“Intentionality” has become a buzzword. Wellness influencers chant it. Marketing copy editors scribble it. It’s been lumped in with cringey manifestation journals and unthinking gratitude practices to mean something spiritual and aspirational and—most often of all—vague. But intentionality, properly understood, is not any of these things. It is the difference between choosing thoughtfully and defaulting to what’s easy, expected, or trending. It’s consideration without self-consciousness.
It’s finally admitting you don’t need the drawer full of gadgets that promise to save you 15 minutes: the herb scissors, the avocado slicer, the immersion blender you used once when you decided you were “getting into soup.” It’s choosing the mortar and pestle that lives on your counter (the one you actually use, and that also happens to be beautiful) instead of the drawer of single-purpose tools you forget you own. It’s the act of being deliberate in what one does.
