Card #35 – Gut Feelings

What is happening with your primeval self? What do your body and animal self tell you? We have a “second brain” near our stomach with a hundred billion neurons. What does your gut tell you?

Often your gut may warn you about a real hazard that your rational mind hasn’t registered. If you ignore such warnings you get blindsided. For example, in A Guide to the Perplexed Interdimensional Traveler I wrote:

In his potentially life-saving book, The Gift of Fear, renowned security consultant Gavin de Becker provides numerous case histories that demonstrate that most victims of violent crime rationalistically overrode distinct intuitions warning them of impending danger. Our intuition is much more acute (and so much faster) than our conscious thinking, especially in rapidly unfolding life or death situations. Many of Gavin de Becker’s clients, often celebrities, are being stalked or harassed by anonymous threats. Gavin discovered an intriguing and effortless way to find the identity of an anonymous harasser. I don’t have the book in front of me but it goes something like this:

Gavin: Who do you think it could be?

Client: I have no idea.

Gavin: OK, just as a game I want you to pick the name of anybody you know, anybody, right off the top of your head.

Client: OK — Bob.

Gavin: Any reason to think it might be Bob?

Client: Oh, no way, it couldn’t possibly be Bob; he’s such a nice guy, so polite, he sent me a dozen red roses last week.

Almost inevitably the person they pick off the top of their head will turn out to be the harasser.

Consider this a propitious time to listen to what your gut is telling you.