Using Your Intuition

Tony Crisp

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Intuition. We all have it, often hidden though it may be - but it can be developed and used.

During one October my wife Hy, two of our children and I, visited her brother who was living at the time near Totnes in the south of England, about a hundred miles from us. We stayed overnight and began to drive back the next day, stopping on the open moorland of Dartmoor for sandwiches and a toilet break. Within a minute or so Hy realised she no longer had her glasses. None of us could remember when we had last seen her with them, but she felt reasonably sure she had them after leaving Totnes. So we all searched the area, and especially where Hy had been to the toilet. The rest of us gave up after ten minutes, but Hy carried on her search for at least half an hour but then gave up feeling she must have left them at Totnes. No glasses.

At home days went by and the glasses didn't turn up at Totnes. We let the situation slide into weeks, then months, until Hy began to have frequent headaches and we were faced with the expense of new spectacles. So we looked over what had happened again. We had searched the area of moor and heather at the time, but now four months had passed. Even if the glasses had been dropped, would they still be there? Was it worth a seventy-mile drive to search an area we had already combed? Should we simply buy another pair?

Because we could not answer those questions we were indecisive, so I suggested we ask our intuition. Using a simple technique which allows the unconscious to express its information, we asked the whereabouts of the spectacles. My response was blankness, then the feeling of futility about asking definite information in such a silly way; then suddenly image after image came of the spectacles on the small bank where Hy went to the toilet. I saw them hidden under heather, or in a hole in the bank.

Hy's response to seeking help from her intuition was physical. She had the urge to squat down, which she thought was silly until she equated it with the moor. When we shared our separate responses and realised they coincided, we set out there and then for Dartmoor. A couple of hours later we managed to find the spot where we had parked that day four months earlier. Hy walked straight to the place she had squatted in and there among heather, on the bank were the spectacles, lightly snow-covered but none the worse. Perhaps there are better examples of intuition, but I can talk about this one in the first person. It shows the process can be used consciously, and that it can be a help in problem solving or in decision making.

Dartmoor and its ponies.

How does it work? Well, there are as many explanation as there are schools of thought about the human mind. Perhaps each of them explains a facet of the process, and some we can ourselves observe in action.

THREE THEORIES

Two of the most likely explanations for many experiences of intuition are the computer and subliminal impressions theories. The first one sees the human brain in some ways like a computer: it is a problem-solving organ and continually computes probabilities. I remember once my daughter coming in from another room and suddenly asking me what she held in her hands hidden behind her back. For some reason I was able to observe my thought processes working with lightning speed, checking through the thousands of pieces of information on hand such as her tone of voice, where she had been, likes and dislikes, inclinations, who else in the house, objects in the house, what could she carry in her hand, etc., etc. In about a second I replied "Banana", and her mouth dropped open in surprise. Somehow my brain process had sorted out the highest probability and got it right. Many experiences of intuition are just that, a computation of highest probability.

Our memory stores millions of pieces of information gathered throughout our lifetime. Nothing is forgotten, and it would be strange indeed if from that vast storehouse of information our computer couldn't come up with some very shrewd observations or calculations about most things important to us. Much of this action occurs beneath the threshold of our waking consciousness though, and any important question we do not rigidly hold in consciousness can be processed by our unconscious mental processes. Like any good computer, and the human brain is the best there is for general purposes, this function of the mind sifts already held information, collects relevant data, and cross references otherwise unlinked pieces of experiences or memory. It does this spontaneously for any question we seriously consider, or any life problem that confronts us. Every word we hear spoken by someone else, every word we speak, is compared with past memories of its associations, evaluated for meaning against tone of voice, situation in which said, context in sentence, and relevance to other words used. This occurs so fast we are usually unaware of it, so to make use of this function consciously needs practice and awareness.

But there are other amazing functions that go on beneath waking awareness that intuition can tap. The unconscious constantly synthesises and cross references the information and life experience gathered. It extracts meanng from it in a way that ordinary thinking does not. From this is develops a global view. For instance, if you could see all the years of your life at once - the global view - you would be able to see how certain things erupt into your life again and again. You would see themes, interests, mistakes and creative action so clearly in that vast view. Such a view is exactly what the intuitive faculty is capable of accessing.

