Tag: intuition

Look! This little finger covers the eye and prevents the whole world from being seen. In the same way, this small mind covers the whole universe and prevents Reality from being seen.
—Ramana Maharishi

The mind is a lot less important than we think it is. In our Western rationalistic cultures, we have given pre-eminence to the operations of the cognitive processes. Of course, the rational mind has its place and value in the scheme of things. But it is not meant to be the primary way we experience reality. Feeling or sensing is the primary way to know anything.

The mind judges, analyzes, measures, and compartmentalizes and thus creates a sense of separation and duality. The heart or the intuitive faculty embraces or becomes one with its object of attention. It knows it from the inside out and not from surface outside appearances and measurements.

So, to really get to know someone or something beyond the narrow confines of your mind’s myopic judgments, learn to quiet your mind and become one with that which you are focused on and then you will know.

“Open for me slightly your heart and I will open the world for you.”
—The Zohar

“There is a voice that does not use words—Listen!
—Rumi

To find the way, close your eyes, listen closely and attend with your heart.

Be present in your own presence and then you can be present for others.

This the last in my seven-part series about intuition. I’m sure I’ll write about it again at some point. Meanwhile, you might want to review the earlier posts as well.

Even neuroscience has declared that intuition physically exists in our brain, in the emotional part of the forebrain. So, follow the feeling.

James Wanless

No matter how deep a study you make, what you really have to rely on is your own intuition, and when it comes down to it, you really don’t know what’s going to happen until you do it.

Konosuke Matsushita, founder, Matsushita Electric Co.

Eight ways to develop your intuition

1. Create the intention to use your intuition and the numerous techniques suggested in the previous posts by regularly reminding yourself, “I want to use my intuition.” And then simply use your intuition.

2. Constantly pay attention to and be on the lookout for the feeling or impression of a person or situation. It’s a moment-to-moment thing, a very spontaneous, subtle process. Listen and “feel in.”

3. Learn to lose your mind and come to your senses.

4. Trust the feelings and impressions you get. Don’t ignore them. Trust your inner voice. Look for, listen to, and don’t ignore this voice when it speaks.

5. Have the courage to act on your intuitive hits. The art of following through is a very important step. Learn how to always practice intuitive awareness and discernment. Begin using your intuition with the smaller issues and situations in your life and then gradually move on to the bigger ones.

6. Don’t be afraid to speak and follow what you “feel” and not just be a slave to what you “think.” 

7. Act on your “feel” and not on your “think.”  Follow the golden thread of subtle inspiration. Use inspiration and not perspiration to navigate through your life.

8. Monitor the process. Say to yourself: “I know this was an intuitive decision and I don’t know what is going to happen, so let’s check it out and see if it works.”  To help you with this, keep an Intuitive Hunch Journal and monitor how often you are right.

Intuition helps one be more decisive, swift, clear, and accurate in decision-making.

Success is an inside job. Develop your intuitive muscles and be intuitively fit. Increase your intuitive intelligence. You’ll be amazed at how good you get at it and at how easy it is.

I hope the suggestions in this series of posts have been helpful to you. If you have any questions, please send them my way.

Cease trying to work things out with your mind. It will get you nowhere. Let your whole life be led by inspiration and intuition. Let your whole life be a revelation.

Eileen Caddy

Editor’s note: This is part six of a seven-part series on developing your intuition.

It is always with excitement that I wake up in the morning wondering what my intuition will toss up to me, like gifts from the sea. I work with it and rely on it. It’s my partner.

When I worked on the polio vaccine, I had a theory. I guided each [experiment] by imagining myself in the phenomenon in which I was interested. The intuitive realm…the realm of the imagination guides my thinking.

Intuition will tell the thinking mind where to look next.

Jonas Salk

Intuition is my most valued business tool.

Lewis Platt, former CEO of Hewlett Packard

Learning to use your Intuition is like learning a new language. Once you are fully conversant in the new language, you no longer need to think about what you are going to say; it just comes flowing out of you.

So, too, intuition can become second nature. Instead of thinking in a left-brain, analytical mode all the time, you can learn to “think” in a right-brain way, too. Instead of experiencing “analysis paralysis,” you can experience great success and fulfillment through inspired creativity.

Intuition uses a “language” made up of pictures and feelings. Over time, you can create your own easy-to-use “language.” For example, if you want to get a read on someone or some situation, try visualizing them as a car, a book, or an animal. See what kind of car, book, animal, etc. comes to mind and then trust that the “feeling” or image you get is an accurate read of the person or situation.

