Do you ever get a gut feeling but you ignore it because you are not sure if you can trust it? Or do you ever trust that gut feeling and then come to the wrong conclusion or decision? We always talk about trusting our intuition but how do we really know if our intuition is correct? Well, let us first go into what intuition is.
What really is intuition? Intuition is knowing something without any reasoning. And sometimes intuition gets confused with insecurity. We can get a really uncomfortable feeling and we can think it is intuition but really it is insecurity. Insecurity comes from false negative beliefs. It is things that we were told or thoughts that we have over and over again that then turned into a belief or a fear.
Insecurities and fears are formed in our amygdala which is where our fight, flight, or freeze is. So in that part of your brain, it stores your negative beliefs or your fears. So anytime you have a fear or insecurity it gets stored in that part of your brain. Now your intuition comes more from your prefrontal cortex, it is the cognitive part of your brain. This is the more calm rational part of your brain. Now it is important to remember because insecurity is very fear-based, it is very negative. It is the wounded ego thinking that it knows better.
Insecurity feels like you are trying to run or hide, you are afraid. You may have panic attacks, are scared, fear making the wrong decision, are worried, and fear not being right. Intuition is not like that, it is being calm and it is usually the truth whether it is good or bad. When it is good or feels right you will get warm fuzzy butterfly feelings in your tummy. For instance, this certain person you are dating, it feels good it feels right. This decision you made, it feels right, you feel good about it. When something feels off with your intuition, something feels wrong like there is a gnawing feeling that something is not right. Like maybe you need to check something or you need to further look into something or this certain person gives you a bad vibe.
With insecurity it is not like that, your nervous system is going off so you will have more nervous feelings like sick to your stomach as you are scared or trying to prevent something from happening. Intuition is your subconscious bringing past experiences or past knowledge to the front of your conscious mind. It is your subconscious reminding you of past experiences like “Hey we have experienced something similar to this before and something negative had happened so pay attention. Even if it is subtle, something is off.”
As children, we were subtly taught not to trust our intuition. It could be with the smallest things like when you tell your mom you aren’t cold and she tells you that you are and forces you to wear a jacket. Or bigger things when you make a decision and your parent tells you that was a dumb decision and to not trust yourself. When you are invalidated or when you are told things like that, that causes you to believe you can’t trust yourself. You will then trust people that remind you of the ones that taught you to doubt yourself.
So then as a kid, you think your feelings are wrong and then feel you can’t listen to yourself and you have to listen to your parents or an authority figure, they know better than you. Or if we are gaslit by somebody you are taught over and over to not trust your feelings because you are crazy or insane. Because of this you then can become very confused about your feelings when it comes to insecurity and intuition. What happens is that you will listen to your feelings of insecurity and they are usually incorrect. Which then causes us to believe that we can not trust our feelings.
But the crazy part is we can listen to our intuition and still be wrong. The reason that is, is because we put meaning behind our intuition. We get no real cut clues about what it exactly is, we just get a bad feeling. For instance, you are married and your partner keeps going out late at night. He is distant and not explaining where he is going and appears to be secretive. Now your intuition is going off that something is not right. Insecurity says they’re cheating on me. Which does happen but actually in this instance your husband was preparing a surprise party for you.
When little things like that happen where your intuition was right but you were wrong about what was happening, that leads you to believe that you can’t trust your intuition. This does not mean you are wrong, you were just off a little about what was happening. We don’t have a manual behind what our intuition is telling us.
So then when things happen like that and we listen to our insecurities, when our intuition is kicking in and we have a gnawing feeling, we believe we can not trust it and we will ignore it. We ignore it because we are afraid it is not correct or we don’t want to believe it is right. Then when you look back you will realize you had a bad feeling but you ignored it. You thought you were wrong or that it could change.
So people will think they can’t trust themselves because they make bad decisions but really it is not that you makIntuite bad decisions, it is that you do not listen to your intuition. You listened to your insecurity and that is why you made those bad decisions or you ignore those red flags and you listen to self-doubt rather than listening to yourself. So intuition can never be wrong.
When you are insecure you will feel nervous inside your body or you will feel fearful and worried. When your intuition is going off there won’t be any worry. It will be a feeling of being curious and concerned. You will wonder why you are having this feeling and what is causing it. What feels off?
You have to be self-aware of yourself and be in tune with the feelings in your body. A lot of people try to distract themselves with what they are feeling. So pay attention to the sensations you feel. If you are feeling worried identify that as insecurity or fear and ask yourself what is causing this? Maybe you are worried something negative will happen or that people will not like you. That is how you know it is insecurity.
When it is intuition you will get this gut-off feeling. Something will feel weird or off. You will see maybe someone’s actions and words don’t match up and it feels off. This is your subconscious trying to tell you that something is going on and it can’t exactly tell you and you need to figure it out. remind you that you have experienced this and to pay attention.
Take some time to really feel the feelings in your body. That is how you become more in tune and self-aware. really sit and ask yourself about the feelings you are experiencing and why you are feeling them. You want to get to the root. Don’t gaslight yourself that you are crazy or making things up or you will overthink it. Just sit and think of the facts. Once you pay attention to your intuition and make decisions based on that you will trust yourself more and more and make fewer decisions based on insecurity.
What do you guys think? Leave it all in the comments below!
1 Comment
Thanks it was helpful 🙏