The Wisdom of our Intuition
Do you listen to that little voice inside your head? How often do you pay attention vs brush it off?
Over the last couple years, I’ve had some experiences that were really important, that only happened because I had the courage to listen to my guiding voice. We call it intuition. But I truly believe that it’s your higher self speaking to you.
So what is your higher self? The way I think of it, it’s your soul, or at least, your connection to it. The reason that our intuition is guiding us is because it’s our higher self/soul pushing you toward the best version of yourself. Guiding you to your greatest and highest good, and to your life’s purpose. The Universe assists in this by always giving us opportunities to learn and to make the decision that best serves us — even if those decisions are hard, and they often are.
A great example in my life was when I chose to leave St Thomas. To most people, living in the Caribbean seems like a dream come true, but after five years, I had learned my lessons and had my adventures, and I was feeling more stagnant and unhappy than ever.
I was working in a restaurant, something I’ve done forever, and had been unfulfilled with for a few solid years at that point. I needed a change, but another restaurant wasn’t the answer. It wasn’t the place I was working, it was the work itself. Or it was the island. Or the tourists. Or all of it combined. I craved growth and expansion that I knew I needed to get from somewhere other than the island. I’d known for a little while that I wanted to move back to the states, but I just kept letting a slew of excuses keep me stuck: Corey had just started a new career in fitness…I was “too important” to leave my job…I wanted to pay down some debt before we moved so we could better afford it…
Finally, through a conversation with my life coach, I realized a few things. First, if money wasn’t an issue and I could get on a plane tomorrow and leave, I absolutely would. That’s when I knew it was time to go. Next I accepted that the restaurant would indeed survive my departure — people leaving is the nature of owning a business, and I am replaceable despite what the Leo in me might like to think. I also came to the realization that I had been in debt for the entire five years I’d lived there…and had been “trying” to pay it off for five years. If it hadn’t happened by then (I hadn’t even made a dent), why did I think staying to work one more miserable season would make a difference? That doesn’t make any damn sense. And Corey, being the wonderfully supportive guy he is, he barely fought me on leaving once I explained how important it was to me.
My coach put it something like this — If you go left when you should be going right, the Universe will make it pretty hard for you. It’s trying to get you on the path you should be going, and it will pummel you pretty good to get you there. That was such an awesome revelation for me, because I hadn’t been listening to my guiding voice and I knew it. I had chosen to let the excuses take over, and it showed in the quality of my life.
Now as backward as this is going to sound, being stuck serves our human selves in some ways (and only for the short-term). Change is hard, and is so uncomfortable that we tend to avoid it at all costs. My being stuck was serving me in that it let me stay in my comfort zone, not confront my feelings, not tackle the major work that it is to uproot your life and actually figure out what’s next. It was all fear-based, and since I wasn’t doing what was in my best interest, I just got more miserable, picked more fights with Corey, got more resentful of my job, felt more stuck, got in more debt, didn’t appreciate where we lived anyway, and on and on and on. So you can see how it served my short-term interest, but it came at a cost. Once I had the courage to listen to my intuition and take action on what I already knew to be true, everything changed for the better.
Now we live in Southern California. I’m in a better mental space. I’m actually enjoying restaurant work for the first time in a long time, I just graduated school for Health Coaching, I’ve made fulfilling connections, and I’m working on a career where I get to help people — which is another thing my intuition has been telling me for a long time that I have been pushing down, not wanting to acknowledge.
What are some areas in your life where you’re feeling stuck? Have you thought about how staying there serves you? What would happen if you had the courage to listen to the voice that guides you?
Having the courage to leave island was an important lesson for me! I’m still continuing to be brave enough to listen to my voice. It’s a daily practice. And I understand more now that that little voice has all the answers.
