“What is Intuition?”

Dear Friend,

A lot of times I’m asked about the relationship of insight—the sudden aha moments—and intuition—the moments of great perception and gut instinct.

Insight and intuition are not the same thing.  They are both human skills that are not commonly used and belong to parts of the brain that are not favored by the Social mind.  Because they belong to a similar domain, they can often seem like the same thing.  It’s like two people coming from the same, exotic country.  They may not know each other.  They may not share much in common.  To outsiders, however, they are more alike than they are different.

All people are intuitive, and capable getting gut-level solutions to problems, and gut-level perceptions about the world.  Insight comes from exposure to True reality—the Tao without any mask.  Sometimes the exposure to reality occurs through intuition.  Most times it does not.  Insight, however, increases the power of a person’s intuition, and the chance that information coming from the gut is accurate and useful.

There are 3 factors that severely limit intuitive ability

1) It exists in the domain of socially forbidden knowledge.  In cultures where it is supported or strongly favored, people are much more intuitive and capable of making good decisions using intuition.

2) It is easily influenced by desire and fear.  Desire and fear are powerful motivators and can easily overwhelm clear perception of any sort.  For many people, intuition has a strong emotional response, and so is easily clouded by emotion.  Basically, desire and fear creates a situation where a person wants to see or perceive something about the surrounding world.  The person then interprets his or her own desire as intuition.  Of course, logic can be bent just as easily by emotion.  You just have to make a bigger effort to do so.

3) When you think of intuition, you think of it as separate from the intellect—thought or reason.  You may even think of the two as being hostile to one another.  Let’s take me as an example to explore.  Because I am able to use my intellect to explain and teach, I am often accused of being intellectual and anti-intuitive.  Of course, I rely on intuition daily, and make most of my decisions based on instinct.  I do this because I understand the limits of the intellect, and the limits of intuition.  This is knowledge that any experienced and trained Taoist has.  The real limit that is created comes from believing that intellect and intuition are hostile to one another.  In such a situation, the intellect usually suppresses intuition and instinct.

The Taoist is concerned with activating and using the Complete Human--that means both intuition and intellect.  What I do is what many experienced Taoist practitioners do. Intuition points the way, and intellect figures out the steps.  Using these two elements together, I can make changes, develop plans, and produce at a rate that is shocking to most people.  Of course, I’m not plodding along at war with myself.  This is power that is available to anyone that wants to pursue it, because it’s already inside of you.

Warm Regards,

Master Mikel Steenrod

Keeper of the Gate of Man and Heaven