such external changes, simple living also reflects a person's mindset and values. Simple living practices can be seen in history, religion, art, and economics.
Simplicity is the state or quality of being simple. Something easy to understand or explain seems simple, in contrast to something complicated. Alternatively, as Herbert A. Simon suggests, something is simple or complex depending on the way we choose to describe it. In some uses, the label "simplicity" can imply beauty, purity, or clarity. In other cases, the term may suggest a lack of nuance or complexity relative to what is required.
The Bruderhof is an Anabaptist Christian movement that was founded in Germany in 1920 by Eberhard Arnold. The movement has communities in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, Austria, Paraguay, and Australia.
An intentional community is a voluntary residential community which is designed to have a high degree of social cohesion and teamwork. The members of an intentional community typically hold a common social, political, religious, or spiritual vision, and typically share responsibilities and property. This way of life is sometimes characterized as an "alternative lifestyle". Intentional communities can be seen as social experiments or communal experiments. The multitude of intentional communities includes collective households, cohousing communities, coliving, ecovillages, monasteries, survivalist retreats, kibbutzim, Hutterites, ashrams, and housing cooperatives.
Ethical consumerism is a type of consumer activism based on the concept of dollar voting. People practice it by buying ethically made products that support small-scale manufacturers or local artisans and protect animals and the environment, while boycotting products that exploit children as workers, are tested on animals, or damage the environment.
An alternative lifestyle is a lifestyle perceived to be outside the norm for a given culture. The phrase "alternative lifestyle" is often used pejoratively. Description of a related set of activities as alternative is a defining aspect of certain subcultures.
Contemporary Sant Mat Movements, mostly among the Radha Soami tradition, are esoteric philosophy movements active in the United States, Europe, Australia, Latin America, and especially India. These movements assert that Sant Mat shares a lineage with Sikhism and contains elements of thought found in Hinduism, such as karma and reincarnation. They further assert that Sant Mat also contains elements found in Sufism and has inspired and influenced a number of religious groups and organizations. They refer to this spiritual path as the "Science of the Soul" or 'Sant Mat', meaning 'teachings of the saints'. More recently it has been described as "The Way of Life" or "Living the Life of Soul". It incorporates a practical yoga system known as Surat Shabd Yoga.
The Radical Reformation represented a response to perceived corruption both in the Catholic Church and in the expanding Magisterial Protestant movement led by Martin Luther and many others. Beginning in Germany and Switzerland in the 16th century, the Radical Reformation gave birth to many radical Protestant groups throughout Europe. The term covers Radical Reformers like Thomas Müntzer and Andreas Karlstadt, the Zwickau prophets, and Anabaptist groups like the Hutterites and the Mennonites.
Frugality is the quality of being frugal, sparing, thrifty, prudent, or economical in the consumption of resources such as food, time or money, and avoiding waste, lavishness or extravagance.
The Foundation for Intentional Community (FIC), formerly the Fellowship of Intentional Communities then the Fellowship for Intentional Community, provides publications, referrals, support services, and "sharing opportunities" for a wide range of intentional communities including: cohousing groups, community land trusts, communal societies, class-harmony communities, housing cooperatives, cofamilies, and ecovillages, along with community networks, support organizations, and people seeking a home in community. The FIC is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization in the United States.
A person's life stance, or lifestance, is their relation with what they accept as being of ultimate importance. It involves the presuppositions and theories upon which such a stance could be made, a belief system, and a commitment to potentials working it out in one's life.
New Monasticism is a diverse movement, not limited to a specific religious denomination or church and including varying expressions of contemplative life. These include evangelical Christian communities such as "Simple Way Community" and Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove's "Rutba House," European and Irish new monastic communities, such as that formed by Bernadette Flanagan, spiritual communities such as the "Community of the New Monastic Way" founded by feminist contemplative theologian Beverly Lanzetta, and "interspiritual" new monasticism, such as that developed by Rory McEntee and Adam Bucko. These communities expand upon traditional monastic wisdom, translating it into forms that can be lived out in contemporary lives "in the world."
Jesuit Volunteer Corps (JVC) Northwest connects people with one or more years of volunteer service that focus on JVC Northwest's values of community, spirituality/reflection, simple living, and social & ecological justice. JVC Northwest provides opportunities for individuals to reach out to persons living on the margins of society and vulnerable places throughout the Pacific Northwest. Jesuit Volunteers live together and serve with partner agencies in both rural and urban locales throughout Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington.
Nonconformity to the world, also called separation from the world, is a Christian doctrine based on Romans 12:2, 2. Corinthians 6:17 and other verses of the New Testament that became important among different Protestant groups, especially among Anabaptists. The corresponding German word used by Anabaptists is Absonderung. Nonconformity is primarily expressed through the practices of plain dress and simple living.
A Seeker is a person likely to join an Old Order Anabaptist community, like the Amish, the Old Order Mennonites, the Hutterites, the Old Order Schwarzenau Brethren or the Old Order River Brethren. Among the 500,000 members of such communities in the United States there are only an estimated 1,200 to 1,300 outsiders who have joined them.
The Rhön Bruderhof was the second of the Bruderhof Communities, with around a hundred people, situated in the Rhön mountains in Germany, not far from Fulda. Begun by Emmy and Eberhard Arnold and a handful of others in 1920, its members sought a lifestyle that would offer an alternative to the bitterness and despair that ravaged Europe in the wake of World War I. They took the words of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount as a directive on which to build their community: peacemaking, purity in relationships, love to one another and to enemies.
A religious community is a community who practice the same religion. The term is used to refer to members of a religion who live within a community, but not segregated from others and not dedicated solely to their faith. They worship together in a religious venue such as a temple, synagogue, church or mosque. In many religions, a group worshipping in common is called a congregation. In a narrower sense, a religious community is a group of people of the same religion living together specifically for religious purposes, often subject to formal commitments such as religious vows, as in a convent or a monastery. Most religious communities are part of the way religions are organized, and most religions have some form of Religious order.