Still small Voice
The ninth step "promises" tell me that I will "intuitively know how to handle situations which used to baffle me." Sure enough, this intuition has come to pass. The catch is, I have to learn to accept it. To trust it. And my "thinking" mind conflicts and contradicts this Voice at every turn. I have relied, regretfully so, for so long on my thinking mind to rationalize (rational-lies) my way through life, that it's hard to fully trust this freshly unearthed intuition. Even though I can't recall a time I've been let down when following it.
Each weekday morning when I am either running or riding my bike, I exert the greatest of energies to make it past my sons bus stop before he is picked up. This morning as I turned my bike back into our neighborhood, I realized I was probably too late to catch him. But amidst this mild sadness, something told me to take a right turn down a side street which I never go down. That I might catch a glimpse of his bus as it drove by. Immediately my thinking mind chimed in exclaiming it was too late and in doing so, I would miss out on the extra mileage of my normal route. As I approached the side street, I just took it. About a block away there was my sons bus stopped picking up another group of kids. I was able to wave goodbye to him.
This is a relatively unremarkable story. But it really had a meaningful impact on how my day started. It filled my heart to know he was able to see me waving goodbye. And I wonder to myself what the balance of the day would be like if I exclusively followed that still small Voice.
It's one thing to "know" you should follow intuition. It's another entirely to trust and do so.