Frequently Asked Questions
We will post the questions and answers about recognizing, trusting and following inner guidance on this page.
Do you have a question about recognizing and following your inner guidance? Go here.
Also, we will answer questions during our monthly Book Club calls. By joining us each month, you can ask questions directly on the call.
Q: How do I distinguish between my inner anxieties and a whisper warning?
A: A Whisper warning, what we call “foreboding” is a sensation of discomfort that comes with Knowing. You know “something is wrong” and although it feels uncomfortable you have a sense of what to do next, i.e place a phone call, write a letter, visit a friend, walk away. As you take action on the sensation of foreboding the anxiety diminishes and lessens, and you begin to see what the message is. Anxiety, on the other hand, is worry that is steeped in fear that has no real basis. (worry about the future) With anxiety you are trying to access a way to ‘figure things out’ and the more you do that the more anxious you become. An easy way to transmute anxiety into awareness is to do the Worry to Wonder exercise on page 42.
Q: How do I listen to inner guidance when there are bills to pay and I don’t like my job, but feel I have to go.
A: When you believe you can’t pay the bills you will feel fear and worry. In the presence of fear it is difficult to hear inner guidance, almost impossible. Why? Because fear is located in a portion of the brain that overrides the sensations of inner guidance that reside in the right hemisphere of the brain. To “move into the area of the brain” where you can access the intelligence of inner guidance you can do a few things:
1. Change your environment… take a walk in nature, go to a museum, church or temple… take a bath.
2. Do the Worry to Wonder exercise on page 42 of Your Essential Whisper.
3. Begin practicing listening to inner guidance for the SMALL things, like, what to eat for breakfast, what page to turn to in the newspaper, what channel to watch on TV, what road to take to work, and so forth.
4. Do the Eight-week practice guide in the book… this will give you ample experience and practice recognizing and following inner guidance.
Q: This last week I have felt an underlying sense of anxiety and lack of clarity which has me rather stuck and confused. How do I best work through this? Thank you.
A: Allow the lack of clarity to act as a guidepost for you. In other words, what is wrong with feeling a lack of clarity? It may mean wait or stop. Ask your Whisper to give you more information. Vanessa has been feeling just like that over designing her website. Finally, she asked what was “missing”… what was another way to look at or see or understand the “stuckness”. She began getting information about “health” and how to incorporate her love for holistic wellness into the site. You may be feeling stuck because you are still working on your vision and tapping into what you really desire. Rather than try to figure out why you are stuck, use it to open to hearing inner guidance more fully… there’s a message in stuckness… it says… hold on, there’s more, take a deeper/closer look. How exciting!!
Q: How do you know what your truth is? I get so many conflicting messages sometimes. I have difficulty quieting my mind.
A: Those conflicting messages are conflicting beliefs. The dilemma is that everything you believe and hold as true is “your truth.” And every belief you have will FEEL true to you. If you believe chocolate ice-cream tastes better than vanilla, that is your truth. If you believe that diets don’t work, that is your truth. The feeling of truth is not an accurate gauge for whether you are listening to inner guidance (see chapter 11 in Your Essential Whisper). Yet, our beliefs have a very important purpose: they alert you, through your feelings of peace or stress, whether what you perceive as true connects you to inner guidance or moves you away from it. Holding conflicting beliefs such as “I should go on a diet” and “Diets don’t work” will feel very stressful. That’s your clue that you are NOT listening to your own wisdom on how to change your eating habits. Rather than try to quiet the mind, instead become more practiced discerning your inner sensations and recognizing the ways inner guidance speaks “the truth” to you and asking your Whisper to guide you.
Do you have a question about recognizing and following your inner guidance? Go here.
