Is it safe to trust your intuition?
Accessing your intuition is a bit like tuning into a secret radio frequency that only you know about, that feeds you invaluable information and insights.
Kind of like a spy.
But how do you know if you can actually trust what you’re getting from your intuition?
I’m going to share with you:
- Two situations when you should definitely not trust your intuition.
- What your intuition feels like and how to distinguish it from all the other stuff going on inside of you.
- And how to develop your intuition so you can actually rely on it.
What is intuition?
But what exactly is intuition? And is it even real?
To me, intuition is knowing something without being able to explain, logically, how you know it.
You might have heard it called our sixth sense or “spidey senses”.
We just know something.
And it’s not always about esoteric or spiritual stuff either.
Some people have an intuition for complex topics like mathematics and can just see the answers without being able to explain exactly how they got there.
Now, just to be clear, intuition is not the same thing as instinct.
Our instincts are basically biological survival mechanisms that pick up on signals from our environment and instantly alert us to danger.
Intuition is also not the same thing as our higher self, but our higher selves can definitely communicate with us using our intuition.
As to whether intuition is real, well, there are many, many people who believe in intuition, also called ESP, and use it in their daily lives in many different ways.
For example, tarot readings use intuition.
Medical intuitives access information about people’s bodies for diagnosis and healing.
And the United States government has been using intuitives for espionage for decades under the guise of remote viewing.
But the best answers really come from direct personal experience.
I personally have a very strong intuition, and I’ve experienced it in lots of different ways, and I’ll share some of those stories with you later.
And I believe that everyone has the ability to be intuitive. It just takes practise.
But you may not fully believe in it until you’ve experienced it for yourself.
What does it mean to trust our intuition?
And when you do, how do you know if you can trust what it’s telling you?
First, we need to clarify what we mean by trusting our intuition.
To me, trusting my intuition means believing what it says, that it’s speaking the truth, that I can rely on the information it gives me and use it as a guide.
One day before I knew I was pregnant with my second child, I wondered to myself whether I was, in fact, pregnant.
We’d been trying to fall pregnant, and I was a day or two late, but not really late enough to do a pregnancy test yet.
My intuition responded to my wonderings with a, “No, you’re not.” Of course, this turned out to be wrong, and I was very cross that I’d relied on its answer.
And I’d done things I I wouldn’t have done if I’d known I was pregnant, like bouncing enthusiastically on my trampoline.
I’d trusted it, and in my view, it had let me down.
When shouldn’t you trust your intuition?
In hindsight, I’d fallen prey to one of the two key situations where you probably shouldn’t trust your intuition.
1. Distortion
The first of these is distortion, and that’s exactly what I was doing.
In my case, I was so emotionally invested in the answer to my question that I’d corrupted my internal messaging and made something up that sounded like it came from my intuition.
Although given that I actually wanted to be pregnant at the time, I’m not entirely sure why that was what I told myself.
But any time you’re overthinking something or paying attention to your inner critic, you can distort the messages you get from your intuition by first passing them through your mental filters.
This can also happen if you’re feeling fearful or if you have unresolved traumas in your system.
Any strong emotions or unhelpful patterns can twist your intuition and make what you think you’re hearing from it very unreliable.
2. Disconnection
The second situation where you probably don’t want to trust your intuition is when you’re disconnected from yourself.
If you’re feeling anxious or distracted, you’re probably spending a lot of time in your head and you’re not really in tune with what’s going on inside of you.
Being under pressure or stress can also make it impossible to hear your intuition accurately because you’re so shut down in order to cope that your communication channels to yourself are completely blocked.
And being surrounded by other people can also block your intuition, either because you’re very outwardly focused on them or because you’re being swamped by their emotions, thoughts, or energies.
So watch out for these types of situations where your intuition might be distorted or blocked and take anything you get with a grain of salt.
But it is possible to figure out whether you can trust your intuition, and there’s two key parts to this.
Part 1 – Learn to recognise your intuition
Firstly, how do you tell your intuition apart from everything else that’s going on inside of you? What does intuition even feel like?
Intuitive hits feel different for everyone.
