Listening to Intuition
learning to hear yourself
One of the things I valued from my upbringing in the evangelical church was the notion that god spoke to everyone in a unique way. If the divine had something to share, the idea was that it would be shared in the way you could receive it. In a way, that spiritual insight could be tailored to your love language. You might receive insight from a dream, god might speak through someone you run into or it might “drop in” to your awareness.
Outside of the limits of Christianity, I still hold this notion dear. Except now, I *think these insights come from within, instead of from without. It’s the same concept with different language - instead of god, it’s intuition.
We connect to our intuition through sensory awareness, known as the clairs. Most have heard of clairvoyance (clear seeing) - the gift that psychics use to “see” into the future but there are clairs for each sensory input / output.
The way that I connect to my intuition is called “claircognizance” (clear knowing) - where information drops into my awareness.
I was writing a piece on sleep hygiene and creating a plan for a client. I was in flow. I wrote, without awareness of what I was writing, “melatonin is a heat-dependent hormone”. I stopped. I had no idea I had written it until it was staring back at me. I didn’t even know if that was true. So I started doing research. And it is true. I just didn’t know it. That’s claircognizance - information I didn’t know before suddenly became known.
Another way I connect to my intuition, that makes my work as a therapeutic coach hold so much more depth is clairsentience (clear feeling).
When clients are feeling big feelings (and especially my neurodivergent clients who might not be able to identify their feelings on their own), I feel what they’re feeling. It always happens on the left side of my body and it feels unexplainably different from my own feelings (which usually exist on my right side). When I feel these sensations, I bring them into session and check in with my client to see if those sensations resonate with them, if they feel familiar. Every single time, they’ve been spot on.
The thing with clairs (how we sense clearly) is it is really unexplainable. We just know. This is why self-trust is such an important ethic to cultivate in spiritual practice - we have to be able to trust ourselves. When we’re working with intuition, we are trusting in the unknown.
There are other clairs for the other sensory modalities that I go through here:
What I love about working with clairs is that so often our intuition is trying to get our attention and it ends up having to shout, instead of us being able to listen to its whisper. I’ve worked with so many clients who thought they were crazy, but their intuition was just on full volume. When we were able to differentiate “this is yours” “this isn’t yours”, it alleviates the shame, the self-consciousness, the fear.
Understanding what we’re experiencing helps us interact with it more consciously. Just like differentiating a heart attack and a panic attack helps medical professionals have a more accurate diagnosis but more importantly - a more accurate treatment. How you respond to intuition that’s a premonition is very different from anxiety. They’re different and require different approaches.
Speaking of which - have you heard of my FREE course on anxiety?
You can learn more with the free Anxiety course here!
Back to it. It’s interesting to me, as a word nerd, to look at the etymology of the word “intuition” - to get really specific on what we’re working with when we’re working with intuition.
intuition (n.)
mid-15c., intuicioun, "insight, direct or immediate cognition, spiritual perception," originally theological, from Late Latin intuitionem (nominative intuitio) "a looking at, consideration," noun of action from past participle stem of Latin intueri "look at, consider," from in- "at, on" (from PIE root *en "in") + tueri "to look at, watch over" (see tutor (n.)).
What stands out for me from the etymology of the word “intuition” is “consider”. It reminds me of how our brains are wired for insight but for insight to happen, we have to have SPACE. I have the best ideas when I’m not working. I have the best ideas when I’m in the shower. Doing dishes. On a drive. With the space to consider ‘the thing’ (whatever thing I’m pondering at the moment), there’s room for insight to arrive. If every moment of my day is regimented or busy, if I’m working until it’s time to fall asleep, then there isn’t SPACE for insight. Our intuition is a guest who requires space to arrive.
To start connecting to your intuition, it’s time to get curious. To truly harness the power of your clairs (whichever one is YOU), we have to create space for the insight. That might look like:
Choosing a journal prompt before going on a drive to mull over the question
Practice closing your eyes for 10 seconds a day to reduce sensory input
Shower with the intention to “wash away” what isn’t yours
Start asking yourself questions:
How do I feel about this *upcoming experience?
What do I think about this *upcoming experience?
What do I need to know about this *upcoming experience?
And - I’m so curious. What clair resonates for you? How do you receive insight?