THE SECOND WAY

The second possible explanation for intuition, subliminal impressions, needs to be experienced to be thoroughly believed or understood. In considering how some very intuitive people come by their information, I had never seriously thought of subliminal impressions as likely until I experienced it. The theory states that we are constantly receiving far more information via our senses than is ever recognised consciously. But this in no way describes what it is like to receive this extra information.

The first time I experienced it was with a feeling akin to shock, the impact was so great. I was at work, cleaning a work top, and four metres away the head of the business was casually talking to one of the employees, a female. Both of them were in their early sixties. The conversation was about the weather, customers, and chit-chat. I was disinterested until, glancing up at them, I realised I was seeing them in a way I had never seen anyone else before. It only lasted for about two or three seconds, but in that short time what I saw told me a great deal about them. My senses noticed all the tiny movements of face, hands, and limbs; heard nuances of vocal sound; caught fleeting expressions; and from these many separate pieces of information an overall understanding arose that portrayed to my awareness what emotions and drives moved deep in these two people, causing the tiny ripples of movement on the surface.

This is an image from a Disney film, flashed on the screen momentarily to impact subliminally.

I could see these two people were linking to each other with an energetic power line that did not show in their actual conversation, only in the usually unnoticed small movements and body positions which accompanied it. I could see, much to my surprise, they had formed this link via sexual intercourse. Later I was able to confirm this observation. The woman in question thought I was psychic when I shared my insight with her, and wondered if I could see other secrets of her life. There was no psychism in this at all, however, only awareness of perceptions gained via my physical senses, which I now presume are available to us all the time if we can tap them. What I understood from it was that before the development of speech as a main form of communication, the human animal, like other animals, communicated via body signals. These were understood as easily as we now understand speech. Over time this ability became unconscious; buried like old roads and pathways. It only now surfaces occasionally unless we try to access it.

THE THIRD WAY

The theory of the third way states that each of us have a core level of our being that is constantly at one with the universe. In the past this appeared ridiculous to thinkers and the analytical mind, but in the last century, with the development of quantum physics, it has been seen as rational - i.e. explainable within our scientific parameters. (See the Bell's Inequality Theorem).

For instance Edgar Cayce could be asked any question and give replies about subjects he had never read about or learned - clear medical diagnosis for instance. His explanation was that we each have three levels to our being. We have an experience of the world through our body and senses. In this world we feel separate and distinct from all else, and mostly live in our personal memories and skills.

Then we have an intermediate world we know as thoughts, imagination, spontaneous mental images, sleep and dreams. In this level much of the limitations of the 'body world' drop away, and it reflects the sort of mental processes described above, and sometimes things known or sensed from the next level.

The third level he called Cosmic Mind, and it was not limited to personal experience, but held in it all that had been experienced through the ages. (See Edgar Cayce; Levels of the Mind in Waking and Dreaming.). Intuition from that source leaps right beyond your own limitations and personal resources.

WAYS OF USING INTUITION

The Swiss psychiatrist Jung felt that humans can tap this cosmic source of information other than through their own brain computer's hidden workings or subliminal impressions of sensory perceptions. He simply called this intuition. An explanation arising from his own work is that each of us have strata of consciousness going beyond personal waking awareness. These he called the unconscious and the collective unconscious. The latter is a field of consciousness or awareness we share with all living things, in which your being and my being mingle.

In that mingling there might be the possibility of consciously knowing each other's thoughts or doings, if it could be made conscious. Edgar Cayce explained from his own state of seer-ship that each of us has unconscious awareness of each other's life, health and being, but only a few people can bring this knowledge to waking awareness.

I believe there are ways we can make more use of our own level of intuition, because from a position of having no observable intuition at all, I have been able to use intuition often enough and well enough to make it an extra tool in problem solving or decision making. I have shown others how to do this, and see from this that it is a skill that can be developed or enhanced. Also, an aspect of intuition that is often overlooked is that it opens a doorway to creativity. Recently, after working hard for weeks on end, I took a day off to rest and ruminate. Alone I walked to a beautiful beach near my home. To reach it I climbed down the two hundred steps on the tree-covered cliffs. With the tide out I crossed to a nearby island and sat for some hours, quietly looking back at the land.

