Sixth Sense: Intuition As A Powerful Success Tool

New entrepreneurs, as well as those are already involved in various ventures, confront seemingly insurmountable obstacles every day. Not only can these incidents be mind-boggling, but most involve totally unfamiliar concepts.

 Most people have never encountered some of these situations, nor do they have any understanding of how to approach a solution or whatever action may be required. It’s true there are many coaches on various subjects, all kinds of books and training materials, college level training, and many other ways to gain knowledge about every conceivable subject. What good is this, however, if you must make some decision in a hurry? Where’s the time for a class; where’s the time for a learning curve? We must often use our inner resources to make instant decisions without the 100% knowledge base every decision-maker prefers. Usually this just isn’t possible.


What are some of these abilities we all possess without realizing it? Inner qualities useful to all at every hour or minute may be considered as self-empowerment. This involves each person taking care of herself without farming this duty out to others. Rather than totally rely on doctors to treat illness properly, for instance, become educated on your problems so you can ask the right questions and guide your healthcare providers on the best course of treatment for you. The same is true of educational issues for you or your children: become knowledgeable about local school issues and be active in groups working to improve learning for you and your family. You can carry this idea into maintaining your home, auto, and all other aspects of your life. Don’t ask others to do everything for you; at some point you will have to act on your own. Be prepared.

Self-empowerment contains concepts that may be uncomfortable for many. Things like using your sixth sense, gut feeling, intuition, and other relatively new ideas are often met with skepticism from every quarter. Health professionals, psychology practitioners, therapists, religious leaders, and many others who consider themselves quite knowledgeable in some subject area may feel threatened by the growing ability of individuals to help themselves. After all, there are usually fees (MONEY) involved in using the services of these skeptics. I would look askance at any idea that might reduce my income, wouldn’t you? Our society has always taught us to respect and accept the authority of professionals and allow them to take unquestioning charge of our lives. Our entire power structure is based on blind acceptance, and even to think of questioning “experts” is a threat to our existing structure. The increasing complexity of everything we do, however, demands a totally different way of looking at things.

As an example of what not to do, let’s use a turkey who wanted to better himself. Turkey could not get enough energy to fly to the top of a nearby tree. He discussed his problem with a bull who suggested Turkey eat some bull dung which was loaded with vitamins and other good stuff. Turkey did this and, after a few days, he was able to reach the top of the tree. A farmer saw him and shot Turkey out of the tree. The moral: B**S can get you to the top but it can’t make you stay there!

And so it is with entrepreneurs struggling in today’s world. The same old methods and ideas will not sustain you in your business or your life. You need all the means available inside of you. You need to be open to new ideas.

There is some thought about an inner intelligence each of us possesses. When activated by us, this is a very powerful force that will clear away old problems of stress, anxiety, shame, anger, fear, and grief. Releasing these problems makes it possible for us to achieve the benefits of personal power and energy. This inner power was introduced in ancient cultures through initiation rituals which were supposed to activate the inner powers. The power is within us all; we just have to look inward to help ourselves.

Like an athlete training to do their best through running, all kinds of physical training, and continuing practice and repetition of their specialty, so must every entrepreneur constantly train and fine-tune all of the inner abilities they have. In a seminar at the University of Michigan, Oscar Britton, of Ford Motor Company, said, “Individuals have it within their power to create a different future, to choose how they want to live, and who they want to be.” He outlined five ways to activate these powers:

1. Self appreciation. It is important to know what you’re good at, to develop a sense of self-dignity.
2. Vision. Vision, the starting point for moving ahead, inspires individuals to proceed despite fear.
3. Power of purpose. Confidence is directly linked to a sense of purpose. Although purpose is not a panacea, it makes living worthwhile. Life matters when you have a purpose.
4. Commitment. This “heartfelt promise to yourself” will not let you back down.
5. Contribution. For those who live by the principle of contribution, reward follows service; getting follows giving. Life is best when we’re happily and willingly contributing to others.

Good decisions and quality of life depend on making correct choices. We are discussing significant choices between conventional thinking and different ways of dealing with life situations. Current scientific thinking has moved from a totally materialistic base toward heavy involvement with spiritual things. There is a new body of spiritual-scientific thought which includes quantum physics as well as ancient Eastern and Asian thinking. Most impressive are new scientific experiments and theories that often show very old ideas have current significance.

