Instinct and Emotions

“What’s going on? Is my instinct for survival kicking in, am I falling back into an old emotional pattern, or is my intuition telling me something?” These are common questions that arise in my spiritual facilitation work.

Eckhart Tolle says an instinctive response is the body’s direct response to an external situation—our fight-or-flight response kicks in (1). Our ancestors had to outrun that saber tooth tiger. Clarissa Pinkola-Estés speaks of a woman’s wounded instincts (2). She says that through abuse and neglect, women are taught from a young age to not trust their instinct, and thus lose their ability to flee an endangering situation—emotional or physical.

Tolle says an emotion is the body’s response to a thought (1).

The heart of spirituality is consciousness or awareness. Meditation and mindfulness exercises (3) train us to watch our emotions and to notice where we feel them in our bodies. We watch our thoughts, becoming aware of the false stories these thoughts often tell us. Monks train for years observing their repetitive patterns of emotional and cognitive responses as they process their experiences.

The Enneagram as a Tool for Waking Up

My People House ministerial mentor Wayne Tittes introduced me to the Enneagram (4). He said that the Enneagram was, in some ways, a shortcut to this personal knowledge. When using the Enneagram with clients, I talk of tendencies. Someone may have the tendencies of a number three, but they are not A number three—I’m not keen to put people in boxes.

Both meditation and the Enneagram are tools that lead us to awareness of our go-to thoughts and emotions. For example, a three may start out on a project, only to find fear constricting his chest and dogging his heels. He asks, “Is this instinct or intuition telling me this is a bad idea?” But he knows that for a three on the Enneagram, failure is his worst fear, followed by the shame of not being good enough. He has learned through mindfulness practices to 1) pay attention to the stress signals going off in his body; 2) to stay with those emotions nonjudgmentally; 3) to sit with this fear nonjudgmentally; and 4) to ask his higher self what to do next.

Sometimes it’s just to breathe. He may bring in some facts: “I’ve got experience, I know how to do this. And even if I fail, that is not a measure of my worth, of my value, and it’s not who I am.”

A seven avoids boredom, limitation, or pain—emotional and physical—and seeks out pleasure. When she feels emotional pain in a misunderstanding with her partner, her tendency is to get out of the relationship NOW. But she knows that’s her tendency and follows the mindfulness practices listed in the previous paragraph.

Intuition, Not the Same as Gut Feelings or First Impressions

Intuition serves the brain’s need to predict and prepare for what will happen next. In that, it is similar to a first impression, which is a rapid assessment based on subtle visceral clues. Also, intuition is sometimes called a “gut feeling.” But first impressions as a quick judgment of someone can be wrong due to biases, including cultural and societal stereotyping. Gut feelings can be an emotional response based on stress-related anxiety held in one’s stomach.

And so we train in awareness.

Psychology Today says,

“Intuition is a form of knowledge that appears in consciousness without obvious deliberation. It is not magical but rather a faculty in which hunches are generated by the unconscious mind rapidly sifting through past experience and cumulative knowledge” (5).

Of intuition, Pinkola-Estés there is no greater blessing a parent can give a child than the ability to depend on the truth of her own intuition. “You have good judgment. What do you think is going on here?” Simple, yet a powerful affirmation of a child’s inner knowing.

About intuition, Thomas Moore, says,

“I don’t mean a simple hunch. I’m referring to a deep kind of knowing that doesn’t follow the rules of logic and can’t be found through research and reasoning” (6).

Intuition comes from a Latin word that means “to keep watch over” and so we “watch over” what’s stirring inwardly. We look for synchronicities—meaningful coincidences of external events that are not related through cause and effect. We pay attention to our dreams . Sometimes a person comes into our lives and nudges us a certain way, or a book unexpectedly lands in our hands that we didn’t know we were seeking. These confirm our intuition’s nudges.

Pay Attention

Instinct, emotional responses, and intuition can and do overlap. Sometimes an inner predator or a thug shows up and tells us: “You’re not good enough.” “What makes you think you can create art?” “Why aren’t you more sensible?” In Chapter 2, Stalking the Intruder, Pinkola-Estés says,

“When a woman is strong in her instinctual nature, she intuitively recognizes the innate predator by scent, sight, and hearing . . . anticipates its presence, hears it approaching, and takes steps to turn it away (emphasis added).”

Pinkola-Estés and Thomas Moore both list ways to strengthen our intuition. Of most importance is to listen to it. It doesn’t mean to force your intuitive insights on an unsuspecting partner, friend, or family member, or to make drastic changes in your life without considering the impacts on your commitments.

Pay attention to your responses to any of these thoughts. If anything seems “right,” that might be your intuition leading you somewhere!

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Notes & Sources:

1. Tolle, Eckhart. A New Earth, Awakening to Your’ Life’s Purpose, Plume, 2005.
2. Pinkola-Estés, Clarissa. Women Who Run with the Wolves. New York: Ballantine Books, 1992. She includes many references to instincts and intuition. Chapter 3, Nosing Out the Facts: The Retrieval of Intuition as Initiation is a good place to start.  
3. Jon Kabat-Zinn, the founder of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction, says, mindfulness is “paying attention on purpose, in the present moment, and nonjudgmentally, to the unfolding of experience moment to moment.”
4. The Enneagram is a nine-sided figure representing a spectrum of possible personality types. It is a model, not an exact representation of a person’s personality. For more information on the Enneagram, contact me or People House.
5. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/intuition
6. Moore, Thomas. A Religion of One’s Own. A Guide to Creating a Personal Spirituality in a Secular World. Penguin Random House, 2014.
7. https://csmt.uchicago.edu/glossary2004/intuition.htm

About the Author: Rev. Mary Coday Edwards is a Spiritual Growth Facilitator and People House Minister. A life-long student of spirituality, Mary spent almost 20 years living, working, and sojourning abroad in Asia, Southeast Asia, East Africa, and Latin America before finding her spiritual connection at People House and completing its Ministerial Program. Past studies include postgraduate studies from the University of South Africa in Theological Ethics/Ecological Justice, where she focused on the spiritual and physical interconnectedness of all things. With her MA in Environmental Studies from Boston University, abroad she worked and wrote on environmental sustainability issues at both global and local levels. In addition to working in refugee repatriation, she was a copy editor for international, English print daily newspapers in Indonesia and Mexico.