In that non striving state of mind, a sense of things floated up from deep within which I had not experienced before. Yes, I had looked at those cliffs many times, but never before had the crumbling mass appeared like a huge dead tree, rotting, full of holes and crevices. Only now did I see the age of the rocks, and how they were decaying. And never before could I see how thin the film of life, of vegetation was, which spread its fingers across them, gaining its life from the dying energies of the earth and the sun. The death of the sun as it loses it energy was so obviously the precursor of life. Life, I could see so plainly, could not exist without death. Do we only touch the hem of some great scheme of things with our normal awareness, separating cosmos and symbols in our littleness?

Whether we seek to use our intuition to find a lost object, consider a business opportunity or look at the great processes of the cosmos, one of the first things we need to learn is to place our thoughts, emotions and body in a balanced or poised condition. Rigid control is as useless as uncontrolled reactions. We do not need to control our thinking process, but to be aware of looking beyond it for a while to our other sources of information, i.e. to allow feelings, spontaneous imagery, fantasy, body language, and sensations.

Intuition is not a god voice telling us what to do or what is absolute truth. It is another way of arriving at understanding and greatly complements thinking and emotion. And something we need to be aware of is that we are dealing with a subjective process. Just as we find it difficult to remember simple facts or words when in a stress situation, such as an interview, or when we feel inadequate, so intuition is much influenced by the attitudes we bring to it.

Actually, in the facet of our being we call our mind, in which intuition and extended awareness take place, a thought or attitude is as solid and real as a brick wall is in the world of our body. If we have feelings that we can't do this thing called intuition, or if we have a sense it is ridiculous, then of course it is!

That is the first thing to remember about any mental work or creativity. What you think, feel or imagine is totally real at its own level. Each shift of thought or feeling creates a completely different world within you. The world of doubt or cynicism has totally different possibilities to the world of open mindedness. There is never any need to struggle to 'believe' in something. All that is needed is the putting aside of disbelief, cynicism and the other mental worlds you create with your thoughts and emotions, and that you usually live in without realising how you are limiting yourself.

In my own experience with the spectacles, I went through a phase of feeling what I was doing was stupid and time wasting. Or you might feel only special or mysterious people have the intuitive faculty. Such attitudes need to be gently seen for what they are, habitual, cultural responses to the subject, and put aside.

The Keyboard Condition and Spontaneous Voice

I have called this necessary state of mind and body the Keyboard Condition. In other words you learn to hold your body, emotions, imagination, sexuality and memories like a keyboard that can be played on by your inner self. In this way you are holding your body free to move spontaneously; you are letting go of any control or resistances you might have in connection with your emotions; you are relinquishing your thoughts and goals, and you are leaving the stage free for your imagination – all to be able to respond to something other than your conscious will – all ready to be moved spontaneously. Remember that when you go to sleep another will creates dreams, body movement, emotions, and all the phenomena of dreams without your conscious will needing to be active. It is this inner process, or inner self, that expresses when you can create the Keyboard Condition.

Also, each person may receive intuitive information in a slightly different way. For some it comes as a physical movement (such as Hy squatting) or as when a dowser holds his rod. Often it arises as spontaneous images like a daydream. Some people find themselves talking aloud from other than conscious volition; while others receive through emotional shifts. In each case, however, something spontaneous and unplanned is allowed to arise into consciousness, whether in movement, images, sounds, or emotions, or even direct knowing, exactly as dreams do.

Spontaneous voice is something I came across while I was experimenting with allowing the dream process while awake. While dreaming we spontaneously move, speak, eat, have sex, and all these arise while our conscious will is 'asleep' or surrendered. Therefore we can say the unconscious itself is speaking when we speak in dreams. In fact when we experience a dream we are allowing the unconscious or inner self to communicate. But dreams are often not easy to immediately understand. But while awake we interpret what arises much more quickly. So when I allowed myself to 'dream' while awake the results were often startling, as what was said frequently gave information or viewpoints that were totally new or unknown to me consciously. I could ask questions about almost anything and gain an informative response. The unconscious, and of course the cosmic mind, are immense databanks of information and experience. Asking a question starts a 'search' and 'synthesising' process that sorts immense amounts of data to find something matching the question. The exercises below explain ways of learning to allow your unconscious and cosmic mind to activate your speech.