The reason they were not accepted as being important was a lack of mathematical proof. That proof is now available, and we hope this discussion will help those going through difficult times, or who can use these ideas to achieve a hassle-free lifestyle.

Even with the new scientific concepts, it is difficult for modern science to accept the consciousness concept because of its continuing acceptance of the old materialistic scientific way of thinking. Consciousness as a new scientific concept is discussed by Bruce Rosenblum and Fred Kuttner in Quantum Enigma: Physics Encounters Consciousness (Oxford University Press, 2008). Consciousness is now thought to play a significant part in the actual creation of the universe, so it is important to everything we use from our inner resources. In accord with quantum physics predictions, some kinds of beings seem to exist alongside us humans, as discussed in Supernatural, Meetings with the Ancient Teachers of Mankind (The Disinformation Company, 2007), by Graham Hancock. Hancock describes actual interviews where people in some places use hallucinogenic drugs of all kinds to achieve a state where images and ideas come to them when none of these are available in a normal state.

They are in the forms of spirit guides, supernatural teachers, fairies, or (recently) aliens. Such ideas are beginning to emerge because of the realization that there may be an unbelievable amount of information recorded in the 97% of our DNA of which little is known. This 97% is known as “junk DNA.” This designation makes it “supernatural” to modern scientists and they won’t talk about it or experiment with it. Life spread across Earth almost instantaneously when temperature and other factors were right to accept it, so Nobel Prize winner Francis Crick (father of DNA theory) believes the original steps to facilitate life were taken somewhere else rather than on Earth. There was not enough time when life began here.

Because of the information in junk DNA, it could be that ancient teachers have always lived within each of us; we just have to enter altered states in order to see them. I’m in no way suggesting anyone use any sort of hallucinogen in order receive this information; you just need to know the knowledge may exist and may be available through other means like plugging in to the entire universe using Zero Point Field technology. Lynne McTaggert provides an excellent discussion of the Zero Point Field in The Field: The Quest For The Secret Force Of The Universe (Harper Paperbacks, 2008). We all exist in the Zero Point Field and everything, including all universal information, is available to us all. It’s just a matter of our World View filters keeping us from using all knowledge there is.

Some will discount ideas—like using the subconscious mind, obtaining spiritual help from the Universe (God), and most recently the idea of tapping the complete knowledge of the universe through quantum physics discoveries like the Zero Point Field—as being sacrilegious or opposed to atheist thinking. My personal introduction to these powerful inner personal mechanisms was during a time of extreme difficulty. They have successfully helped me achieve success in the face of overwhelming opposing forces including the doctors repeatedly saying a loved one would surely die. I’m a 1,000% believer in this kind of thinking, and my advice is to try what you understand about some of these ideas and see how they work. Not everyone will succeed because one must have faith in the ultimate outcome.

Another inner element contained within each of us is the “sixth sense,” the title of this article. This is sometimes included in the field of Extrasensory (ESP) perception which is the ability to acquire information without using any of the physical senses. It has been studied extensively since the 1920s and has never been totally disproved. Unfortunately, none of the favorable experiments have so far been duplicated satisfactorily, so there is skepticism by the main body of scientists.

 Current popular belief is very strong, and perhaps a maverick scientist will soon be able to design a experiment that can be replicated, thus proving the validity of ESP and the techniques associated with it. Meanwhile, listen to your sixth sense; if there is nothing else to rely on it may be your only source of guidance if you need to take any action.

Intuition is another inner mechanism for solving problems. It is the apparent ability to acquire knowledge without a clear inference or reasoning process. The Oxford English Dictionary says, “It is the immediate apprehension of an object by the mind without the intervention of any reasoning process." Abella Arthur, a well-known psychic, says, “Intuition is a combination of historical (empirical) data, deep and heightened observation and an ability to cut through the thickness of surface reality. Intuition is like a slow motion machine that captures data instantaneously and hits you like a ton of bricks. Intuition is a knowing, a sensing that is beyond the conscious understanding — a gut feeling. Intuition is not pseudo-science.”

