Trusting My Instincts, But Not Blindly

Sometimes in our lives, we have clear facts before taking any decisions; nothing to be skeptical about; everything just seems so glaring, and boom, you are on your path to finalize the whole thing, but then there are other times when we seem to be in the dark and trust only our feelings to direct us. This kind of feeling is what we call instincts in my own understanding, and personally, it comes to me like a small voice deep down within; if I don't pay attention, I will always ignore it, and sometimes I do regret why I don't obey this little voice/feeling.

Over the years, I have learned that instincts can be the guide we needed to make some decisions, but honestly, as much as I believe in instincts to guide me sometimes, I would never substitute them with wisdom or even an adequate judgment of a thing. Wisdom demands that we carefully observe a situation or case before finalizing, because our instincts are sometimes being influenced by our emotions. That is to say that they are not perfect.

Personally, I trust my instincts to a greater extent because they have obviously saved me from unseen troubles in the past. I can vividly remember what happened sometime last year in my home. I don't know why, but most times, strange people usually knock at my gate asking for both financial assistance and foodstuff assistance. I understand the economy; so I usually give out whenever it's available, but there is one woman that came around one hot afternoon, narrating one emotional story about her child that she left at home and how she seriously needs financial assistance at that time.

While I was patiently listening to everything she was saying, I felt very unsettled; something was not just right about the woman, says this little voice within me. I had some money I already kept to take it to church, and while I wanted to go get it and give it to her, my instinct was dragging me back. It was an intense struggle to resist such, knowing how emotional I can be. I didn't have any evidence that she was not telling me the truth, but my instinct kept warning me to be careful on this, so what I did was get inside my kitchen and offer her a tuber of yam instead of money. She reluctantly collected it and went away.

A few weeks later, the truth came out, and several people who had given her huge money out of sympathy realized that they were scammed in broad daylight. Her stories were all fake, only a disguise to exploit money from innocent, kind-hearted citizens. When I heard the news, I was grateful that I listened to my instincts and followed them; however, this doesn't mean that my instincts are always perfect. Sometimes, I am wrong. I allow emotions to overtake me, and thus, misunderstanding people sets in.

To this date, I still regret a person whom my instincts told me to distance myself from when she kept coming close. I totally assumed wrongly, and later I discovered how kindhearted the person is. Just like I mentioned earlier, my instincts are never perfect, but they have been super helpful to me dealing with life and its ups and downs at certain points of my life, but I must admit that sometimes my instincts are greatly influenced by fears, past experiences I had, and sometimes even personal biases.

Overall, I do trust my instincts, but because I am only but a human, I am usually wrong sometimes. This is why I should be careful to balance any feeling with wisdom, close observation, and the help of the Holy Spirit too; it's very important.

Images are mine