Trust Your Intuition

Let’s cycle back to this idea I’ve talked about a number of times on this blog.

Your body/mind knows what you need to heal.

There’s an aspect of this statement that is completely maddening. You may think, “If it knows what to do, why doesn’t it just go ahead and do it?!” You would be justified in this thought. You would even be justified in getting angry about it. Heaven knows I’ve spent more than my fair share of time yelling about this very issue.

The thing is, just because your body/mind knows what to do doesn’t mean that it can. We’ve hashed out the reasons for this in the blog post Healing is Not Direct where I go into detail about how energy blocks form, build on each other, and eventually make complicated health issues that the body can’t easily heal. Energy blocks are just that. They are physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual roadblocks that your body can’t deal with. It tries to work around them, but at some point, it simply can’t continue doing what it does best: self-heal. It’s too blocked up to deal with normal issues, so it breaks down and big issues ensue.

But even though your body/mind can’t resolve all those blocks, doesn’t mean it can’t guide you to what you need to clear out those blocks. It may know that the first thing you have to deal with is something physical, such as your diet or a medication you are taking that is causing a problem. Or it might know that the first thing you have to deal with is something emotional such as a relationship that needs work or something in your past you have to resolve. Or it might know that you need the help of a specialist, an energy worker, or a therapist to start digging into the blocks that have to clear. Your body/mind knows what to do and it knows what you need.

It doesn’t always know how to tell you. Or more likely, you don’t know how to listen. I’m not pointing any fingers. When I started finally dealing with my food sensitivities, I never would have guessed all the steps I would have to take to resolve the problem. I never thought I’d have to dig up old family problems as well as get rid of parasites. I had no idea they were connected and I had no idea that’s what my body/mind was trying to get me to work on. I simply didn’t know I should listen, let alone know how.

So yes, your body/mind knows what you need and it wants to tell you if you are able and willing to listen.

Here’s another thing you need to know about healing: it’s complicated. It’s highly unlikely that your problem has one simple solution. It probably has ten or twenty or eighty-nine. By the time we get sick enough to need medical help, it usually means we’ve had loads of energy blocks building up causing small issues over the years. That means undoing that all will take some time and some creativity. We’ll have to work on a number of things at once and we can’t expect that any one doctor or therapist or pill will have all the answers. We’re going to have to do some work.

So, this is what we know:

Your body/mind knows what you need.

It is trying to tell you what that is.

Healing is complicated.

Which probably leaves you with the question, “So how do I figure out what my body/mind is telling me I need so I can actually do something about it?”

That, my friend, is where your intuition comes in. Your intuition is the wisdom of your unconscious body/mind. It knows all kinds of things that sometimes border on psychic. It wants you to heal and it wants to tell you how to go about it. It might not know every single step of the process, but it has ideas of how to get started and how to find the help you need.

Which is why, more than anything else, you need to learn to trust your intuition.

Now, to be totally honest, sometimes my intuition doesn’t seem to have it all together. Sometimes it is wrong. Sometimes it gives me bad leads.

Or does it? Sometimes those bad leads turn into something good. Sometimes those leads make me try something so I can cross it off my list of possibilities. Sometimes doing something “wrong” actually helps me learn.

So maybe it’s smarter than I think. But it’s still important to know that following your intuition doesn’t always make things direct or easy. Follow it anyway. It will get you where you are going along some twisty path only known to itself.

So, this is how it feels to follow your intuition. Let's say you are experiencing unusual pain and fatigue. You do all the right things to feel better, but nothing changes so you decide it’s time to go see your primary care physician. They take a look at you, listen to you for two minutes, and send you home with the advice to get more rest and stress less. You head home feeling embarrassed and ignored with just as much pain and fatigue as before.

Now, this is a scenario that happens to MILLIONS of people in the world. If you are a woman, the likelihood of this happening is much higher than if you are a man. If you are a woman of color, then your chances of experiencing this are even greater. Research has proven that women (particularly of color) are rarely believed when they have any pain or fatigue. If this sounds familiar, you are not alone.

But let’s continue. If this happens to you, you will head home feeling worse than when you went to the doctor. Now, many people who experience this end up going home and believing their doctor. They assume nothing is wrong and they just need to deal with their stress better. They go on about their lives feeling worse all the time because, most likely, there is actually something wrong and their body/mind is trying to get their attention. If you ignore stuff like that, the symptoms just get worse as your body/mind ramps up the messages.

The better way to handle this is to go home and ask your intuition if the doctor made a good call and what you should do next. If your intuition says, “The doctor’s right, I need to deal with my stress, I’m going to get help with this,” then you should follow your intuition and do that. Perhaps your intuition says, “Clearly this doctor doesn’t believe me, let’s go find another doctor to talk to who is willing to listen to me,” then that is your next move. Or maybe your intuition says, “Let’s try something alternative and see if someone outside the medical profession has something to say about this,” then follow that lead and see where it goes. You need to trust that your body/mind knows what you need and will guide you in the right direction.

