How To Use Your Intuition (The Inner Voice) - Teal Swan -

How to use use your intuition
(the innervoice)

Hello there.

Some of us, we can hear our inner
voice speaking loud and clear.

We use it to make decisions.

And we can do it quickly.

For the rest of us, this
really isn't the case.

We can't hear our inner voice.

So we don't know what we want,
we don't know what we need,

we don't know what we think,
we don't know how we feel.

So for those of us
who feel that way,

it's critical for us to learn

how to listen deeply within
ourselves for that inner voice,

so that the whisper of our inner
voice can become a scream.

So how is it that this voice
within us became silenced?

It became silenced because
other people didn't listen to it.

When we came into this life, they
disregarded our inner voice.

They made us not listen to it
but listen to them instead.

So as a result, this voice
got fainter and fainter

and fainter and suppressed
more and more,

until we could no longer hear it.

It was replaced by
other people's voices.

The inner voice comes to us
primarily through sensation,

through emotion and through thought.

It doesn't often come to us audibly
even though it can take that form.

You hear the inner voice a lot.

It's the you that talks to you
inside your own head

or inside your own heart
or inside your own body.

You just don't realize that this
is in fact your inner voice.

This inner voice is our self, our soul,

what some people call 'our true self',

talking to us about ourselves and
about the world all day every day.

Some people call the
inner voice intuition,

because it is an inner knowing, an
inner seeing, an inner believing.

Not listening to the inner voice

leads the body to try to
communicate in other ways.

Through things like stomach aches and
headaches and illnesses and even disease

Not to mention that the universe
will magnify the inner voice

through your external reality,

so you can no longer run
from your own inner truth.

Which is less than comfortable.

I don't want you to think that
the inner voice is always pure.

Because it is in fact distorted.

It is distorted by our shadows, the
things that we're unconscious of.

It's distorted by our
beliefs, our experiences.

It is also made up of the
aspect of us that is eternal,

that is untouched, that
is completely clear.

The aspect of us that we
associate with pure intuition.

Our inner voice will reflect

exactly what is real about
us at this moment.

Both in a state of purity
and a state of impurity.

It will reflect the fact
that we are both

shadow and light.

so I'm not really concerned with
you discerning between the two,

because both are real.

obviously the more conscious, the more
aware, the more shadow work you do,

your inner voice will become
purer and purer and purer

as a more accurate representation
of who you really are.

Now, here's something really important.

Most people in the field of
wellness and spirituality

are gonna tell you that
it's important to ignore

the inner voice that judges, that criticizes,
that's constantly making a commentary

and a negative one, usually,
on the external life,

and to only pay attention to the inner
voice that has good things to say.

But I completely disagree.

Because both aspects
of your inner voice

represent what is real about
you in the current moment.

And if you ignore the
inner voice in you

that is constantly making a negative
commentary of everything in your life,

the rest of your inner voice
will be suppressed as well,

because it is part of
the very same thing.

Whether it's saying something negative
or saying something positive,

it is your inner voice
that is talking.

When you hear this aspect
of your inner voice,

the one that's constantly making
a negative commentary,

that's an indication that your inner
voice is trying to pull your attention

towards an aspect of you that
desperately needs attention.

Because the quality of your attention,

is pure unfiltered consciousness
which is the thing that heals.

So it's like drawing your
attention to a wound.

When you focus on these unhealed
or unconscious aspects of yourself

that the inner voice is trying
to draw your attention to,

only then when you work through those
things and give those things attention,

can the aspect of your
inner voice that operates

from a space of complete clarity and
empowerment, actually speak to you.

So I am going to boldly tell you,

that even if you were to do absolutely
no shadow work whatsoever,

it would still be critical for you to
listen to your internal voice,

no matter what it says.

Because it still represents what's real
about you right here and now.

Now, I'm not telling you to believe that
what your inner voice says is true.

I'm just asking you not
to disbelieve it either.

I'm asking you instead to see whatever the
inner voice says as valid and as important.

Something can be valid even
if it isn't necessarily true.

Something can be important
even if it isn't necessarily true.

When we are not connected to the inner
voice we are in a state of unconsciousness.

Effectively we're in self-denial.

Our inner voice could be
screaming: "I hate that person.",

but on the surface we might
say: "Oh I really like him."

Or our inner voice could be saying:
"I wanna be a singer,"

but on the surface
we may say:

"I wanna do whatever
makes sense to me,

you know, like it's really important for me
to just, you know, be secure I guess in life.

And so I'm gonna go take
that job in accounting."

We go against our intuition.

Sometimes the disastrous ends.

Our inner self is always communicating
with us about its truth.

