Trusting Yourself and Your Intuition

One of the most elusive but important feelings to embrace is your “gut feeling,” also known as intuition. In part, trusting yourself relies on introspection and tapping into innate physiologic responses that arise with many life situations and circumstances you are faced with daily in your life. Based on a litany of life experiences and interactions that cannot be contested, trusting yourself, your “gut feeling,” your intuition—the ability to understand instinctively or knowingly without conscious reasoning—should provide a built-in layer of comfort and sustainable support when making small and big life decisions.

Introspection

Looking inward, assessing, and reflecting on one’s own thoughts, feelings, and sensations to gain insight and glean an understanding of personal behaviors and experiences.

Judy M. Kellum’s Story

Judy M. Kellum is a 45-year-old executive director of JMK Empower, an Atlanta community-based organization she established that offers psychological assessments and services to abused women and teenage girls. JMK Empower is primarily grant-funded but also relies on fundraising efforts and donations from philanthropists, professionals, and local celebrities. Over the years, Kellum has built trusting relationships in the community and is widely known as a caring, authentic, and trustworthy woman, visionary, and professional. After a recent fundraising soiree hosted by Kellum, staff, and several women and teens receiving services from JMK Empower, Kellum was informed by her accountant that $2,000 was “missing” from the fundraising collected funds. Days after the event, Kellum called a meeting and discussed the discrepancy with the designated staff collecting the cash donations; no one immediately came forward. However, the next day, staffer Nina K., a long-term JMK program manager and single mother of two children, requests a private meeting with Kellum and discloses that she, in fact, “borrowed” the money to cover her upcoming mortgage and food for herself and children and she had planned to replace the funds within seven days during their next pay period. Kellum has known Nina for over 10 years and has never had any issues with her. It has grown both their professional and personal relationship. What should Kellum do in this situation? Would the answer be obvious to you? While Kellum raises many logical questions in her mind, her “gut feeling” says there’s more to the story and warrants a deeper dive for a thoughtful and hopefully rectifiable response before anything permanently punitive ensues. Many of you, at some point, have or will face a personal, professional, ethical, and/or social dilemma and will need to make a decision that not only makes sense but one you can live with.

Life coach and motivational speaker Iyanla Vanzant describes in her book Mastering the 4 Essential Trusts: Trust in God, Trust in Yourself, Trust in Others, Trust in Life (2015) the inherent beauty of “trust in yourself.” She explains that

“Trust turns rejection, abandonment, disappointment, and loneliness based on social norms into motivation rather than deterrents. Trust moves us beyond what is wrong and what is missing into taking the next best step that will make a difference—trust is an inherent part of who we are as human beings.”

Concurrently, Warell (2020) suggests that not trusting oneself limits self-belief and the power to believe that one’s full potential can be reached. While self-monitoring and authenticity-centered behaviors foster trust, integrity must be fundamental to avoid word-deed misalignment (Nguyen, 2022).

5 Top Reasons to Trust Your “Gut Feelings”:

1. Authentic Beliefs and Core Value Alignment
2. Cumulative Knowledge and Experiences
3. Emotional Intelligence and Insight
4. Holistic Perspective and Subjectivity
5. Red Flags and Warning Signs

Logic and rational thinking absolutely have their place and, likely, for many people, take precedence and supersede subconscious insight, but acknowledging and listening to your inner voice is beyond merit-worthy. According to Ryan (2015), when we trust ourselves and our instincts, the following can happen:

• We Blossom Into Our Fullness.
• We Let Go of Should, Must, Ought.
• We Live More Congruently With Life’s Measures.
• We Say “No” Without Reservation.
• We Release Ourselves From Some of the “The Rules.”
• We Become More Optimistic and Trusting in Life.

Trusting in yourself can be innate as well as harnessed and nurtured. Relying on knowledge and experience only you can define can help with small and big decisions and major actions or inaction in life. And although intuition should not be the only basis for which decisions are made, learning to trust your “gut feelings” can be a useful tool and valuable complement to rational thinking and critical analysis. Protect and preserve your energy and embrace the inherent wealth of your intuitive mental, emotional, and behavioral health by being introspective. The power is within.

Your supportive sisters in mental health and wellness,

Kisha and Malika