What Does Instinct Feel Like?

Taking time to develop what an instinct feels like can be fun and create a whole new level of awareness. Our heightened levels of intuition affect brain activity in the prefrontal-cortex region and can be seen on an MRI. It’s important to understand that intuition does not necessarily speak to us using words, as our critical thinking faculty does. The language of intuition can come from images, sensations, gut feelings, sounds, words or phrases, and even smells.?So, which signals and sensations are the voice, the nudge, or the “hit” telling us how to proceed, and which sensations are just random tickles, stiff joints, gas cramps, or our monkey mind chattering away? Here is Orloff’s list of what some of these physical sensations might feel like from your second sight.??

Positive-intuitive hits:?A sense of warmth in your body, the ability to breathe more easily, sharp clarity of hearing or vision, a wave of goosebumps, tingles, or “fluttery” sensations, or relaxation in the gut and shoulders.?

Negative-intuitive hits:?Icy cold hands and feet; an overall chill, twinging or clenching pain in the gut or chest, nausea or acid stomach, a sense of being on “high alert,” fatigue or loss of energy, the onset of a headache??

If these sensations ring familiar, it’s because intuitional intelligence exists within us all.?It’s your right to tap into it. (It is, after all, tapping into you.)?Orloff writes: “The benefits of listening to your instincts go far beyond making good life-or-death decisions. Living more intuitively demands that you’re in the moment, and that makes for a more passionate life.” On the flip side, as with any other human capacity, it atrophies if it is not used and developed.?

Most of us don’t pay enough attention to our gut instincts to consider how they could serve us daily. Start practicing today. Anytime you have a sensation that the phone is about to ring, then it does, or when you are thinking of someone and suddenly that person calls, that’s transrational intuition speaking in sounds and images. Another example is the hair standing up on the back of your neck, making you switch routes on the way to work, only to find out later that there was an accident. You decide to hire the greener candidate over the more qualified applicant solely based on gut instinct. And your new hire transforms the company.??

One reason SEALs are so effective is that the trainers do not pass off intuitive intelligence as voodoo. They acknowledge it and seek opportunities to train and refine this particular skill. SEALs rely on a combination of training, planning, intelligence, intuition, improvisation, imagination, and luck. Most of those traits are not what you’d think of as a Special Operations Forces (SOF) “hard” skill. They are the “soft” internal skills of a master warrior. Special Operators, alone or with a small team, log dozens of hours training in silence with senses on full alert– because this is one way to develop intuitive skills naturally.?One training evolution with the SEALs had me walk to the shooting range at our tactical training grounds when I strongly felt the word “stop!” in my gut. It was like a punch combined with a firm hand on my shoulder that held me back. I immediately froze in my tracks. A millisecond later, a gun was accidentally discharged, and the bullet whizzed right by my ear. I felt the wind from it. Had I not stopped, I would have been shot in the back of the head. Gut instinct is a huge source of inspiration and wisdom that most of us don’t tap into. Why? Because you think it would be irresponsible, or outright strange, to take orders from sensations over our rational mind.?Well,?I would be dead had I not trusted that voice. Whether you’ve trusted this innate ability all along or have practiced perfecting this skill like a SEAL, whether you’re a woman, an empath, left-handed, all three, or whether you’re starting at square one, you can up your game and become a master of your intuitional intelligence. I know for a fact that following your internal guidance system will radically change your life for the better.?

We’ve got this easy day, Hooyah!