Even though human instincts are very weak as compared to the other species, the little children would have stronger instincts, which is essential for their survival. While animals respect and groom their instincts since they appreciate them and are aware that their survival on these simple emotions and feelings, humans also should learn to groom their instincts, which some people term as gut feel. Imagine the scenario when you want to cross the road and suddenly you feel like not moving forward, just to witness a speeding vehicle pass by, which you were never aware of before the thought prevented you from crossing. This is the way that instinct communicates to the person to help them out in the various walks of life.

Appreciate Second Thought:

It is the instincts that put the second thoughts in the mind of the person when they are about to pursue something in their life. Some people do not feel it right to do some things and will not do them, but when they are questioned for the reason, they would not be in a position to explain the proper reason, but their feeling would have been perfectly right. While it is noticed that fools would rush in while the wise are patient and matured enough to wait for the second thoughts and would proceed only if no such thing comes to them.

Hesitations Offer for a Reason

When the people hesitate involuntarily, then they would be a reason that is much more superior to their thoughts. Life is not a pure math or science which is designed on top of the set of postulates or formulae and it is not wise to ask the instincts to give proper reasons every time when the hesitations sense to arrive to the person.

Go With The Flow, But With Steering:

The log of wood floats on water and moves from one place to another. Similarly a duck also floats on water and moves from one place to another. Even though both move on water without sinking, the ducks have better control. Therefore by making use of their instincts the people who transit through life like a dead log on water can transform themselves like ducks on water. The choice is up to the individual to make.

It is wise to seek the best advice from the experts. The instincts that are simple instructions from the souls, which are existent since the dawn of time and space, and those who listen to their instincts live a much better life than those who choose to ignore them.

Being so, the brain has the magnificent ability to absorb the universe. It is “capable of anything, for everything is in it: all the past, the present, as well as the future.” (Joseph Conrad). Man’s memory— allied with his instincts—makes possible the use of prior experience and learning for the modification of subsequent behavior and thought for him to shape and re-shape his future.

Through his brain man has thought processes which enable him to control or alter his environment, to submit Nature to his will, although his environment controls him in return. He has a system of learning, understanding, abstracting, conceiving, perceiving, projecting, and creating. His concepts have found their way into law, literature, science, medicine, art, and so on.

Man projects himself towards the future using the brain as repository for experiences and information and the body’s processing or analyzing mechanism. Though he is seasonal and cyclical in his chemistry, he is forward-moving in his mind; even the movement of his body is forward. He has prescience, or foreknowledge, the ability to envision and shape his future. In doing this he interacts with his own body and his environment in a conscious and unconscious way.

Within the brain is a compartment we call the limbic system where many of the regulatory functions of the human body take place. The limbic system controls temperature, eating, drinking, sleeping, and daydreaming; it is the repository of certain survival instincts such as aggression, rage, and fear; it contains a source of pleasure, self-stimulation, and aspiration— and sex.

Through his brain, man has advanced in cultural evolution as he reasons himself into a sophisticated toolmaker and searcher for the meaning of life and existence. Through his creativity he has advanced in science and has created a technology and technique that can either build or destroy. Through his conscience and feeling he has power to empathize and sympathize, to praise or despise, to accept or reject, and so forth. In short he can choose to be either good or evil depending upon the dictates of his mind.

Objective and scientific research and experiments cannot dispel the mystery of the brain or the “mind” (”soul” to the Greeks) as the prime mover of man’s actions and reactions. Analyses of its functions and structures brought about by discovery only deepen the mystery. Who did all these for man? We can only ask in awe and wonder. There should be a power higher than man. ###

While our mortality embraces reality, it somehow falls short of accepting it completely, the reason being that our fragility demands the counteraction of things beyond the scope of reality, based on concepts that help mitigate the harshness of certain aspects of our existence, such as those of fear, doubt and uncertainty. Since the beginning of time, the need to circumvent our weaknesses has, in many respects, intruded on certain areas of our existence, such as the unpredictability of life’s ”ups and downs,” the nature of our being, the mystery of the universe, as well as the phenomena of inexplicable occurrences of Nature that propels our thoughts and actions.

Our dreams are based on reality. The “miracle” of  discoveries and inventions, could never have materalized without the conception and calculation of possibilities, the groundworks of which consist of germs of ideas that develop out of the knowledge that nothing is impossible, as long as we do not veer from the concept of reality.

The Age of Enlightenment could never have dawned on humanity without discriminating between the possible and the impossible, enriching our intellect and cementing relationships that otherwise would not have been possible in a world of diverse cultures and primitive ideals. 

  The death instincts, also known by the word “Thanatos” (god of war mythology), has as its goal the destruction, separation, the order of things. Means a fundamental category of drives that are opposed to the instincts of life and tend to complete reduction of tensions. Initially directed inwards and tend to self-destruction, the death instincts are secondary directed outwards, then manifesting itself in the form of instinct of aggression, destruction, domination, etc..

