Awakening Your Instincts
Many times it seems to me that extraordinary humans choose not so easy paths in life for the simple reason of performing.
I hear almost everyday people struggling, feeling lost trying to find their purpose. “What is my purpose?” “What am I meant to do with my life” “Where am I going”? These are life’s most difficult questions. They can be equally as inspiring as they are daunting, fatiguing and unsettling. But of course we feel this way. From the moment we are conscious we very quickly learn that the purpose of sleep is to feel awake; the purpose of eating is to be nourished, the purpose of drinking fluids is to be quenched; the purpose of school is to be educated; the purpose of following rules is to be normal. Everything seems to need a purpose.
Act before thinking
While these are all very important questions and facts of life, sometimes we just need to do before thinking. Sometimes we can thrive without a reason to justify thriving. Sometimes we can be happy without this deep sense of purpose that many of us seem to be longing. Sometimes we can break a rule and find ourselves on a better path in life. Sometimes just accepting this is enough. Many of the world’s most successful humans just started on their journey because it felt good for them.
Living without purpose is ok
The point is that many times it’s ok just to do something for the sake of doing it - without a clearly defined and well thought out purpose. Did the first ever single cell organism think about the purpose of eating nutrients? Or did it just act on what we might call instinct? And look how it has evolved over trillions of years into the humans we are now! Maybe what you instinctively want to pursue is fun, maybe it’s enjoyable, maybe it’s easy or maybe you have no idea why you want to do what you want to do. And guess what... that’s completely ok. And guess what again... yes, by selecting one thing to do, you will miss out on something else, and yes you might not be happy with you decision. But, does that really mean that you cannot change your mind? Does that really mean that you cannot pivot and change your actions? If pursuing something you feel good about provides less struggle than trying to understand why you want to pursue it and how it will impact your life, then why wait? Don’t let decades of conditioning, cultural tradition and norms tell you what is and is not meaningful to you. Only you can discover what you are capable of; others can only hinder, help or observe.
Losing touch with our instincts
Sadly, many humans from all walks of life, including world class experts, have lost touch with their instincts. People most at risk of losing touch of their instincts are those who:
(1) have not acted on their instincts for a long time,
(2) are unable for whatever reason to make their own decisions
(3) live a monotonous or repetitive life, with the same day to day without much uncertainty and lots of predictability
(4) experiencing complete exhaustion, severe injury or illness. Note, however there are cases where complete exhaustion, severe injury or illness actually awakens our instincts more than ever. You can read more about this in my previous blog called, Is Life Precious Enough?
Awakening our instincts
There is much more to understanding our instincts and how to best use them to achieve more of what we desire. I will discuss more in future but for now I want to share a few simple strategies to awaken or recalibrate your instincts. These are particularly useful for people who meet any of the criteria above.
Make small inconsequential decisions rapidly throughout your day: simple things like what you want to eat or drink, ordering food or choosing a movie without spending so much time contemplating, what clothing you will wear. These small decisions add agency to your life.
Respond to impulses: are you thirsty, hungry, in need of sunlight, wanting to talk with someone or make a phone call, looking to dance, explore a piece of jewelry or item that catches your eye in a store window. Whatever it is, responding immediately without planning to these what seem like innocuous impulses matters in the grand scheme of building your ability to act on instincts.
Break your routine, just slightly... but enough to shake up your day. This could mean waking up very early one morning a week. Running for an extra 5 minutes. Spending that extra 2 minutes engaging in conversation with a stranger. Changing the shower temperature. Whatever it is, change something small but significant enough to feel like a change.
It’s not just about the result, it’s making the decision itself that matters
The overall tactic here is to act on an “urge” - a subtle and often spontaneous feeling or desire for change. Doing so will not necessarily result in a positive consequence - take note of that. But, doing so will allow you to start engaging with yourself and your environment in an entirely new way. Doing so will help you move beyond paralysis by analysis, boredom of routine or lack of agency as described above. It’s the result of our actions that we should be contemplating when trying to reignite our instincts as opposed to spending so much time contemplating how we will act. We might enjoy rapidly choosing a movie, but the movie itself might have been a poor show. No matter, appreciate that you took action instinctually - you are awakening a deeply rooted and very valuable physiological navigation system that may have been suppressed for quite some time - and with time your instinctual choices will become more accurate with what it is in line with what you need and value.
So, there you have it. Progress without purpose with instinctive decisions, because many of us start out that way and still achieve extraordinary. Go, reawaken your instincts and I very strongly believe that you will find yourself choosing action over thinking about action in many aspects of your life and career. If anything in this post has got your attention and you’d like to learn more then feel free to drop me a message.
Dan
As always, my guidance is not designed to replace professional medical advice or treatments. In many cases my thoughts, opinions and recommendations are crafted by peer-reviewed scientific research and/or hands on experience trial and error working with thousands of high performing humans. Everyone’s journey of success and healthy living is unique. So it is in the space between science and real-life scenarios in high performing fields of work that we must forever forage for new discoveries for ourself and others. Should you find this article of value I encourage you to share it with someone you know. :)