So you’re going to have to learn what yours feels like and what forms it comes into you.
But there are some common features that can help you recognise yours.
Firstly, your intuition is generally soft, subtle, and calm.
It has a certainty and a quiet strength.
It’s not noisy blaring or in your face obvious.
And because of this, you can easily override or ignore your intuition.
Secondly, intuitive information can come in a variety of ways.
Most commonly:
- by seeing things in your mind’s eye, like photographs or a movie playing on a screen
- by hearing voices or spoken words in or around your head,
- by feeling the vibe of something, usually as emotions or physical sensations, or
- by just knowing something instantaneously, like downloading it directly into your brain
Some people can also experience smells or tastes intuitively, although these can be much harder to recognise.
Thirdly, your intuition always feels good, like the right thing to do or the right path to follow.
You might not immediately understand the message, but it will never be full of fear or anger even if it’s warning you of danger.
Your experience of your intuition might be hard to put into words, but I bet if you look back over your life, you’ll see some times when you received information seemingly out of nowhere.
And these moments can hold clues as to how your intuition speaks to you.
Examples of intuition
Here’s some examples from my own life that might help make it clearer for you.
1. The wrong therapist
When my son was young, he was slow to start talking, so I booked him in to see a speech therapist.
The whole time I was organising the appointment and leading up to the session, something just felt off.
On paper, she seemed great, but there was this gnawing feeling in my stomach and a vague sense of unease over and above my usual baseline.
But I pushed through those feelings, believing I was doing the best thing for my son.
But that appointment was one of the worst experiences I’ve ever had with a healthcare professional.
She treated my son like he was both deaf and dumb, speaking very loudly and not listening to him one bit.
She wasn’t interested in what we had to say and offered us nothing helpful.
I couldn’t get out of there fast enough.
Afterwards, I apologised to my son for putting him through that experience, and I vowed to never again ignore those intuitive warning signs.
2. Missing words at work
On more than one occasion, I’ve been at work observing two people having a conversation when one of them gets stuck, unable to find the words they want to say.
Instantaneously, their missing words have appeared directly in my head.
And in those instances, it was everything I could do not to blurt them out, finishing their sentence for them.
One time, it was a co-worker trying to remember where they’d recently been on holidays, and I didn’t even know they’d been away.
And yet I knew exactly what they were about to say.
It was so clearly something I had no way of knowing that it kind of freaked me out a bit.
3. Meeting my husband
And finally, when I met my husband, we had a fascinating start to our relationship.
I met him at a party on the same night I was having a Venus-Mars conjunction.
We had a long and scintillating conversation that I never wanted to end.
And then I came home in the wee hours of the morning.
When I woke up later that day, I was filled with a sense of complete and utter certainty.
I had no idea what I was so certain about, but there was one thing I was sure about, and that was that I was 100 % certain.
Of course, in hindsight, I could see that what I was certain about was the man I’d just met.
But at the time, it was just a very, very strong, clear sensation about nothing in particular.
So the first step to trusting your intuition is to learn what your intuition feels like and how you get your information.
Once you know that, it’ll become easier to trust what you get because you’ll recognise how it feels.
Part 2 – Practise using your intuition
And that brings me to the second part of learning to trust your intuition.
How exactly do you connect with your intuition or even begin to develop it?
Well, the most effective thing you can do is to practise using it.
I know, I know.
It’s like teaching someone to play the piano by saying, “Just start playing.” So let me explain what I mean.
1. Low-stakes situations
Start by using it in low-stakes situations – times when it doesn’t really matter what the answer is, so you’re not too invested in the outcome.
When I was learning to reconnect with my intuition, I used my drive home from school to figure out what it was saying.
At a key choice point where I could go one of two ways, I’d ask myself inside my head, “Which is the optimal way for me to go today?” or “Which way will be the fastest?” or “Which way will be the most enjoyable?” depending on how I felt that day.
And then I’d listen for an answer.
Sometimes I’d get one, and sometimes I wouldn’t.
But because it didn’t really matter which way I went – I was going to get home either way – the chance of me blocking or distorting the answer was pretty low.
And eventually I started to learn how my answers came.
