Using Intuition

As a philosopher, I trust rationality.  Making logical decisions is a necessary step to living a successful life, and rationality is an important tool for achieving your goals.  As much as I trust and promote logic as a necessary and useful tool, I declare that intuition is more important. 

Intuition is more important because the human is an amazing machine with incredible capabilities.  While we can think through a problem logically, we often miss key premises, or use faulty logic, but our intuition quickly analyzes the situation and already has the answers we seek.  It is a guiding force that has been developed and perfected through milennia of evolution to allow us to process the complex patterns of life before our consciousness even becomes fully aware of them.  A well-developed intuition is never wrong.  This is a key point which I will address later.

While modern science cannot yet point to the area of the brain responsible for intution, I can tell you it is different from the area used in conscious thought and rationality.  It uses a more basic, primitve part of the brain which is why it is associated more with a 'feeling' than a linguistic reasoning.  It is something innate in every human, that has a close connection to the essence of the way things are.  Its your connection to God, or Nature, or the Great Equation, if you will.  It does not matter what you call it, but your intuition has the answers and it knows what to do.  And it is right.  Using intuition comes with the benefit of complete confidence.

The problem is, that we also have an aspect of ourselves that competes with our intutition.  It is our consciousness, our language, and our fears that continually work to repsectively challenge, silence, and change our intuition's message.  These are the checks and balances of our human system.  While consiousness, language, and fears play an important role in our lives, they interfere with our abilities to utilize the full potential of our intuition.  This is why it is so important to practice utilizing intuition, exercising this capacity until it is well developed and one is familiar enough with it to get the right message out of it. 

Everybody has had the experience of listening to their intutition.  Think of the scenario when something just didn't feel right, so you avoided it to find out there would have been a personal disaster.  Or the scenario when you decided to jump in and 'go for it anyway' beating the odds to be successful.  One's intuition is more often ignored however, and often to one's peril.  There have beens everal examples I could share where the little subconscious voice in my head told me to do, or not do something, but ignoring the warning signs, I continued anyway, leading to a difficult situation. 

The most recent personal experience I've had with intuition was when I was driving in a new neighborhood, and I did not know the speed limit.  Mindlessly driving along, I had the thought out of the blue that I should immediately slow down, and hitting the brakes I dropped my speed by 15 mph.  Not a block later, there was a police officer with a radar gun hidden around the corner checking for speeders.  As the next speed limit sign came up, realized that my reduction in speed put me only at 3 mph over the limit instead of 18, thus avoiding a ticket.  My intuition led me to the right action.

This is a small example, but if you think back to your life, I'm sure you can identify many examples.  But the key to developing your intuition and using it effectively, is to constantly be in tune with it rather than only listen to it in the few moments it screams at you (as in the speeding example above).  It has much to give you if you listen.  There are many exercises which can work toward this, but ultimately, it involves remaining relaxed, self-aware, and having the will-power to lucidly control your actions rather than spontaneously react to life.  Let your intuition be a guiding force in your life.  Using intuition as your guiding force will quickly lead you to your success as it is always right.

The Great Negotiator

Travelling to other countries, it quickly becomes appearant that nearly everything is negotiable.  This concept is foreign to many Americans as we pay "sticker price" for most items without thinking about it.  Sure, there are times where negotiation comes into play, but by and large it is not part of our culture.  Travel to China or India however, and its a completely different story, where you negotiate for nearly everything from food, to merchandise, to cab fare, and more.  While the skills of constant negotation are intricate take time to develop, one rule prevails over all others:  You have to be willing to walk away in order to get what you want.

The key to getting what you want is successfully negotiating in the ultimate game of life.  If you want to be rich, you have to negotiate with Life the terms on which to acheive that.  If you want to live on a beach on a tropical island, you have to negotiate with Life the terms on which to acheive that.  If you want to travel the world, you have to negotiate with Life the terms on which to acheive that.  If you want to live in a cabin in the woods, you have to negotiate with Life the terms on which to acheive that.

And while the skills of constant negotation are intricate and take time to master, one rule prevails over all others:  You have to be willing to walk away in order to get what you want.  Let me elaborate.

Many people are stuck in their lives, not knowing how to achieve their dreams, desires, and ambitions.  In their mental scripts there are a million reasons why it won't work, and few if any reasons why it will work.  That is a poor position from which to negotiate your own terms.  The reason one cannot successfully negotiate is because they are not willing to walk away from what they have in order to achieve it.  Perhaps you have the (false) security of a 9-5 job, or you have a decent house.  Perhaps you are poor, but get by just fine.  Perhaps you run a small business, and can make ends meet, but haven't been able to expand to the next level.  These things are all great, but often hold us back because we are not willing to walk away from them.  We are not willing to walk away toward something greater, and we are not willing to walk away risking losing it all.  But if you want to be successful you must be willing.  And in your journey toward success at some point you will be willing to walk away.

