When folks ask what I do and I tell them I’m a Feng Shui Consultant, Intuition Trainer and Professional Organizer, it’s always interesting to watch and hear their responses. They range from barely disguised rolling-of-the-eyes to fascination and are almost always followed by, “You mean you can TEACH INTUITION?”   Frequently, the next question is, “What’s it got to do with Feng Shui and Organization?” 

Well - nearly everyone has a story about some time in their life that they knew something without knowing why they knew it.  Some will even admit it!  And sometimes when you enter a house with “bad vibes,” you’re picking up on what has happened there in the past or the emotional climate of it’s current occupants.  In short, your intuition is always giving you information – about people, life decisions, spaces – all of which has implications for Feng Shui.    Now whether you can receive it, know how to listen to it and use it – that’s another matter.

First, the answers. Yes, you can teach intuition, but it’s a little more like training than teaching.  Teaching implies an “it” that is outside of us, knowledge we don’t already have.  Training, on the other hand, seems more about learning to use something we have access to or we have the option to access, if we only had the tools.  That fits intuition - we all have it and have had it since birth. However, in varying degrees – we have been:

• trained out of relying on it
• learned to distrust it (because it’s not visible or “scientific”)
• scoffed at  for believing in it
• told it’s only our imagination
• told it’s only a “dream”

Westerners, as a society have a certain amount of pride in more left-brained/linear pursuits.  We are only now – in the last 10 years – beginning to publicly acknowledge our curiosity with and need for more right-brained, creative, non-linear approaches to life, health and problem solving.  More significant though is the respect it is beginning to garner in fields as seemingly far a-field as engineering, computer tech support and management. I think part of that is due to information and stimulus overload and the realization that some of the “softer skills” really fill a void and provide insight and genius when hard facts alone no longer solve everything or give enough of the right kind of information.

To the second question, “What’s Intuition got to do with it?”  I would add, that Feng Shui is about being aware of our environments, the symbolism that surrounds us and knowing how to use that awareness to our best advantage.   That awareness includes not only what we can see with our physical eyes, but what we can “see, hear or feel” with the other senses. 

Since Intuition is one of those senses (always present, but left to languish from under-use) there is a direct relationship.  Who needs to tune into what’s happening “out there” when we have telephones, computers, paparazzi and the government telling us what’s “true, real and proven.”  If you felt a slight twinge with that last statement, I think you’re ripe for wanting to develop that 6th sense that will guide you to deciphering for yourself what’s “true, real and proven.” 

Here’s the deal:  when you were a kid you cried when something didn’t feel right and you received certain feed back that was either affirming or said “Don’t try that again.”  If you received the latter message frequently enough, you probably learned to stifle expressions that show feeling or awareness of your surroundings, because no one was listening or responding.  The next step might have been – “well that didn’t help, we’ll turn off that sensor.’   The result is, that from birth, we get signals, which support or demean that “sense,” allowing us to further develop it or distrust it.  So – parents – heads-up when your kiddos tell you about their dreams, “imaginary playmates,” flying dreams and other non-ordinary events.  You have an opportunity to nourish and help you child understand and use information they’re receiving and to develop a life skill that will serve them (and you) well.

As physical organisms, we are designed to respond only to those stimuli that are necessary for our survival.  For example, frog’s brains register a response only to visual stimuli that alert them to food or danger.  Hooked up to a little froggie EKG it’s been shown that frog’s eyes respond to rapid shifts in light patterns and sharp, erratic movements.  Both are indicators that a nice, juicy bug is within striking distance OR that “something big comes this way,” and might signal the end is near.    It might explain why you see so many flattened frogs – cars (for the most part) aren’t darting within tongue range and by the time they can see the shadow – well, you get the idea…

As humans, we are bombarded by SO MANY stimuli, that if we responded to all of them, our brains would be in constant chaos and overload.  So we must constantly filter to receive only those stimuli that are most pressing.  The dilemma as I see it is, that we have so MUCH information coming in now, that we need to rely on something other than the linear, information analysis paradigm to determine what relevant, safe and appropriate.  There’s not enough time in this lifetime to apply the analytical approach to the information we receive in just a couple of days.  So we need to apply a smarter filter (intuition), then use the linear method to fine tune.    It reminds me of something I read from another Professional Organizer, and will paraphrase:  ‘We receive so much data through Email, news and television each day it would take us a year to process all of it.  It’s a little like drinking from a Fire Hose.’

Harnessing your intuition is like using an Anti-Virus program.  Your Intuition-filter deletes the information you don’t want, can’t use and might actually be harmful, allowing you more time to focus on how to use the most relevant data.   When your Anti-Virus program fails, you can find yourself in deep trouble and it may take days or weeks to get back on your path.  A recent experience with this has made me acutely aware of the devastating consequences.  It’s a distraction that few of us can afford.  So think of your 6th Sense, as a high-tech pathfinder:  you may not know how it works, but you don’t want to navigate without it.  In the vernacular of flying, it’s your Instrument Landing System (ILS) bringing you down for a safe landing when you can’t see your way through the storm clouds.    But that’s quite enough metaphor for one paragraph.

Once you become a bit proficient or at least start recognizing and trusting the signals you receive, the practical applications for this newfound information source are boundless.  In my earlier years of learning to identify relevant information, I had no idea what do to with it.  The intuitive mind does not always receive in language or images we know what to do with.  The tendency is to apply logic to the data and write a short story to explain it and place it into the context of rational thought.  This is troublesome, because it usually takes us in a completely divergent direction.  Sometimes you might receive information and have it verified ONLY to let you know that a certain feeling is a signal to “pay attention,” and that you are – in fact - on track.  Here are a few examples from my own experience. 