Just a word about medical doctors here. I believe that medical science is excellent at acute care. If you’ve broken your leg or you're having a heart attack, then get yourself to a hospital now and get help! That’s what they do best and that’s why we keep them around. On the other hand, medical science is REALLY bad at dealing with chronic conditions. There are many good doctors out there, but medical science actually knows very little about what causes lots of things that range from autoimmune diseases to menstrual cramps. Because of this, doctors can’t do much but help you manage chronic conditions. They just don't have the information they need to help you heal. So, if your intuition is guiding you to go to the emergency room, then you get up and do that and insist that they care for you (sadly, ERs suffer from the same issues of ignoring female pain as the rest of the profession). If your intuition is telling you that medical science probably can’t help you, then listen to that too. Or maybe it’s telling you to go to the doctor AND get alternative care. Then that’s also necessary for some reason.

And for the record, your intuition might not want you to take the advice of other professionals. If your acupuncturist, pastor, counselor, coach, nutritionist, guru, or anyone else gives you advice that REALLY feels wrong, then DON’T FOLLOW IT. Your intuition knows when it’s getting bad advice. Trust it.

I’ll admit that my experience with medical professionals has not been great. In my late 20s I stopped getting my menstrual cycle, so I went to a highly recommended endocrinologist. She listened to what I had to say, ordered a few tests to rule out some of the biggest concerning issues (I don’t mess around with the possibility of a brain tumor), and prescribed estrogen replacement therapy for me (before even seeing the test results). So, I followed up with all the tests and even filled the prescription but, once everything came back clear, I just couldn’t make myself start the prescription. It just didn’t feel right. My intuition was screaming at me that the meds were not the answer. Thankfully, I listened and didn’t take the estrogen. Since then, more studies have come out about how medical doctors love throwing hormones at women, but they rarely solve any problems and often create more issues. My intuition knew that this was not the answer and, despite being a dead end on the way to healing, the experience at least let me rule out a number of serious problems it might be. So overall, it was worthwhile for me.

So, I know from experience that trusting my intuition was the right way to go. I did the right thing and consulted with a doctor, but in the end, I just knew that answer didn’t lie there.

You can learn to do the same thing. You can learn to listen to your intuition and follow its rabbit trails to healing (and believe me, you’ll probably go down some unexpected side paths!). You can take its advice and find the right professionals (medical and otherwise) to help you heal. You can come out of this healthier and happier than ever before.

What does intuitive guidance look or feel like? It can be anything. It can be something that catches your attention and you just KNOW you need to try it. It can be a book or article sent your way that makes you feel hopeful. It can just be a step that feels right to you or an action that feels peaceful. It can be advice that makes sense and you want to follow up on it. Sometimes intuition comes with words or images or smells. It can be all these things and more. Learning to listen to your intuition takes practice because it won’t always be the same. The key is to take time to listen and to trust what you receive, even if it doesn’t make sense.

Below are some ideas how to begin:

Meditation in general is good to help you connect with your intuition because it teaches you to get quiet and open yourself up to guidance.

Jen Picicci has a simple five step process for connecting with your intuition over at Pretty Colors & Kind Words. Give it a try and see what you think.

Here’s one that might be a surprise: Practice making decisions quickly. Often in daily life our intuition gives us a quick “feel” for something that we can easily override if we overthink things. Use Jen Picicci’s five steps but learn to do them quickly. Practice with small stuff first. If you are picking out something for dinner, go with your gut and make your choice quickly. If you want to watch a movie or plan an outing, just pick something that sounds good as quickly as possible. Give yourself lots of small opportunities to let your intuition talk to you on the fly. This will help build trust and open you up to more detailed communication when you meditate or do the visualization below.

I created this 12 minute visualization that will help you practice getting in touch with your intuition and asking for advice. It is designed to help you get quiet and experience the many ways your body/mind uses to communicate with you. Once you are finished, you will have a list of one thing you can do to bring more happiness into your life right now and three things to get you started healing your primary problem. You can play it online or download it using these links: Ask Your Intuition for Guidance Visualization (with birdsong background) Ask Your Intuition for Guidance Visualization (with nothing in the background so you can play your own!) Transcript of Ask Your Intuition for Guidance Visualization

So, with these possibilities, get started connecting with your intuition and following up with what it has to say. Don’t be discouraged if the advice you receive doesn’t seem to make sense. Just follow where it leads and see what happens. Your body/mind knows what you need and will guide your healing if you learn to listen to what it is saying. No doctor, psychic, Reiki Master, or any other professional can take the place of your own inner knowing. Yes, you will likely need the help and advice of professionals along the way, but you never have to do what they say if it feels wrong to you. Trust yourself to know what you need and follow your intuition wherever it goes.

I’d love to connect with you and hear your story! Contact me on my website or email me at katie@harmoniousrenewal.com.

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