Why Intentions Are Everything
In Stoicism, intentions are absolutely everything. Why you do the things that you do are of utmost importance while the result or outcome is actually of less importance. The reason why this is true is far from obvious, though. After all, one could understandably consider a positive outcome, regardless of intention, as the most important. Therefore, why are intentions everything?
Defining Intentions, Actions, and Results
For the sake of clarity, it’s worth defining what intentions, actions, and results actually mean.
Intentions are the reasons behind what you do (i.e. the action).
Actions are the things that you actually do.
Results (or outcome) are what happens as a result of the action.
It must be stated that this article presumes that one’s actions naturally follow from one’s intentions. That is, it is obviously the case that one must act with the intention to mean anything at all. All of the good intentions in the world could not make up for lying on the couch all day and doing nothing. Hence, we must assume that intentions naturally lead to actions.
An Example — Buying Someone Dinner
Let’s use the example of buying someone dinner to explain these terms and…
