April 14, 2020

Navigating uncertainty is an ongoing focus of these times. We never know what is coming and now that understanding is even more present. The yoga tradition says is a defining characteristic of the human condition. At times, the reality of uncertainty is more hidden and at other times, like now, it is more revealed. An antidote to living with uncertainty is to deepen our capacity to trust.

Trust is intimately woven into the way we engage with others and with ourselves. The non-dual yoga tradition teaches that all that is found outside us is also inside us. Relationships with something or someone outside us are merely reflections of the internal relationship we have with ourself.

It is often easier to see trust from this external perspective. We can easily name people in our lives that we trust. Asking about the qualities of one of these relationships does elicit certain responses: reliability, unconditional positive regard, authenticity, loyalty, for example. Yet many of us do not cultivate an equally loving, authentic, trusting relationship with ourselves. We make ourselves promises we do not keep, we berate ourselves in ways we would never consider using against a friend, we forgive others more easily than we forgive ourselves and so on. These attitudinal responses we have toward others and ourself create internal noise that interferes with our ability to listen to and follow our intuition which is intertwined with our capacity to trust.

In high school, my class was asked to engage in a team-building exercise. One of the exercises was to fill in a classmate’s name for a series of value questions. One question asked which fellow student would I trust with my life. I do not remember who I chose but I remember the process I went through. I did not choose my friend or a popular kid .... in fact, I remember being surprised by my choice. The answer came, not from a logical cognitive process, but instead a less conscious one. The answer floated up from the depths of my being, from my intuition.

To cultivate trust is to listen to that voiceless directive, the almost silent knowing, the spontaneous instinctual sense, the insight that floats up into consciousness unexpectedly. It is not reasoned out, logical, intellectual; it arises from our core, our centre, the heart of our being. And its power is timeless wisdom, insight and a knowing beyond rational thought. It is the heart’s unspoken voice.

The challenge with listening to our intuition is that this skill has been conditioned out of us. Social and cultural norms teach us to value logic, critical thinking and reasoned planning. There is little room for the spontaneous, unpredictable arising out of the intuitive voice. With survival anxiety as an evolutionary necessity, we have come to worry about placing our trust in our intuition. Mental reasoning seems protective and smart as a decision-making technique. It is what will allow us to conquer our darkest fears, we think.

In reality, we have already survived most of what we fear — and listening to our mental reasoning didn’t prevent any of those apprehensions. As adults, we have probably had our heart broken with the ending of a love relationship, survived physical injury or illness, lost someone / something we loved. In reflection, often we find these moments were not only survivable but also yielded wisdom.

In building the kind of relationship with myself that rehabilitates intuition and prioritizes an ability to listen to my intuitive wisdom, I have to have faith in what I hear. Fortunately, listening and developing confidence in our intuition can be learned. The yoga tradition has specific practices that may be helpful in building our connection with and trust in our intuition. Here are three ways to creating an intimate relationship with our inner voice:

1. reflection. We have all made intuitive decisions but we perhaps have not recognized them for what they were. I didn’t consciously call on my intuition to choose the person I would trust with my life in high school. Upon reflection, however, I recognize this as an intuitive decision. Engaging in regular reflection on our decisions and the decision-making process may aid in recognizing when our internal guide was present. 


Similarly building a relationship with difficult yoga poses that stretch our capability can also cultivate self-trust. Trying poses, failing and surviving that failure amplifies our courage, perseverance and dedication - all necessary in the process of following intuition especially when moving outside of social norms.

1. relaxation - How do we listen to our inner voice of wisdom? It is not something that we can “figure out” or think our way through. Intuition is that spontaneous emergence in the pause after we ask the question. In order to hear more clearly that voice, we must practice listening. Effective listening requires a calm, relaxed state. If our body - mind system is agitated from over-stimulation and a chronic low level activation of our fight or flight response, listening to our barely perceptible inner voice is impossible. So, a key step in the practice of listening to our intuition is relearning what a state of relaxation, (something the body knows exactly how to achieve when given the chance), feels like. Slowing down, pausing and actively setting aside time for relaxation practices (for example, daydreaming, epsom salt baths, intentional silent time, prescribed no-device time) is instrumental in reducing the over-stimulation that interferes with our capacity to hear our intuitive voice. Once we slow down the parasympathetic nervous system, we have more ability to tune in.

2. taking responsibility for our own state - To have clear access to our internal voice, taking full responsibility for our physical, mental and emotional state is necessary. Putting blame outside of us removes any opportunity for action on our part. From this stance, we are only able to see what the other should or should not do. As a result, there is no way into our own sense of what we need and what effective action could be appropriate. Recognizing that we alone are responsible for our mental patterns, our emotional states and how relationship with our body gives us the power needed to move inward, to ask what is needed at any given moment, to listen for the response and to take clear action as a result of the answer is intuition in motion.

Cultivating a deeper level of self-trust and a stronger connection to the internal intuitive wisdom has the potential of building a state where fear and doubt fade. The resulting ease is well worth the process of the practice.