Making Wiser Decisions: How to Balance Intuition and Analysis

March 5, 2024/0 Comments/in Blog, Living in the Flow, Positive Living /by Carolyn Cooper

Making Wiser Decisions: How to Balance Intuition and Analysis

Last week I posted a short quiz about how you use intuition vs. analysis in your life. If you missed it you’ll find it here on my blog.

Let’s be real: with so much going on these days, making choices can sometimes feel overwhelming. The constant back-and-forth in your head, the overanalyzing and second-guessing can really slow the process, am I right?

Here’s the good news: there’s a simpler way that saves you time and stress. It’s called intuitive decision making.

At the core of intuitive decision making lies two crucial modes of thinking: intuitive and deliberative. While deliberative thinking involves deep analysis, often leading to a prolonged process of indecision and stress, intuitive thinking offers a swift, effortless path to decision-making.

Imagine being in a flow state, where your prefrontal cortex quiets down, and the brain’s lower regions take the lead, making rapid choices based on pattern recognition. Sounds liberating, right? You already have this, you just need to allow it to happen.

By blending your inner wisdom with practical facts, you can make clear-headed choices without all the agony. Trust yourself to tap into your gut instinct and then balance it with logic. Avoid getting hung up on every little detail—go with what feels aligned.

According to researchers at the Flow Research Collective, there are four simple steps to harness this effortless intuition in your everyday life. To make it even easier I’ve added some examples:

Identify the True Problem: Often, we fixate on surface issues rather than the root cause. Take a moment to ask yourself, “What is the real problem here?” This isn’t just about treating symptoms; it’s about uncovering the underlying issue.
- Example: You’re feeling overwhelmed and stretched thin. Instead of simply vowing to “do less,” ask yourself what’s truly driving your feelings. Is it the lack of meaningful activities, or perhaps the desire for more quality time with your family?
Turn it into a Question: To engage your subconscious turn your problem into a question. Asking an open ended question taps into your rapid intuition, automatically leveraging patterns from your lifetime experience.
- Example: If you’re deciding to quit your part time job to build an online business because you want more time at home with family. Ask your ‘inner advisor’ what are the potential benefits and challenges of starting my online business now, and how does this align with my long-term career and personal goals?
Let Your Mind Incubate: Write down your question and then, let it be. Engage in relaxing activities, allowing your subconscious to work its magic in the background -and it will.
- Example: Spend some time in your garden, take a walk through your neighborhood, drive to your errands with no radio or podcasts playing – just the quiet. These moments of calm give your intuition space to breathe and bring insights to the surface.
Extract Insights: Aha moments often arrive when least expected. Make sure you capture them by writing them down right away. This affirms their value and also offers you a point of reflection and reassurance if you question your choices later on when doubt creeps in (as it likes to do).
- Example: While preparing a family recipe, you’re inspired by the thought of hosting regular family dinners or potluck gatherings with close friends. This intuitive solution speaks directly to your desire for quality time with loved ones, fostering deeper connections and creating fulfilling moments together. Write down the insight and schedule it on your calendar.

By embracing this intuitive process, you’ll find that decisions come faster, and the path forward becomes clearer. You move from agonizing over every choice to trusting your inner guide to bring you the right answers right on cue.

With practice, your inner voice will fill you with calm direction. Its whisperings lead you to growth and contentment.

If you’re ready to dive deeper and truly embrace your intuitive potential, my online course, “Your Intuitive Gifts,” is designed just for you. It explores the different types of intuition and helps you discover your personal intuitive style. Click here to learn more.

Much Love,
Carolyn

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QUIZ – Intuition or Logic: Which Guides You?

February 27, 2024/0 Comments/in Blog, Living in the Flow, Positive Living /by Carolyn Cooper

QUIZ – Intuition or Logic: Which Guides You?

Ever wonder how much your intuition plays a role in the decisions you make every day?

Here’s a quick, insightful quiz to get a glimpse into your intuitive decision-making process!

