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Stop Second-Guessing Yourself

Strengthening Your Intuition with Breathwork

You sit there, stuck in indecision. Maybe it’s a big life choice, maybe it’s something as simple as sending a text—but either way, you can’t land on an answer.

You overthink. You spiral.

You hear the “what ifs” piling up. What if I get it wrong? What if I regret it?

Or maybe you shut down entirely. It’s easier not to decide at all.

Somewhere along the way, you were taught that intuition isn’t enough. That logic should always win. That trusting yourself is reckless.

Take a look at these scenarios and see if any resonate with you:

Someone asks, “How do you feel about that?” and you freeze. You should know, right? But the answer isn’t there. Instead, you give a polite response and change the subject.
You trusted your gut before—and it backfired. Maybe you stayed in a relationship too long, took a draining job, or made a choice you later regretted. Now, “going with your gut” feels risky, even reckless.
A decision is in front of you, but your body reacts before your mind can make sense of it—tight chest, clenched jaw, swirling emotions. Is this intuition? Or is it past hurt clouding my judgment?
You replay a scenario over and over, trying to predict every outcome. One moment, your intuition says yes. The next, you doubt it. By the time you’re done spiraling, you don’t trust any answer at all.
Your initial instinct is clear—until you mention it to someone else. “Are you sure?” they ask. Suddenly, you’re doubting everything, wondering if their perspective is more valid than your own.
You feel pulled toward something—a creative project, a new opportunity—but the voice in your head says, “Who are you to do this?” Self-doubt drowns out your knowing before you can even explore it.
You hesitate to make a choice because you want certainty. The idea of getting it “wrong” is unbearable. It feels safer to do nothing at all than to risk misstepping.
You expect intuition to feel like a lightning bolt, clear and undeniable. When it doesn’t, you assume you’re doing it wrong—or that you don’t have intuition at all.
You get a weird feeling before saying yes to something—a subtle discomfort in your gut, tension in your shoulders—but you dismiss it as “nothing.” Later, you realize your body knew before your mind did.
Your intuition might be trying to get through, but you numb out—scrolling, consuming, staying busy—anything to avoid stillness. In the quiet moments, you realize you’re disconnected from yourself.

Why We Struggle to Trust Intuition

Our ability to trust our intuition is often shaped by conditioning, societal norms, the desire to avoid discomfort, or a learned disconnection from ourselves.

One way to begin “hearing” your intuition again is by understanding how your nervous system responds to decision-making.

What Happens When We’re Outside Our Window of Tolerance?

Your Window of Tolerance is the range where your nervous system feels safe enough to think clearly, access emotions, and respond to life rather than react.

When you’re regulated, your intuition can flow. You sense what feels aligned.

But step too far outside this window, and your body shifts into survival mode:

Hyperarousal (Anxiety, racing thoughts, control): You try to predict the future, avoid discomfort, or micromanage every detail.
Hypoarousal (Numbness, brain fog, shutdown): You disengage, disconnect, and feel like you don’t know yourself at all.

If you grew up being told that intuition was “irrational,” that emotions were “too much,” or that external validation mattered more than inner knowing—then this disconnection might feel normal.

It’s not. It’s just what your nervous system has adapted to.

This aligns with Polyvagal Theory, developed by Dr. Stephen Porges, which explores how our nervous system detects safety or threat. When we feel safe and connected, we engage with life and intuition naturally. But when we sense danger—even subconsciously—our nervous system moves into survival responses like fight, flight, freeze, or fawn.

If intuition feels blocked, it’s often because our body isn’t registering that it’s safe to listen.

Breathwork: A Tool to Regulate and Reconnect

Your breath is a direct line to your nervous system.

When you’re spiraling in hyperarousal, breathwork can slow everything down.
When you’re stuck in hypoarousal, breathwork can gently bring you back online.

With practice, breathwork helps:
✔ Expand your Window of Tolerance, so stress doesn’t hijack your clarity.
✔ Create space between reaction and response, making intuition more accessible.
✔ Rebuild trust with your body, so you don’t have to outsource every decision.

Two Breathwork Practices for Intuition

1. 2-Minute Grounding Breath (Extended Exhale)

Best for: Regulating the nervous system in the moment
How it helps: Slows the heart rate, activates the parasympathetic nervous system, and creates an immediate sense of calm.

Try it:

Bring to mind a decision—big or small.
Inhale for four counts, hold for four counts, exhale for six to eight counts.
Repeat for two minutes.
Notice: Does your answer feel different? Does your body have more clarity?

2. Rhythmic 3-Part Breath

Best for: Deepening emotional processing & releasing stuck energy
How it helps: Clears mental clutter, making it easier to hear intuition over fear or conditioning.

This practice can be intense, but also incredibly freeing—especially in a guided setting.

🎧 Want to experience this firsthand? I’ve created a Beyond the Pattern Sample Breathwork Bundle offering a taste of what’s possible in a longer facilitated experience.

Facilitator vs. Healer: The Power of Being Guided

Many of us were conditioned to believe that healing comes from an external expert—someone with the answers, the solutions, the “fix.”

But true transformation doesn’t work that way.

Your body already holds deep wisdom. Your breath is your guide.

My role as a facilitator isn’t to tell you what healing should look like—it’s to create space for you to access the clarity, release, and insight that already exist within you.

As Jack Kornfield wrote in Holotropic Breathwork, a facilitator is like a midwife—safeguarding and supporting the natural healing process, rather than controlling it.

Just as the breath has its own intelligence, so do you. The practice is about learning to trust it.