Find Your Intuition
Speaker 0: Welcome to Takeout Therapy. I'm Rebecca Hunter, a therapist who knows therapy is actually very expensive and believes that mental health education should be free. Stick with me for the next few minutes, and you'll learn something that will help you think about life differently, or maybe manage things better for yourself. This podcast is authentic. It's unedited and without a bunch of ads.
All I ask is that you pass it along. Please forward an episode to a friend in need. And if you like my style and you wanna do some work with me, come join the club at takeout therapy dot com. Let's get to work. Hello there.
I'm so glad you stopped in today. Today's subject is a fun one for me to talk about, you know, it's easy to talk about the body and the mind, but, oh, friend. There's all this stuff that's going on that's so less tangible than that. Isn't there? And one thing people ask me a lot about is like, what's my intuition?
And how do I, like, figure out how do I discern the difference between my thinking and my intuition? Or how do I discern the difference between like my behavior based in trauma versus my behavior based on my intuition. Like, what does intuition feel like? And how do I know how to listen to it? Oh, I love this question so much because In my in my club, I recently did this series on I did a workshop called mental health one hundred and one, which is basically about like how mental health is a factor of how we relate and take care of our body, our mind, and our self.
And when I say self, I'll say that many people use lots of different words for this. Many people use spirit. Many people use soul. I personally go with Rick Hanson's method of the capital s self, which is this super intangible part of us that exists aside from everything else independently of the body independently of the mind. It's like the deepest deepest part of us that's that's really aware of our true thoughts, our true feelings, our true need, our true purpose sometimes, our true knowing.
It is our capital s self. This is so intangible. And so when people are fused about what's going on in their life and they get all these messages about, like, we'll just listen to your gut or listen to their in your intuition. They're like, what? How do we even know when that's happening?
And so the best way that I really know how to talk about intuition is this idea about yeses and noes or more specifically expansion and contraction. So expansion and contraction is a really great place to start. If you're somebody who's wondering what's up with your intuition and why you can't discern it, from everything else that's going on in the world. Now, listen. You can be the most emotionally developed person on your block and still not listen to your intuition.
Because the thing about intuition is it's like it's our pure knowing. Okay? So, like, when you were a kid and you you had a pure knowing that when you're in the target and you're having to wait in line, that you don't like that. That's a that's a hard no. Right?
Like, kids don't like those sorts of activities. And intuitively, they know, like, I need to, like, move more or I need to express my thoughts and feelings on this issue, which is why oftentimes in large box stores, you see children laying on the floor screening and kicking their feet. It's because they're expressing their true knowing was like, which is like, this is really frustrating to be in the store. Or this is very boring. To be in the store or I haven't moved enough today and I'm gonna lay on the floor and kick my feet and scream.
Right? Kids have good intuition. Kids are, like, hug your grandma Shirley and kids are, like, I don't really wanna hug grandma Shirley. That's their intuition. And oftentimes parents don't see it that way and so they say we'll just do it anyway because we hug our elder.
So we, you know, we do all these things because that's what we do. And kids know what's right for them and what's not right for them. And yet in the process of growing up, our intuition gets kind of squashed at every turn. Doesn't it? We're like, I don't wanna be friends with the girl next door, but we are anyway.
We're like, I don't really wanna play this sport, but our parents make us. And so through time, we sort of end up in all these situations that don't really feel very good, but we know we're supposed to be there. Because the adults in our life have, like, kind of pushed us into it or let us there or as society deems it normal for us to be in this situation. Like many kids go to college out of high school, whether they want to or not. Did you know that?
Did you do that? I did. I flunked out. In short order after learning many important lessons. Obviously, I made my way back to college, but my first start was not great.
And you guys, I intuitively knew at that time in my life as a seventeen year old girl that, like, I did not have, a, the mental health skills or the academic skills to do college. What I really needed to do is go out in the world and live a little and see where my skills were and make a decision about what I wanted to study because I'm one of those kind of people that, like, if I'm not interested in it, the content does not sync in. It's it's just like my brain does not absorb things I'm not interested in. And so if I had listened to my intuition, I wouldn't have gone to school. But when we grow up, our intuition gets overpowered by everything happening in life and we just sort of do as we're supposed to do.
So then we get to this stage in life and we're like, why can't I discern? Well, of course, you can't discern. Between your thinking and your feelings and your behaviors and your intuition because you're just not in good practice. So let's talk about it. Let's practice helping you come into contact with your intuition.