I would wager the vast majority of people these days probably don’t consider much of a spiritual element in the way that they care for their dwelling space, save, perhaps, for a yoga or meditation corner. The closest iteration of ritual for some people is likely in the way they decorate, or even the regularity with which they clean their homes. 

As a person who is drawn to the art of subtle energies (intuition, psychic experiences, empathic feelings, etc.), I was very intrigued to come across The House Witch by Arin Murphy-Hiscock just days before our move. In all my studies of magic, alternative healing, and the like, the most I’ve ever come across about “hearthcraft,” if you will, can be generally summed up by the following statement:

“It’s important to take care of the energy in your space.”

There often isn’t much more to it, so in the past I’ve done a few things here and there, but mostly ignored the energy in my home because, save for a neglected altar and a periodic smoke cleansing, I didn’t know what else to do. 

It is not a new concept to make the home a sacred space, but it is, I believe, in this period of collective upheaval and uncertainty, a better time than most to start trying. Cultivating helpful, loving energy in your home can be as simple or as formal (I’m looking at you, Capricorn!) as you’d like to make it. One of the most beneficial aspects of cultivating magic, chi, or energy in your home is that this spruced-up vibration then flows into other areas of your life. If this seems like a foreign concept, consider this:

Many of the principles of home and hearth magic share their ethos with Buddhist and mindfulness-based practices. 

In a nutshell, cultivating the energy in your home can be done by focusing in the following key areas, which have been paraphrased and expanded from The House Witch:

1. Learning to be present. This can be especially helpful in moments when we feel tired or rushed, such as trying to get dressed to get out the door, or sluggishly putting together a meal at the end of a long day. Focusing on the task at hand rather than what has happened in the past or the future helps to calm the mind and as such, the environment around you.
2. Creating intention. Even the smallest task, such as seasoning food or washing dishes, becomes an elevated experience when the intention is made to do it just so. This is not about micromanaging, but about creating awareness around why you are doing something, rather than just zoning out or seeing it as something to get through. With intention we harness the energy to nurture ourselves and our space.
3. Clearly direct your energy. Somewhat of an extension of creating intention, directing your energy means using your focus to pinpoint where you want your energy to go and what you want the outcome to be. When we are less mindful, especially when we are tired or rushed, we lose a lot of valuable energy simply because we are not creating clear intention and direction with our tasks. 
4. Hocus, focus. Pick one thing at a time to focus on. Life starts to feel overwhelming when our minds run rampant, trying to decipher and problem-solve everything at once. Meditation can certainly help with this, as can creating awareness around moments of feeling overwhelmed and scatterbrained. Even if you’re worried about tomorrow’s project, give yourself the gift of taking a mental break from that while you stir your soup, or place the blanket back on the couch. 

Humans also have a tendency to focus their attention on what they perceive as their personal space within a home, such as a bedroom or office. Collective spaces, like the kitchen and living room, are then left at the mercy of whatever energies collect by the colliding of multiple lives that occur there. Paying attention to shared spaces is just as important, if not more so, than monitoring the energy of private parts of the home. 

If you’re feeling ready to take a more active role in guiding the energy of your home, here are a few simple ways to get started:

a. Place a bowl of water or salt in a room to absorb unwanted energy. This can also be done in the four corners of the house to create a grid, but should be discarded and refreshed frequently. The same can be done using crystals and cleansing them on a regular basis. Smoky quartz and black tourmaline are good for this.

b. Clean with intention. Sweep towards the doors that lead outside, mentally picturing any unhelpful energy getting swept away along with it. Dispose of any debris in trash cans outside the home; don’t let it sit inside once it’s been intentionally collected. If you like you can follow this up with an herbal floor wash. Simply make a tea of your favorite loose herbs and dilute a bit with water, using the energy of your hands or focused intention that the herbs fill the water and your home with blessings and protection. 

c. Smoke is a common choice for cleansing a space these days, and can be very effective, but seeing as how white sage and palo santo are now at risk plants due to overharvesting, and are sacred to certain cultures, it’s great to look into other options. Juniper and mugwort are both quite prolific and cleansing in their own rite. Chimes or singing bowls can also be used to cleanse a space using sound vibration. For more folk-inspired techniques, hanging a rope of garlic or placing a cut onion in the center of the room are also said to dispel unhelpful energies. 

I tend to prefer philosophies that value the depth of intention over how closely one follows specific instructions. To that end, if there are ideas that come to you naturally about how you’d like to cultivate your space, I think that is just as valid as any instructions found in a book.

If you find yourself feeling frayed, lacking energy, or simply feeling the weight of the world these days, you are certainly not alone.

Taking time to care for both yourself and your home can provide a much-needed refuge, a place for you to rest and restore as you follow your path in this world. 

Blessed be. 

If you’re interested in more ways to take care of your home, including recipes and more complex rituals, please do read “The House Witch” by Arin Murphy-Hiscock. It does not fall under the category of “Wicca” but is simply based on the author’s personal practice, which takes inspiration from many different areas.