So you need to practise a condition of body, mind, and feelings that allows unplanned fantasy in whatever way it is going to arise. Jung taught some of his patients to allow their hands to fantasise while they watched without planning moves or interfering, judging, or criticising. And of course, as already said, one of the big interference's is the thought or feeling that nothing of importance can come of such an irrational activity. Perhaps at first nothing does arise, but maybe our intuition is a little rusty from years of non use and needs limbering up. How would you be physically if you had been tied and gagged for years and now someone asked you to move and speak? At first you would barely be able to move, and only mumbling would come out of your mouth. So it is a learning process to gain this skill. Practice is necessary, just as one would with the piano or typing.

OPENING THE DOOR

At first try exercises such as these:

Exercise One

One of the easiest ways to begin allowing something spontaneous to arise other than what you consciously think or decide, is to use your body's own urge to express spontaneous movement, as with yawning. To do this first take time to create the right setting for the practice. You need a reasonable space - something at least the size of a single blanket, so you can feel free to move without bumping into things. Play some music that is flowing, but without a strong beat. Music also 'gives permission' for easier self-expression in that you are less worried about making a noise or moving.

When ready, stand in the space, listen to the music and drop unnecessary tensions. Remind yourself that for the next few minutes you are going to let your body play. You are going to let it off the lead. Create the keyboard condition as fully as you can. Now open your mouth wide with head slightly dropped back and simulate yawns. As you do so notice whether a natural yawn starts to make itself felt. If it does, allow it to take over and have a really luxurious yawn. Any following impulse to yawn again should be allowed.

Let the yawns come one after the other if they want to. Without acting it out, let the impulse to yawn take over your body, not just your mouth and face. So if the urge to move includes stretching the arms or elsewhere, let it happen. Let your body really play with this.

Exercise Two

This next approach is a slight advance on the last - and remember this is a learning process. Stand in your 'space' again and give yourself over to the enjoyment of having time to really indulge your own natural feelings and body pleasure.

Now tense your whole body and face. Clench your fists and your jaw. Really hold tight and hold the tension for about thirty seconds. Now slowly drop all the tension and create the keyboard condition as fully as you can. Let yourself release the tension in any way your body wants to. If that is yawning or stretching, then let them take over if they become spontaneous. If the yawning or stretching develops into other movements, let them. In the same way you would normally allow your body to express itself in a yawn, let it express itself in whatever other form of movement, postures or stretches arise. Maybe you want to be noisy, so allow whatever noises you want to make, however 'silly'. If this flows into movements following the music, don't hold yourself back. Or your movements might not follow the music, but have a direction of their own. This is playtime with your body and imagination, so enjoy it. What has gone before has simply been preparatory. Now you can do what you want.

Exercise Three

Again, here is a continuation of the last method. Stand in your 'space' where and when you can be undisturbed. Give yourself fifteen or more minutes in which you will put aside directed activity of mind and body, and allow your body, feelings, and voice to doodle.

To start, use the tension as in the last method. Then let tension melt, create the keyboard condition, and start circling your arms in front of your body so they make big circles above your head and down to pelvis height.

When that is established notice and allow your arms, voice, feelings, whole body, to move wherever impulse takes you. I do not mean impulses of thinking such as 'Well maybe now I'll jump up and down a bit. OK, what shall I do now?" But putting aside your constant directing self let things happen, even if that means nothing at all and feeling sleepy and curling up on the floor. This is free space, and do not interfere by trying to understand what is happening. Allow the process to describe itself if it is going to.

Exercise Four

Sit comfortably and create the keyboard condition. Now watch the thoughts and daydreams that arise without interference. Note each one, but for the given length of time do not direct. I believe the intuitive process is connected with the dream process, and expresses most often in images, symbols, and fantasies. When the body expresses this it often starts as movement that become mime. The mime must be seen as symbolic communication. Ask the process for help understanding. It is very responsive once you learn to work with it.

