Have you ever had one of those moments where you knew with every fibre of your being that you must do something? Did you listen?

For many years I heard these whispers deep from within my soul, but the fear of what might happen kept me frozen, stuck, afraid to take action. Because I had a plan, and what those whispers were telling me didn’t fit with how I was expecting my life to turn out. Listening to them would have meant leaving my nice cosy comfort zone, and I wasn’t ready yet to take the risk. The saboteur was constantly in my head… you can’t do that, that will never work, what will people think, what if it doesn’t work? And so I squashed those thoughts down deep inside me. Hoping if I just ignored them, they’d eventually go away.

But every single time I tried to ignore what I knew deeply within me was the right thing to do, the universe took action for me. The energy of Kali Ma swept through my life and destroyed the very thing I was clinging desperately to, afraid to let go of. The job I no longer enjoyed, I got made redundant from… twice! The long term relationship I was no longer happy in, ended after 17 years, while I was busy making other plans.

Why is it that we find it so hard to take action on those intuitive knowings? For me it was fear. Fear of what people would think of me, fear of not having a plan, fear of not knowing what would happen when I stepped out of the life I currently knew. And that fear kept me stuck, miserable, unfulfilled for YEARS. Holding on so tightly to the illusion that I had control over my own life. Trying to micromanage the universe so that everything went according to my plan. Until I suddenly found myself, again and again, thrust into a new life that I had been too scared to step into of my own free will. A life I had not planned for, and I had no idea how it was going to turn out.

When your world gets turned upside down, you have no choice but to trust in yourself, to strap yourself in and go along for the ride. To put one foot in front of the other and find your way down this new path. To have complete faith and trust that everything will be alright, because there really is no other option.

When I finally started to trust myself, to trust what I intuitively knew, to listen to those whispers, and to take what were often huge leaps of faith, the most wonderful things started to happen in my life. Each time I was made redundant I walked right into a new and better job. After I separated from my ex partner I bought a beautiful brand new house all by myself. Most recently I quit my part time job and stepped into my business full time, only to have projects and opportunities open up that I could not have foreseen coming when I was so focused on the fear of “what if it doesn’t work” and “how will I pay my mortgage”?

When I had faith in myself I opened up to the possibilities of what I could do and who I could be. I found myself enrolled in a 12 month spiritual development programme I just knew I had to do, training to become an intuitive guide with the Institute for Intuitive Intelligence with no plan on what it would become and what I would do with it. I opened up to the parts of myself I had kept hidden from everyone, my whole life. I found strength I never knew I had, I made lifelong friendships and bonds, I uncovered skills I had yet to use in this lifetime, and I found communities where I finally felt I fit in.  Everything fell into place, without me having to obsess over how the puzzle pieces were supposed to fit together.

Letting go of control is not easy. Whenever someone would tell me to “release my attachment” to the outcome I’d laugh, as if it were that easy. And I won’t lie I still struggle. But what I have learnt is when you’re so focused on something going a certain way, on life following the plan you have so clearly mapped out, you miss the possibilities of how much better things could be. Because whatever plan we think we have for our lives, the universe always has something bigger, more powerful, and more joyful in mind for us.

So if I could give anyone one piece of advice it would be this: Trust those whispers. Listen to them. Take action. Even when they scare you, especially when they scare you. Because when you finally let go of the fear, when you finally let go of the illusion of control that you think you have over your life, you open yourself up to how truly amazing life can be.

Image by Jill Wellington from Pixabay