How Being Accommodating Costs Us Our Intuition
And why reclaiming it is gonna rock the boat
People looking to deepen their connection to their intuition often turn to spiritual pursuits. The right music. Regular meditation. Books to grow their wisdom aided by crystals to both clear the negative energy and amp up their personal vibration.
But what if I told you that one of the most common speedbumps to greater intuitive clarity–particularly for women–actually comes from an intricate social dance we have learned? A dance of inner-compromise and self-censorship.
Children have an extremely keen sense about what they like and don’t like. They rarely speak in ambiguity, but instead lean heavily into the extremes. I love my teacher. I hate eggs. They know what they feel strongly about and rarely fall into agreement with the people around them–until they are taught to. A lot of adults are oddly uncomfortable with the extreme proclamations of children.
A number of years ago, after 14 years of marriage, my husband and I divorced, agreeing to raise our precocious 4 year-old together, with lots of love and good communication. A few years later, after my ex-husband had remarried, our son came home from his time at their house and announced that his step-mom had become very upset when he said he hated something.
We don’t use the word hate here, she had said.
He was so confused. I had raised him to believe that it was absolutely ok to not only hate something if it felt true, but to also express it honestly—and now he was being told that his behavior was unacceptable. I reassured him that some people are uncomfortable with anger and strong dislike, but that doesn’t mean it’s wrong to feel and express those things. But I could tell by the dismayed look on his face, the unfortunate lesson had already been learned: Tone down strong feelings to get along in the world.
I distinctly remember my own mother cautioning me against stating dislike, let alone hate. I can only imagine that during each preceding generation, the reigns against vocal self-expression were probably even tighter. Women, particularly, seem to have perfected the fine art of reading the room. And for good reason. In a patriarchal society, it’s to the health and benefit of a woman to get a sense of where others are at, then craft her thoughts carefully in order to find the best way to express herself without frightening or threatening those who imagine they are in charge. The fact that the original impulse is now so watered down that it is unrecognizable is just the accepted price we all pay. This is truly the only way to move through and rise above a society that–even now–embraces a woman’s value as a new and shiny concept.
And sadly, this way of showing up has been passed down so fully that it’s no longer limited to women.
However, this ingrained way of thinking–even if we don’t feel consciously constrained by it nowadays–seems to have turned our attention heavily toward action and results. We focus on what we say and do and the results we get out in the world far more than the impulse that initially moved the needle inside our soul. But what happens to our intuition when we make these kinds of unconscious trade-offs so far upstream?
We get flashes or a sense about something, with no context
We get an uneasy feeling, but don’t understand why
We miss the comfort and inherent power of being in a deep inner partnership–of trusting ourselves
Our body is our greatest partner in this life. And when we race past our intuitive moments to focus on the reasonable way we can implement our fleeting impulses, our body is always there, slowing us down, attempting to give us the truer, more complete picture. So often our unheard intuitive messages can get dismissed as just the normalized state of being unwell. Some physical signs I've found common among intuitive folks:
Anxiety that doesn’t seem to be connected to anything in particular
Disrupted sleep and content-packed dreams
Digestive issues
Even unexplained aches and pains can be the body’s way of saying, “You missed something!” Often, whether we feel like it or not, just turning our attention to the area and saying, “I’m listening,” can make a huge difference, and it sets the stage for…actually listening more.
It helps us to become more internally-defined, rather than outwardly-molded.
Because when we define how we show up in the world only by what we do and say, we are missing so much of the real magic.
Who we are.
The simple thing that is meant to define all that we do and say. And that begins way back in the quiet moments. When the spark of inspiration or inclination lights us up, even in the tiniest corner. It begins when we let ourselves feel and hear all of it, even if it seems like just the thought of it will upend our lives and the lives of everyone around us. When we make space to just hear it–even if we begin with, “Alright, this is probably crazy, but I’m just going to let it play out in my head”–we can get a fuller sense of where our path is taking us.
Before we begin to make all those little adjustments to suit the world around us.
Stepping back from the quick “how am I going to put this idea into action?” mindset also offers us another incredibly valuable opportunity.
The time and space to zoom out and look at things metaphorically and conceptually.
Intuitive direction is often steeped in metaphor and when we are in our coping-with-the-expectations-of-the-world mode we tend to be deeply literal. We dismiss things as damaging or unrealistic because we are so trigger-happy-literal, and we really don’t want to ruin our lives. But when we take the space to get curious and sit with our nudges, we not only get to experience ourselves as the calm, connected person that we truly are, we also get to experience ourselves as the one who is in full choice.
The one who came here to live a life that is uniquely ours.
One that is defined by what moves through us.
Something that doesn’t need to be changed to suit the world.
Something that is exactly what the world needs.
Just as it is
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Beautiful article, full of food for thought. Thank you. ❤️