For me, it was generally sensations in my body, but sometimes also images or words or a knowing.
I then started practising with other low-stakes questions like, “Do I want to wear this or that?” Or, “I”s this optimal for me to eat?
Checking in with what your body needs and wants right now is a great way to develop your intuition.
And simple “yes-no” questions usually work best, especially when you’re first learning to hear your intuition.
2. Explore your purpose
You can also strengthen your intuition by exploring your path or purpose.
Questions like, “Does this feel aligned?”, “Am I on path?” or “Does my purpose include this?” The stakes are a little higher on these questions, but the answers from your higher self on this important question tend to be much stronger, so they can be easier to hear.
In fact, the reason I’m here making this for you today was because over the last couple of years, I’ve asked many, many questions of my higher self about my path and purpose, and the intuitive answers I’ve received so far have led me here.
3. Strengthening activities
And as you start to reconnect with your intuition, there’s many other ways you can strengthen your relationship including things like…
Solitude, where you spend time alone with yourself and make space to hear your intuition.
Meditation, where you train your mind to quiet down and remain focused so you can notice your intuitive hits.
Journalling, where you spill your thoughts onto the page and see what comes through from your intuition.
Playing pretend where you pretend you’ve already made a choice or taken an action and see how it feels.
Being present where you stay focused on the current moment, just observing what’s happening for you right now.
And the more you practise using your intuition, the more you’ll come to trust what gives you because of the history you’ve had with it.
Basically, you’re exploring your intuition and building a relationship with it.
And this takes time, so it’s also something you don’t want to rush.
A controversial suggestion
I’d also like to suggest something a bit controversial.
I don’t think you should ever really just trust your intuition.
Listen to it absolutely 100 % as much as you can, but don’t just trust it blindly.
Don’t take what it says on faith, and don’t feel like you have to do what it says just because it said it.
It’s just information, and you still get to choose what you do with it.
You know, free will and all that?
Just because it comes from your intuition doesn’t mean you don’t get to question it.
In fact, you should question it.
Use your critical thinking skills. Push back on what it says. Ask for confirmation or explanations. Check for biases.
Make sure the information you’re getting also makes sense to your rational mind.
Test it out to see if it works for you. See if it feels right. Look at it from every angle you can.
But also be careful not to let your ego mind use this as an excuse to completely discount or minimise your intuition.
Because that sneaky little gremlin will do that any chance it gets. Trust me.
Use the right tool for the job
Instead, aim to strike a healthy balance between the two because basically, they’re both powerful tools suited for specific but different tasks.
For example, your intuition is not great when you’re trying to process information.
That’s what your mind is designed to do.
It’s also not ideal if you only use your intuition to focus on other people and their needs, because that means you’re neglecting your own sense of self and your own guidance, which can completely derail your intuition.
To help you out as you reconnect with your intuition, I’ve linked to a free resource that will help you learn to trust what you’re getting from your intuition:
A quick recap
- Your intuition has the ability to know things beyond the five senses
- Everyone has the ability to be intuitive, with practice
- You don’t want to listen to your intuition if it’s being distorted or if you’re disconnected from yourself
- The first step in building trust is learning how yours communicates with you
- The second step is to develop your intuition through gradual practice
- You can strengthen your intuition through solitude, meditation, journalling, playing pretend, being present and more
- You shouldn’t just blindly trust what your intuition says
What next?
- Consider times in your life when you received information seemingly out of nowhere for clues to your intuition’s style
- Start exploring your intuition by using it in low-stakes situations, and build your skills from there
- Use the activities suggested above and in the workbook to further strengthen your intuition
- Watch out for distortion and disconnection, and sense check what you’re getting
- For best results, only use your intuition in the right situations and conditions
So build that relationship with your intuition. Learn how to recognise it, how it communicates with you.
Practise using it whenever you can. Know when not to rely on it.
And as you build that trust, there’s a good chance you’ll start getting intuitive messages from your higher self.
- But what exactly is your higher self?
- How do you know when it’s talking to you?
- And what can you do to successfully connect with it?
Check out my newsletter on accessing your higher self to find out more.
And I’ll see you in the next one.
