“Follow your intuition! Go with your instincts! Trust your gut!” I’m sure you have heard this advice numerous times even well before depression set in. You would probably love to follow it, if only you could find the magic button labeled “Intuition Now.”
Intuition under normal circumstances is a very confusing thing. It’s not an emotion and it’s not mental advice or reasoning. Intuition is a built in internal communication where we know something without having to think it through. It’s very personal, and kind of hard to explain. Florence Scovel, a theologian, described it nicely when she stated, “Intuition is the spiritual faculty that doesn’t explain; it seemingly points the way.”
Your intuition is an extension of you, like your own guiding North Star. It is pure thought, perception, and higher understanding. Intuition isn’t exactly a voice and it doesn’t come through your logical mind. It is the ability to receive a sense, understanding, or feeling about something or someone. Intuition is the instinctive knowingness, the reliable wisdom that lives inside of you.
Intuition comes in all sorts of different ways. For example, intuition is feeling into future implications of a current action, perceiving the underlying meaning in what people say or do, or seeing the big picture. It’s the smell of a food you instinctively know you will not like, the sound of song that doesn’t feel good to you, the vibe of a certain painting that inspires. It’s sense about which direction to turn toward, or which decision feels right to you. You don’t analyze why you would feel pulled in certain direction, or rationalize why you like something or dislike it, you just know. Intuition is how you guide yourself to follow your personal best course of action by choosing what feels “right” and “good” for you.
You can’t force intuition to speak. Instead, you learn how to tune into the subtle insights, feelings, and hunches that rise up as you go through your day. Everyone has intuition and yours will come through in a ways that are unique to you. It’s most likely not going to be loud or show itself in vividly clear pictures, but it’s there nonetheless. It’s a vague sense, feeling, or quiet knowingness.
Intuitive awareness can arrive in a variety of differing ways, including:
- Clarity that seems to come out of nowhere
- Hunch
- Feeling
- Knowingness
- Aha! moment
- Internal realization
- Gentle nudge
- Gut feeling
- Bodily sensations
- Idea or sudden insight
- A calm inner voice
- Sixth sense
- Heartfelt sense
- Flash of awareness
- Recognition of a possible alternative choice
One of the hardest parts about listening to intuition is that it is a quiet wordless whisper in the background. Intuition is a sense of something, an idea, or an insight that resonates within. Because intuition shares itself in ways that are subtle and sublime, it’s easy to miss or dismiss it. However, intuition is always with you, whether you listen to it or not. It’s more of a matter of tuning in, being aware that this guidance is available, and wanting to listen to what it has to say.
How can you tell if you’re hearing the voice of intuition? Your intuitive voice doesn’t assign blame, and it doesn’t make any experience right or wrong. It’s not critical, disempowering, or demanding. Instead, it simply provides doable, creative solutions for taking one-step forward to help guide you on your higher purpose for living. If you don’t follow intuition, it doesn’t scream louder or beat you up for not listening. It just sits in the background, waiting for you to acknowledge its presence and follow through by putting the intuitive response into action. It takes practice to notice intuition and trust to put intuitive guidance into physical action. Decide to tune-in more often to your intuition and watch your world come alive with new possibilites!
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I have read a couple of things and will continue to take a good look.
conrad
Hi Conrad,
Glad to have you visit! Let us know what you think, your comments and opinions are always welcome.
Create a fulfilling life,
With joy, Annette
This is one of the best articles I ‘ve seen on intuition. Way to go!
Tess The Bold Life´s last blog ..Magic Monday Freebie from The Bottom Line Book Club
Thanks for your affirming comments Tess! Even though we all know that following our intuitive hunches will never steer us wrong, we’re often reluctant to follow them. Over time, we learn to override our own inner sense of truth in favor of living in an entirely rational way, following the “rules” of life, or believing that others know what we want or need better than we do. By the time we’re young adults, the influence of intuition is weak or denied. Coming back to intuition is the most self-love, life-affirming action we can take!
I was always encourage to be a minister and never was able to go to school let alone the seminary. My mother prayed about this all her life. I am now doing lay ministry work and love it. She is smiling in heaven now. I speak to church men’s groups about Cowboy Counseling. Many family, friends, neighbors, and fellow church members have a need for that friend that understands non-clinical depression. In these times we have layoffs, bankruptcies, accicdents, divorces, and deaths of family and friends that can cause emotional stresses. I teach men how to be prepared to Cowboy Counselors.
Hi Conrad,
You have risen beyond many obstacles to follow the path truest to your heart. Many congratulations, although it seems you are already enjoying the fruits of your labor. It is a rare person indeed who can offer compassion and understanding to those in crisis and depression. Many blessings and much love, Annette