PPI #108: When to Follow Your Intuition

Everyone says follow your gut, but that can actually be very dangerous advice. And in today's message, I'm going to make sure that you know when you should follow your gut instinct and when you shouldn't.

Hi, my name is Eric Partaker, and I'm on a mission to help people realize their full potential, both in their work and their life. And today we're going to talk about when should you follow your intuition and. And when shouldn't you? Because as I said, sometimes if you follow your intuition, it can actually create more harm than good. So let's start off with just understanding what is intuition? What is gut instinct? And gut instinct is simply that feeling sometimes that you get about whether or not you should or shouldn't do something or do something with another person or work on something. And it's an important part of our programming, right? It's one of the key reasons why we've survived as long as we have on this planet is because we're protected by this incredible instinct, this incredible intuition that helps us make the right choices and decisions without having to agonize about whether or not we should do something or not do something. But we shouldn't always just blindly follow what that gut instinct is telling us. There are certain situations when we should follow certain situations when we shouldn't. So let's start with talking about some of the situations that we should follow our gut instinct. One of the best places to use your intuition is after you've whittled down your options. So if you have a lot of things that you can choose from, you are trying to choose a new partnership for your business or trying to choose amongst different people that you could be working with or hiring. Always try to whittle down the options first. And once you got into a small number of options, say you have two, three, four things to choose from. That's a good point to start tapping into your gut instinct and ask yourself which of these options feels like the best way to go? Which of these people feels like they're the right person for the job? Trust that instinct, especially with regards to people. We're going to be talking a little bit more about that one in particular a little bit later, or I'm not sure, you know, which path I should be pursuing. You know, as a career. For example, if you're thinking about a career change, and once again, you've whittled it down to a few options, what is your. What does your intuition tell you? You know, where is where. Do you feel that pull or that push? You know, that is a great sign. That's a good sign for where you should be going next. So after you've whittled down your options, that's a good opportunity to then bring into your, then bring your intuition into the picture and ask, you know, where should I be going next? What's your gut instinct telling you? Also, I mentioned about, you know, choosing, you know, or making decisions about people. So when your intuition is telling you, for example, anything related to trusting another person, another human being, it's always wise to listen to what your gut instinct is telling you. There's. I never second guess that if I'm feeling trust issues with a person, I totally respect that and I will, as a result, maybe not work with that person, or as a result, I might not continue working with that person, or as a result, I might decide that I'm not going to hire that person. Or when I've been having trust issues in a relationship, for example, I always, I trust that intuition. So your intuition around people, especially around trust, often, very often in my experience, is trying to tell you something very important and I would be thinking twice about ignoring that. Also with regards to safety, especially with physical things, you know, for example, if you're in an environment that feels physically unsafe or you're questioning whether you should go, you know, walk in a particular area or something like that, you know, your intuition, again, it's trying to protect you there. So I would definitely would trust your intuition in those situations as well. Um, again, it's highly evolved. This has been programmed, you know, over millions, you know, years, right. Of, of since the early, you know, our early, early, early ancestors. And so trust your intuition in those situations when you're feeling, you know, issues about your physical safety or you're questioning, you know, am I, am I safe in this situation? Usually your intuition is right in those instances as well. Another good intuition area, you know, when to follow your intuition, is with regards to congruence with the best in you. So day, moment to moment to moment, throughout our days, we have opportunities to act in a way that's congruent with the very best in us, or we have opportunities to act in a way that is incongruent with the best in us. And if we take a moment to just simply pause in those situations when we're wondering how to respond maybe to a particular situation, and then ask ourselves, what is the best way to respond here? What's the best way for me to move forward? And our intuition, those moments, is really good at showing us the best way forward, you know, you may not know how to respond to a particular thing that's triggering you or making, you know, bringing out the worst in you. But if you took a moment to pause before that worst came out, if you took a moment to pause and just ask yourself, how's. How would the best version of me respond right now to this particular stressor, or to this particular challenge, or to. Or to this particular obstacle? Your intuition is almost always right. There's an infinite wisdom within you, and if you just take a moment to pause and ask, it reveals itself, it gives you the answer. Your intuition steps forward and says, I think you should respond in this way. This would be a way that would be congruent with the best in you. Now, last but not least is when to ignore our intuition. So sometimes we will get the gut instinct to not do something. Maybe we're trying to develop a new skill, or we're trying to make a shift in careers, or, you know, we're trying to stand up for what we believe in. And our intuition or what we think is our intuition says, I don't know if you should do that. And it's really fear being disguised as our intuition. That's not really a gut instinct in those situations. It's parading itself. As, you know, I'm telling you, you know, I'm your intuition. I'm telling you that you shouldn't do this. But it's that that's really your fear that's holding you back. I mean, you should listen to that. Maybe, you know, after you've tried doing whatever it is that you want to master, if it's a new skill, you know, after you've given some effort in progressing in a new area, whatever that you know might be holding you back, maybe then trust what your intuition is telling you. But if it's right at the outset and you haven't even given any effort yet, that's probably your fear masquerading as your gut instinct. And that's an opportunity for you to maybe break down. Instead of wondering whether or not you should operate on this false gut instinct. A better thing to do in that situation would be to ask yourself, okay, let's. I mean, let's take the example of you're trying to develop a new skill. Ask yourself, well, are there any experts that I could connect to that could help me develop this skill more quickly? Have I zeroed in within the skill on what are the 20% of things that I could be working on that could create 80% of the improvement that I'm seeking? Have I broken those sub steps down and have I scheduled that into my calendar so I know when I'm going to be working on those things. So when fear is masquerading as our gut instinct, it's a really good signal that to ask yourself, what is the handful of things that I could be focused on rather than the myriad of things, how could I get some support, how could I break that down to make it feel a little bit more manageable, and how could I schedule that in my calendar so that what I'm working on, what I want to improve, actually gets done? And in a way that's not going to elicit this fear response? So in summary, your intuition is there to help you, but you shouldn't always follow it. You should follow in the times when you've at least whittled down your options to, you know, a subset or a handful of things to consider. It's generally good to follow when it's around issues, trust issues with people. It's generally good to follow when it's prompting you to question your physical safety. Right. It's a great thing to follow when you're asking yourself what would be the best way to respond to this situation, to be congruent with the best in me. But I'd be really, really careful about just following it when it's saying, oh, you shouldn't do that because, or, you know, start to work in a particular area or develop a particular skill, shouldn't try to put yourself out there. I would question that because that could just be fear masquerading as your gut instinct. And instead, in those situations, break it down. Ask if there's some help out there from someone else, Schedule it into your calendar. Work on that. So I hope you've enjoyed that. And if you head over to my website@ericpartaker.com you can also subscribe to my weekly Peak Performance Insights newsletter.