(223) Kapotah

There is a “voice of command” to which you must listen—it’s the same as intuition or nous. Intuition isn’t the first thing that comes into your head. The first thing that comes into your head is usually an attempt to get the situation under control, to manipulate someone, or to look good. If you want to access intuition, you usually have to pause before you respond, let your mind clear, and then let the voice speak—the voice will be from your internal monologue but it will not be a worked out “reason” or means to manipulate. It’s pre-verbal, really—and it’s connected to that sensation when a name is on the tip of your tongue, you just have to let go and then it comes back and when it comes back it “clicks”. Intuition is like that.

I had an argument with my girlfriend but I was being intuitive. She said something and I paused and then said, “I’m angry.” Actually, I wasn’t angry—she was angry, but she couldn’t say that directly so she said something rational to chastise me, just to express the anger; but when I said “I’m angry” she knew her anger had been heard and she started to loosen up, the tension had been broken. It’s because I actually heard her, I heard what she really said. I heard her because I emptied myself; then the real meaning of what she said came back through me as the internal voice and when she heard it reflected back to herself she knew I’d actually heard her.

It’s all done with mirrors, the diamond sutra of enlightenment—you need to make yourself an empty bowl and then you’ll bounce it back and people will recognise themselves in you (it’s connected to God; and also Hegelian philosophy). The intuitive voice isn’t always just a reflection of the metacommunication, sometimes it is an autonomous observation—but often it is. You have to be like an empty bowl—Alan Watts knew.