The Intuitive Gift

Years ago I came across a profound quote by Albert Einstein. "The intuitive mind is a sacred gift”, he said, “and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift."

The quote has been extremely useful for me in teaching, and for decades. Here is a man seen by so many within our culture as the pinnacle of intellectual brilliance, a man that the whole system buys into and unanimously agrees was a monumental mind and figure in our modern scientific world, and he is simply stating that we have inverted the truth of all things.

It would be a different thing altogether if this came from a mystic, a dreamer, a wandering soul bent on living a life outside of the false constructs of this world. But these words were spoken from a man that this world celebrates and reveres.

We human beings, living inside of the unspoken “truths” of this world, this culture, and this society, from every angle and every institution, are trained to minimize that which is most innately profound within us, that is to say the inborn gifts that are meant to guide us towards true freedom, true happiness, true health and true wealth, trading in this great mystery for a labyrinth of shadows and mirrors that we believe to be the supreme pinnacle of this world.

We have swapped out the wonder, the curiosity, the deep heart sentience and bodily wisdom, the spiralling intuitive flame that exists as a guiding lamppost in all human life, for a linear and closed paradigm of thought and being where we cannot see beyond the constructs of this society, for many have not the creative capacity to even imagine its inverse.

This is not to say that the intellect is not useful, for we know that it is. But when we place the intellect at the center of the table, and we forget our visionary capabilities, we find ourselves lost in a sea of unknowing and ignorance. We find ourselves without a true compass, we do not know the North Star, we cannot conceive of a civilization that is born from truth.

And so truth slips through our fingers. It is hidden under rocks and debris at the bottom of the sea, buried for millennia, awaiting our awakening. There are souls that have found it through their own sheer spiritual will and desire, and they are mostly cast out of the fold. They are the exiled, the forgotten, and they are the wisdom keepers. They are often now belittled as children for their capacity to dream. They are often labeled mentally ill. They are often made fun of for their sincerity in a world that loves and admires sarcasm above all, for it is the tool of a quick mind and a closed door.

This culture now dabbles in expanding our creative, it plays with the intuitive flame like a toy that it knows not exactly what to do with. But the whole foundation of this dabbling springs from the continued foundation of the supremacy of the rational. It’s something that is brought out in between “real life”, experiences, and it is all predicated upon the inverted structures that this society has been built upon.

But what would a world look like if this great “intuitive gift” was placed at the center of our table?

What would be most meaningful?

What would we hold as sacred?

I do not entirely know, but I can imagine that it would look incredibly different, and in every single way. I know that wonder, sincerity, and love would be honored, and that success would be built upon such intangible things as these.

I know that children would be protected and adored above all, for they are the great seeds that we sow.

And so this is the work that has been laid out before us. These are the truths that must be tended to, buried under the dark sea, in the high caves, in the song bird, in the touch of the wind, in the inception moment, in the spiral staircase, in the dance of life. These are the truths that must be tended to, if we are to turn this ship around.