In time you will learn to trust your impressions and use them to easily, accurately, and quickly “read” a person or situation with this simple, yet very powerful tool.

For example, if I imagine someone as a car and then “see” them as a bright, sporty, red Lamborghini, I’m initially sensing that this person is a major extrovert who is always on the go. But then as I dig deeper and enter the car, I might see that the interior is strewn with garbage and tons of books and papers. That would tell me that this person’s internal life is a mess. So, within just a few seconds of tuning in I have a lot of information about this person. If I chose to look more closely at other aspects of the car, the engine, the trunk, etc., all this would reveal even more to me about the person.

This may sound too simplistic, but I can assure you that after having done hundreds, if not a thousand readings in my life, this technique can reveal a lot about a person.

Please see my next post for further suggestions on how to use your intuition in your daily life.

Editor’s note: This is part five of Yanni’s series on how to develop your intuition. You might want to go back and review the earlier posts.

The intuitive mind is a sacred gift; the rational mind is a faithful servant.
We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.
Albert Einstein

So, as you are walking down the street and something or someone catches your attention, take notice! Pay attention. There are no coincidences. The Universe is talking to you all the time, reflecting back to you something you need to “see” or know about yourself or a situation or person. Read the “signs.” The Universe is a mirror. Everything speaks to you! Watch the language of life’s symbols. Every person, thing, and experience is mirroring some information back at you.

For example, not long ago my wife was contemplating a change in her job. She’d been offered a new position and was unclear whether it would be the best move for her. She decided to stop thinking about it and just trust that she would be guided. A short while later, while driving back on her regular commuting route, she saw a sign at a Real Estate office that just jumped out at her. It read: “It’s Time to Move Now!”  The sign had been up for ages, but that was the first time she’d noticed it. She knew right then that it was time to change. By the way, her new job is a million times better than the old one.

Here’s another suggestion about how to develop your intuition: When you are in a conversation with someone, really “feel into” every word they are saying rather than “think” about what they are saying. Also, become aware of the spaces and pauses between their words. Don’t get lost in your mindless chatter or theirs. This is the key. “Listen” more to their energy and less to the content of their words. There is usually more information in their silence or the “feeling” they are projecting than in their actual words. 

So, take a deep breath and just feel into what they are really saying. Really pay attention. Practice awareness and discernment. This technique helps you understand someone and be present for them. It’s also an excellent way to develop your intuitive faculties.

Slow down, take a long deep breath, ask for ease and grace to enter and take over, and allow for inspiration to lead the way.

…To be continued next week.

Small is the number of those who see with their own eyes and feel with their own hearts….Albert Einstein

For the last few weeks I have been sharing ways to develop your intuition, such as practicing anticipating events, connecting with objects and experiencing objects’ perspective, and sensing people’s inner states. This week we cover more ways to practice. You might want to go back and review the previous posts.

In time, as you keep working with your intuition, you’ll come to realize that everything is a “feeling.” Thus, in time, you’ll remember to always place your awareness into things to discover how they “feel” instead of mentally trying to figure things out from surface impressions and judgments.

So, to further refine your intuition why not approach how you understand things in the following way: How does this tree “feel?” How does this situation at work “feel?” How does this person “feel?” How does a crow “feel” as it flies? How does this business proposal “feel?” Is it safe, crooked, something else? So, how do things “feel?” 

Asking yourself how a situation, object, or person “feels” is the initial step in learning how to access your intuition. This is the basic training. Note that this system is not foolproof, for sometimes your perceptions get cluttered with your beliefs, projections, analysis, etc.. The more you use your intuitive faculties, the more accurate, honed, and sensitive they become.

So, how does the crow feel when it flies? Take a few minutes to close your eyes and become one with a crow and see what it has to tell you.

And how does this person you just met feel? Take a few minutes to close your eyes and sense what he or she has to tell you energetically.

Remember that for you to develop your intuition, you must exercise it! So, quiet your mind, open your heart, and take the time to feel.

“Open for Me slightly your heart and I will open the world for you.”
The Zohar

When you think with your mind, you seek answers to your questions. 
When you feel from your heart, the questions dissolve into answers.

…To be continued next week. This is part four of a seven-part series.

Let’s continue from where we left off. In last week’s post we focused on learning to connect with objects. Here’s how to “sense” people. It’s a simple and very effective way to hone your intuition.

As a person you don’t know passes by you, visualize yourself focusing on their heart area and then, with your mind blank, just ask: “How do they feel?” Happy, sad, confident, angry, hopeful? The first answer that comes to mind is the correct one. Don’t think about the person; your mind will lead you astray. Practice this as often as you can over the years—hundreds and thousands of people—and eventually you’ll know just by looking at them.

