The FIRST Sense – Intuition

 Derived from The Mystery of Intuition: Where Gut Feelings Really Come From

"Your intuition knows what to do. The trick is getting your head to shut up so you can hear it."

We all have heard of intuition.  Commonly it is described as a “gut feeling.”  Intuition is not just superstition, it serves as a sophisticated form of intelligence operating largely beneath conscious awareness.  But where do gut feelings really come from?

One of the first sites is our brains.  Due to the thousands of hours of experience under their belts, brains can make rapid decisions through pattern recognition, without requiring deliberate thought. This experience, similarly reflected among experts across many fields—doctors, military personnel, and firefighters—points to the possibility that intuition may emerge from a rich substrate of prior experience. In these instance intuition is “a fast, instinctive form of intelligence that operates separately from our conscious thoughts.” Those who focus on their intuitive feelings rather than painstakingly analyzing every detail are often documented to make better decisions and, perhaps even more importantly, are more satisfied with the outcome.  The use of intuition is invaluable in situations with multiple alternatives, no clear criteria, insufficient information, and unique problems without precedent. 

So gut feelings play a valuable role.  Research now shows the phrase carries both a metaphorical and biological truth.  We all are hard wired to have gut feelings.  The gut has what scientists refer to as a “second brain,” comprising more than 200 million neurons. These neurons send signals back and forth with the brain through the vagus nerve, forming the gut-brain axis. This system creates a feedback loop that affects how we feel physically and emotionally.

Moreover, the health of the gut microbiota, which comprises approximately 38 trillion bacteria, can affect feelings of urgency, emotions, and even memory, as it produces chemicals that affect the brain. In mouse experiments, tweaking the gut microbiota balance can alter brain neurochemistry, making mice more bold or anxious. Notably, in humans, approximately 90 percent of serotonin, a key neurotransmitter that influences mood and decision-making, is produced in the gut. This indicates that emotional states and intuitive feelings may be influenced by the gut-brain axis. When you feel butterflies in your stomach before a big decision, or a sinking feeling when something seems wrong, you may be experiencing this ancient communication system at work.

Other brain processes that may be a part of intuition is our consciousness.  Our brains are wired to be efficient at perceiving patterns and research demonstrates that memory occurs before you are aware of it.

Before we consciously remember or notice something, our brains rapidly sort out experiences, picking up the important bits and giving them a holistic level of understanding.  The psychological concept is called gestalt and it describes the brain’s tendency to perceive patterns rather than individual parts, and to create closure to make sense of incomplete information.

For example, in the image at the left your brain completes the triangle. This is Gestalt psychology, in which the mind organizes parts into patterns.

The cues may not have been noticed, but the brain assembled them into an intuitive warning—into an unconscious gestalt.

The right hemisphere of the brain is good at spotting patterns and noticing things that don’t fit, even if we’re not aware of it. The hippocampus compares what we see now with past experiences, while the orbitofrontal cortex integrates emotional memories with present sensory input. The result of this information processing appears as a feeling rather than a thought.

Not only that, but the brain actively generates predictions about what it should perceive based on its experience. When these predictions detect a mismatch—something that does not fit the expected pattern—the result manifests as intuitive unease or “knowing.”  A vague feeling gradually becoming more conscious and explicit as the brain works to understand why the feeling arose.

Could intuition also come from somewhere else?  Perhaps instead of merely reacting to the present, intuition offers us a glimpse of the future.  In the mid-1990s an experiment was designed to test whether awareness could transcend time. Participants were connected to an EEG machine and placed in front of a computer screen. The computer randomly selected and displayed pleasant or disturbing images after a brief pause.

Researchers noticed that people’s brains became more active just before seeing disturbing images, but not before positive ones. It was as if the brain could sense something bad was coming, even seconds before it happened. This effect was called “presentiment.”

The results were statistically significant, and other researchers, found similar effects in their own experiments.

A 2012 meta-analysis of 26 studies suggest that human physiology can distinguish between randomly delivered emotional and neutral stimuli occurring one to 10 seconds in the future.

This isn’t precognition in the sense of a psychic power of seeing future events.  Instead, their autonomic nervous systems—heart rate, skin conductance, and brain activity—show measurable arousal before encountering emotionally significant stimuli. According to the 2012 meta-analysis, the effect size may be small. Still, it’s statistically significant across multiple laboratories and researchers, with the probability of the effect being a coincidence estimated at one in a trillion.

So if we are generally hard wired toward intuition and if there is a real advantage to developing the “cognitive faculty” of intuition, and if intuition represents a fundamental feature of how living things respond to their environment and thus shouldn’t be called a “sixth sense,” but rather the “first sense” and if intuition is one of the first guidance systems in living organisms, and whether intuition comes from the brain, the gut, or something more mysterious, researchers generally agree on a few practical points.

Firstly, intuition can be developed. Think of it as a separate form of cognition that has been neglected in our education. We prioritize rationality over intuition, innovation, and creativity—but we are now seeing a creativity crisis in our young people because these skills are not nurtured the way logic and rationality are. But since intuition is a cognitive faculty, it is something that can be trained.” Building intuition begins with paying attention and that it can be developed through practicing mindfulness. Humanity has lost its connection to its environment not just natural surroundings but also paying attention to where you are, what you are, who you are, what you’re doing.  Being intentional and aware of yourself and your surroundings is one of the first developments to cultivate.  

Secondly, intuition needs discernment, which is the ability to judge well.  Judgement is the ability to come to sensible conclusions which requires self-awareness for you need to be able to discern if your feeling is your intuition or just your fears arising.

Thirdly, integrate both intuition and rational thinking. This is part of that discernment process.  Question an intuitive feeling and discern if it makes sense and then incorporate it within your decision making processes.  Intuition is not infallible, it is not easily verified and therefore can be wrong.  It is also an early level of gaining knowledge and therefore, rational analysis is necessary to arrive at the best sensible solution. 

The most effective decisions come not from gut feelings alone or pure logic alone, but from the conscious interplay between the two. Don’t consider your intuition your sixth sense.  Consider it your first sense in your decision making process.