   Part of this drive, also called the instinct of destruction, an instinct for domination, etc.., Is placed directly in the service of sexual function, which has a role to play: the sadism itself. Other party does not follow this shift to the outside and may remain in the body where it will be linked libidinally. This is where we must recognize the original masochism, erogenous (sexually). The death instincts appear on Freudian concepts as an entirely new kind of drives that had no place in previous classifications (sadism and masochism are their avatars). 

Humanism, the belief that humans are innately good natured. Oh really? What other species has such a reputation for killing so many of its own species, and entirely eliminating others? Humans use their vastly superior intellect to continually create better and more efficient ways to kill and have been since their appearance on Earth. Only now is it changing. Humans are recognizing what they’re doing and fixing it. They are helping other species, the environment, and themselves. We certainly aren’t perfect but we are reversing a trend thousands of years old. It won’t be easy or quick, but things will balance. War will still be there, worse and more deadly to be sure, but rarer. Humanity has seen the consequences of such things as the atom bomb. They, we, are turning our ways around now. So are humans naturally good or bad? I believe humans are not born with instincts for either. The sole drive humans are born with is the desire to survive. All our actions are derived from this. Why are humans so destructive? Some say because a leader desires power or wealth and controls all those under him in a war. Well why does someone want power or wealth? Because it’s a lot easier to survive if you have money to buy what you need or the power to take it! The soldiers, the lower classes, they fight because they believe either or both of two simple threats, their leader will kill them or the enemy will. If they don’t kill the other guy he WILL kill them! If both men believe this, than you have 2 men who will do everything in their power to kill each other. Replace the soldiers with nations and you get a war. Then why don’t the lower classes attack the leaders who control them you ask? Most don’t see their leader as a threat to their survival, usually he isn’t. His actions have little effect on your life. There is no need to fight. If the leader is a threat, rebellion sparks. The threat to survival is terminated.

How people see things is based on their experiences, education. How they deal with their problems, education. I don’t mean just schooling, though what they learn, in and out of class, plays a major role. Humans are constantly learning from everything they observe. Everything they hear from their parents, the radio, seen on TV, etc is interpreted by their brain automatically as good or bad though good and bad are learned at a extremely young age. Through their education they act. When they choose an act, it is always a choice, they do what they believe is good, as long as it does not threaten survival. The “good” action may not meet our definition of the word but that is because they have had different experiences. Good and bad is just an idea slightly different for each person. There  is no set line between good and bad, there can’t be. People go through different experiences, live in different places, look different. The “good” is “good” because they have learned that that is the choice supposed to be made. The instinct to survive will, however, override the desire to do “good.” to survive is the ultimate good. So humans may not be born with the desire to good, as humanism says, but we do learn it. The only problem is we all have different definitions. We always will.

Illness and injury may be chosen by the soul to heal aspects of individual consciousness but also to heal an aspect of the greater group consciousness, advancing the many through the suffering of the few.  Physical issues indicate deeper psychological evasions and as we evolve so do the tests that we are put through.  Bodily distress alerts us that issues exist and demands that these are addressed by making the physical consequences of attempts to deny or ignore our issues so painful that we must address them.

The physical body is nourished by elements from the physical plane where the astral and mental bodies are nourished through the chakras via their respective planes.  When our physical selves are clear and free of distortion, the vibration of our entire human energy fields are clear and even.  Physical issues create distortions as do problems in the subtle bodies as these can block the flow of energy through the chakras.  When chakra energy is distorted for a period of time, these blockages can advance into diseases.

Many times, these illnesses are brief and passing, including things such as indigestion, headaches, colds and flu but prolonged and habitual distortions of the energy fields predispose the body to far more serious diseases such as cancer.  Many times we need to remember and reincorporate the frozen and rejected aspects of ourselves and our experiences that have damaged our subtle bodies as this damage must be addressed and dealt with if we are to restore healthy physical functioning.

Incarnation allows us to expand our consciousness through many experiences over many lifetimes.  The beginning of our journey is ruled by animal instincts, urges and appetites and then as we gather experience and learn and grow our consciousness develops, bringing with it the capacity to choose.  Young souls struggle to learn the basic principles of self control which is the earliest stage of physical, emotional and mental development and as such is limited chiefly by the degree of pain that an individual is able to tolerate within their physical body.

Individuals in the earliest stages of development do not have much ability to empathise and are only really restrained from hurting others by the possibility of punishment.  Behavioural restraints in these people are external, rather than internal and will remain as such until their consciousness has evolved.

By the time we reach adulthood, we have usually matured enough to express whatever level of consciousness our previous experiences have imparted and this level of consciousness varies greatly from one individual to another depending on their previous incarnations and the experiences related to those.  Education cannot elicit  the capacity for respect if this has not already been learned in prior incarnations.  After each incarnation, life is reviewed and this is objective and free of the dictates of personality.

There are three major conditioning factors which define the essence of a coming incarnation. First, the circumstances necessary for the next assignment are set up and the design of the physical, astral and mental vehicles required to accomplish it are then conceived.  The first conditioning factor is the nature of the physical environment in which we will next incarnate and this includes family, culture and  socio economic standing and this is all decided before we are born.