You can practice this on people you know, and people you don’t. You can do this for people who are not physically present with you, too. Just see their face in your mind’s eye and “feel into” how they are doing. In time, you will pick up a lot of information about a person in this way. I do this all the time with my wife and son when we are not together. It helps me to get a sense of how their day is going.

In doing this you are not judging the person, nor are you looking at them intellectually. You are sensing them with your intuition. You are observing them with the eyes and heart of your Soul. If you don’t judge, analyze, or measure a person with your mind’s limiting belief systems, a higher sense of awareness and discernment comes forward. You see the God within them because you are seeing them from the God-ness within you. You see them for who they are, not as your projection of them.

Be present in your own presence and then you can be present for others.

Play with these techniques for a while and see what happens. The more you practice, the clearer your intuition will become.

To see a World in a grain of Sand,
and a Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
and Eternity in an hour.

William Blake

…To be continued next week. This is part three of a seven-part series on intuition.

For primitive people the presence of energy is the starting point of their analysis and understanding of the natural world. Primitive people felt energy, but did not measure it. Today we measure energy, but are not able to feel it.

Vine Deloria, PhD

Sometimes the more measurable drives out the most important.

Rene Debois, PhD

My post last week was the first of a series of seven posts on developing intuition. Let’s continue.

To improve your intuition, you must exercise it. Here are a few more exercises:

How to sense the energy and essence of an object

Find a stone or crystal and notice everything there is to be noticed about it—its size, shape, smell, indentations, coloring, weight, etc. Next imagine yourself inside it and then become it; listen for the silence within it. What is it saying? What does it feel like to be inside of it? What wisdom has it to impart to you? What kind of personality does it have? Why has it come to you now?

Don’t think as you do this, just feel. Stay with it for a few minutes so that you can fully connect with its essence. Keep your mind still and your heart open, and listen.

Next focus your attention on a flower and do the same as you did above. You can actually do this with any object.

Lastly, follow these same steps with an object that belongs to someone—an object they care about. Connect first with the object itself. Next, see what the object has to say about the person who owns it.

Have fun and just practice getting a “feel” for things. Stop relying always on thinking instead of feeling. You’ll be amazed at what you learn about the object you have put your attention on when you “feel” instead of “think” about it. You’ll be pleasantly surprised by what you learn about yourself in the process, too.

There is a voice that does not use words—Listen!
Rumi

…To be continued next week in part three of this seven-part series on intuition.

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new lands, but in seeing with new eyes.….Marcel Proust

Using your intuitive faculty is not something you do; rather it is something you allow to flow through and to you. By stepping aside, that is, by leaving the cognitive mind behind, we allow the divine to flow to and through us. It is an effortless process, one in which there is no mental effort or striving, but instead a flow of the divine.

It is a feminine, receptive process rather than a masculine, assertive process. It is a process of trust, allowing, surrender, receiving, and love rather than a process of force and will.

So, to get in touch with this part of yourself, just sit, quiet your mind and allow yourself to “feel” what is going on. And then, trust your “feel” before you trust your “think.” In this way, you will have engaged the intuitive/heart faculty within you and will have touched into a deep reservoir of information, love, and wisdom that can never be accessed by the mind alone.

To find the Way, close your eyes, listen closely, and attend with your heart.

How to develop your intuition: Anticipation

Learn to anticipate with your intuition what is going to happen next. Don’t guess, in other words; don’t use your mind. Train yourself to learn how to read the energy of a situation or person so you know what will happen next. The more you ask of your intuition, the more you get used to using it to gather the information you want. 

For example, when a person is talking to you, anticipate their next few words, then anticipate their next sentence, and so on. In a given situation, “feel into” how a pattern will unfold before it does. In a supermarket, again “feel into” what aisle a person will turn down or what product they will buy. Always “feel into” how a situation will unfold instead of thinking of how it will. “Feel into” when a driver before you will turn off the road. Pick someone in a mall, at the beach, etc., and anticipate what they will do next.

By constantly going into your intuitive faculty to ask for information about what’s coming next, you train it to “read” the energy patterns of life. Thus, you move from the cognitive mind and guesswork to intuition and feeling. Eventually you will become so accurate at reading patterns that you almost always know what is going to happen before it does. Play with this technique at least ten to fifteen times a day. Let me know how it goes.

The term intuition does not denote something contrary to reason, but something outside the province of reason.…Carl Jung

Today’s post is the first of seven posts about intuition. Next week we’ll look at more ways to develop this inner capacity.