Trust Your Inner Compass

When was the last time you trusted your inner knowing?

Many things could come up. Maybe you have no idea what I'm talking about. An experience may come up for you. Maybe you've never regarded your intuition in the first place.

Have you ever had a feeling you couldn’t explain, only to realize later that it was right? For example, you’re riding home, and there’s a typical route you always take. On this day, you’re driving home, and something in you is telling you to take an alternate route. You decide to listen and take the alternate route, only to realize it's blocked by a bad accident, leaving the road backed up for hours. That nudge is your intuition or inner knowing.

Intuition shows up in various ways within our bodies and physical field. It differs from a trauma response or anxiety because trauma or anxiety comes from a deregulated nervous system, typically from several events that are still heightened within you. That “gut feeling” shows up in spaces of calm and groundedness; you’re going about your day as usual with no interference when it shows up.

Now, if the question above took you back to a memory, then you're aware of how you felt something, and instead of disregarding it, you moved with it. You allowed yourself to trust what you were being alerted to, allowing it to linger, and make a judgment call based on the information you gathered.

We all have this inner knowing within that alerts us when something may be wrong or right, whether we are consciously or subconsciously aware that we’re using it.

I can tell you from experience: whenever my intuition told me something, and I didn't listen, I ended up in a situation I didn't want to be in.

I like to use this example I’m about to give because so many feel stuck in jobs they don’t like or actually don’t resonate with them. I know this can be difficult when you are trying to provide for your family, and there’s this perception that that’s the only thing you can do to make money. Money runs the world we live in, so having the resources to feed yourself and your family and provide a roof over your head is a very real priority. I believe we have a choice about how that provision comes about, so you aren’t sacrificing yourself or your well-being.

I applied for a position in behavioral health to have a job and earn extra income. It was a job that didn’t require much from me, but, at the same time, required quite a bit. Initially, when I started the job, I thought it would be a good opportunity; no red flags popped up.  I began to work there, and everything was good. On this particular day, before getting ready for my shift, I felt that something was going to happen that night. The feeling felt like a sense of dread that wasn’t there before. I had this thought of not going in that night. It didn’t feel like anything bad or crazy, but I knew it might be a bit uncomfortable, so I did a guided meditation before getting ready and heading out the door. As soon as I walked in, it started. The “something” that I felt at home was very present. I didn’t allow it to rock me, but as time went along, the night got weirder and weirder. Around 4 am, I decided to take my break, and when I got in the car, everything in me told me to leave and that this wasn’t the place I needed to be in. Before making any final decisions, I allowed myself time to think about whether I should return to this job. Still, I kept thinking about several things from that night: what my environment looked like during my shift, the reason I took the position, what I was actually being set up to do, and my original priority for the position. Everything within me was telling me this job wasn't for me, so I listened.

I can’t tell you what would’ve happened if I stayed. Still, I can tell you that it was the catalyst I needed to refocus on my original priorities and not take the decision I made about the work I needed to complete for granted.

That experience reminded me of something I’ve come to believe deeply: what you do has to resonate for it to be authentically sustainable. When it's not what you actually want to do, it will show up as burnout, emotional exhaustion, which for me would’ve placed me back into a state that wasn’t conducive to my overall wellbeing and only enhance the chronic pain that I often experience, plus take me farther away from the work that I had already dedicated my time, energy, or mental space towards.

This connects to trusting your intuition or inner knowing because it works like a compass. It guides you to implement practices in a way of being that continuously supports you rather than hinders you.

Our society teaches us to think only logically or use deductive reasoning, which has a very real purpose, but what if we also combine that with our intuition or emotions? Both should be in unison with each other, which grants greater access to a multifaceted way of thinking that includes critical thinking and the trust in our feelings.

The more you disregard your intuition, inner knowing, whatever you’d like to call it, the more you begin to doubt yourself and question every decision. That doubt sets you up to always seek external validation, need constant guidance outside yourself, and create this rigidity. An interesting thing that happens when you settle into doubt is that, like anything else, it’s an energy. This energy opens the door to a reflection of more doubt or even control.

Take any job where the employee is always reliable and never gives their employer pushback about their personal time. The employer repeatedly asks the employee to stay past their scheduled time, which impinges on their time with family, friends, etc., because they may believe this employee doesn’t care about their personal time and will always put the job first. If the employee never gives pushback because they’re afraid to (doubt) despite wanting to enjoy their personal time, why would the employer create the space for the employee to have time off? As the employee begins to assert their need for time off, there may be pushback, but they gain awareness of the outcome because they see its importance.

When you begin to lean more into your inner knowing with a strategy, you’ll see it reflected to you almost immediately, just as we collect data. Whether we are aware or not, we are always collecting data about our experiences (both logically and intuitively) that we use to make future decisions that will hopefully help us and move us towards the outcome we actually want. The more data we have from both standpoints, the better we’re able to gauge our movements toward people, places, and things that match what we want.