Some business coaches are saying that the development of business intuition is an essential skill for the time-starved 21st Century entrepreneur. This can be an answer to the demands on all of us for instant gratification. Intuition is immediate, but it requires scientific development over a period of time to be effective on a useful basis. Here are three things you can do to develop Business Intuition:

1. Practice meditation daily. This is hard for me to do, but it only requires setting a specific time for 15 or 20 minutes by myself.
2. Most entrepreneurs plan their day in some way. To develop intuition, put these plans on paper and note situations where you know what will happen, be it good or bad.
3. Make a separate Intuition Journal and write all your intuitions for later study and evaluation.

A lot of people will say they don’t have time to do these things, but consider how much future time you will save by going a little bit out of your way now. Before you throw out intuition as being too impractical, realize it was one of Carl Jung’s four ego functions. They were Intuition, Sensation, Feeling, and Thinking. He felt that in any individual, one of these would be primary with the others less developed. The key is to develop enough intuition to be helpful; all intuition, unbalanced by the other functions, would probably result in poor decisions.

Here are a few ways to effectively cultivate and use your intuition:

1. Pay close attention to what your intuition tells you—listen to those inner nudges.
2. Realize how intuition communicates with you—mental images, feelings (gut), or thoughts.
3. Ask for help; intuition will not know you want it unless you ask yourself.
4. Act on your intuition; start with low-risk situations
5. Use your logical left brain to enhance what you get from the intuitive right side.

A recent article in the LA Times about gut feelings ended with these words, “Evolution did not equip Homo sapiens with ready access to insights that transcend our personal experience. But somehow, we'd better get over our stubborn bias toward "thinking" with our gut, which is to say, not thinking at all. And that's the truth.” I mention this so you can see what some skeptic journalists feel about anything outside conventional thinking. Read what they say, read what supporters say, then decide what to do. I hope you will at least consider some of these unconventional ideas. I personally know they work under some circumstances, “if you believe they will work.” So, let’s look at some “gut instinct” ideas.

The New Scientist reports promising research about the validity of snap judgment (gut instinct). This study was done in January, 2007.

The researchers say our initial instincts are often right, and higher-level thinking sometimes takes us away from the correct answer. Subjects were given half a second to answer a question and 95% were correct. When given a full second, only 80% were right. Further time extensions resulted in descending levels of accuracy. People doing the research say there is a biological basis for these findings. An image picked up by the eyes first gets processed by a region at the back of the brain known as the primary visual cortex. This area of the brain is thought to be involved in subconscious processing. The information then travels from this visual processing area to both the parietal region (which recognizes shapes) and the decision-making frontal cortex. Researchers believe the higher-level mental processing that takes place in the parietal region and frontal cortex can initially make us mentally reorient an object to help decide what it is. This re-orienting may cause our minds to classify the oddly oriented symbol as the same as all the others, making it temporarily harder to pick out. This explains why people perform worse when given an additional amount of time to do so. When given a short time, they only have their subconscious as a guide; when given more time, they can override the re-orientation.

Another experiment, reported by Telegraph.co.uk, says new brain-imaging shows the higher the level of uncertainty, the more likely it is that a gut reaction is correct. Uncertainty calls up the brain’s emotional center which is different from the logical center used when most data is known. This kind of research may lead to understanding wide social outcomes. An example is investors in every country hold too many shares they are familiar with, from their own countries, and do not diversify their holdings by buying more ambiguous foreign stocks. Gut reaction based on unfamiliar stocks might lead to better investments. The opposite of fear of the economic unknown may be driving entrepreneurs, who often thrive under uncertainty. They are apparently using gut feelings effectively.

One coach says, “not only can Intuition help you make money, it can help you stay safe—physically and emotionally. And it's something we all have. It’s just a matter of developing it.

In many situations you may have only seconds to react. THERE WILL BE NO TIME TO THINK.”
Maybe you can now see how significant these unconventional ideas are. Choose the ones you feel are best for you and try them. You probably use some of them already without realizing what you are doing. Do you believe the LA Times, or the ongoing research about the unconventional?

Remember, THERE’S NO TIME TO THINK before you answer that question.