We need to begin to listen.

otherwise we have nothing
real to work with.

For example, there's nothing that
we can actually do shadow work on

if we're not willing to admit
that something like that exists.

All of you have experienced this.

When you walk up to somebody
when they're triggered,

and they say: "No I'm fine. I don't
know you're talking about."

Even though they're
obviously upset.

Until we listen to the inner voice and say:
"Yeah, you're right, I actually feel upset",

there's nothing we can do about it,
we're dead in the water.

So how do we go about
listening to the internal voice?

Step 1. We take all of our attention
off of the external world,

and we place it instead,
entirely in the internal world.

I want you to imagine
that your skin separates

an inner universe from
this outer universe.

Pretend they are
two separate universes.

You are going to take
all of your attention

and place it on the
internal universe.

If you need to close your
eyes to do this, feel free.

Step 2. You're going to pay
attention to the sensations

that are happening in
the internal universe.

You're gonna be completely
unconditionally present with them.

You're going to observe them like
they're a unique sensory experience.

step 3. You're going to make your
interaction with this sensation,

much more real and tangible.

Especially for your mind, so
your mind can comprehend it.

For example, if the sensation
that I'm experiencing in my body

was a color,
what would it be?

If it was a texture, what
would that texture be?

Is it moving or is it still?

if it was a shape,
what would it be?

Then take it further.

If this sensation where an image,
what would the image be?

Step 4. You're going to mentally
engage with this image

which is a translation of the sensation
taking place within the internal world,

as if the sensation itself
is a separate being or thing

that can talk to you about itself.

Which is really talking
to you about you.

Step 5. You're gonna begin
to ask it questions.

Any question you feel like asking,
is a good question to ask.

Ask it questions about itself and
about its perspective about you.

Questions like, what are you?

What do you represent?

Why are you here right now?

What do you want me to know?

What do you want me to do?

What is the truth that I don't want
to admit to and express right now?

If I were to tell the absolute
truth in this situation

and weren't afraid to do so,
what would the truth be?

Step 6. You're going to listen
to the answers that come

as a result of those questions.

It doesn't matter whether you
get the answers audibly

or whether you just get them in
terms of a sense of knowing.

Or whether you see the answers.

However those answers come to
you, you're going to engage with,

you're intuitively going
to take this process

wherever you feel
like it needs to go.

no matter what answers you
receive or how you receive them,

this is the inner voice
communicating with you.

This is you hearing the inner voice.

Step 7. Have a conversation with yourself

now that you've asked this aspect of
yourself this inner voice these questions.

I don't need to teach you how
to have a conversation.

You will intuitively know
exactly how to do that.

How to respond to the image
that has come to you

that is representing
this internal truth.

You will know what to ask
as a result of the answers

that you get from the inner voice.

And you can let the process
naturally unfold from there.

Talking to yourself internally

is you having a conversation
with your inner voice.

There is no right or
wrong way to do this.

When you are feeling
a strong emotion

such as when you're
triggered or feel inspired,

the inner voice is calling
for you to listen.

Don't ever think that if you don't
know the reason why you feel

the way you do, that
there isn't a reason.

But even if the inner voice isn't
actively calling for your attention

and calling for you to listen.

It's really important for
us to listen anyway.

What we do with our
own inner voice,

is the same as we would do
with a romantic partner.

If we had a partner,

it doesn't matter whether they were
triggered or feeling super super happy,

we wouldn't wait for that circumstance to
come up, we would go check in with them.

We would take time to essentially,
during the day, say hey how are you?

How's it going? How do you feel
today? What do you want today?

If you're not sure what
your inner voice is saying,

I want you to be really,
really patient with it.

Delay making decisions.

I want you to be able to give it time to
completely fully express itself to you.

So that when you take actions as a
result of listening to your inner voice,

all of you can be in alignment
with that movement.

If you try this process and the
inner voice doesn't talk to you

or isn't communicating to you.

you're getting no impressions
from your internal world,

I also need you to be patient.

what's happening is that you
suppressed your inner voice

and ignored your inner
reality for so long,

that that aspect of you that's wounded
by the fact that you've done that,

is testing you.

It's basically saying,

"why the hell should I believe
that you're gonna do this now?"

"I don't want to talk to you, you
haven't listened to me for so long

what's to say you're not just gonna
go back to ignoring me again?"

So if you got this
type of inner voice,

it's essential for you to
be even more present.

Continue coming back and
continue coming back,

no matter how long it takes, no matter
how many times you have to do it,

until it begins to trust you
enough to talk to you.

