Article: Intuition - Trusting Your Gut

Lately, I have been noticing people's tendency to want to "figure things out" (myself included). HOW am I going to do this? HOW do I MAKE this happen? The urgent desire to plan things out and the discomfort with the unknown future. KNOWING makes us comfortable. We think that FIGURING IT OUT will makes us secure. But all too often the answers we search for come from someplace other than inside our heads. Sometimes it comes from our heart. Sometimes, our gut. For one person I know, that sense of "what is right" comes from her left big toe!

Developing your sense of Intuition can be an immensely useful tool for making decisions. Intuition is often an underused sense that we all possess but few of us develop.

Have you ever had an experience in which you had a feeling or a hunch about something that turned out to be right? Maybe it was not even a conscious or articulated thought. Perhaps it seemed inexplicable. That's your Intuition.

Intuition is a deep sense inside yourself that knows what is right. The conscious (critical) mind often gets in quite a tizzy over intuitive reactions. Intuition is irrational, intangible and often subconscious. It is that deep inner place of "knowing". Intuition is where your answers live. It is just a matter of training yourself to listen.

There are countless examples of how following one's Intuition has led to life changing events. Bill, an accountant in Texas, was scheduled to take one of the fatal flights on 9/11. He had an inexplicable feeling the day before, that he should postpone his flight. Following his intuition saved his life. Swordfisherman value their sense or Intuition with as much respect as the scientifically produced weather reports. A captain's foreboding sense of dread is reason enough to postpone a trip to sea. The crew's lives depend on the captain's finely tuned Intuition. If you find the notion of Intuition too elusive and abstract to give credence to, ask yourself why. What have you got to lose? More importantly, what have you got to gain?

Your Intuition might already have a strong voice. You might be well practiced in listening to it. If not, here are some steps for developing your own sense of Intuition. Once you start listening to it, you will be amazed by the quality of information you receive.

Practice listening to your Intuition for 2 weeks.

1. Notice where in your body YOUR intuition lives. When you get a "hunch", notice what sensations accompany it (ie. tension in your gut, tingling in your chest, rapid pulse) Once you become familiar with your body's reaction to your intuitive sense, you can use this as your Intuition Radar.

2. Notice what information your intuition gives you. When you have a choice to make, what does your intuition tell you? Jot it down under the heading Intuition.

3. Your thinking mind will be screaming information at you that might be quite different from your Intuition. Jot down what your thinking mind says under the heading Thinking Mind.

4. Choose to make a decision based on your Intuition. Jot it down.

5. At the end of 2 weeks review your experience. Where did your Intuition lead you? What is the result? What effect does it have on your life?

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