Jan­ice Lear­mond-Criqui, CPC, ACC

jan­icel­criqui@gmail.com

We have all heard of the word “in­tu­ition” but how many of us tru­ly un­der­stand its mean­ing? De­f­i­n­i­tion–the abil­i­ty to un­der­stand some­thing in­stinc­tive­ly, with­out the need for con­scious rea­son­ing.

Life to­day is fast-paced with in­for­ma­tion com­ing at us from all an­gles–ca­ble tv, most so­cial me­dia plat­forms, but the most pow­er­ful is from our cell­phones. I tru­ly be­lieve that all hu­mans are smart re­gard­less of their sit­u­a­tion. We all go through life with our ex­pe­ri­ences, and we would have ex­pe­ri­enced “un­der­stand­ing some­thing in­stinc­tive­ly” on more than one oc­ca­sion.

An ex­am­ple of fol­low­ing my in­tu­ition which saved my life. Many years ago, I at­tend­ed a con­fer­ence in St Vin­cent and my hus­band and I went out lim­ing with a friend who lived in St Vin­cent. Af­ter the lime, we dropped him off and he told us to just fol­low the road. We fol­lowed the road which took us to a house on a hill. It is dark and the vis­i­bil­i­ty in at­tempt­ing to re­verse was min­i­mal. My hus­band start­ed to turn the car and stopped but as he was get­ting ready to re­verse some more my in­tu­ition kicked in and I in­sist­ed that he did not re­verse any fur­ther. I told him that I will get out of the car and guide him. When I got out of the car and went to the back, I was hor­ri­fied to see that we were dan­ger­ous­ly close to re­vers­ing in­to a deep ravine.

Be­sides pay­ing at­ten­tion to our in­tu­ition, there will be times in our life where we tend to dis­miss un­der­stand­ing some­thing in­stinc­tive­ly be­cause there will be shiny ob­jects or car­rots on a stick that would be placed in front of us and all we will see are the shiny ob­jects or car­rots. That is life. But in­stead of beat­ing up on our­selves no mat­ter the price we had to pay for not pay­ing at­ten­tion, learn from the les­son. Move on with your life. I am not say­ing that it will be an easy les­son–you will find your­self some­times feel­ing a sense of guilt or de­spair. When this hap­pens, talk to some­one who will not be judge­men­tal.

Be will­ing to ad­mit that you were wrong, that you made a mis­take. That goes a long way to ease the guilt that you are go­ing to ex­pe­ri­ence.

Start pay­ing at­ten­tion to your in­tu­ition again. Pay close at­ten­tion and recog­nise the shiny ob­jects or car­rots on a stick. Take your time in mak­ing de­ci­sions when your in­tu­ition is rais­ing alarm bells. Ask lots of ques­tions and if the an­swers don’t res­onate with you, then leave the sit­u­a­tion alone un­til you are sat­is­fied that the de­ci­sion that you are go­ing to make is the right one.

Try not to abuse your body with drugs and al­co­hol to numb the pain of mak­ing a bad de­ci­sion. In the long run, you are on­ly go­ing to do your­self more harm than good.

Come up with a plan to deal with the wrong de­ci­sion. Write it down, look at it from all an­gles and pray on it. The idea is not to make the same mis­take twice. Trust that things will work them­selves out.

The life lessons that we have learnt along the way is what helps to build our char­ac­ter and make us strong. It is our ex­pe­ri­ences in life that al­lows us to men­tor the younger gen­er­a­tion com­ing up be­cause they can learn from our mis­takes and there­fore avoid mak­ing the same mis­takes that we have made along the way.

Keep in mind Kel­ly Clark­son's song–What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger–Stand a lit­tle taller…what doesn’t kill you makes a fight­er, foot­steps even lighter, doesn’t mean I’m over…what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, stronger, just me, my­self and I…

Re­shape your des­tiny and pay at­ten­tion to your in­tu­ition.