The Feeling of Intuition
It’s More Than a Gut Feeling How to Tell If It’s Anxiety, Instinct, or a Deeper Knowing
Picture this: You’re driving home on a stormy evening. Rain pounds your windshield. Visibility is low, your wipers can’t keep up, and you’re cruising your usual route—tired, foggy, and ready to be home. At the exact point where you always turn left, something inside says, “Not tonight. Keep going.”
You hesitate, ignore the feeling once… then it nudges you again—subtle, but firm. So you skip the turn, take the longer road, and arrive home safely. The next morning, you see a fallen tree blocked that left turn. Somehow, you just knew.
That’s the feeling of intuition. Your nervous system sending signals—maybe even from your unconscious mind—before your thinking brain catches up.
But how do you know if it’s truly intuition? What if it's anxiety? Or instinct? If you live with trauma, ADHD, or chronic stress, telling the difference can feel impossible.
Let’s explore how to understand your internal signals, rebuild trust in your gut, and reclaim the wisdom of your body.
What Is Intuition, Really?
Intuition is your inner compass. It’s not something you figure out—it’s something you feel. A quiet tug, a flash of knowing, a subtle shift in energy that says “yes” or “no,” even if you can’t explain why. It’s not linear. It’s not rational. It’s your body and unconscious mind gathering information faster than your thoughts can keep up.
When you’re feeling intuitively, you’re accessing a deeper form of intelligence—one that blends past experience, nervous system sensitivity, somatic cues, and nonverbal processing. It’s like a sixth sense—but one you’ve always had, even if you were taught to ignore it.
Intuition vs. Instinct: Not the Same Thing
These terms get used interchangeably, but they’re different.
Instinct is primal. It’s survival-based. You pull your hand away from a hot pan. Your body reacts without needing permission from your brain. Instinct is fast, automatic, and triggered by immediate danger.
Intuition, on the other hand, is more nuanced. You feel a shift in a room before anyone says a word. You sense that something is “off” long before you have proof. It’s not always about safety—it’s about alignment.
Both are valid. But intuition speaks in layers. It may come from deep memory, pattern recognition, or the subtle energetic language your body speaks fluently—even if your conscious mind doesn’t.
Anxiety vs. Intuition: How Can You Tell?
If you live with anxiety or ADHD, this is the million-dollar question: How do I know if it’s fear or real inner knowing?
Here’s what I tell my clients:
Anxiety is loud, demanding, and frantic. It floods you with what-ifs and worst-case scenarios. It wants you to act now. Your body might feel tight, heavy, nauseous, wired. After following anxiety, you rarely feel better—in fact, it often leads to more doubt and overwhelm. The voice of anxiety is judgmental, harsh, and fear-based.
Intuition, by contrast, feels calm—even if the message is serious. It’s clear but not urgent. It’s neutral, spacious, and grounded. Your body may soften. You may feel unexpected clarity or even relief after making a choice in alignment with it. Intuition doesn’t spiral. It whispers. It nudges. It says, “You already know.”
If you’ve ever felt pulled to say no to something that “should” be fine, or drawn to something others don’t understand—that’s intuition. And when you listen to it, you usually feel more like yourself.
ADHD: How Do You Know?
If you’re neurodivergent, especially with ADHD, sorting through internal signals can feel chaotic. Thoughts move fast. Emotions get big. The volume is always cranked up.
People with ADHD often ask, “Is it intuition, or is my brain just being impulsive?”
That’s valid. And here’s the difference:
Impulsivity tends to feel urgent, buzzy, emotionally charged.
Intuition feels clear, steady, and non-reactive—even when it’s asking for a big change.
One way to tell: Check what happens after the choice. When you follow impulsivity, you often feel regret or dysregulated. When you follow intuition, there’s peace, even if the path is hard.
When Fight, Flight, or Freeze Get in the Way
For those with trauma or chronic dysregulation, tuning into intuition can be especially hard. That’s because when your nervous system is stuck in fight, flight, freeze, or fawn, every internal cue can feel like danger.
You might want to trust your gut but feel flooded with fear the moment you try. Or you second-guess every decision, never sure what’s “real.”