Chances are if this is how your own
inner voice is interacting with you,

it doesn't trust you because
you have an abusive pattern

with responding to yourself.

So what I want you
to do to understand

the steps for how to
address your own emotions

is to watch my video titled:

"The Emotional Wake Up Call"

The tonality that I
use in that exercise

is the way I want you interacting
with your own inner voice.

Practice connecting
with your heart.

Your inner voice speaks
loudest through your heart.

To understand how to do this I want
you to watch my youtube video titled:

"How To Connect With Your Heart"

But what's important to know

is that your inner voice can speak
through any aspect of you

your inner voice can speak
through your mind,

it can speak through your heart, it
can speak through your fingernails,

it can speak for your pancreas, it can
speak on behalf of any aspect of you.

Why can it do this?

Because your inner voice
represents the real you.

With enough practice,

you're not gonna have to shut off
your senses to go find your inner voice.

It's not gonna be a whisper,
it's gonna to be a yell.

So instead of going to find it,

to listen so deeply to it, it's
going to come up to meet you.

In fact, it's gonna become unavoidable.

As you're engaging with
the external world

you will literally hear your
internal voice all the time.

And then, you can be an expression of
that truth and reality within yourself.

It's not gonna be a
mystery, what you think

and how you feel and what you
want and what you don't want.

That being said, expression
is a really really critical

way to get the inner voice
to go from quiet to loud.

It became quiet because
we suppressed it.

We essentially sent it the
message that, guess what?

"My parents or my caregivers or my school
teachers or my peers are right about me."

"My voice doesn't matter."

That's essentially you saying to
yourself: "You don't matter voice."

So the voice shrinks.

We didn't allow it
to express itself.

So, what's the opposite of that
suppression?

Expression!

For this reason, I want you to
learn how to express yourself,

and to make an
active practice of it.

To understand how
to express yourself,

you can watch my
youtube video titled:

"How To Express Your Emotions"

Our inner voice is always
talking to us about the things

we experience in our life and
the people that we meet.

In the beginning, when we are first
starting to listen to our inner voice

we need to stop and reflect.

We need to trace back over what
was said and what happened,

what we thought about it, how
we felt about what we thought.

When we do this the inner
voice honors the pathway

by which we arrived at our intuitive
reaction in any given situation.

It makes our intuition much more acute.

It enables us to identify
the concrete reasons why,

for example, we hesitated
to make a decision,

that on the surface
seemed like a good one.

The more often you're
able to recognize why

you have the instinctual
reactions you do,

the more comfortable you'll
be with your intuition.

You'll come to learn that your
inner voice can be trusted.

here's another tip;

I want you to be really really conscious
about surrounding yourself

with people in your life who actually
care about your inner voice.

People who are gonna help you

to make it louder, instead of
to tell it that it doesn't matter.

Now most of us who have an
inner voice that doesn't speak,

we're surrounded by people who
make our inner voice not matter.

It's not gonna work very much
for you to be doing all this work

on really expressing yourself
and really listening to your voice

with an entire orchestra
outside you saying:

"Screw that what you think and want
and don't want doesn't matter."

So, if you're serious about
making this inner voice speak

surround yourself or spend
time with, selectively,

the people who are gonna make you
aware of what the inner voice is saying.

I want you to involve people
in your spiritual practice.

That means if you're in the
development of the inner voice,

I want you to go to your friends,
the ones who you trust,

the ones you know will actively
participate in this process

and say: "Hey guys
here's the issue:

I have a real problem when
it comes to understanding

what my inner voice
is saying to me."

"I can't hear it."

"And when we all as a group
decide to do something,

I don't even know if I want
to do that thing or not."

"Sometimes I just feel resistance
but I don't know why."

"So what I need your
help, friends, to do,

is to feel into when you
think that my inner voice

may be saying something
that I'm not listening to,

and direct me back towards
it so that I can listen to it,

figure out what it's saying and
then enable me to take actions

in accordance with what
my inner voice is saying."

Sooner or later if you ignore and
suppress your inner voice,

the universe isn't going to
let you do it anymore.

Your life is going to become
quite literally so uncomfortable

that everything will
drag you back to it.

Until you can't ignore it anymore.

And then you're gonna
have to shift everything.

And it's not a
comfortable process.

I'm not gonna make an
enemy of that process

if it's the road that you take,

but I'd rather you just start
living your life according

to your inner voice
from the get-go,

so life doesn't have to
become so painful for you.

Live your life according to
what is real about you.

Admit to what's real and
listen to your inner voice

and never let your inner voice be
drowned out by the voice of others.

Have a good week.

Subtitles by: David Soh +
Bodhi Shin + Tanya Duarte