The Mickel Therapy Clinic, Auckland, Mickel Therapy - contact Kim or book a session
by Dr David Mickel
"...we need to abandon the idea that wisdom is knowing everything—
the whys, the wherefores, the how-tos.
Wisdom is often more subtle, both far simpler and exceedingly more complex.
For wisdom requires the discerning, the listening to, the acknowledgement of nudges and notions,
of senses and sensations, of the minute and what we often mistakenly assume is the mundane.
Wisdom means listening to the still, small voice, the whisper that can be easily lost in the whirlwind of busyness, expectations, and conventions of the world....”
-- Jean M. Blomquist
Life seems to present us with many challenges which involve making decisions about a whole host of things, big and small, on a daily basis; “what car shall I buy”, “should I go to that party”, “what do I want for dinner”. Perhaps, though, the challenge is not those things out there in life, but making sense of the ‘data’, signals and sensations that are produced inside us in relation to those things outside us.
We live in a culture that favours an analytical, ‘left-brain’ approach to assessing and working though all life’s situations. We are encouraged to “think things through” in a logical manner. The problem arises when this approach is used exclusively and there is no place for intuition. The next question might be, “why is intuition important?”. Intuition comes from your ‘core’, it is representative of who you really are. Logic, analysis and critical thinking are learnt skills that are not representative of who you are – they are representative of conditioning. “So what”, you might say. Well, being who you are is incredibly important, and some would argue, increasingly important for your health and well being.
“To know how to choose a path with heart is to learn how to follow intuitive feeling.”
Jean Shinoda Bolen
The problem we face is that to many people intuition sounds a little weird and wacky, something that lies within the domain of a select few willing to tread a certain path – old ladies reading tea leaves, and the like. The truth is intuition is available to all of us, and often goes hand in hand with the emotions that our bodies produce.
So what is intuition? Well, arguably there are many ways to describe intuition, a few examples could be: inner wisdom, gut feeling, inner knowing, or a deeper feeling. As humans, intuition is something that we have always had and, arguably, have used to greater effect in the past as compared with life today. Our ‘head’ could be thought of as the clever part of us while our intuition and emotions could be thought of as our wisdom.
A basic premise of Mickel therapy is that we all have a true self or core. This is where our emotions come from and also where our intuitive responses come from. They all always there whether we recognise them or not. They are usually simple and usually instantaneous in response to situations in life that present themselves to us. So intuition could be described as the little feelings, pushes or pulls that present themselves instantaneously in response to life situations.
"I never know what the next lesson is going to be, because we’re not supposed to know; we’re supposed to trust ourselves to discover it."
Melody Beattie
We’ve all had that feeling when going to a party that there is a good or bad atmosphere present. Sometimes this happens when we walk through the front door, sometimes people can feel this intuitively half way down the street.
A friend of mine recently told me a story of using his intuition. He was walking down a street close to his home at night, and he had a feeling that something ahead was not right. This was strange to him as this was a street he would walk down every night, but this particular night felt different, strange, uncomfortable.
As he walked on a little further somebody emerged from the darkness and the feeling of discomfort increased. A stronger sense was starting to grow that this person coming towards him was someone to be avoided – there was something about the energy that was increasingly uncomfortable. As he walked past the stranger in the street he avoided eye contact but was aware that this person moved towards him. He moved quickly away and was aware that the person stopped and turned around.
His intuitive feeling was to walk faster, in fact he broke into a light jog until he reached home. He didn’t stopped to question his intuition, he merely trusted it completely. This story it is a great example of allowing oneself to be open to the intuitive responses, signals and feelings that we have all the time.
Many people think that developing intuition will be hard - it’s not. However, it is something that needs to be allowed to flow, it can’t be forced. The more you chase it the less likely you are to catch it.
"Ultimately, we must learn to trust ourselves. When we do this intimately and intelligently, the world opens full of meaning before us. We find that we ourselves are the doorway to a fathomless understanding of the source of life itself. We need only to learn to walk through it."
-- James Thornton
How to develop your intuition - Mickel Therapy Newsletter - back to top