By Susannah Richardson

Hear me out on this one. 

When I first heard this sentence, spoken to me by someone who I trust deeply, it blew my mind. I think it’s one of those truths that will always live in me, and it will prove itself to be valuable every single day. 

“Distinguishing fear and intuition apart from each other and defining what they mean for you will help you in trusting yourself.”

Read that a couple of times. You have the freedom to define fear and intuition in a way best for you, but for me, it’s sensory. 

Fear is a scream, and intuition is a whisper. Fear is a rapidly growing fire, and intuition is the steady burn of a candle whose scent lingers for long after it’s blown out. Fear stops you from doing what you’re meant to do. Fear screams so loud that you can’t even hear your inner voice whispering to you.

Instead, intuition is always there, and it’s a powerful and underrated tool. I listen to a lot of podcasts, especially when I am experiencing anxiety or stress, and I find that I can't quite hear my inner voice because it’s so clouded by fear. A quick listen to music, a podcast, and anything that intrigues me is innumerably helpful when fear begins to turn up the volume. “We Can Do Hard Things” with Glennon Doyle is a podcast favorite of mine. In an episode recently she said, “Knowing doesn’t speak in right or wrong.”  

If you ask me, that’s a pretty spot on definition of intuition. Just like feelings, the inner voice or intuition or gut feeling or “knowing” that people experience doesn’t speak in right or wrong. It speaks in a special kind of truth that we need to trust. 

Is there something that you think about frequently? It might come to you when you’re falling asleep or waking up or maybe it appears in your dreams. Or maybe you feel like there is a lesson that you just keep learning over and over again. Also, consider where your brain goes when you’re most aligned with the things that matter most to you or when you are entirely off course from those things, also called your values.

In those moments, the voice you’re hearing is your very own intuition speaking, and the longer you ignore it, the more it will reappear.