We all have instincts. They are part of our human makeup and operate in various ways to provide an internal mechanism to assess externals.

For example: I find myself in a room with people I don't know and I am drawn to one person in particular. Here, I am not speaking of physical attraction, merely a social interaction.

'Something' inside me 'seems' to suggest one person rather than others present and in doing so, there is a feeling of 'rightness' about what the 'something' is telling me.

Why should that be, as I don't know anything about anyone in the room, let alone the one person my inner feeling is advising me to approach.

Yet the bias is unmistakably there and I am acting upon it. The other person in my target, senses the same and starts their walk toward me at the same time.

Sure enough, after conversing, we find much common ground, mutual acquaintances and similar life goals. We both 'feel' we were supposed to meet and it felt right to act on our instinct to cross the room and talk.

Granted, the language here is all subjective as it revolves around my feelings or the mood of the moment.

Therefore, how reliable are these feelings as indicators as to whether I should pursue a certain course of action over another one, when there is nothing in my experience to bias me to one or the other?

The above scenario happens more often than we know and may be more instrumental than we have yet considered in determining events and interactions.

I am fascinated with our instincts and how important they are in weighing up what is the most expedient thing to do when we are unsure of our next step.

Instincts, sometimes referred to as a 'gut feeling' or our intuition, are very important tools in our psychology and should not be ignored.

They have saved lives, prevented foolish decisions and opened up new opportunities when acted upon, although we could not rationalise in those moments why we should obey them over another course of action.

However, it is not easy to really pin down how these instincts operate and why they do. I am not a psychologist nor neurologist so I cannot offer a scientific or medical basis for their existence.

Just seems that some of them are intuitive ways of behaviour whilst some may be subtle safety mechanisms that we have silently absorbed over the course of our life.

When the need arises, they kick in like ABS on a car or the friend who phones just when you were thinking about them.

What I can say is that there have been marked moments in my life when I have acted on a gut feeling about something or someone and it has proved to be right.

It may have even saved my life.

The funny thing is that these instincts are not hit and miss in their success rate; acting upon them has proven to be consistently the right thing to do, even when the thing suggested was deemed irrational or contrary to convention in the moment.

I cannot tell you why this should be.

I am not advocating throwing common sense out of the window. Nor is our life experience to be jettisoned on a whim when we have the understanding to act with all the facts at hand.

Indeed, this is how we operate the majority of the time.

But, common sense and conventional wisdom aside, there will be moments in your life, in every arena, that you just know, without obvious reason, what you need to do.

You do it and it proves to be the right thing at the right time to do.

Be prepared for these moments as life is full of them. Use all your accrued wisdom to navigate through life.

Collaborate with what you know to apply yourself to a new situation.

All this should be so obvious as to not need stating.

However, listen to your instincts.

Seek out your gut feeling on something you are unsure about, whether to proceed with caution or to get the heck out of there.

Train yourself to be sensitive in discerning instincts and soon you will acquire a very important helper in making the right decisions or moving on to things you never thought possible.

A key characteristic of those who have been instrumental in sensing the pivotal moments in history and rewriting human destiny, was their sensitivity to hear and act upon their instincts.

Facing a challenge today? Feel that something needs to change and it is at hand to turn the opportunity to your favour?

Against the wall and no cavalry rushing over the plain to rescue you?

Listen to your instincts.

They may save your life, lead you to a goldmine or open the door via a strategy that has been elusive till now.

What is your instinct telling you my friend?

#instincts #mindset