When faced with a difficult decision, do you:
- A) List pros and cons in a detailed analysis.
- B) Feel the right choice in your gut and go with it.
After making a decision that goes against the grain, do you feel:
- A) Doubtful until you see proven results.
- B) Confident in your choice, trusting your inner guidance.
How do you approach problem-solving?
- A) By immediately diving into logical solutions and research.
- B) Allowing the problem to simmer in your subconscious, waiting for insights to bubble up.
When you think back on your best decisions, were they more often based on:
- A) Extensive research and advice from others.
- B) A strong, inexplicable knowing that you were making the right choice.
How do you feel when you go against your initial gut feeling?
- A) Usually, it doesn’t bother me; I trust logic more.
- B) Often regret it; my first instinct tends to be correct.

What Your Answers Say About You:

Mostly A’s: You lean towards analytical thinking. While thorough, giving your intuition more room could lead to faster, more satisfying decisions.
Mostly B’s: You’re intuitively driven, and trusting your gut serves you well. Fine-tuning this ability can make your decision-making even smoother.

Unlocking Your Decision-Making Power

Making decisions doesn’t have to be a stressful, drawn-out process. By balancing intuitive and analytical thinking, you can make quick, effective choices without the headache. The secret lies in harnessing your intuition—listening to that inner voice that often knows what’s best even before you’ve had time to think it through.

Stay tuned for PART TWO coming next week, where I’ll share specific tips on leveraging intuition for smooth, confident decisions!

In the meantime, to go deeper on harnessing intuition’s power, and to learn what YOUR most natural way of receiving intuition is, you might find my online course helpful: “Your Intuitive Gifts” – click here to learn more.

I’m bringing you more juicy info about intuitive vs analytical decision making next week.

Until then Shine On,

Carolyn

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5 Daily Strategies to Love Yourself More

March 3, 2023/0 Comments/in Blog, Energy Healing, Positive Living, SimplyAlign /by Carolyn Cooper

5 Daily Strategies to Love Yourself More

I was recently asked an interesting question: “Can you help someone to love themself…and is that even possible through SimplyAlign or coaching?”

My answer to that (and what I’m sharing with you today) is -yes it’s possible, and yes, over the 25+ years that I’ve done energy work, and now coaching, I’ve worked with many clients who struggle with self-love and self-acceptance. It seems to be something that affects most of us to one degree or another at different times in our lives. Self love is a critical aspect of any healing process, because having it, or the lack of it, ripples out to all other areas of our lives.

So, whether I’m coaching, or clearing energy with SimplyAlign, here are some strategies I use to help my clients connect to themselves more deeply so they can live and love whole-heartedly. As you read through this list, check in with yourself that you are getting ‘enough’ of each of these, and I invite you to identify one loving thing that you can do for yourself in the next few days:

Self-care: I know we hear it all the time, but one of the best ways to show love to yourself is through self-care. I encourage my clients to prioritize self-care activities such as exercise, meditation, or taking a relaxing bath. When we set aside time for ourselves, we are sending a message to the subconscious mind that we are deserving of that time, love, and care.
Self-compassion: Often, clients who struggle with self-love have a harsh inner critic that constantly berates them, and most often this began in childhood. In addition to releasing any adverse energetic vibration of childhood experiences and/or generational issues, I also teach my clients self-compassion techniques, such as talking to themselves the way they would talk to a friend or visualizing themselves being held in a loving embrace. These techniques help clients cultivate a more compassionate inner dialogue.
Explore limiting beliefs: In general, people who struggle with self-love have underlying limiting beliefs that are holding them back. With SimplyAlign, it’s easy to quickly get to the root causes and release the low-vibrations without having to re-live the entire story. But I also help my clients follow the thread to identify their beliefs and reframe them into a more positive and empowering story. It’s a step toward resilience in the process of connecting with your own heart.
Use positive affirmations: It’s so true that the words we ‘declare’ matter. I find that when asked the right questions, my clients are really skillful at coming up with powerful, customized affirmations they can repeat to themselves daily. These personalized affirmations help to reprogram their subconscious mind with positive beliefs and thoughts, which can help to increase self-love and self-acceptance.
Focus on strengths: I love helping my clients and students see their own light that they may not even be aware of, or have lost sight of. I encourage them to focus on their strengths and accomplishments rather than their perceived shortcomings. And of course by focusing on what they do well and what they have achieved, they can develop a greater sense of their own capacity and self-love.

