“Listen to your broccoli, and your broccoli will tell you how to eat it.”
Not only the advice a psychiatrist gives their patient in the 1950s Mel Brooks sketch 2000 Year Old Man but, according to writer Anne Lamott, as important a concept in writing as in life.
Last month we talked about following your curiosity. But, that requires knowing what you’re curious about, and sometimes, it’s not all that clear. You need your intuition to guide you.
Which is all well and good but what if you’ve lost touch with your intuition?
This is the exact situation I found myself in at the start of the year. Somewhere along the way, I had let doubt, fear and indecision creep in. Understandably not liking what they saw, trust, belief, confidence and intuition found a safe place to hide.
The problem is that these days, many of us don't feel connected to our intuition.
And it's not our fault. Our culture doesn’t necessarily encourage intuition. We live in a world with endless technology at our fingertips to help us make decisions. As a result, we don’t rely on our senses as much anymore. A blessing and a curse.
The other issue is many of us are solely focused on our rational minds. We prioritise logical thinking, trying to rationalise our way to answers, rather than listening to our gut feelings.
And the less we listen to our instincts, the more disconnected from them we become.
Now for the good news. Your intuition is still there! Despite being ignored or lying dormant for years, it hasn’t gone anywhere. Unlike the title suggests there is no need to send out a search party. Rather, reconnecting with your instincts requires three key elements: silence, mind-body connection and trust.
Intuition is a muscle. And like any muscle, the more you train it, the stronger it becomes. Read on for some tried and tested suggestions for how to get those reps in.
Make time for silence
‘...when you don’t know what to do, you get quiet and try to hear that still small voice inside. It will tell you what to do.’
When was the last time you heard…nothing?
At first, this seems like a simple question however, the more you think about it, the more you realise how truly rare silence is.
Many of us live or work in cities or towns, with an accompanying soundtrack of almost constant background noise.
And that’s before we add technology. The blessing and curse that ensures we are constantly connected and conditioned to neverending notifications. Encouraging us to live an ‘always on’ lifestyle, where every moment is an opportunity to consume - podcasts, social media, news, TV…anything and everything to avoid nothing.
But it is the ‘nothing’ we need to stand any chance of hearing our inner voice. And, given all of the aforementioned noise isn’t going away anytime soon, we must actively cultivate silence.
The key is to start small. Avoid multitasking and embrace single-tasking instead. Cooking dinner? Taking a bath? Tidying up? Don’t automatically turn on the TV, a podcast or music. Banish the background noise and embrace the opportunity for peace and quiet instead.
I’m also a big fan of headphone-free walks. Granted, there is a lot of surrounding noise that it can be tempting to drown out at first. But, push past this, and it often fades into the background as your mind meets the rhythm of your footfall. Best practised in nature (a park is perfect), with your mind more present than usual, get ready to be rewarded with clearer thinking, new ideas, solutions, and maybe even some birdsong.
Another great way to cultivate silence is through meditation. Before you dismiss the idea, meditation is simply making time to sit and breathe. Something we are all capable of, there’s no need to meditate for hours on end. Even five to 10 minutes of sitting still and following your breath helps to quieten your mind and create space to reconnect with your intuition.
Learn to listen to your body
‘Don’t look at your feet to see if you are doing it right. Just dance.’
At 6pm on December 1st 2022, I found myself standing in my bedroom faced with a choice. Ever since I woke up that morning, I had felt unwell, the pain in my stomach different to anything I had experienced before. Did I crawl into bed and try to sleep it off? Or drag myself (and my partner) out in the dark, cold night to an urgent care waiting room? Not wanting to be a hypochondriac, option A was far more appealing. And yet, something overruled my rational mind, urging me to grab my coat and head for the door.
24 hours later, I was propped up in a hospital bed minus my appendix.
But I wasn’t always this in tune with my body.
For a long time, I did the opposite of listening to it. I failed to recognise the underlying causes of health issues and ignored warning signs when it was run down. Arrogant enough to think that I could override its needs with my own agenda, I learnt the hard way that the body keeps score.
The mind and body are inextricably connected. Known as the mind-body connection, they have a direct impact on each other. Intuition is an instinctive feeling. So it makes sense that the stronger the relationship between our mind and body is, the easier it becomes to connect with these instincts and feelings.
There are many ways we can strengthen this connection. Body scans can help to enhance awareness of how we are actually feeling both physically and emotionally. My preferred choice, practising yoga, is another great option for its focus on being present by combining physical postures and breathing.
If yoga isn’t for you, any form of physical activity from walking and running to cycling, weightlifting, or dancing, can also help you to reconnect with your body and tune into how it is feeling.
Trust yourself
‘You get your confidence and intuition back by trusting yourself, by being militantly on your own side.’
All the yoga and silence in the world, are no good if you don’t trust yourself. Going back to the start of the year, this was the biggest issue for me - that ultimately I had lost faith in my ability to make the right decisions for myself.
There is no easy, quick fix for restoring your belief in yourself. It’s possible, but, as is the nature of trust, it takes time. One of the strategies that has helped me the most, is to stick to facts rather than the storyline I was telling myself. While not every decision deserved a space in the highlight reel of my life, there were still plenty that demonstrated that I was capable of making sound choices.
A big part of this comes down to belief. Often, we can seek belief in all the wrong places - namely, from other people. But, if we don’t believe in ourselves, why should anyone else have faith in us?
Again, something I learnt the hard way, it can be helpful to remind yourself that you are worthy of belief. And the way to get it starts with you.
So don’t believe everything you tell yourself. Look for the proof that you are more capable than you give yourself credit for. And have a little faith in yourself and your intuition.
Naming not taming
‘I think a major step in learning to rely on your intuition is to find a usable metaphor for it. Broccoli is so ridiculous it works for me…but whatever you come up with needs to suggest a voice that you are not trying to control.’
I love this idea from Anne Lamott. As humans we are so desperate to control anything and everything however, that’s not how intuition works. An innate sense, it doesn’t care to be corralled or questioned, rather it needs space and trust to be able to guide us.
So why not give it a fitting name?
For me, that metaphor is a candle. A delicate flame burning in my soul. Flaring with flashes of inspiration. Flickering when it doesn’t get the oxygen it deserves. Threatening to be extinguished when I try to influence it. But always there to help light the way back to myself.
What’s your metaphor?
PONDER:
“The light burning within you is a far more accurate reflection of who you are than the stories you’ve been telling yourself.” - B Grace Bullock
“As soon as you trust yourself, you will know how to live.” - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
*All other quotes from Anne Lamott in her book Bird by Bird.
I hope this instalment of Future You has sparked some inspiration. If so, please do share it with a friend or colleague who could also find it useful.
I’d love to hear anything that helps you tune into your intuition, or what metaphor you’re giving your inner voice in the comments below.
Best,
SJ