Aaaaalriiiiight!

Oh boy, oh boy. Today at Wing Chun I took a good hit to the teeth, and she was wearing a ring, too. Fine, though, I guess my tahn-sao was good enough.
Anyways, today in S.S., I said a bit about natural consequences. Well, I've been thinking about it. Since nature only sees our actions and not our intentions, where do our intentions come in to play? Even another person can not sense our intentions unless we reveal them, but that revelation is also an action, and what do we intend to do when we reveal our intentions?
When we boil it down, our intentions do often make themselves manifest in the manner in which we act. A man who feeds an animal because he loves the animal would pay careful attention to his distribution of the food, maybe even feeding it from his own hands. He would pet it, and talk to it, and give it a nice pat on the head as he leaves. A man who feeds an animal because he wants to eat it might scatter the food on the ground before it, showing no compassion for his future meal. He might even whistle a tune about the meal that animal is destined to become. This is mostly because animals are stupid.
We may be much more secretive or clever when it has to do with humans. All of us act differently depending on the people around us. If you're surrounded by adults, do you behave the same way you would if you were surrounded by children? Boys, if there are ladies present, would we compose ourselves the same way we do when it's just us guys? When Mr. Dye is in the classroom, do we act the same when he leaves for some reason?
Oh, let's see. NO.
Even if you're always the quiet one no matter who's around, don't you at least try to be impressive if you're alone with someone you like?
Yeah, that's what I thought.
So I return to my question: Why do our intentions matter? The answer largely depends on whether you're religious or not. If you believe in God, or Allah, or what you would call it, you must also believe that your god knows your thoughts and intentions. Personally I believe that those who mean well are more likely to make it into heaven than those who do good, but do good only intending to better their own situations.
Take Porter Rockwell, for instance. He was an awesome guy. He carried enough loaded weapons to fire hundreds upon hundreds of times without reloading, and carried enough extra ammunition to be able to fire those hundreds of shots again. He drank hard liquor, killed enemies and traitors of the Mormon church, and had his fair share of wives throughout his days. Wanna know something cool? Former and deceased president of the Church Joseph F. Smith answered a question that was a hot topic back in those days: Did Porter Rockwell achieve Celestial Glory? His answer was yes. He did indeed.
How does a guy get into the highest afterlife he believes there to be when he did all that stuff that we would now consider questionable? Well, it's because he did it with the intent to protect his church, and his friend, Joseph. He didn't do it to quench his thirst for liquor/blood/pleasurable company. Porter Rockwell killed people, and he was a good man.
So you see how our intentions are important. If you don't believe in a god, then believe in yourself. You know whether or not you're a good person. Everybody else knows whether or not you do good things. And believe me, when you hate yourself, when you think you're a bad person, bad things happen to you. (I won't delve further into that statement now, but remind me to address it on a later date.)