Seizing on intuition… (Part Three)

Keeping track of intuition through a log is perhaps the best tool there is to train our perceptual system. This is not about journaling our life. It’s about training, developing and using that perceptual faculty. So, each time we feel a strong intuition, write one sentence, like “I have a feeling X will happen.” Then add the bodily sensation, the emotional tone, the context and forget about it. 

Later, when the outcome becomes clear, return to the log and mark either correct or incorrect, partially correct or undetermined. This will build a feedback loop, just like the athletes among us refine our muscle memory! If we are persistent, we’ll begin to see patterns, like which sensations correlate with accuracy, which emotions distort intuition, which contexts sharpen or blur our perception. This is how intuition becomes a trainable skill rather than a lucky guess. Finally, before we close this discussion, let’s see how to tell "Intuition" from "Anxiety". This is perhaps the most critical skill. Real intuition and fear feel very similar, but they have different "flavors". The table below shows these differences:

Finally, while it’s fun to celebrate our successes, it will be even more helpful to study our misses When an intuition proves right, it’s tempting to just enjoy the confirmation, but the real growth comes from asking, first when it worked perfectly: What did it feel like? What was the first moment I sensed it? What was the “signal” beneath the noise? 

And when an intuition is wrong, let’s ask what emotion was masquerading as intuition? What bodily cue misled us? What did I want to be true? This is best way to train our intuition into a more precise indicator. This is both a complicated and elusive matter, so don’t be surprised if I find more effective or useful tools in the near future. 

In the meantime, we’ve got enough to get to work, so for those of you interested, let’s try to compare our respective progress, say in a year from now. Good luck !