Trust Your Intuition

Have you ever felt a nudge to do something or go somewhere? This week it was to the yarn shop.

I hadn’t been there in 6 months and when I arrived one of the owners threw up her hands and said, “Julie,” came over, and gave me a big hug. The yarn shop is sacred space and safe harbor. Some places just make you feel good and we should give ourselves the gift of listening to that voice that draws us to them.  She fixed me a cup of coffee and we talked and listened.

Sharing my desire to find a cost-effective way to have a more engaging web presence, asking her if she knew someone who could help…her reply was. “That’s easy. Write a blog. I had one for several years when I had breast cancer.” And so she proceeded to show me hers, tell me a place to go “BlogSpot.” By that evening I had overcome my need to get it just right, plunged in anyway…remembering a favorite quote, “The enemy of the good is the better.”

Rather than being paralyzed by which site to use, the choice of the “perfect” template, I decided to trust my intuition and begin.  In my web search I noted that some bloggers worked to remove the “Simple” template page designation from the bottom of the blog page. That would have been me years ago in my get-it-just-right professional self. Now I am delighted that the word “Simple” might invite other elders to blog to find a place to share their life lessons with others.

So how can we come to trust our intuition?

Reb Zalman’s work of Sage-ing invites us to use contemplative tools to help us: make peace with our past, harvesting our life’s wisdom; and make peace with our future, acknowledging our mortality. This work frees us to be more fully present, to release the energy tied up in regrets and fear, to live more consciously, fully, in the now. Meditation, life review, harvesting our wisdom, journaling, poetry, creativity, expressive art-making, yoga, and prayer are examples of these spiritual tools. Reb Zalman Schachter-Shalomi in From Age-ing to Sage-ing, says extended longevity calls for extended consciousness. He believed we could learn to use more of our brain, to develop our intuition and learn to trust it.

After I came home from the yarn shop, I decided to call a woman who it turns out also has breast cancer.  I was able to refer her to the blog my friend had written. I emailed her some mandalas to color and information about Zentangle, two expressive arts processes for self-soothing and anxiety relief. Visit www.zentangle.com to learn more and Amazon for an adult coloring book, best sellers now. Or just search, “mandalas to color” for free ones to print and color.

Two more thoughts:

“Trust is the toggle switch for synchronicity.” (More about that another day)

“Knitting is the new yoga.”

Sample of a simple mandala to color