Strengthening your intuitive muscles

If you want to get your body in shape, you have to work out to get the desired results, right? The same goes for your intuitive “muscle”. You’ve got to practice and ‘work out’ in order to improve your intuitive skills, much like you need to practice and work out to improve the shape your physical body is in.
Everyone has their own internal guidance system. We all have access to guidance for our own life – but not everyone uses it. You can tell the difference between people who use their intuition and those who don’t in how they view the world.

Each of us has our own dominant channel that speaks to us intuitively and your first step is to identify what yours is. You’ll want to honor that and sharpen it, right? This article: How Intuitive Are You? will help you determine which of your intuitive muscles is currently the strongest.

We struggle to hear our own intuition because we’ve got into some sort of block up at times. We can’t remove our own emotional responses and desires, which kind of gets in the way of listening to our intuition. And that’s okay.

When I do a reading for someone, I often confirm what people intuitively think is going on but just need some guidance & confirmation. Much of the time, clients get back to me and say, “That’s what I’ve been thinking!” Sometimes it’s just nice to hear confirmation from someone else, too.
So why even try to strengthening your intuition? Well, for starters you will:

Be confused less often about what to do next and you’ll have greater clarity for many of the decisions you have to make
Make fewer mistakes and solve problems more easily
Begin to develop more trust in yourself and more self-confidence
Find a deeper meaning and purpose in your life
Enhance your quality of life (yes, really!)

So, you know you have intuition, but how do you build it up? Fortunately it’s less painful that a workout at the gym or a run through the park. At least I think so.

Be empathic: Put yourself in someone else’s shoes. See it, feel it and act on it. Do what you can to experience what others are going through and feeling. This one comes very naturally to empaths.

Let go of fear: Fear blocks intuition and only gets stronger as we try to resist it. Allow yourself to feel the fear – let it flow and then let it go. Don’t resist or bury it. Just focus on it for a moment, reflect on it and let it go. You’ll come out of that little “fear focused” moment with more clarity. This little exercise strengthens your intuition because it’s teaching you to listen to your inner voice and accept it for what it is instead of suppressing it.

Stop judging: When you find yourself judging someone or something – including yourself – that’s not intuition. Nope, not even if it’s the first thought you have. It’s just negative energy that blocks your intuition. When your inner voice says, “That won’t work,” ask yourself, “What part of this idea would work?” Once you start formulating thoughts and questions in a positive way and from a place of no judgment, your intuition will start kicking-in, full-time.

Spend some time alone: Meditate, sing alone, go for a walk. Whatever activity that you can engage in with yourself and have some internal peace, do it. Learning to listen to yourself in solitude will train you to listen to your inner voice when you aren’t alone and will lead to catching powerful intuitive ideas right when you need them. Admittedly, I’m not a very good meditator (as hard as I might try!) in the traditional sense, so the best way to spend some time in solitude for me is sitting under a tree or by a body of water and thinking (sometimes journaling).

Communing with nature is a fantastic way to let your mind quiet down so you can listen to that inner voice.

Practice on friends: This is something my best friend and I like to do from time to time. One of us will think of something completely random while the other tries to guess what she’s thinking about. Intuitive hunches come from the same place inside you that form your emotions, so the better you are able to read and identify emotions and triggers in others, the better you will be able to listen to your intuition.

Most important…

Trust yourself: You know better than anyone what your gut (aka intuition) feels. Trust yourself. Listen to yourself and don’t doubt yourself. Trust that what you think you “know”, you probably do indeed know. If you have a feeling in your “gut” or just know something or feel like you are being called to action somehow — trust yourself. The more we listen to our intuition, the louder it is and the more it plays a role in our lives.

What advice do you have for someone trying to sharpen their intuition? What do you do to make yours stronger?