Powerback 15: Use Your Gut as a Tool, But Fact Check With Your Brain

Have you ever been in a situation where you just feel like your gut is trying to say something to you, even though your mind may be telling you something completely different? For this week's #powerback, we're going to talk about using your gut as a tool while fact checking with your brain.

Your gut can really guide you when you're making decisions, feeling things out, or trying to understand a situation. Sometimes it comes up in the craziest scenarios and protects you. For instance, have you ever been going home, you have a standard route you always take, but all of a sudden you had this kind of weird gut feeling like you should go a different direction or pick something up on your way home? And then later you find out there was a terrible accident or there were deer in the road or something happened on that route? Or maybe you ended up running into someone at a store you hadn't seen in a long time that you really needed to reconnect with?

Your gut is this deep feeling of something needs to change or something isn't right. It's often associated with that little voice in the back of your head as well. So if you're feeling - like physically feeling - something in your stomach and all of a sudden get a thought in your mind, 9.5 times out of 10 that's your gut trying to tell you to pay attention to something.

In a business perspective, I had a potential client come in at one point and there were just a lot of signs and symptoms that uh, you know, we were just not really going to be the best fit for them. And the more they spoke, the more my gut spoke and the more I let it continue with the louder my gut got. And despite that feeling, I accepted them as a client anyway. Cash flow was tight, projects weren't as dense. It just felt like we needed to fill the void.

And guess what happened? It ended up being a miserable relationship for both of us. My gut was trying to tell me - I mean, it had its arms up in the air. It was throwing red flags. It was like, don't do it. Turn around and go the other direction. And instead of listening to it, I went against it and I paid the price.

Now, I'm no scientist or doctor or anything, so don't go quote me on research papers, but from what I have read and researched, we have more neurotransmitters in our gut than we do in our brain, which basically means we have a second brain that lives in the center of our bodies.

Our gut-brain actually serves a really amazing purpose because it cannot overthink. It can't overplay. It doesn't process any other information than yes, this is right or no, this is wrong. It's kind of like having a magic eight ball in your stomach. When you have this gut feeling, it releases Serotonin, which sends a signal to your brain. That's where you can feel like you're having a gut feeling, but then can also really process the information as well. I might have a gut feeling that I want to do something big and extravagant, but my brain is going to help me to really make an educated decision based off of the facts.

This week, I want you to take your #powerback by tuning into what your gut is saying to you. I want you to be just a little bit more receptive and aware of when you're making decisions or going about your daily life. If your core and your gut start to interact with you, notice how that feeling starts to make you feel. If you get a deep, heavy brick-like feeling, be open to evaluating that situation or scenario a bit more