By Victoria Brodsky
Learning to recognize and follow your intuition takes practice, self awareness, and confidence. Uncover your inner qualities to get comfortable making intuitive decisions.
“Do You Have an Intuitive Sense One Way or the Other?”
During this unprecedented year, many of us have taken the time to do various forms of self reflection. In my own self reflection, I’ve come to realize that I don’t have much of a relationship with my intuition.
As an entrepreneur, I make challenging decisions everyday. During a recent hiring decision, my advisor asked me “do you have an intuitive sense one way or the other?” My answer: No, and if I did, I wouldn’t even know how to recognize it.
It was then I realized this would be a good time to explore all the reasons why I’m unable to recognize my intuitive sense, and how to improve. After all, intuition is a powerful force in our own human character, and should not go ignored in professional and personal development.
Since then, I’ve embarked on a journey to enhance my personal qualities in order to be more in touch with my own intuition. Here’s how I did it, step by step:
Step 1: Recognize What’s Holding You Back
One reason you may not be able to be in-tune with our own intuition is because your insecurities keep us from trusting ourselves. An important part of self awareness is being honest about where self doubt comes from and whether or not it’s ACCURATE. That’s the key.
I realized that the reason I tend to choose logic and expert advice over my own personal judgment in decision-making is because I trust logic more than I trust myself. My insecurities and lack of self confidence weren’t allowing me to tap into my intuition.
Take the time to reflect what’s holding you back in your own life – is it an insecurity? A lack of patience with yourself? Once you discover what’s holding you back, it’s time to tackle it head-on.
Step 2: Tackle What’s Holding You Back Head-On
When it came to facing my insecurities, I decided the first step in changing this would be an exercise where I wrote down all my insecurities in a journal, and ‘busted’ them (like myth busters).
For example:
Myth: I don’t trust myself because I am not experienced enough.
Truth: I have years of experience. Many other people trust me, I have good moral character, and admirable personal qualities that make me trustworthy.
Writing this down allowed me to have positive affirmations for myself that I could come back to if/when I was ever feeling insecure.
Whatever is holding you back, I encourage you to write it down and practice being mindful of it everyday.
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Step 3: Practice Trusting Your Intuition
Once you’ve begun the process of recognizing what’s holding you back and taking steps to tackle it, it’s time to put your intuition into practice.
For me, the first time doing this was during a simple conversation. I put my intuition to practice the other day when speaking to a friend over the phone. I had just gotten news that I’d gotten into an MBA program and normally would have been eager to share the news. However, I felt an intuitive sense to hold off. It turned out this friend was having a particularly hard day and it just wasn’t the moment to share my news.
Although this situation was not hugely significant, it felt good to trust my intuition. It fed my self-confidence and I looked forward to the next opportunity to test it as well.
The Positive Feedback Loop of Confidence and Intuition
After a while of trusting my own intuition, I began to feel more confident. Being confident made me less anxious about decisions, and therefore allowed me to trust my intuition even more.
This exploration proved to me that confidence and intuition have a positive feedback loop that will likely benefit anyone who puts the time and effort into exploring their intuition.
As a part of your self-development, I encourage you to take these steps in order to become more comfortable making intuitive decisions.
Photo by Nick Seagrave on Unsplash
