“I knew something didn’t feel right!”
We’ve all heard someone say these words; or have said them ourselves. Over and over, whenever we feel conflicted when meeting someone (a new date, a new friend, hiring a new employee and so on), we hear the same thing: trust your intuition.
The same is true whenever we feel conflicted about making decisions that can ultimately bring a big change in our lives, such as a career choice, the place we live, our finances or whether or not to end a long term relationship.
We contemplate, examine and rationalize every angle of the evidence before us for days, weeks, months and sometimes years, ignoring that gut-clenching feeling as our guide. Why?
I want to share a personal experience that probably would have cost me my life. Hopefully, it will spark something inside you to trust your intuition.
I lived in Santa Marta, Colombia for a few months. About an hour away, is one of the country’s most magical, natural reserves.
Parque National Tayrona mixes up the beauty of its amazing beaches, dense jungles, fascinating wildlife and is cut off from the fast paced world.
The first time I visited Tayrona, I trekked along a steep, long trail under the hot sun beaming down through the thick leaves, while carrying the humidity of the forest, heavy on my body. After an hour, I stopped at one of the lookouts.
It was absolutely breathtaking!
As far as I could see there was crystal blue ocean and the soothing sounds of huge waves crashing into enormous boulders. The entrance to a secluded, white sand beach was a few feet away. I picked up my pace and hurried for a moment to relax and refresh myself.
As I stepped foot on the beach, I froze in disappointment when I came face to face with this sign, staring back at me.
I had a momentary lapse of judgment to carry out the image I had created of what it would feel like to go for a swim. As I listened to the waves rumbling on the beach, my mind took over.
“It’s just a couple of innocent waves. There’s no harm in that. I can swim. I can easily control a few waves.”
But, something inside me didn’t feel right. I looked around for something, anything that would over ride the red flag.
I walked back to the entrance when I noticed a big, flat wooden board with something written on it.
I wasn’t the only one who had been taken in by the beauty of it all.
I had let the beautiful scenery drown out all the warnings signs. The danger was real. There was nothing I could do to control or change it. Nothing! It probably would have cost me my life.
Guess what? Thirty minutes away from here are two spectacular, paradisiacal beaches that are safe for swimming!
For many, ignoring the warning signs cost them their life.
Let’s bring this in our daily life.
How often have you dismissed your inner wisdom, allowing the outside world to drown out the truth it’s trying to tell you?
Every day, we are bombarded with all kinds of information on what we should or should not be doing to be happy and successful, that we can easily lose touch with our own inner truth and forget that we can trust it to direct us towards a path most harmonious to who we are.
We want tangible, concrete answers of certainty, don’t we?
The thing is, intuition doesn’t show up saying, “Psst, hey there Antonia, listen up.” It shows up in that clenching feeling in your gut. It’s the loving language of the heart guiding you and pointing out the red flags.
When we don’t like what it’s trying to tell us, we convince ourselves that it must be wrong. To accept it as the truth may mean having to change something in our lives, this scares us. It may mean having to change ourselves, this terrifies us more.
We resist by conducting our own scenario, the one we insist on trying to control from an idea or image we created and want to protect.
We believe that our rational mind knows better than our heart. We say, “I hear what you’re saying, but I’m good. I got this one covered.”
I know what it’s like to feel that the clenching feeling in your gut is not enough. The package sometimes comes beautifully wrapped with a bow and we imagine it to be the ‘perfect scenery’ to last forever. So, fearing that we will never have it again, we brush off our inner voice of intuition. To do so, may come with high price to pay. Hanging on to the illusory scenery we create in our mind keeps us from ever discovering the paradisiacal beauty of living a life true to who we are.
Take a moment to reflect on those times when you didn’t trust the whisper of your intuition. How or what did it cost you?
I spend years being miserable at a job because I didn’t trust my inner voice.
The package kept telling me that I had everything I needed to be happy. But, something didn’t feel right. Every time the feeling in my gut of making a change came up, it felt good and right.
But then, I let fear take over; it spoke in a very rational way.
“I’m not good enough. What if I fail? What if I lose the only thing that’s familiar to me?”
And, anxiety stepped in. I listened to my fearful mind and stayed in a place that was familiar to me, but it cost me my happiness.
The wonderful thing about intuition is that it won’t give up on you and say, “I told you so, Antonia. You didn’t listen to me; now stay in your suffering.” Intuition comes from a loving place. It’ll keep showing up with that sensation deep inside of knowing what you should or should not be doing.
The day when I finally shut the outside noise and listened, was the beginning of the magic in my life.
It’s not to say that we do things blindly or that our road will be smoothly paved. Once we’re deeply connected to ourselves and trust ourselves to be ourselves and express ourselves, the smallest step towards the right path will feel right. We may have to tiptoe, we may trip over bumps and fall in potholes along the way, but we’ll trust ourselves enough to get back up and keep moving forward. We will not see the world through the screen of fear that once filled our minds and kept us stuck in misery, but through our loving heart.
I found that the more time I spend alone, especially in nature, the more my mind becomes quite. In that silence, the more I connect with my intuition and have learned to trust it. My mind still creeps up every so often with all the chattering. But, now it’s easier not to let it take control.
We all have an inner wisdom that holds our truth. It’s a matter of tapping into that wisdom and letting it guide us.
Slow down to give yourself enough quiet, alone time to listen to your inner voice without interrupting it. If you make even the smallest efforts to allow a space to enter, you’ll be more in tune and connect with your intuition, understand what it’s trying to tell you and learn to trust it. That’s when the magic happens in your life!
