4 Ways To Allow Your Inner Wisdom To Help You

Our culture considers asking for help a sign of weakness. You're supposed to be able to take care of things by yourself. And most people were taught that "God helps those who help themselves," which discourages turning even to God for assistance. So, you work to become self-reliant and try to bootstrap your way through the challenges of your life without any assistance.

But there's a place where you can always go for help. Within you, there's an innate core of creativity and resourcefulness that's available for you to call upon. Most people don't turn to it because our culture also doesn't trust anything it can't control. And you certainly can't predict how instinct or intuition work.

Although you may not actively seek out inner guidance, you often tap into your instinct without realizing it. Whenever you have a gut response or a hunch, you've accessed it. You may get a sense that the person you're dealing with isn't trustworthy. Or you have an impulse not to take that particular route home. These are the types of incidents that cause you to automatically access your instinct.

Your instinct generally catches your attention through a physical or emotional feeling. Some people are more tuned into it than others. It's very basic, and operates on an unconscious level. Instinct's main drive is to keep you safe and help you survive.

Instinct is something you're born with. But you can also draw on your intuition, which comes from your knowledge and experience. Intuition can be developed and be a valuable tool for guidance or to help you discover solutions. It's simply letting the subconscious mind satisfy one of its essential purposes, to solve problems.

Whenever you need some direction or guidance, you can always ask your own inner creative power for help. It's always willing, available and functioning. As you begin to listen, you'll notice an idea come to mind, a word, a sense, or a slight urge in a specific direction. It may take awhile for the subconscious to come up with a solution, but since its always working, it will find one.

Here are some ways to begin accessing and developing this valuable wisdom:

1. Ask for help, a solution or direction from your inner wisdom. A good way to do this is to write down the request. Then, ask about it several times a day, and let it go each time. This keeps the request at the top of the subconscious mind's "To do" list, and lets it know that the issue is important. Answers may come when least expected, such as when your mind is occupied with something else. Be open to any ideas or promptings that might come and write them down.

2. Before bed, ask a question and forget about it. Then, "Sleep on it." This allows the creative mind to mull over the request while you're in slumber. In the morning, when you're awake, an answer or at least a possibility to follow will probably present itself. If not, ask again that night.

3. Whenever receiving an answer, idea, sense, or hunch, acknowledge it. Even deciding not to act on the concept recognizes the impulse and validates it. Valuing the creative mind's efforts gives it permission and power to ponder the issue even more. French philosopher Theodore Simon Jouffroy said, "The subconscious mind will not take the trouble to work for those who do not believe in it." The subconscious needs to know that it's being listened to and trusted.

4. Use your conscious mind to evaluate the idea and decide if it's appropriate or fits the situation. The subconscious isn't going to be right on target every time. It may come up with ideas that are close, but won't actually work. Let your subconscious mind know if it's on the right track or not. If it's not, get more specific to allow your creative mind find a more suitable solution. But if it's close and just needs more refinement, give your subconscious more information as to what is right about the idea and what doesn't work. Then start the process over again.

This is a practice. You're developing an unconscious awareness to be able to use it deliberately for conscious insight. By doing so, you can then take inspired action. And just as when you're cultivating any skill, the more you use it, the stronger and more accurate it'll become.