These five strategies can be practiced everyday to develop a greater sense of self-compassion and self-acceptance.

At the beginning of this post (and since we can all use a stronger, consistent connection to our own heart), I invited you to identify one loving thing from the above list that you can do for yourself in the next few days, and, pro-tip: put a reminder on your calendar to increase accountability and follow through, yay!

As you add more loving thoughts and actions into your life, you’ll find it crowds out the self-limiting thoughts and behaviors, and aligns you with the peace that comes from giving yourself permission to love yourself.

These strategies above work well, AND…if you’re ready to learn how to clean up and revitalize your energy field in a way that is even more streamlined, join us for the next SimplyAlign Training – it’s all LIVE with me online, and includes access for a full year to a HUGE online course -with all the recordings, plus many additional videos and teachings.

You’ll learn how to do energy work for yourself, friends, family, clients (if you choose), and yes, of course your pets!

All in a way that is so simple, yet profoundly effective. Learning SimplyAlign isn’t hard, it’s an intuitive and graceful process that anyone can learn!

SimplyAlign Training:
April 25-28, 2023
Online!

If you’ve attended in the past (CalycoHealing, SimplyHealed, or SimplyAlign), don’t miss the REFRESHER Course: March 9/10th.

It’s all online so you can join from anywhere!

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I want to share with you this photo of these amazing women (and one man!) from last week’s SimplyAlign Refresher Course! These practitioners traveled from eight different states to be

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Let’s talk about your subconscious…

October 27, 2022/0 Comments/in Blog, Living in the Flow, Positive Living /by Carolyn Cooper

Let’s talk about your subconscious…

You may not always be aware of it, but your subconscious mind is always working in the background. It’s sometimes called the unconscious mind, and it holds all of the stored information of everything you have ever experienced.

The subconscious mind keeps your body temperature at 98.6 degrees, regulates your breathing, and keeps your heart beat steady. It also keeps you thinking and acting in a manner consistent with what you have done and said in the past.

Because of that it influences how you react to things, negatively or positively. It’s the hidden but powerful part that affects things like why you may be fearful, resistant, disappointed in certain situations. And on a good note, why you are motivated, confident, successful, cheerful, hopeful in other situations.

Studies in the field of psychology on how the brain works indicate that the experiences we have shape the way we think and act, especially experiences in our early childhood. Although you don’t remember most of your life data, the unconscious data in your head influences 90 to 95% of your behavior.

A monk was walking down a quiet road when suddenly he heard the sound of a galloping horse.

He turned and saw a man riding a horse in the distance moving swiftly towards him.

When the man on the horse got closer, he slowed down just a bit and the monk asked,

“Where are you going?” To which the man replied, “I don’t know, ask the horse,” and rides away.

The horse in this story represents your subconscious mind running on past conditioning. And sometimes it seems we don’t know where that past programming will take us. If past experiences, conversations, perceptions are in your subconscious mind, running like like this horse, how do we change it when necessary?

Is there a way to update your “horse” with new, positive instructions?

Luckily yes! Because your subconscious doesn’t think or reason independently, it simply obeys the commands it receives from your conscious mind, your conscious thoughts and actions can reprogram it.

You can consciously choose to feed your subconscious with positive, empowering thoughts and here are some ways to do that:

1. Catch your inner critic in the act of saying something negative and ‘flip’ it to the opposite (but something believable)

2. If you want it fast and thorough, SimplyAlign can clean up and re-program thoughts lightening fast

3. Use AFFIRMATIONS to state what you want, who you want to be, and how you want to feel.

And…because I want to help with your affirmations I’m gifting you my ebook: 239 Affirmations to Lighten Your Life !

It’s a collection of my most used and loved affirmations that pack a punch (in a good way!). I hope you love it.

Go here: https://simplyalign.com/239-affirmations to download your copy.

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