Note that I say willing to walk away.  Its not always the case that you will have to, but if you don't put that as an option, you have no levarage in your negotiations with Life.  You will be willing to walk away when moment comes because it will lead to your success in the adventure you pursue. You will get the best deal from life only when you learn to negotiate with the Great Negotiator.  Getting what you want out of life requires you to choose a direction and negotiate until you reach your destination getting the best deal you can along the way.

Direction

It is beneficial to have a direction in which to go.  It does not matter what that direction is, but it is important to choose one and start going that way.  You may be side-tracked, lost, or turned around in the process.  No matter.  It is important to go anyway.  By standing still, you fade away and lose the great experience of Life.  Pick a direction and start your journey.  Take action to acheive what is in your heart and what you feel in the essence of your being.  Become yourself.  The advancement you will bring to your life, and to the world will change you for the better.  This is a garauntee.  However, if you stand still you will get nothing.  Begin your journey in the direction that you have chosen and become yourself. 

This is a direction in which only you can travel, and it will be slow-going, bringing almost imperceptable gains, but in time you will see that you have begun to master your life.  It does not matter the direction as you will find the way during your travels, but you must pick a direction and start going.  Take today to start travelling in the direction of your choice.  Be your own master.

Balance

A lesson I have learned in my practice of Ba Gua is to learn balance through imbalance.  I have recently been reflecting on this lesson and it has reminded me of the ying-yang symbol.  The ying-yang symbol is very ancient and developed according to the observed principle of balance.  Everything ultimately results in balance.  Combined with the notion of constant change, you begin to see that there are ups and downs to everything.  The circular shape of the ying yang represents the flowing change, and the black white dimensions show the contrast between dominant energies.    The circle of the opposite  color within each domain shows that everything has a tinge of its opposite within it.  This simple symbol becomes quite complex when analyzed over time and takes on an almost divine meaning.  But how does one use this meaning in daily life? 

I recently wrote about sustainability, and the ying-yang symbol represents the balance I touched on in that post.  Not just in the environment, but in everything.  For every excess, there is poverty, for every euphoria, there is depression, for every good day, there is a bad day.  These are the trials and tribulations of our life.  Unfortunately, we’ve been conditioned to believe in imbalance.  We want constant excess, euphoria, and everlasting good days.  Instead of appreciating and embracing the balance of things, we fight it at all costs.  But its important to realize that in order to understand excess, one must experience poverty.  In order to understand happiness, one must experience sadness, and in order to appreciate a good day, one must have experienced a bad day.  The opposites give meaning to eachother.  While its important to experience the imbalance of excess in order to understand balance, it is detrimental to continually seek imbalance.  Work on bringing balance into your life.

Tale of a Preacher

A man walked into the woods to get relief from the relentless sun.  As he walked he noticed the life around him and had a moment of enlightenment as the spirit of the woods imparted to him a message of the way life is meant to be.  As he continued walking, he came upon a path leading up a mountain and decided to climb to the top.  Looking out over the valley after his long journey to the top, he noticed that the sun was nearly setting and the world was nearly quiet.  He himself could not be quiet however, as the message imparted on him by the woods had been turning in his head for the entire climb, and he knew that he had discovered a sacred secret about life.  On the mountain top he realized he was alone, with no one but himself and the mountain with which to speak.  He decided however that his newfound message was too valuable to keep to himself and proceeded to speak the meaning of life he learned from the woods as he understood it.  As he finished speaking this divine secret, he made a deep etching capturing the essence of his words on a giant stone next to where he was sitting, and the sun fell behind the horizon just as he finished, leading to a quiet stillness in the valley and in himself.  He realized the world had just been changed by his words, by his message, even if only in the smallest sense.  He slept a long deep dreamless sleep and when he awoke, the valley had also been awakened, buzzing and humming its own message in return.  The man quickly descended the mountain, and exited the wood, to breathe the fresh sun-drenched air.  He had only his message to give henceforth, and understood the little miracle that he spoke changed the world everywhere he went.  He understood the importance of his impact as his message was imparted to others so that they, after a long journey of their own, could speak it as they understood it.

The Desire to Understand Life

A curious mind is constantly exploring the world with the desire to know Life, and to understand Life.  It is only when you can understand life that you can make rational decisions with conscious control over your behavior.  Let me give you an example. 

You might spend the evening behind a tv or computer screen, but you will benefit if you stand up and try this exercise.  With your palm on one hand facing down in front of you and all your fingers together pointing in a forward direction, try to draw a perfect circle in the air.  Now try to draw that same exact circle perfectly at half speed.

If this is your first time trying this, your first circle was probably fairly decent, and you did it at a moderately fast speed that you are naturally comfortable with.  The second circle you drew was not nearly a perfect circle, and it was hard to control your speed to go so slowly.  This demonstrates that you do not have very much physical control of your body.  It can be learned however by drawing the slow circle many times until you can go even slower. 