This self observation or self watching method is sometimes hard to do by oneself. If you can get a sympathetic or interested partner to join with you though, it increases the power of it enormously. So, with a partner, take turns for one to observe, and one to sit and give a running commentary on what thoughts, what body sensations, what emotions arise spontaneously. It is important not to repress anything or direct the process.

This last method, with a partner, is one of the most powerful and useful mental tools you can develop. Apart from being a doorway to explore questions, it is also a way to find personal growth, healing and insights. Once you have learned to allow depths of feeling, body movement or fantasy, then you can ask questions or choose to explore aspects of yourself that need attention or healing.

Exercise Five

Something that has struck me over the years about how what we know unconsciously can arise into our waking awareness, is the place excitement or excitation plays. Maybe the word stimulation could replace excitation, but when we are highly stimulated or excited, the spontaneous and creative can flow much more easily. A method Hy and I used in group work when there was plenty of room to move, was to ask the group to walk in a big circle - fast. Then, when they had got their body really moving they had to start talking aloud to themselves. I told them to say any old thing that came into their mind, and say it aloud. It is difficult to think clearly while being very active, so the words gradually became spontaneous. We then took time to define a question that was important to each of us. One woman was a nurse facing stress in her work. Another was a man looking for a creative shift in his relationship. Whatever their question they then started the fast walk again, talked aloud, and dropped the question into their action. They then let any old words and feelings arise. They could stop when they got a result. Within five minutes they had all stopped and each of them had a very satisfying response that had broken through as they walked and spoke.

When you have learned how to allow the spontaneous uprising of feelings, movement or speech, then you can bring a question to the process and watch what response arises. But you need to be able to allow the inner self to speak without interference before that can work well.

Getting in the Flow

Researchers exploring how creativity is accessed found that athletes say they are "in the zone" when they are fully physically and mentally functioning. They tell of vision sharpening, time shifting into slow motion, and their alertness and physical skill reahing a peak. Scientists have dubbed this phenomenon "flow" and recognise it has biochemical causes.

For instance there are special docking sites on brain cells for certain neuro-chemicals connected with the brain's opiate receptors. Endorphins bind these opiate receptors and dampen pain, and produce the elation-nicknamed the "runner's high" that is felt after prolonged exercise. The neuroscientist Candace Pert also believes that opiate receptors play a role in creativity. They "filter reality" that allows an altered state of consciousness.

I believe this is why 'excitation' can play such an important part in intuition and accessing your potential. During such excitation at times I was able to see how the process worked, and with that understanding learn how to do it myself without the stimulus. So using the approaches described, take note of how you function, and gradually refine it. It needs practice, but so does any great skill.

When Hy and I gained useful information regarding her glasses, we started by leaving our body, mind, and emotions open to spontaneous movement or fantasy. We also asked a specific question. Until one has loosened up in the exercises given above, it may be quite fruitless to try a direct question. (In times of great crises one sometimes breaks through all the barriers and the process works without practice). But when you are fairly adept at the exercises any sort of question can be asked. It can be about health, work, relationships, children, dreams, or creative ideas.

You Are Infinitely More Than You Are Conscious Of

Your inner self, your unconscious, or whatever you want to call it, is much more that a passive responding system. The processes that built your body and keep it running are not passive. Even as a tiny unborn baby you had a powerful integrity that defended itself against infection and harm. That is very active and has an agenda of its own. Overall it moves wherever possible, and in as much as you allow it, toward healing injuries of body and psyche, toward your growth of mind and understanding. Particularly it at first tries to clear out all the old hurts and defences you use that stifle you and hold back your innate wonder and creativity. I call it 'doing the housework'.

The Sleeping Giant Mullwarchar Galway

This level of you is not the same as your conscious mind and memories. Although it has motivation and direction, as it does in repairing or regulating your body systems, it does not do it from focussed and word dominated decision making. As far as I can myself put it into words, it is like a sleeping giant that has massive knowledge, strength and skill, but responds instinctively without conscious thought. But when your conscious abilities link with this sleeping giant it wakes and demonstrates its incredible potential. So remember that what you are opening to is responsive. It is incredibly wise, having millions of years of experience of life that is all involved now in the processes of your body and mind. But it is not an intelligence like your conscious mind. It is more like nature that reaches and retreats out of an unfocused but nevertheless vast awareness. The fact you can hold and ask a question and evaluate what arises is enormously important when it connects with this sleeping giant. Together you can uncover wonders. But remember it has its own needs that in many ways are more important than the needs and worries of your limited conscious awareness.

