“The intellect has little to do on the road to discovery.
There comes a leap in consciousness,
call it intuition or what you will,
the solution comes to you
and you don’t know how or why.“
~~ Albert Einstein
Greetings to all my precious people!!
As October deepens and we approach the ancient celebration of Samhain, the veil between worlds naturally grows thin. But there’s another veil that dissolves during this season – the one between our thinking mind and our knowing heart. Intuition isn’t mystical fantasy; it’s the most practical guidance system we possess, refined through decades of lived experience and finally ready to be fully trusted.
The Portal Within
At midlife, something profound shifts in our relationship to inner knowing. The external authorities we once deferred to – parents, partners, cultural expectations, even our younger selves – begin to lose their power over us. In their place emerges something far more reliable: the accumulated wisdom of our own lived experience speaking through the portal of intuition.
The Science of Sacred Knowing
Dr. Antonio Damasio’s groundbreaking research at USC reveals that what we call “gut feelings” are actually sophisticated neural networks processing vast amounts of information below conscious awareness. His studies show that people who trust their intuitive responses make better decisions than those who rely solely on rational analysis, particularly in complex emotional and relational situations.
Research from the University of Leeds demonstrates that intuitive decision-making improves dramatically with age and experience. The study found that people over 40 show significantly better “thin-slice judgments” – the ability to make accurate assessments based on minimal information – because their brains have developed more sophisticated pattern recognition from decades of living.
Neuroscientist Dr. Caroline Leaf’s work shows that intuition activates the insula, a brain region that integrates emotional, physical, and cognitive information. This same region is more developed in women and continues maturing throughout midlife, explaining why so many women report their intuition becoming stronger and more reliable as they age.
But perhaps most fascinating: research from Harvard Business School found that successful female entrepreneurs consistently score higher on measures of intuitive decision-making than their male counterparts, and this advantage increases with age and experience.
Autumn’s Intuitive Awakening: When the Veil Grows Thin
In Traditional Chinese Medicine, Autumn’s Metal element governs not just physical breathing but spiritual inspiration – literally, the in-breathing of wisdom from beyond our logical minds. As the earth releases what no longer serves and prepares for winter’s deep knowing time, we too are invited to release our over-reliance on external validation and tune into the portal of inner knowing.
Signs your intuition is calling for attention:
- Knowing something before you can explain how you know it
- Physical reactions (gut tightening, energy shifts) that precede mental understanding
- Dreams, synchronicities, or recurring themes that feel significant
- Feeling guided toward choices that don’t make logical sense but feel deeply right
- Sensing others’ emotions or intentions before they’re expressed
- Having hunches about situations that later prove accurate
- Feeling called toward new directions without clear rational justification
The approaching Samhain season (October 31st – November 1st) has been honored for millennia as the time when the veil between conscious and unconscious, seen and unseen, becomes most permeable. This isn’t superstition – it’s recognition of a natural cycle when our intuitive capacities are heightened and most accessible.
The Four Gateways to Embodied Intuition
1. Somatic Intuition: The Body’s Wisdom Portal
Based on interoception research and somatic experiencing
Your body is constantly processing information your mind hasn’t yet registered:
- The Expansion/Contraction Practice: Before making any decision, pause and notice – does this choice make your body expand (yes) or contract (no)?
- The Energy Scan: When meeting someone new or entering a space, scan your body’s response before your mind forms opinions
- The Stomach Wisdom: Place your hand on your belly and ask your gut directly: “What do you know about this situation?”
This week’s practice: For every significant choice, consult your body before your mind.
2. Emotional Intuition: Feeling the Invisible Currents
Drawing from emotional intelligence and mirror neuron research
Your emotional body picks up information from the field around you:
- The Mood Detective: When you feel a sudden emotional shift, ask: “Is this mine, or am I sensing something in the environment?”
- The Heart Compass: Place your hand on your heart and ask: “What does my heart know that my head doesn’t?”