When my sons were young toddlers, I had a dream I knew to be pre-cognitive.    It had that particular feel of dreams that had manifested in exact detail on other occasions. In the dream, I was driving with my boys and encountered high water.  This was totally unexpected, and as the dream ended there was a threat of us being swept off the road into  roiling, muddy, flood-stage waters.  At the time of the dream, it was 105 degrees outside and we were experiencing one of the longest, most severe summer droughts in memory.

So – when I put three life jackets (2 kids and an adult) in the back seat, nestled between their car seats, friends thought I’d gone a little daft.  They were still there when my oldest son, Travis, was invited to be the Ring Bearer in the wedding of a friend.  By then, it was February and torrential rains were the order of the day, along with bitter cold and the flu.  When the day of the wedding came, we had coughs, felt lousy and didn’t really want to go anywhere in the downpour, much less to a dress-up event an hour-and-a-half drive through the hill country on a good day.   This was not a good day…

We departed, and about two miles out of town I had the most bizarre urge to stop at a Dry Cleaners and call – just to be sure – the wedding had not been postponed.  That in itself felt pretty ridiculous, but I had the feeling I needed to stop, and justified it with the phone call.  No such luck – we we’re still on.  Just then,  a man walked in the door and said “I have no idea why I’m here, except that I thought I might find someone on the way to Fredericksburg, and let them know that the river is cresting.  If they try to cross they’ll be swept off the bridge.  It’s very dangerous!  Please tell anyone you see headed in that direction to turn around.”  Well, not needing to be hit in the head by the proverbial 2X4, I knew that information was my signal.  That’s the river we would have to cross to get there, and we were still an hour away – meaning it surely would crest by the time we cross the bridge.

We made another call, turned around and headed home – where, you guessed it – I took the life jackets out of the car. 

There have been many other less dramatic events.  It has saved my life in Italy; guided me to the aid of my younger son, Brett  in a school out-of-state and steered us away from a business deal that looked great on paper – but later was found to be fraudulent. More importantly, it has provided me with an inner gauge to allow my sons the latitude to recognize, trust and be guided by their OWN instincts and intuition, when my logic would have had me resist, control and finally alienate the two people I hold dearest to my heart. The only decisions I can say were truly ill advised were those where I allowed the linear to rule completely, and ignored my intuitive hit.    Sometimes, when emotion and pressure coincide, it’s hard to know the difference between intellect, fear and intuition.  That’s where the training really helps.

Here’s some news you can use.  There are a number of different ways we receive information:

• Visual
• Auditory
• Tactile
• Dreams
• Spontaneous “thought bubbles”
• Gut feel
• Joy/anticipation
• All of the above

The first step is to make a list of  5 times you “knew something” without know how you knew it.  The, if you can remember, write about how you “got it,” choosing from the list above or a combination.  Next, describe the episode of “knowing” and the event that affirmed or verified the initial hit.  These activities will help you identify your style and build confidence in your ability. 

Next, begin paying attention to the “background chatter” in your daily activities.  We’ve been trained to ignore it as “noise,” but frequently it’s our “inner voice or compass” giving us information.    Note how you feel when you enter environments or meet people:  good, creepy, spooked, happy, excited, etc.  Look for any information you later gather that supports or disagrees with the feeling.  This is a way of “bracketing” hits and misses;  in doing so you begin to catalog your responses to match to future events.

If you really want to cultivate this sense, begin taking out 5 or 10 minutes every day to get deeply relaxed and set you intention to receive and recognize information that is appropriate and beneficial.   Setting you intention is critical, both to your ability to tune in andto  connect ONLY to information that is appropriate for you!   It prevents your  tuning into information or images that are frightening, not yours or unsupportive.    It allows you to be open without being bombarded or used. 

So now that you’ve tuned in, how do you use this skill in a daily, practical manner?   First you practice and have fun with it.  And while you’re doing that tune it to your “heart’s desire.”  What do you really want out of life?   As you get in touch with that, develop the use of another tool: one I call Intentioning.

Setting Intentions is a little different from Goal Setting.    Intentions are decisions made in a positive forward moving format that usher us in the direction of what we want in life.  Goals are a bit more task specific and tactical.  Setting Intentions demands that we develop clarity around our “heart’s desire.”    It’s talking about what we WANT, instead of framing life with what we “don’t want.”  This concept is at the very core of Feng Shui.  The point is that we can have what ever we want, we just have to figure out what that is and keep it alive in our vision. 

Further, if we try to move in the direction of our desires, by avoiding what we dislike or what scares us, guess what:  it’s like trying to drive forward while looking in the rear-view mirror.   You’ll get somewhere, but is it where you intended.  You have the choice to live by default - always responding to what others have planned - or you can be the designer and proceed using your own map.  Yes, there are intersecting roads, detours, and surprises – and you get to DECIDE how you will handle each.  Further, by using your intuition to follow the map, you’ll frequently get a “head’s up” when a detour is approaching.  At the very least, you’ll know a little more about the purpose of the detour and how to use is to your advantage. 

This works so beautifully with Intuition, because once you’ve become clear about where you want to go, your intuition allows you to recognize the signals, know which path or opportunity is for you, choose mentors, guides and friends and arrive safely and “on-time.”  This method works from something as mundane as planning a trip across town and remembering what you went into the next room to get, as it does with navigating careers, nurturing relationships and raising children.  While my sons got away with their fair share of foolishness, more often than not, their actions were tempered by their own intuition AND the knowledge (fear?) that they had a slightly spooky mom who “knew things.”  For them, that was both the good news and the bad news. 

“The intuitive mind tells the thinking mind where to look next.”  Jonas Salk

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