5 Ways to Strengthen your Intuition
Intuition is the way our subconscious mind communicates with our conscious mind, giving us the ability to understand something instinctively. While the concept itself is fairly simple to grasp; tapping into your intuition and making accurate sense of the messages it is sending can be a little trickier. If you’ve been ignoring your intuition or mistaking overthinking or anxiety for gut instincts, you aren’t reaping the glorious benefits of honing in on what your sixth sense can provide – from increasing self-knowledge to improving your decision-making. Read on to discover ways to tap into, and strengthen, your intuitive muscle.
1. Set aside time to meditate
Regular mediation is a key pathway to connecting with your inner voice. Whether it be on your own or through guided meditations, as little as 10 minutes a day will make it easier for you to de-clutter the mind, and better tune into the subtle words, images, emotions, or physical sensations that can help bolster intuition.
2. Pay attention to your dreams
Your dreams are a place where your intuition is often at its strongest. This is because your instincts have the ability to bypass the cognitive mind while it’s resting, and tap into the wealth of knowledge that lies in your subconscious mind. Before you go to sleep, turn your mind to concerns or uncertainties you have, and pay attention to what potential resolutions or clues your dreams might be suggesting when you wake. Keeping a dream journal can help you with this task.
3. Strengthen your listening skills
Go deeper with your listening skills. When asking people about their feelings or vulnerabilities, focus not just on what they say but also on what they mean, and pay attention to body language, gestures, tone, and volume of speech. This will enhance your empathic accuracy by allowing you to pick up on signals beyond what the words coming out of someone’s mouth.
4. Practise with small tasks
Like most things in life, the more you do something, the better you become at it. Applying this notion, try leading with your gut whenever you can with small tasks. Whether it be your food order or what to do on the weekend, the act of checking in with yourself on the little things will help strengthen your connection to your intuition with the big things, too.
5. Decipher when it’s not intuition
You might be leading with fear or anxiety when you think you’re leading with intuition. One of the quickest ways to decipher between a gut feeling and anxiety is by how long your symptoms last – intuition is often a reaction to an immediate situation, while anxiety tends to last for long periods of time, such as hours or days.
