The Gut Never Lies: How to Master Your Intuition

iStock_000004685201XSmall[1]MAZE INTUITION

Have you ever had a gut feeling and not listened? Think about those times when, for example, something told you not to take a certain route to where you were driving to, you took it anyway, and ended up stuck in traffic.

There are other circumstances where not listening to your gut can cost you big time—like forming a business partnership that never felt right from the beginning. Sometimes the consequences of ignoring our sixth sense can have even more dire consequences.

In our culture, we don’t quite give the power of intuition its proper due. It all seems to be about know-how and doing more. Of course, knowing as much as you can about how to reach a goal can only lend toward success. Likewise, we have to act in order to get anywhere. But there are times when we could have saved ourselves a lot of headache if we had just listened to our first instinct.

We have another source of intelligence within us that we tend to ignore. It’s the inherent wisdom of our spiritual nature. It can’t be measured, but it seems directly connected to the creative intelligence of the Universe. It’s deeper, more refined, more subtle, more instinctive, and more intuitive than thinking.

Intuition comes to us generally in feeling rather than logic. When a woman thinks “This guy gives me the creeps,” it usually pays for her to listen to herself. She is drawing on well-distilled experience and instincts that are a thousand generations deep. In the same way, when someone refuses to go along with the crowd, they are relying on something more than what the world praises as “smart.” 

Ask any really successful person and they will tell you success comes as much from intuition as from the brain. How many millionaires do you think go along with the crowd, or listen to the “conventional wisdom” that everybody else is following toward sameness? If you’re not utilizing this incredibly powerful inner guidance system that is at your service 24-7, you might as well be going through life with one hand tied behind your back.

The key is to get your mind to quiet down. Meditation helps, or even just really being present in the moment without labeling things as good or bad, right or wrong. Once the mind is quiet, wisdom can have its say.

The idea is to “stop thinking.” You’ve probably experienced this unexplainable phenomenon when you were trying to remember something but couldn’t. Finally, you stopped trying to “figure it out” and later on, out of the blue, the answer popped into your head.

Your spirit knows what’s right for you. It knows what directions you need to take for your highest good and the good of others. The thinking mind is an awesome tool that’s meant to be used, but it pales in comparison to the inner wisdom of your intuition.

Trust in yourself. Trust in the Universe. Open to your higher guidance and have the courage to follow this guidance, even if it seems to defy logic, which is usually the case.

Now it’s your turn:  What’s the most powerful example in your life where it paid to listen to your intuition, an automatic reaction to a situation where—even if you doubted it at first—proved to be the correct response?  If you have not been listening to your inner spirit lately, what can you do to get back in tune with that central part of you?  Tell me your thoughts below . . .