If your mind does not have good control over your body, how can it have good control of your will.  This too can be practiced by resting the mind.  So, take a deep breathe to relax, and try the exercise above with the circles, because you will develop both your physical precison, and your mental willpower.

 You have just explored an aspect of life that helps you to understand Life.  Doing these types of activities (and 1000's of other similar activities) you begin to understand Life.  While you may never get to a true enlightenment, you make constant progress to getting closer to Life's meaning.  Approaching this understaning of Life, you begin to think clearly and can make more rational decisions while exercising your will.

There are those who don't want to understand life.  They are content to not know, and do not want to explore to get further answers or enlightenment.    It is simple enough to be led by the physical pleasures in life.  It is much more of an accomplishment to explore beyond the physical pleasures, and to be led by your sheer will.  So how do you get control of your own will?

Really this is a path that only you can go down, as the answer is different for everybody.  You need to explore life and figure that part out.  I can't tell you how to control your own will, but I can give you suggestions for things that have worked for me to understand life:

• Put yourself in an uncomfortable position and relax in it everyday.  I mean this both physically through stretching or lifting or doing some difficult exercise, and I also mean this in the other context of taking actions to expand your mental awareness.  Go somewhere you don't know the language, talk to a stranger, give somebody $100 out of the blue, go skydiving, etc.  
• Observe how nature works.  Nature is a complex entity, much more complex than our most advanced technology, and it works incredibly efficiently and resilliantly.  Go somewhere you can find a relatively undisturbed natural place and sit quietly while observing the interactions.  The longer you stay the better, whether its sitting quietly for an hour or for 3 days.  Observe how nature works and adopt its patterns into your life.
• Do opposites to acheive balance.  If you just lifted somehting heavy, lift somehting light.  If you were just angry, practice being calm.  If you've been calm all day, work on getting excited about something.  If you've been working for 70 hours, take a vacation. 

These are just a few of the exercises you can do, and the list is virtually limitless.  Be creative with your time as you only live once.  Please share a comment with the things that you do in your life to explore Life, because it can only lead to enlightenment.

The Meaning of Sustainability

The term 'sustainable' is lightly tossed around in conversations about the environment, food, energy, and even the economy, to demonstrate that we as a civilization are in trouble if we continue on our current trajectory.  It has become a buzz word that triggers euphoria in hippies and nausea in conservatives.  From my personal experience, I have approached the word with great concern and interest, especially when presented with compelling data, but have grown callous to it with over exposure.  This has triggered me to reflect on the true meaning of the word, and how it relates to the way we live our lives.

Without consulting a dictionary, I would define something as sustainable if it can be continued indefinitely.  A sustainable system is one in which the inputs feed the outputs and the outputs feed the inputs, leading to a closed cycle which is balanced.  I have seen this imagery in the form of an ouroborus, and Aristotle described the universe as the mythical snake eating its own tail and constantly regenerating.  If we care about self preservation, it is worth caring about whether we are living sustainably, that is in a way in which we can preserve our collective quality of life or improve it indefinitely. 

It became clear with the economic collapse, that our system was not sustainable, and it needed a large boost to stay afloat.  Its questionable if that boost has put it on track to be sustainable from this point on or if it was merely a band aid on a much larger wound.  Looking at the world economy would lead one to believe it was just a band aid.  And if our economy is not sustainable, it is not likely that other parts of our lives are sustainable either.  We're running out of things.  Quickly.  While I could write a list of things that we can never get back, its better said that we are running out of the ability to continue doing what we are doing.

I'm not here to argue about conserving fossil fuels, or conserving water, or conserving soil, or conserving the environment.  I think those are all important things, but they don't really matter.  They don't matter because we are currently not living sustainably and this means that we either change our ways or we perish.  What matters is that we, as a species, as a civilization are able to continue to thrive.  And this ability is currently being threatened by our current lifestyles. 

I'm not here to argue about the right way to live your life, or that you should bike more often than drive, or that you should eat local organic foods because I do not have the answers, and I'm not sure our best actions could solve the current system of unsustainability.  It is estimated that the world can only support 1-2 billion people, and I'm not eager to see how that goes down.  But I do find it believable that life has value and it is important to preserve our world, our quality of lives for our children, nieces, nephews, grandchildren, and neighbors if we value our existence and the ability for civilization to thrive.   It seems people want to take everything they can before its all gone and leave nothing for the future (either for themselves or the next generations).  We are destroying instead of building, consuming instead generating. 

 Nature will correct itself as it always has and always will.  This means we can begin to live sustainably either by choice through consciously changing our ways, or by force through an unstable environment, government, and economy.  I do not fear continuing on the current path because I know it cannot happen as it is by definition not sustainable.  Sustainable is the only thing that can persevere and is the natural order of things.  The only question is what will the future to get to sustainability look like and how do we make it the least painful?  Make your changes now so you won't be forced to do so later.  Cleaning up the mess begins with the individual cleaning up his or her own life.