And the nice way to do this is to think about it in the way of the expansion and contraction. Meaning that sometimes in life, people or their words or situations that we're in, make us feel really tight tight in the chest, tight in the eyes, tight in the face, tight in the jaw, tight, tight, When we say no, I don't like that. Right? When the answers know, it's it's kind of a contraction. It's a tightening of the system, literal, and also emotionally.
Isn't it? And so that's one good way to feel your intuition is to feel for contraction. Like, you know how sometimes you go to a party and you meet somebody and you're like, I don't know about this person. Feel your body the next time that happens. Your body is telling you everything you need to know.
And if you learn to listen to it, then you'll know what you need to know too. So again, look for contraction. And feel what that feels like. Think about a situation right now that's going on in your life that brings you a lot of displeasure. Maybe it's angst or anxiety stress overwhelm, sadness, anger, whatever.
Give a little bit of attention to that situation. Just put it in your mind for a moment. And notice what happens to your body? It probably gets a little tight. You probably feel the situation a little bit.
And maybe you can take time side to do this after you finish the podcast and really kinda get into this exercise because it works better that way. But all I'm asking is for you to notice what happens in your body. Because that's a signal that's coming direct from you of you, your capital s self, your intuitive being. The part of you that's not your body and it's not your thoughts and it's not your behavior, it's not your brain. It's your intuition.
Now, think about something in your life that you just love. Maybe it's your pet. Maybe it's your partner. Maybe it's going out in the woods and riding your bike or running or I don't know. For me, it's nature, for sure.
It's backpacking, it's being on water, maybe expansion starts to happen. When you hit on things that are a good match for you, are a good fit for you, when you when you encounter people, when you meet people, that you're intuitively drawn to, you will feel an expansion. A yes. Right? Like when you met somebody that you fell in love with or when you met your best friend, there was an opening that happened.
Like, the chest is open. There isn't a lot of tightness or congestion or constriction there. Right? Right? There's not contraction.
There's like an opening. And sometimes the opening is a welling up. Oftentimes, when I'm feeling grief, which I definitely feel from time to time. To me, it feels like an expansion. Which is super interesting.
And I think it would be easy to go, like, well, that's weird. That's not good. No. It is good. I listen to my body.
Not my mind. Not this BS social stigma about feeling emotional, you know? I'm listening to my body and what it needs. And emotion sometimes creates expansion because that's how emotion gets out of the cage of our being. We have to expand.
And so sometimes even difficult emotion will feel rather expansive. But the brain quickly goes, well, you know, what are you so upset about? Or you shouldn't be sad or don't cry here, honey. But that's not true because that expansion that you feel It means that what you're feeling means something and it's appropriate and it's right for you. And so if you're somebody who's been searching for your intuition, I would recommend that you play around with expansion and contraction.
Play around with how does your body feel when it interacts the subject matter that you're trying to figure out. Right? And if you need to, like say you're in a relationship that you're kinda like, I don't know about this. How do you feel when you take a break from the relationship? When you just get some time to yourself when you just don't engage so much in whatever the drama is that exists in the relationship.
How does it feel to you. At first, it might feel really painful, but watch and listen. And feel because sometimes pain is a contraction that leads to expansion. Right? And sometimes, you just get stuck in contraction.
And what does it mean? It's just one piece of information in the puzzle. It's just one signal. Of how to get in touch with your intuition, expansion or contraction. You can use it as one data point to make decisions about what's right for you and what's not right for you.
Because there are definitely probably people in your life that are not right for you. And there are definitely probably situations that you get yourself into as I do too that are not good for you. And if we can feel those things, then we can make an exit. We can bow out. We can say goodbye.
We can take a break. We can set boundaries. We can use our other skills. Right? If there's situations in which our intuition is sort of begging us to protect or to nurture ourselves.
Something to listen to So that's all for today. I just want to highlight for you an easy way to connect with your intuition to feel your life a little bit more and to use that as just a little bit more information about how to proceed. I'm glad you listened today. I hope it was super helpful. If you wanna dig in with me any further, I really want you to come and join the Club.
Takeout Therapy Club is happening, and I'm having a lot of fun with it, and I'm getting all geeked out with all of you. That are part of the club. So let's keep it going. Visit me at takeout therapy dot com for more information. See you next time.
Thanks for listening. The goal of this project is really to provide health education to everyone who needs it. So if you want to help me with that, forward an episode to a friend or write a kind review. Please And if you like my style and you're ready to dig in, do some work with me, come join the club at takeout therapy dot com, where I'm now hosting a monthly mental health maintenance club. I also do classes, groups, and one on one coaching and therapy.
It's time for a change. Are you ready?
