Now for the tricky part: let’s say you’re dealing with a person or plan of action or project. You listen to your gut, and you have a good idea of what to do next—except that move doesn’t really match what other people say you should do, what you originally thought you would do, what society says you should do, and so on. You feel stuck and start arguing with yourself, defending different choices you could make or convincing yourself one path is the correct one. Doubt creeps in, and all of a sudden you’re back to square one, trying to figure out if you really had a gut feeling about something or not. Maybe you are dealing with a minor suspicion, or a full-blown sense of “This isn’t right” or “Yes, I need to do this.” Either way it can be hard to take steps based on a feeling alone.
This crossroad comes back to trust. When you’re able to trust yourself, you’re more in tune with your own intuition and can use it as a guiding force to follow through on decisions. Listening to your gut, or your intuition, is really an act of self-confidence: you believe you are doing the right thing, even if it looks different than what you anticipated or comes out of nowhere. You may not always get it right, and no outcome is guaranteed, but trusting a gut feeling is your best bet. Think of your intuition like a tool: the more you practice using it, the sharper your skills will become.