Igniting your intuition By Stacie Ivey S T A C I E I V E Y. C O M
S T A C I E I V E Y.COM Igniting your intuition How to Strengthen and Trust Your Inner Guidance By Stacie Ivey Ego or Intuition? What is Intuition? Intuition is the ability to know something instantly without conscious reasoning. It is the still, quiet voice that speaks when you are quiet enough to listen. Intuitive hits can include signs, thoughts, feelings, visualizations, and even smells. Why would you want to strengthen your intuition? When you strengthen your intuition, you live with greater wisdom, a deeper connection to life and a blissful feeling of oneness with all things. You receive guidance and answers that help you along your journey and reduce the amount of suffering you endure SIGNIFICANTLY. Intuition enables expanded imagination and visualization and helps keep you on track with greater ease, joy, grace and love. What is the difference between ego and intuition? Ego is the mind-based false identification with things like your personality, name, roles and possessions. It is conceptual, focused on survival, acts from fear, and holds the belief that you are separate from others and God. Intuition is a deep internal knowing beyond logic and your physical senses which often involves being given a message about someone or something you wouldn t otherwise know. It is your natural state and connects you to presence, love and higher awareness.
S T A C I E I V E Y.COM Where does your body house Intution? Your intuition is housed energetically through many layers of awareness but is primarily associated with the 6th chakra, known as Anja. Physically, the pineal gland, which is part of the endocrine system is the body s link to your inner vision and insight. The pineal gland or third eye is a small pinecone shaped gland tucked within a small groove between the two halves of the thalamus and secretes the hormones melatonin for sleep and serotonin for emotional wellbeing. Intuitive messages are subtle, symbolic, quieter, and come in many forms, such as an images on a billboard, a song on the radio, or an instantaneous thought. Intuitive messages don t make sense to the logical mind because they aren t rational and therefore the logical mind will want to override them. Intuition falls into four primary categories and you may be stronger in some more than others. v Claircognizance: Having an inner knowing that can t otherwise be explained. v Clairsentience: Feeling or sense of something that isn t seen. v Clairvoyance: Seeing beyond the eyes, such as seeing auras or spirit guides. v Clairaudience: Hearing beyond the ears.
Why will the logical mind try to override intuitive thoughts? Because we have been trained to trust our logical mind and ignore our intuition. As infants we were born with natural intuitive gifts, but as we grew and became conditioned by family and culture, we learned to ignore the signs and signals our intuition has always been sending. Since childhood, we developed the habit to not trust our intuition because: 1. Intuition is rarely talked about. Most families don t teach their children about intuition, so unless you grew up with conscious and intentional parents, you likely didn t hear about the word intuition until later in life. Rarely is intuition discussed in Western culture, media or everyday interactions, but this is beginning to change. 2. Once we entered school, almost everything we were taught, especially after Kindergarten, was primarily focused on left brain thinking, which includes logic, reasoning, analysis, verbal language, past, future, and what is linear and measurable. We were taught if it can t be seen, heard, tasted, smelled or touched, it doesn t exist. 3. We are too busy. Our fast-paced and frantic lives have placed us on a symbolic hamster wheel of life just enough to keep everything going to keep us from asking questions like, Is this all there is? or Isn t there a better way? or What am I really here for? 4. We have lost the connection our ancestors once held to the natural world. We no longer eat mostly directly from nature and instead we now eat many unnatural and harmful substances, including those in processed and genetically modified foods. Most of our time is spent indoors, in vehicles, and we no longer walk directly on the Earth and instead walk on paved sidewalks and streets. We stay inside at night, no longer gazing at the stars and in order to cope we numb ourselves with alcohol, antidepressants, food, or any other drug of choice in order to keep it all at bay. S T A C I E I V E Y.COM
STACIEIVEY.COM Intution is a gift? The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift. -Albert Einstein We live in a society dominantly focused on the physical external world and mental concepts. Our culture has forgotten our sense of wonder and the sacred. Old beliefs can cause suffering When you believe you aren t naturally intuitive, you stay disconnected from your natural state and in turn, suffer. Family traits can carry over If you were raised in a family who believed intuition wasn t real, was only for psychics, or that people saw or heard things others didn t were crazy, you would fear rejection and have a tendency to hide or shut off your natural gifts. Now, however, you can rediscover and trust what is true for you.
