The Write Mind: Intuition Developed

Writers use intuition in all kinds of situations, from deciding what to write, to making plot decisions, to following creative urges that make no logical sense. Intuition is always trying to lead us to the right destination, and to get there we must learn to follow it.

Shakti Gawain, author of Developing Intuition, says that to capitalize on this innate faculty, we must pay attention to what’s going on inside us during our quiet, distracting thoughts and get in touch with the place where gut-feelings reside. In our logic-biased culture, this requires discipline and practice, but the benefits make it well worth the effort.

Here are some steps you can take to start developing and applying your intuition (for more detailed explanations, refer to Gawain’s book)

1. Quiet your mind. Allow 5-10 minutes for this exercise, and combine it with numbers 2 and 3 below. Get comfy. Close your eyes. Take deep breaths through your nose, exhaling slowly through your mouth. Imagine nourishing air moving into and out of your body. Focus it with each breath into a different body part—feet, chest, head etc.—allowing each part to relax completely. Let any thoughts that arise float away on your exhalations.

2. Review and learn. With a quiet mind, review your day in as much detail as possible, searching it for intuitive moments you may have overlooked. Did you have any hunches today? Any feelings of rightness or wrongness in your writing? Feelings of knowing something without knowing why? How did you handle these feelings? Did you act on them? Did you push them aside? How did you feel afterwards?

3. Shift awareness. Imagine your mental awareness moving out of your head and into your solar plexus or belly, where intuition resides. With each breath, go deeper into this place. Ask yourself, “What do I need to remember or be aware of right now?” Listen for thoughts, feelings or images that arise. Be aware of how your body feels during this process. With practice, you’ll be able to ask more pointed questions and become more adept at responding intuitively.

4. Take action. For one day, one week or longer, depending on your comfort level, imagine that your intuition is infallible. Give yourself permission to act on it every time it arises, in writing or any other area of your life. Let go of doubt and fear and see what happens. How does it feel to follow intuition? To ignore it? If you’re paying attention, you’ll notice a difference.

Once we’re tuned in, intuition can become a reliable guiding force in everything we do. You know those synchronistic moments that happen in writing, those insights and connections that infuse our work with meaning? They occur when we quiet our minds and let intuition speak. When we trust it and listen, we tend to experience an increased sense of aliveness, a sense that in spite of the circuitous route we might have taken, we have somehow arrived exactly where we’re meant to be.

Intuition Defined
Intuition Rationalized

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Doug Kurtz is a published novelist, certified life coach and the owner of Write Life Coaching (www.writelifecoaching.com). He earned his MA in creative writing at the University of Colorado, where he also taught fiction writing. He currently lives in Boulder, where he’s busy coaching other writers and working on his next novel.