Your intuition is a wonderful, innate source of knowledge, wisdom and guidance. If only tapping into it and trusting it was easier!
Perhaps this sounds familiar: you’re going about your day and get a hunch about something. It could be that you should drive a different way to work, or there’s something going on with the person you’re dating that just doesn’t quite feel right.
But you blow it off. Where did that idea come from anyway, you wonder? You let your analytical mind talk you out of it and you get on with things.
But then…there’s an accident on the road ahead of you on your way to work. Or that person in your life turns out to not be who you thought they were. Perhaps they’re lying to you, or aren’t as kind as you wanted to believe.
I should have listened to my gut, you think.
It’s true. You should have. And it’s also OK that you didn’t.
Listening to and following your intuition is harder than you’d think.
Why it’s hard to listen to your intuition
There are a few reasons you may be having a hard time trusting your intuition or using it in your everyday life.
How your intuition shows up in your life may not be what you expect it to be.
It’s often not a big, flashy thing. Signs don’t usually rain down from the heavens, whacking you over the head so they are completely unmistakable.
While the universe does seem to hit you over the head with a 2 x 4 at times, that’s fortunately the exception, not the norm.
Your intuitive voice is usually subtle and gently guides you through your life. It may come in the form of a thought out of nowhere or a tugging in your body. It may be an idea you’re really drawn toward, or a feeling of repulsion or low-energy when you think of a certain person.
Because it may not be what you expect, you may be ignoring those intuitive nudges.
You’re afraid of listening to your intuition and following it because of past hurts.
Often people who are highly intuitive or sensitive honed their skills on the battlefield of childhood in dysfunctional or abusive families.
In order to keep yourself as safe as possible, you learned to sense the emotional temperature of people and situations. You learned to extend your intuitive senses outward as a means of protection.
If you grew up with these kinds of experiences, you can probably sense the emotion and atmosphere of a room before you even walk in it. You might feel the energy as weight or pressure. You can tell what the undercurrent and subtext is without people having to say anything.
No matter how much you were able to read situations and people in your childhood, bad things still happened to you. That wasn’t your fault, or the fault of your intuition. But it can cause a rift in your relationship with your inner self, and cause your trust in your intuition to be severely undermined.
Society’s demand that you listen to and obey authority figures further leaves you feeling disconnected from your inner voice.
Society teaches us to look to outside influences for information and approval, not within.
It’s much harder to control people when they listen to and trust their own inner voice. And so the messages you get from those in authority are to keep listening to the people in authority for answers.
As social beings, we want to fit in with our pack. We want to feel safe and connected. It’s part of how we’re wired for survival and it can be hard to evolve from that.
How to begin trusting your inner knowing
Now you know some of the reasons you may feel disconnected from your intuition and have trouble reconnecting to it.
What do you do about it?
You need to rediscover your relationship with yourself and rebuild trust with your intuition.
Meditation, especially mindfulness meditation.
Meditation quiets your mind and brings you into the present moment. You receive intuitive information in the present moment, so being able to be present and aware in your life and within yourself is incredibly important.
Journaling, especially depth journaling or expressive journaling
Journaling helps you open up to the emotions within yourself and hear your inner voice.
If you’ve been repressing the emotions you’ve (understandably) been feeling, this can keep you disconnected with your inner self. It can also make you physically ill. Letting these emotions out in a safe way, such as through journaling, can release the internal pressure that’s been building up within you.
Journaling can also give you insights into your limiting beliefs that are holding you back from truly being who you are.
Healing the wounds of your past.
So many of us are grieving past hurts we just don’t know how to heal.
Whatever method of healing works well for you is worth your time and energy. I love, use and teach the Grief Recovery Method. It’s been amazingly helpful for me in releasing pain I’ve been holding onto for years (sometimes decades).
Following the little hunches in your everyday life.
Use your intuition to choose the clothes you wear, the food you eat, the TV shows you watch. Don’t get hung up on it, just ask and go with what you get.
This begins to rebuild trust in your relationship with yourself. Like any relationship, it’ll take time to grow and develop. But it’s incredibly worth it.
Learn more about how you can trust yourself and your intuition again, heal from loss and live life authentically by signing up for my newsletter.
Image by sweetlouise on Pixabay