Here is a true story about when I personally decided to trust my intuituon I was visiting Costa Rica on a vacation where I was first introduced to plantains, monkeys in the trees, and armadillos walking on the ground. One day, I felt prompted to go on a walk to the local yoga institute for one of their community classes. Walking through the jungle, I got lost and couldn t find the institute, so I decided to go again the next day. On the following day, I decided to trust my inner guidance combined with a little more situational awareness of my location. I walked for a while and this time, easily found the entrance to the institute. Upon entering, I felt an energy within the grounds that was indescribable, like a spiritually protected sanctuary. I was about 20 minutes early and eventually I came upon a yoga class that was ending. It was the 200-hour yoga teacher training. Prior to seeing this class, I had never thought about becoming a yoga instructor, but this time was different. Instantaneously, I felt with every cell of my being that I was supposed to be there. I watched the students leave and stood by the door to look inside. The instructor saw me and came up to me, thinking I was one of the students at first because it was only the second day of training. His presence was so calm, peaceful and caring. I told him I felt like I was supposed to be there and he told me I would be there at exactly the perfect time. Well, I went home from that trip and everything fell into place for finding the right amount of money, time, and other resources to go and I was there for the next training a month later. The experience of my yoga teacher training was one of the most life transforming experiences of my life. I m glad I listened and took action. STACIEIVEY.C OM
STACIEIVEY.C OM So how do you learn to listen to and trust your intuition? First, it s necessary to remove the blocks: 1. Your thoughts: Recognize your thoughts are often not your thoughts. You may identify with your thoughts because you are the one thinking them, but the majority of the thoughts you have are simply a result of the conditioning you have received mostly from family and culture. 2. Your beliefs: It is likely you don t fully believe you are intuitive because you were never taught that you are intuitive. 3. Your habits: The daily choices you consistently make have an effect on your intuition. These include caffeine intake, alcohol consumption, television, electronics, and so on. 4. Your people: It has been said that you are most influenced by the five people you spend the most time with. Are you choosing to surround yourself with positive and supportive people or negative and unsupportive or even harmful people? 5. Your environment: Some environments are supportive of intuition and others are not. Pay attention to where you spend your time. Are you inside too much? Do you spend a lot of time under artificial lights, around loud noises or big crowds? These environments could have an effect on your ability to tune in. 6. Your food: Are you relying on processed foods that contain harsh chemicals, hormones, additives, and other ingredients you don t know? 7. Your water: Research has discovered the consumption of sodium fluoride found in tap water, toothpaste, mouthwash, food, and soda to have a detrimental effect on the pineal gland by creating calcification of the gland and rendering it ineffective in opening intuitive channels and in balancing the entire hormonal processes throughout the body.
STACIEIVEY.C OM learning to listen to and trust your intuition... 1. Second, it s necessary to begin to harness intuitive strengths and amp up your antenna: 1. Engage in radical self-care. Prioritizing the care and balance of your body, mind and spirit is essential for strengthening your intuition. This includes enjoying time alone, spending time in nature (i.e. walking barefoot on the grass), getting plenty of rest and sleep, and taking time for joy and pleasure (i.e. bubble baths, regular massage, and fun). 2. Meditate. The practice of regular meditation is essential to strengthen intuition. This can include many forms such as a sitting practice, mantra (word or phrase), mudra (energy lock with the hands or body), sound (gong, singing bowl, or voice), guided, walking, and other embodied meditative or mindful practices. 3. Practice yoga. Yoga brings into union mind, body and spirit. It is meditation in motion and helps you quiet the thinking mind, heal the body, and connect to the spirit. Poses that are effective in strengthening intuition are: standing forward fold, pigeon pose, child s pose, and savasana. 4. Breathe. Breath practice or pranayama is your connection to your life force, spirit and the present moment. Pranayama has profound effects on both consciousness and intuition, can elicit either a relaxed (parasympathetic nervous system) or activated (sympathetic nervous system) state, is highly effective, and free. Practice humming bee breath and the sound OM. 5. Heal your subconscious mind. Utilize tools to access the subconscious mind and the ways it controls deeply held beliefs about money, abundance, relationships, purpose, family, et cetera. Practices to access the subconscious mind include meditation, creativity, Emotional Freedom Technique (EFT), hypnosis, drumming, chanting, and other therapeutic practices from both Eastern and Western medicine.
STACIEIVEY.C OM learning to listen to and trust your intuition... 6. Activate your right brain. This includes being creative, paying attention to synchronicities (signs), keeping a dream journal, seeing the big picture, and being willing to open to new possibilities like opening to what you don t know you don t know. 7. Eat whole and organic foods. Think in terms of foods close to nature, which are high in life force energy (prana). These can include almonds, berries, broccoli, and pineapples. 8. Spend time in nature. Walk barefoot on the Earth, learn to listen to the wisdom of the trees, plants and rocks. 9. Harness the power of water. Water is a healing force that cleanses away impurities. Drink distilled or purified water, spend time around bodies of water, and use water to cleanse your body externally. Adding 1-2 teaspoons of apple cider vinegar to your glass of water can also help. 10. Ask for guidance and practice receiving messages in ways you enjoy. These can include free writing (journaling without editing), oracle card readings, tarot, astrology, and numerology. A good question to ask is, Dear angels and guides, what do you want me to know right now? 11. Find a mentor, teacher, or a group focused on providing support and encouragement as you practice harnessing your skillset. 12. Add additional tools you may like to enhance your experience, such as candles, essential oils, or crystals. 13. Trust the answers and messages you receive.
STACIEIVEY.C OM We are all intuitive; we just may need a little reminder. Never forget: No matter what your past has been, everything can change for the better. You are deserving, amazing, a unique expression of the Divine, beautiful and connected to all. You always have been and always will be. Now is your time to remember. Join me on the journey Personally, as I have grown to learn to trust my intuition more, life has begun to present itself in ways that unfold like magic. Synchronicities appear as people and things that are just what I need at just the right time. Instead of always trying to swim upstream, I have learned an inner flow and connection to life that cannot be explained. With so much love, Stacieivey.com Copyright 2016, Stacie Ivey The content provided in this e-book is meant for informational purposes only. Consult your doctor or other medical professional for any individual medical or psychological needs.