Where Does Intuition Come From?
In a personal study with workshop participants and clients over the last 6 months it was interesting to discover that when asked to close their eyes and ask a question of their intuition and then explain where the answer is coming from, it came from different places for different people and from different places at different times. Although many participants in the study did say the intuition is coming from their “gut” area, some receive it from outside their bodies, in their aura, or from around their heart. The conclusion drawn was that intuition is possibly connected to different energy chakras in and outside the body, depending on the issue at hand, similar to how Caroline Myss suggests in her book “Anatomy of the Spirit” that life and health issues are chakra related. And there also seems to be strong connections to the heart and the solar plexus chakras. The solar plexus is the “large network of nerves located in the area of the belly just below the sternum; named due to the raylike patterns of its nerve fibers….is sometimes called the “enteric nervous system” or the “gut-brain”. So it makes sense that many intuitions arise from this chakra.
And there is new scientific evidence to show that the heart is in fact another brain and that it has the ability to “think for itself” , formulating it’s own logic and influencing behaviour. Childre and Martin in their book “Heart Math Solution”, explain the scientific evidence which shows “that the heart sends us emotional and intuitive signals to help govern our lives”. They go on to say that intelligence and intuition are heightened when people learn to listen more deeply to their hearts. They suggest that “the human capacity to meet life’s challenges with fluidity and grace is based not on knowledge, logic or reason alone; it also includes the ability to make intuitive decisions. HeartMath research suggests that with training and practice, human beings can develop a high level of operational intuitive intelligence.”
Awakening your own intuition begins with training your awareness to expand and receive more information from others, from your Higher Self and from God, says Choquette.
It is learning how to expand your consciousness and better understand how your instrument of expression – your body- receives and responds to energy…..It is training yourself to be open and receptive to the subtle planes of energy that constitute our intuitive lives.
When Myss describes her own intuitive ability she says objectivity is key.
For me, impressions are neither auditory nor visual. Rather, they are like quick mental images that contain a very subtle electrical current, she says.
I learned through experience to discern the difference between personal and impersonal impressions; my indicator of an accurate intuition is a lack of emotion.
Trusting Intuition
Although scientists and psychologists and all the participants in the intuition study for this paper agree that intuition exists and that everyone uses it to varying degrees in everyday life, there is still a great deal of hesitation to trust those gut feelings. This is mainly because sometimes intuition is seen to betray people – or to lead them to an outcome they did not desire. It is not easily measured, not consistent and not always logical. So people tend to lack faith when using it.
As Gladwell describes,
Our unconscious is a powerful force. But it’s fallible. It’s not the case that our internal computer always shines through, instantly decoding the “truth” of a situation. It can be thrown off, distracted, disabled. Our instinctive reactions often have to compete with all kinds of other interests and emotions and sentiments.
The majority of survey participants for this paper replied that intuition should be used alongside other methods of judging a situation, like research and analysis, to make the best decisions. They said they would use intuition alone only when other sources of information were not available and they had nothing else to “go on”. But they did not always trust their intuition as it is often wrong. Megan Reitz interviewed a number of coaches on the topic and asked ‘ if your intuition turns out to be wrong, was it really an intuition? ’ Most, but not all, replied “no” as they believe an intuition is by definition a ‘ correct ’ insight into a situation. If the hunch turns out to be wrong it was probably entangled with assumptions, bias or emotions. Choquette also says that when intuition is speaking a person will feel relief, grounded, like their chest is opening up and they have more oxygen, everything relaxes, even if it’s not good news. She says that if it’s emotions speaking the persons chest may be contracting, they will feel tense or restless, breathing will be difficult or short and often the brain will be agitated and won’t stop talking. So perhaps there is some confusion also over whether a “gut feeling” is a real intuition or simply ones emotions telling them what they think. Research is suggesting that intuition is actually a muscle that needs training and that there are a number of effective techniques for learning to use intuition more efficiently so that more accurate answers can be achieved.