Intuition and Needs
Intuition can be defined as the ability to understand something immediately without the need for conscious reasoning. In other words, having a clear sense of knowing what feels right in your body and your life.
Intuition can be felt physically, whether it is a gut reaction to something or a change in temperature in your body, there is a shift in energy that can be felt. On a mental and emotional level, there can be a peace and trust that is experienced. Intuition takes time to cultivate, and everyone needs to be disciplined with finding times to connect with their intuition, and recognize times you may feel disconnected from it.
Needs
Needs on the other hand, in the mental health realm, consist of actions that need to be taken to meet a goal, or alleviate discomfort. We can understand our different types of needs from the well-known Maslow’s hierarchy of needs (McLeod, 2020). From this model, we have physiological, safety, love and belonging, esteem, and self-actualization needs.
Physiological- food, water, shelter, and health.
Safety-shelter, job security, and safe environments.
Love and belonging- consist of friendship, intimacy, family, and love.
Esteem- confidence, self-acceptance, and respect from others.
Self-actualization- reaching your full potential in work, creativity, spontaneity, acceptance of facts, and sense of morality.
Using intuition to understand needs
The concept of intuition and personal needs are helpful to be understood together in that using our intuition to understand and meet our personal needs is the cornerstone of mental and physical health. So how do we cultivate intuition, and work to identify our needs?
Below are some helpful tips:
Out of your head and into your body. Intuition and having a flow of taking care of your needs does not come from overanalyzing our thoughts. Finding ways to shift energy and focus from our thinking into our body is important. Whether that be physical exercise, journaling, meditation, being in nature, and setting aside time to be in silence. Build activities that foster body presence over mental stimulation.
Make a list of your personal needs. Feel free to use Maslow’s hierarchy of needs categories from above as a guide. Exploring your needs in all of the categories. Identify which areas are going well, and your needs that are being met. Also, important to identify which needs are not being met, and why that may be the case.
Identify triggers in your day. Be aware of times in your day when you feel triggered by another person’s behavior or felt an intuitive response in your body. If felt triggered, asking what need is not being met for yourself. Work to meet that need once identified.
Source: McLeod, S.A. (2020, March 20). Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Simple Psychology.