Inform Yourself

My good friend Jay Niblick, founder of Innermetrix International, recently completed a study called The Genius Project. His study became the basis for his latest book, What’s Your Genius?

Intuition: knowledge from within; instinctive knowledge or feeling without the use of rational processes” Oxford English Dictionary

One of the first questions people ask when they start trying to become authentic is, “how do I learn to rely on my own talents better?” My answer is that there are two things they can do. The first is very easy and requires nothing more than your own attention. That answer is, “just listen.” You see, these voices in your head never stop speaking to you and even though you may have become quite adept at ignoring them, they are still there. These voices in your head are talking to you all the time - you just don’t realize it much of the time. They are seen on the surface as what some call intuition and this is what you have got to learn to listen to better.

Intuition is not about extrasensory perception (ESP), a sixth sense or anything mystical or super metaphysical. It is about data, gathered by our five senses, which is being recognized by our subconscious mind, instead of our conscious mind. Carl Jung noted, “intuition does not denote something contrary to reason, but something outside of the province of reason.” Dr. R. Rowan describes intuition as, “being able to bring to bear on a situation everything that you have seen, felt, tasted and experienced.”

Intuition is about instinctive or subconscious awareness. When I talk with people about the difference between using their conscious and subconscious minds I use the words reasoning and reacting. Reasoning is the result of logical, rational thought driven by your conscious mind. Reacting is the result of following your intuitive, subconscious mind.

Some people call it their “gut”, a “hunch”, a “funny feeling”, ”an inkling” and there are a hundred other euphemisms in as many cultures. The subconscious mind misses nothing and is aware of everything around us – always – so whenever we have a feeling about something that we can’t explain, it is more often than not just the fact that we can’t explain it based on what our conscious mind is aware of. We are not alone in our decision-making. There are two minds at work (or play) here. Instead of dismissing intuition as an unfounded and irrational impulse, reaching the 5th level requires that you learn to accept and respect this voice as it is your natural talents talking to you. In that frame of reference, learn to give that voice the benefit of the doubt and trust in it. The higher your levels of ability in a given dimension or class of talents (Head, Hand or Heart), the more intuitive you are about that dimension.

This is easier said than done, though. Just as we are not taught to trust our subconscious mind as much as our conscious mind, so too are we taught to go with what we know, not what we feel - stick with what you can prove, not some hunch.

"Intuition will tell the thinking mind where to look next" Dr. Jonas Salk

Of mammals, humans are the only ones who discourage listening to intuition, but there is a lot of research that proves that in reality intuition actually plays a larger role in decision-making than most conventional teachings would lead us to believe.

• Research into the decision-making of consumers shows that as much as 95% of the decision to purchase something is subconscious (Harvard-Zaltman, 2003)
• Research on Fire Fighters showed that 80% of their decisions were subconscious and intuitive rather than logical and rational (Klein et all, 2003)
• Research on Naval Commanders showed that 95% of decisions were based on intuition and “gut” rather than actually analyzing and comparing options (Klein et all, 1996)
• Yet another study of commercial airline aircrews in 1991 found that more than 95% of decisions were what was termed “snap judgments”, which are those based on intuition, not rationale (Mosier, 1991)
• In a study of offshore oilfield managers, one study showed similarly that 90% of decisions were not of the conscious rational type, rather they were snap judgments and intuitive (Flin, 1996)

Great athletes too are often quoted as saying “if you have to think about it, it’s too late.” Even those people that most of us would assume must be very logical and rational turn out to be very much driven by their intuitions. Physicist Albert Einstein’s genius for conceptual thinking was much more a feeling for him than a rationalization of the facts.

So intuitive and pure was this talent that he only vaguely understood it and rarely attempted to use words or logic to define it. In his work, Principles of Research, Einstein said, “There is no logical path to [truth]. Only intuition, resting on sympathetic understanding of experience, can reach it.”

This is not unusual for any of the modern-day geniuses we studied as well. Most had a very hard time attempting to explain their decisions in a literal sense, they just knew how they felt and what things they saw clearly and those they did not. Their level of intuition and willingness to trust their guts is extreme. Painter Pablo Picasso once told a friend, “I don’t know in advance what I am going to put on the canvas any more than I decide beforehand what colors I am going to use. Each time I undertake to paint a picture I have a sensation of leaping into space. I never know whether I shall land on my feet. It is only later that I begin to estimate more exactly the effect of my work.” What Picasso is saying here is that he follows his genius where it leads. He is not trying to control it, he is just trusting his gut and going with the flow. Only after he has created something might he then try to rationally explain or analyze it. Poet Robert Frost spoke about his process for writing poetry as one of, “carrying out some intention more felt than thought.”

"The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift." ~ Albert Einstein

I said that I gave two answers to the earlier question of how someone can learn to hear their own voices better. The first answer is simply “learn to listen to them.” The second answer is to use some method of actually measuring them. Subjective introspection (i.e., listening to what your inner voices are saying) is a good start, but it can only take you so far. Another way to help you to develop superior self-awareness is to employ some objective scientific tool that will actually measure and quantify those talents within. With my own clients I use a battery of different assessments, but the profile we used for the Genius Project was customized from its original design specifically for our purposes, so it is another great way of understanding your talents, your voices, your masters.