Hannukah is a celebration of light out of darkness. For eight days we affirm the miracles of plenty, strength, and joy appearing in our lives wherever there was formerly lack, weakness, or sorrow.

Unless of course, you’re celebrating the miracle of Viagra, then I think after that long you’re supposed to call your doctor.

Ok. I did not want to hurt anyone’s feelings with that joke. ED is actually no laughing matter, so I apologize for that. For the record, I imagine there could be several scenarios in which an eight-day erection might end up being more miraculous than annoying, but I don’t have a penis so I probably should talk to some people who do before I try to convince anybody that I am intensely compassionate while at the same time being a record-setting smartass.

Now I’m supposed to segue into a deep and thoughtful treatise on the miracle of getting our thinking straight, which after this intro shouldn’t be hard at all.

I mean difficult. It shouldn’t be difficult at all.

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If you’ve been reading my blog, you’re probably starting to get it by now that I really, really, really want you to have a strong connection to your intuition. Basically, that means I will do anything legal to help make that possible.

And giving myself a freer reign with shameless and wanton irreverence undercuts one of the biggest myths about intuition: that it is rare. We think that it is a gift bestowed only upon a chosen few. Even if you have intuitive experiences only once in a while, like the special people, yours still won’t ever be as consistently active as theirs. This is hogwash. This belief is why we think intuitive ability is something so high falutin’ and sacred that we have to be very formal and serious when we discuss our intuitive experiences. We must speak in hushed tones.

I call BS on that, obviously.

Actually, your intuition is like that fun, funny friend of yours who is super easy to be around and who goes with you to Target just so they can remind you to get all the things you forgot to put on your list.

It’s like a friend who is never even remotely high maintenance. You can serve them a fancy dinner on paper plates. (Unless of course, you are concerned about the environmental impact of paper plates, in which case they would help you compost them, or nudge you to use china and help with the dishes).

It’s like a friend who has perfect timing. They are thoughtful and sweet and say the most sincerely kind things to you just when you need to hear them.

And it’s like a friend who loves you enough to tell you the truth even if you don’t want to hear it.

Your intuition is the friend that’s so safe to be around, that’s so generous with you that your friendship with it never feels like work. You can relax and be yourself.

So you see, playfulness and irreverence are the best tools I can use to teach about intuition in a culture that is always trying to get you to believe intuition is unusual, unhelpful, and shadowy. The weirder and darker you believe intuition to be, the less you’ll actually be inclined to reach for it and use it.

The culture, by the way, is betting against us.

But my money’s on you. You are a miracle. You are the light out of the darkness.

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One of the things that you are going to have to accept if you want to have a great friendship with your intuition is that you are a product of the culture which seeks to marginalize it. This means if we’re lucky enough to experience our intuition at all, by the time we realize what’s happening our intuition has had to wade through layers and layers of muck just to get our attention.

Becoming aware of those layers and exposing how they operate is the only way to remove their effect on you. There are times when you’ll have to roll up your sleeves and put some muscle into it. But trust me, any effort you put into this endeavor will benefit you more than you can even imagine. The more you change your thinking and beliefs about intuition, the less your intuition has to do to get your attention. The clearer you get, the more helpful it will be.

Remember, it’s never an issue of whether or not you have a strong enough gift. If you are human you have everything you need right now to frolic down the aisles at Target with nary a care in the world because you know your gut has your back.

(Like in a good way. In the way where an ambulance doesn’t have to be called).

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One of the biggest categories of blocks to intuition are what I call thinking errors. These are unchallenged assumptions about who we are as humans that are universal in the sense that almost every single person who has walked into my office over the last 30+ years has labored under the misunderstandings they produce. Your intuition uses language and thought to communicate with you, so if it’s blocked by a thinking error, you’ll never hear what it’s actually saying.

Here are the three main thinking errors that make it hard to hear our intuition clearly.

1. We believe that we are fundamentally alone. We struggle with the idea that we are actually spiritual beings connected to other spiritual beings. As a result we are deeply isolated and don’t hear when our intuition is encouraging us to reach out to our loved ones and our communities.
2. We are chronically pessimistic. We interpret the circumstances of our lives in the most negative way possible. This causes us to try and control and manipulate rather than hear the guidance of our intuition, especially if it is positive, loving and kind.
3. We constantly project how we are feeling from moment to moment into the future. This causes continual anxiety and fear and also keeps our focus on control of the outer environment, rather than on the intuitive messages that help us develop inner peace and resilience, and which allow us to have an honest response to what’s happening in our lives.

Each of these thinking errors loosen their grip on us quite easily the moment we begin to question them. That’s all it takes, just becoming a wee bit curious. All you have to do is open your mind up to the possibility that your intuition is specifically interested in directing you to the people and experiences that are going to help you become part of the highest good for the greatest number in any situation. And since part of that is experiencing your own personal highest good, you’re going to have to consider that (especially) the intuitive guidance that surprises you with its kindness, its riskiness, and its reassurance, might be exactly what you need to know to make that possible.

Listen, life is hard. But living it well does not preclude becoming more positive, present, and joyful. So the miracle of getting our thinking straightened out is a gigantic, if quieter type of miracle.

Of course the biggest miracle of all is when our stories of deliverance from darkness help others find the path out of their own struggle. There is no light stronger than the one we shine on someone suffering in isolation, stuck in despair, or afraid they’ll never feel better than they do on their worst days.

So go shine like the light you are. I’ll be right here thinking up more tacky jokes to tell you when you get back.

Happy Hanukkah, Friends.