To get the best out of the process, always seek the end result of actually understanding. I have found, in teaching people practical ways of using intuition, we can have a conversation or develop communication with the process. The first uprisings of intuition may be in symbols in images or body movements, or in bold verbal statements, depending upon how it shows itself. The process must not be left at this stage, but led to an expression of further information which unfolds the meaning and leads to understanding. For instance, Hy's squatting was only a symbolic body movement, a mime, until it connected with her past squat and was understood to refer to the spot. So if your body mimes something, you need to ask what it is trying to describe by holding that question in your mind.

Never forget that your unconscious holds everything that you are. It is not only wise, but also just under the surface are all your personal fears and prejudices, all your cultural cliches and limitations. Sometimes we have to wade through these - the 'housework' - before we can get at useful information and insights. To 'wade through' you have to avoid being satisfied with apparently prophetic or sweeping statements that do not bear up to ana;ysis or bring actual results. That level of your uncsoncious is full of amazing promises - wish fulfillment hoaxes. What you receive must be critically measured against real events and your history. Freud found most people have powerful resistances to actually seeing or experiencing the truth about themselves. So sometimes we need to cut threought these brables to reach teh Sleeping Beauty.

This is where your conscious rational and critical evaluation comes in. Without it you may be adrift in symbols and the expression of attitudes that need to be transformed. All the time aim to link what arises from within to your own here and now history and what can be observed externally.

As an example of this, some years ago a friend of mine developed cataracts. When I opened to my intuitive process, without seeking it I experienced a huge flow of energy through my being that suggested my friend was being healed. I was amazed but watched to see what would happen. After many weeks of this no change occurred to my friend. So I did what I should have done earlier, asked my unconscious what the hell it was presenting me with. The response was immediate and fully understandable. In my youth I had longed to be a healer, but had never been succesful. The longing over years had set up hopes, expectations, and, most important, massive conenctions with emotional energy. What I had experienced was the energy those patterns set in place. I had seen my own innner functioning, not any real ability to heal. That ws the end of it.

Such exploration through seeking answers is the way to find real growth and healing. One woman, after having a hysterectomy, wanted to look at her life situation and received the words, "I am a work machine". When she explored this a bit more by asking the question, "What does that refer to in my everyday life and feelings?" there arose memories of many incidents in her life as a farmer's wife, in which she felt she worked for her family like a machine, without pleasure or personal motive. But then, beyond that arose a wonderful experience of herself as an essential person beyond her body situation or exterior events of her life. She knew her wonderful potential and light. This helped her to re-evaluate her relationships. It arose through asking for further understanding. The process was led to connection with everyday, here-and-now life, and not left in the limbo of symbols or oracular statements.

Some years ago a friend of mine, Cliff, broke the neck of his guitar and couldn't afford to get it mended because he was saving to get married, and the price at the local shop was high. I suggested he sit quietly for a while and imagine standing right in the center of a large round room, representing his mind, doors all around, and say to himself that he was allowing all the doors of his mind to open, so he could access information that would solve his problem. When I saw him the next day he told me he sat and did what I suggested and nothing happened. Then he smiled and said, "But as soon as I gave up I remembered an old music shop near where I used to live. I knew this was the answer, so I drove there right away. I showed the shop owner the guitar and he said he could fix it for a fraction of the price asked at the other shop." Cliff created a situation in which he opened himself to the wider influx of memories or impressions than he usually allowed. Nothing happened until he 'let go' in the keyboard condition and allowed his intuition to express. Learning to use our intuition is as useful as being able to reason or count. I believe developing it as part of our mental equipment is an important step in human growth. It changes the way we relate to our own being, and, I feel, reveals new horizons in regard to our relationship with nature and our creativity. Why not try it?

See Part Two - Going Deeper

See: Body Dowsing; The Splendid Alternative..

Tony's in print Books in the UK or USA

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