How should I explain the depth of this word? Let us borrow a formulation from Henri Bergson; a French philosopher awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1927:
Fortunately, some are born with spiritual immune systems that sooner or later give rejection to the illusory worldview grafted upon them from birth through social conditioning. They begin sensing that something is amiss, and start looking for answers. Inner knowledge and anomalous outer experiences show them a side of reality others are oblivious to, and so begins their journey of awakening. Each step of the journey is made by following the heart instead of following the crowd and by choosing knowledge over the veils of ignorance.
If you look up the word «intuition» on
Wikipedia, you will find that it lists a large number of phenomena, including:
- Artistic inspiration – needs no explanation
- Automatic writing – the words «come to you»
- Astral projection – the ability to see the body from the outside
- Clairvoyance – you see something that has no physical origin
- Clairaudience – you hear something that has no physical origin
- Clairsentience – you receive information through emotions
- Clear perception – the ability to sense spirits or energy that is not physically there
- Claircognisance – you know that something is right without being able to explain why
- Clairalience – you smell something that is not physically there
- Clairgustance – you taste something that is not physically there
- Common sense – «everyone» agrees about some truth without analysing it in depth
- Déjà vu – you feel that you have experienced a situation before
- Extrasensory perception (ESP) – thought transference, seeing things from a distance, etc.
- Epiphany – a glimpse of profound understanding
- Flow – to immerse yourself in an activity so that you forget yourself
- Instinct – innate ability to do certain things automatically
- Mediumship – ability to communicate with the hereafter
- Miracle – a feeling of «truth» or an event that solves something seemingly insoluble
- Precognition – one senses or is sure that something will happen
- Psychometry – the ability to obtain information about a person via touch
- Psychokinesis – the ability to influence objects with thought
- Pyrokinesis – the ability to affect flames through thought
- Rapport – synchronised experiences and behaviour in groups
- Retrocognition – the ability to experience past events
- Revelation – a vision or insight that does not seem to belong to the world we know, often life-changing
- Sixth sense – a collective term for all kinds of inexplicable experiences
- Synchronicity – seemingly random events that appear to be interconnected
- Subconsciousness – the mind's unconscious processing of information before the result becomes conscious
- Vivid memories – you remember the atmosphere and rich details in episodes that once were
- Vocation – you feel that you have a task
With which of these phenomena do you have a relationship?
I have experienced automatic writing (constantly), déjà vu (a few dozen times), epiphany (weekly), claircognisance (daily), vivid memories (many, many times), extrasensory perception (a few times), mediumship (a few times), miracles (dozens of times), precognition (constantly), synchronicity (frequently), rapport (synchronised experiences and behaviour in groups – all the time), revelations (a few times).
In addition, I must mention something that is not on the list, a feeling that things are connected over a long period of time. I look back on events and understand in retrospect how they are connected. I see that one led to the other and that there was a meaning, a purpose, a goal under development long before I became aware of it.
It all seems predestined.
I see how obstacles became breakthroughs, how humans appeared at crucial times and planted seeds that may not bloom until after many years. I look back and see what opportunities and solutions presented themselves but which I did not seize.
The longer I live, the clearer it stands. A road has been laid. There were significant, necessary choices to be made. If I missed them or chose wrong, then the same options came back in a different form, maybe a long time later, via a detour.
I have this feeling that «what happens, it happens» – in a slightly different sense than when Doris Day sang «
Que Sera Sera» in a Hitchcock movie in 1956. That song has been on my mind since I first heard it as a child. It carries something true in it.
Another song that stuck in a young boy's mind was «
Children of coincidence», sung by Dory Previn. It came in 1976, and I was 15 years old. The song is about all the «coincidences» that determine our lives. Beneath the surface, the message is different; could it be that these coincidences are not random?
There is hardly a person who does not invoke common sense, claims to have a sixth sense, is aware of their subconscious or has experienced déjà vu?
I guess most people have experienced a lot of the other things on the list as well. So the question is – how do we understand it?
