Developing Intuition: How to recognize and use your own

I’ve often heard the advice, always trust your gut instinct. It leads me to wonder, what’s inside my gut giving me all these great answers? Is there a little brain in there controlling biological signals to make me feel weird when I’m about to make a mistake? How come my gut feeling so often predicts the physical outcome before it happens?

What if I said this “gut” feeling is intuition, and intuition is vital in our lives? Would you believe me, or would you just know what I’m saying is true? If you know what I’m saying is true you may be intuitive already. If you are still skeptical, you might want to know that millions of dollars of US government money has gone into research on intuition. Stop playing the Twilight Zone music in the background, there is actually some substance to this.

Intuition is defined as instinctive knowing without the use of rational process. In other words, intuition is that sensation that you just know something without an apparent rhyme or reason. Many contribute intuition to a gut feeling. We all experience intuition whether we realize we are intuitive or not. Intuition is commonly noticed when we are about to succumb to a negative choice and we feel the negativity of the outcome before it actually happens. You might end up saying, “I knew I shouldn’t have done that.” We’ve all been there before. You can feel intuition with positive circumstances just the same, but it’s the negative ones we might remember the most.

The problem is, most people blow off intuition as luck or sheer coincidence. However, the coincidence with intuition is not so much coincidence. When the intuitive feeling predicts the physical outcome time and time again, there has to be something to it, right?

The United States government thinks so. They have invested millions of dollars into scientific research with intuition at its focus. This subject of intuition sometimes has a taboo overshadowing and often gets mixed in with a cloud of conspiracy theories and other taboo subjects like UFO’s and cover-ups. However, the truth about the government’s interest in intuitive sciences is out in the public arena. There are several reports talking about this government spending on such subjects as ESP and remote viewing research. A New York Times article from 1984 talked about these reports.

“…President Carter ordered the Central Intelligence Agency to conduct a high-level review of psychic research behind the Iron Curtain in an attempt to assess a possible Soviet threat.” – New York Times, 1984

ESP is an acronym for extrasensory perception. It is the ability clairvoyantly perceive things that are not present to the five common senses. It is often used in the context of remote viewing – where individuals can tune into places and describe details from many miles away.

Psychics who give psychic readings are sometimes considered to be at the butt end of scientific validation and understanding, but psychics merely have heightened intuition. And it’s the same kind of intuition we are all familiar with. When you look at psychic abilities at heightened intuition, its not so hard to believe.

Psychic phenomenon has been slow to pick up modern culture, but it is gradually gaining credibility. You can see evidence of the increasing occurrence with mainstream television programs like A&E’s Psychic Kids and Crossing Over with John Edwards. There are also plenty of “ghost hunting” shows that bring in psychic-mediums do psychic readings to intuitively explain hauntings and the lives of people who have already died.

If you are an ordinary person, chances are you can’t hear your dead grandma asking you if you are hungry. You may not be able to feel your dead dog Fido humping your leg from “the other side.” And you maybe not be able to intuitively know what the winning lottery numbers are. But every so often your intuition kicks in like a soft breeze. You can pick up on the feeling of an outcome or information for which you can’t rationally explain. You may have finished someone’s sentence while talking to them. If we continue to dismiss these as coincidence we will never strengthen our own intuition, even if we don’t think it exists.

According to many individuals, like psychics, who claim to have heightened intuitive abilities – they say intuition is something you can strengthen like a muscle. Many psychics claim every individual has these abilities at some level, and they can learn to strengthen them.

Lorrie Kazan, named one of the top psychics in a world-wide audition by the Edgar Cayce Institute says on her website (http://www.lorriekazan.com), “People ask me when I first learned I was ‘psychic.’ When did you first learn you weren’t, would be the question I would ask.”

Like Kazan, there are those who believe we are born with intuition and we have learned to tune it out. In a world where everything has to be backed up with scientific evidence, its hard to prove that which can’t be picked up and measured – like intuition. It is no wonder science and mainstream has turned its back to intuition.

Despite a tough scientific judgment, intuition can still be very important to embrace. Intuition helps you understand what others are thinking and feeling. It’s a level of communication that allows you to connect on a more direct level. And the better you can communicate and understand others, the more successful you can be in relationships and even in your career. You don’t have to psychically read people’s minds, but picking up on subtle thoughts can make a big difference.

When I was a kid, I remember my parents telling me to turn the lights off when I left the room. If I could have picked up on their reasoning intuitively, I would have saved a lot of money when I payed my first electric bill when I was on my own. In this regard, intuition is similar to being empathetic to some degree. Intuition helps individuals not have to learn or understand things the hard way. It’s a naturally ability we have to just simply understand things.

You can save a lot of trouble and inconvenience in your life the more you understand others, and the more you understand your environment. I would suggest every individual start paying attention to their intuition. I’m not a psychic, but subtle intuition helps me understand simple feelings and mindsets of others. Wouldn’t you wish others could understand you intuitively, without having to explain your life story?

Please share your comments or example of when intuition helped you or made you realize something you couldn’t conclude rationally. If you have suggestions to help other strengthen their own intuition please go to SHARE YOUR IDEA! A follow-up article based on your responses may be in store for the future.