- The Feeling Forecast: Before entering any situation, tune in and sense the emotional weather you’re walking into
3. Mental Intuition: The Whisper Beyond Logic
Based on research on insight and creative problem-solving
Sometimes knowing comes as sudden understanding or quiet inner voice:
- The First Thought Practice: Notice your very first response to questions before analysis kicks in
- The Dream Journal: Keep paper by your bed to capture night wisdom before it disappears
- The Walking Meditation: Take your questions on walks and notice what insights arise in movement
4. Spiritual Intuition: Connecting to Larger Wisdom
Adapted from contemplative traditions and consciousness research
Sometimes guidance comes from beyond our individual knowing:
- The Stillness Practice: Sit quietly and ask: “What wants to emerge through me?”
- The Nature Oracle: Spend time outside and notice what the natural world reflects about your situation
- The Ancestor Wisdom: Connect with the knowing of those who’ve walked before you
Lunar Intuition: Riding October’s Mystical Tide
This week brings us the New Moon in Scorpio (October 27th) – the most intuitive and psychically potent lunation of the year. Scorpio energy naturally opens our access to hidden knowledge, unconscious wisdom, and the mysteries that live below the surface of ordinary awareness.
New Moon Intuition Ritual:
- Create sacred space with candlelight and silence
- Write down a question you’ve been struggling to answer
- Sit quietly and breathe into your heart center
- Ask: “What do I need to know that I’m not yet seeing?”
- Listen with your whole being, not just your mind
- Trust whatever arises, even if it doesn’t make logical sense yet
From Personal Intuition to Collective Wisdom
Here’s what I’m witnessing: women who learn to trust their intuition become natural leaders and healers. Not because they have special powers, but because they’ve learned to access the wisdom that’s available to all of us when we’re willing to listen beyond the noise of external expectations and internal doubts.
This is exactly the kind of leadership our world needs. Decision-makers who can sense the subtle currents beneath surface presentations. Healers who can feel what needs attention before symptoms become crises. Mothers and mentors who can guide others toward their own inner knowing rather than imposing external solutions.
Questions for reflection:
- How might trusting your intuition be preparation for serving at a larger level?
- What becomes possible when you stop second-guessing your inner knowing?
- How does your intuitive wisdom become medicine for others who’ve lost touch with their own?
The Deeper Call: Intuition as Sacred Service
As we approach Halloween and the ancient celebration of Samhain, I’m creating spaces for women who understand that their intuitive gifts aren’t meant to be kept private but offered as medicine for a world that has forgotten how to listen to deeper wisdom.
If you’re ready to trust your intuition not just for personal guidance but as a tool for collective healing – to use your inner knowing to serve your community, to trust your wisdom enough to offer it boldly, to step into your role as a bridge between seen and unseen worlds – I’d love to explore what that deeper work might look like.
Because here’s what I know: the women who will guide us through these uncertain times are not the ones with the most credentials but the ones who have learned to trust the portal of their own inner knowing. Your intuition isn’t just personal guidance – it’s a sacred gift meant to be shared.
Curious about stepping more fully into your intuitive leadership? Let’s talk.
Integration Invitation
This week, as the veil grows thin and intuitive energy peaks, practice trusting your first knowing before your second-guessing mind takes over. Choose one area of your life where you’ve been overthinking and commit to following your intuitive guidance instead.
Pay attention to the subtle ways wisdom wants to flow through you – dreams, body sensations, sudden knowing, synchronicities, or the quiet voice that speaks when you’re finally still enough to listen.
Remember: your intuition has been refined through decades of experience. It knows things your conscious mind hasn’t yet figured out. It connects you to wisdom beyond your individual knowing. And in a world drowning in information but starving for wisdom, your ability to access and trust inner knowing is not just personal power – it’s sacred service.
The veil is thinning. The portal is opening. Your wisdom is needed.
Next Friday: THRESHOLD – Crossing Into Your Most Authentic Power
P.S. How is your intuition speaking to you as we approach this mystical season? What is your inner knowing trying to tell you that your logical mind keeps dismissing? Your intuitive wisdom might be the guidance someone else desperately needs to hear.
“When you don’t pay attention to your intuition, or go against it,
you may find that you feel a certain heaviness, lack of energy,
a kind of deadness. This is because the life force is trying to come through and move you in a certain way, and it is being blocked.”
~~ Shakti Gawain
Photo by Janesca on Unsplash