The truth is, you can’t access your intuition in survival mode. And that’s not a flaw. It’s biology. Your body is trying to protect you.
The good news? Nervous system regulation is possible. Therapy, breathwork, somatics, even online ketamine treatment or trauma-informed care can create space to come back into your body and rebuild the felt sense of safety needed for intuition to emerge.
Why Intuition Matters for Healing
When you learn to trust your intuition, you reclaim your autonomy. You stop outsourcing your truth. You make choices that honor your timing, your energy, your values.
Intuition is how you come home to yourself.
In my work with clients navigating anxiety, trauma, neurodivergence, or chronic illness, I see it again and again: when people reconnect with their gut knowing, healing accelerates. The nervous system relaxes. The noise quiets down. Life starts to feel like yours again.
How to Strengthen the Feeling of Intuition
You don’t have to wait for a crisis to start listening inward. Here are a few ways to sharpen your intuition in everyday life:
1. Practice Stillness
Pause before making a decision—even small ones. Check in with your body. What sensations show up? Is there a yes? A no? A leaning forward or pulling back?
2. Track Your Physical Signals
For many, gut feelings live in the body—tight chest, fluttery stomach, tingling skin. Start noticing where intuition shows up for you.
3. Journal It
Keep a log of intuitive hits. What did you feel? Did you act on it? What happened afterward? Over time, you’ll start to recognize patterns in your inner signals.
4. Limit Outside Noise
Take breaks from too much advice, scrolling, or over-analyzing. Intuition thrives in quiet spaces—not in the algorithm.
5. Explore Tools That Help You Tune In
Therapies that reduce mental clutter or increase self-awareness—like mindfulness, somatics, or ketamine integration—can support deeper connection with your body’s messages.
Here's a Simple Challenge
Grab a small notebook or open a notes app. For one week, commit to this:
Every time you feel a subtle nudge—write it down.
What did I sense?
Did I listen to it?
What was the outcome?
Over time, you’ll begin to feel intuitively with more confidence and clarity. That quiet voice gets stronger the more you honor it.
Final Thoughts: You Were Never Broken
So many of us were taught to dismiss our gut feeling. To override it with logic. To minimize it, suppress it, second-guess it.
If you’re healing from trauma, navigating ADHD, or living with chronic dysregulation, it makes sense that tuning into your body’s cues feels unfamiliar or even unsafe. But that doesn't mean you’re broken. It means you’ve been protecting yourself.
And now, maybe you’re ready to come back home.
You’re allowed to pay attention to your subtle knowing. You’re allowed to trust your gut. You’re allowed to explore what happens when you follow that quiet thread of truth.
You don’t have to do it alone.
Ready to Reconnect With Your Intuition?
We all have those moments—when something feels off- maybe a big decision looms, or life feels like too much. In times like these, it’s natural to reach out. We ask friends, mentors, therapists, maybe even pull a few tarot cards or check our astrology apps, hoping for clarity.
Sometimes, we repeat our story, waiting for an answer to reveal itself in the retelling.
But what I’ve learned—both as a therapist and a human—is that the kind of support that often helps in those pivotal moments is the kind that:
– Makes you feel deeply seen, like someone finally gets it
– Clears away the noise so your deeper truth can come through
– Leaves you more connected to your inner knowing—not more confused
Because advice that doesn’t resonate with your nervous system or lived experience rarely sticks. And when it pulls you away from your truth? It can do more harm than good.
That’s why my work is not about giving answers. It’s about creating a space where your truth has room to rise. You get to feel what’s real—without shame, performance, or pressure—and learn to trust your inner compass again.
If you're feeling stuck or overwhelmed, you're not broken. You're in a process. And you're not alone in it.
I offer somatic therapy trauma-informed that honors the whole you—your neurodivergence, your nervous system, your stories, and your deep inner knowing.
If you’re ready to feel less stuck, less anxious, and more in tune with yourself, I’d be honored to walk with you.
Book a free 20-minute consultation:
https://JourneyInwardConsultation.as.me/
You are the expert of your inner world. Let’s help you remember.