How to make Dua: Tip #10

To have good intentions

All deeds are based upon intention in Islam, including Dua. The intention of the dua can help your dua to be accepted as you are telling Allah what you intend to do with the response.
It is essential that a person making dua has the best of intentions for whatever he is asking for. So, if someone asks for an increase in wealth, he should intend with that, that he spends more on his relatives and on the poor, and increase in reward in this manner. Likewise, if someone asks that Allah bless him with a pious spouse, his intention should be so that he can avoid falling into prohibited acts and begin a pious family.

The proofs for this are obvious, for it is not possible for a Muslim to ask Allah for something in order that he do evil with it. This principle is found in the dua that the Prophet taught us to say when visiting the sick. Abdullah ibn Amr narrated that the Prophet said: When a person comes to visit the sick, then let him say: O Allah! Cure your servant so and so, for he will then inflict a wound on an enemy, or walk for your sake to the prayer. [Abu Dawud #3107. Sahih al-Jami #466]