Is ignoring intuition a good thing?

About three decades ago I began my training as an Electronics Engineer. I left school at 16 and set on the path of work and college based learning that led to technical exams five years later. Like most learning in the Western world it was logical and analytical in its approach and yielded consistent results.

I like many other people learned to structure what I did, in short I adopted what many people call left brain (or more accurately left hemisphere) thinking.

Theory about the way the brain operates suggest that we each have a preferred realm of thought; some prefer left brain some prefer right brain.

Left Brain		Right Brain
Logical Sequential Rational Analytical Objective Looks at parts		Random Intuitive Holistic Synthesizing Subjective Look at complete Picture

So for years I used mostly my left brain thinking and was successful in my work. But work changed, I moved from an Engineering role to a Sales role, now things seemed to be different. Working with people was different, it required far more of my right brain processes to understand how to be successful.

Gradually my thought patterns changed, I found myself more willing to trust my hunches or intuition and those hunches often paid off. It's not that the need for analytical thought went away just that it was balanced by more intuitive thoughts as well.

That change in my thought processes was amplified further when I began to study hypnosis and other development methods.

Trusting your hunch or intuition can feel like a very strange thing to do when all of your education is geared toward analytical thinking, but it can be a rewarding experience too.




In his book 'Blink', Malcolm Gladwell discusses the pro and cons of our ability to size up a situation in literally the blink of an eye. However I think intuition goes deeper than this, you may come to intuitively realise something but you can then test that with rational left brain thought patterns. Your subconscious may deliver an idea to you fully formed and ready to go but there'e no harm in testing the rope before jumping out the window!

Next time you have a slightly offbeat idea or notion, try going with it for a while and see where it leads you. It's just possible that it will be a rewarding and worthwhile experience. If it goes nowhere then at least you had an interesting detour down a new pathway. Ignoring your intuition is a way to ensure that you have fewer enlightening life experiences; surely you would be poorer if that were to happen.