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“The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant.”
—Albert Einstein
In 2017, I was hovering ever closer to burnout while navigating a stressful time at the magazine job I worked a decade to get. A friend told me about a retreat; and despite my logical mind telling me it would be impossible with how much I had on my plate, something deep in my gut told me I needed to go. So, I did. That choice set into motion a series of similarly illogical choices—including quitting my job—that led me here, writing to you. Like the tug of an invisible string, across all of these moments, I followed an inner knowing: my intuition.
Research shows that consulting our intuition can help us choose the best outcome when faced with a complex situation. But what is it, and where does it come from? Does it belong to science or mysticism? From gut feelings to the sixth sense, intuition has had countless names and as many meanings—but the root of the word is the Latin verb intueri, which means “to look inside” or “inner sight.” Generally speaking, it is a way of perceiving beyond customary channels of thought, a knowing that exists outside the realm of apparent logic.
Western science often positions intuition as our ability to quickly access—and assess—stored information. It’s your mind processing the many factors of your circumstance, according to Joel Pearson, a neuroscientist, psychologist, and professor at the University of New South Wales. Your gut feeling to not turn down a dark alley might be your brain weighing lighting, time, and location based on lived experience and what you’ve been taught (which is why it is often encouraged to pair intuition with slow, deliberate reasoning to weigh for biases). In other words, intuition is a portal to the unconscious.
Other researchers have linked intuition to interoception, saying that our gut feelings are our brain’s ability to interpret bodily signals. In the 1990s, neuroscientist Antoine Bechara and his colleagues created the Iowa Gambling Task, an experiment designed to study how people make decisions amid uncertainty. They found that the brain uses “somatic markers” (changes in the body like increased heart rate, tension in the gut, or sweaty palms) to label certain choices as good or bad. In this sense, intuition is our ability to interpret the wisdom of the body.
Of course, mystic traditions have long detailed forms of spiritual insight likened to intuition. Mystics and poets like Meister Eckhart and Rumi wrote of certain heart-knowings, truths that our deepest selves are aware of, untouched by logic. Hindus and Buddhists describe the third eye, our capacity to see beyond physical reality, while Daoists practice wu wei, effortless action when one is aligned with the flow of nature. Witches and wise women have been sought out—and persecuted for—their ability to intuit the unknown. And since time immemorial, Indigenous people have described an awareness both ancestral and relational. The list goes on.
I have come to think of intuition as how nature speaks to and through us. And by nature, I mean both our deepest, inner nature as well as the collective nature that connects us all. Listening to our intuition is how we can practice being in collaboration with life or the universe. The beauty is that we all possess this capacity. Intuition isn’t a voice we must attain, but rather the one we attune to when we can quiet all the other noise of modern living.
Whether a link to the unconscious or knowing of the body, a connection to the divine or nature, intuition can take many forms—but in all of them, it is a tether to the unknown, a wisdom that exists beyond our conscious minds. I think we need more of that in a world of corrupt logic and thinking machines. Wherever it comes from, I’m grateful for every time I followed that internal tug of string and listened to a sense called sixth by some, that I hope one day will be common.
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