The second conditioning factor is the degree of refinement and the strengths and weakness of the physical body. The most karmic factor in any incarnation is the physical body and the most karmic part of the physical body is its nervous system.  We choose the body that best suits the work of each lifetime and our natural abilities determine the path of least resistance causing us to emphasize the activities and interests that come easily whilst our weaknesses preclude other endeavours.

The third factor is the make up of the astral or emotional body which determines to what and to whom we are attracted and in turn who and what we attract.  This emotional body links us to our perceptions of the world around us through our nervous system.  Our physical senses of touch, taste, smell, hearing and sight interpret the environment in a manner conditioned and flavoured by the emotional body and every level of our aura responds to the corresponding energetic dimension in another person.  These responses are emotional and through the attractions governed by our emotional body, we seek out and are sought by those with whom we have business to attend to in a given lifetime, or perhaps in lifetime after lifetime – those in our karmic group.  This group may or may not include our given family but always includes those with whom we have meaningful and life changing associations.

Fear activates in the presence of an external and imminent danger; it advises us about the peril and lets us react before it, either by means of escape or defense; although it can also generate paralysis.

The trouble with fear is that it can be also activated before imaginary and inexistent perils, as is the case of phobia and anxiety.

Rage activates before an imminent attack from the external environment, it can or cannot be previous fear, but at the moment that rage activates itself, the attack is already in progress; here to, those attacks can be real or imaginary.

Guilt, instead, warns us of damages that we are about to do or we have already done to something or someone external to us, and its function is to prevent the harmful action or minimize its effects; if the damage has already been done.

Shame activates itself in front of auto sabotage; when we harm ourselves or before we do that; its function also is to call our attention about the consequences of our destructive actions against us, in order to minimize damages.

The problem with these alarm systems is the obsessive compulsion, which appears when these alarms do not shut down once we took consciousness of our bad actions, taking us throw altered states totally negative; so that fear drives us to paranoia, rage to psychosis, guilt and shame to depression and all together can lead into the alienation that follows schizophrenia…

To be clearer, the misuse or the perpetual activation of these alarm systems has an effect like the one that means to drive a car all along a thousand kilometers with the robbery alarm on all the time.

It has to be a horrifying way to live, this one, so it is very important that our inner alarm systems will shut down once there function would be accomplished.

Someone else won’t find you attractive just because you’re being “nice.” Nice can be a bonus, like getting a refund on your bank charges, but it’s not the nice, sweet behaviour that makes one person attracted to another. When you try to get a potential partner’s interest or attention by appealing to their personal interests like a good friend would, they not only won’t feel a spark for you, but they’ll possibly lose interest in you when they see you trying so hard to win their approval. They will sense you aren’t being genuine.

Nice people are honest about how they feel

Always think before you act on your instincts – behave and communicate in ways that your date is actually responsive to rather than always relying on the actions that come to you instinctively or act through emotions that you aren’t fully in control of.

Have you been brought up to believe it is right and honest to always share how you feel about situations? When the feelings are positive than that can be a way of getting closer to someone..,When a negative emotion becomes so strong that it actually becomes you, your behaviour and your sole motivation… then you’re out of control.

In fact emotions can actually trick you into trying to control others, just to get back to where you feel comfortable. Then instead of simply communicating in a nice way what it is that you’re going through and what you want, you actually try and make the other person feel the bad things that you feel. Some people refer to it as “winding someone up”. The short-term payoff for this is usually some sense of immediate relief or resolution when you get the reaction you want. You get your feelings off your chest and get
to release them, which can feel great at the time.

But the long-term effects aren’t so sunny because your partner’s perception of you will have changed for much longer than it took to get things off your chest. They will be more apprehensive about you once they have seen you lose it, or made them lose it with your actions.

Is that what you want in the long term or wouldn’t it be better to learn to control your negative emotions? You have to stop thinking about what you’ve learned about being “in touch” with all of your emotions and realize that a partner’s attraction isn’t triggered by you being everything that you feel. That’s a nice fairy tale, but it’s a lie.

Your friends, your parents, your family might give you unconditional love and understanding when you behave in a certain out of control way, but your partner won’t start to feel love, passion and connection with you if you’re playing out all the things you feel with them.

Nice people are likeable because they are reliable

Keep your date on their toesrather than giving in to all their wishes. Most men by the way know they can be lazy and not make the effort when they feel secure and will admit this.

That admonition started me thinking about the importance of intuition or instincts, but how little attention we pay to them. Unless we’ve been in a situation where our instincts saved us from something horrific, or prevented us from making a really big mistake, we rarely even think about the role it plays, or should play in our lives.

What is Intuition

Comprehension without effort of reasoning. Instinctive knowledge. The state of being aware of or knowing something without having to discover or perceive this.

In short, intuition doesn’t come about as the result of any particular processes … it just is. It’s not something that makes you think as much as it’s something that makes you act. Not that thinking isn’t involved … after all, intuition can direct us to think a certain way about something; and that can lead to an action.

Many times, I believe we actually think intuition to death

“That’s just my imagination. No body’s following me.” Not that it’s always appropriate to follow your feelings rather than your mind, but at least acknowledge your feelings and if it’s compelling ask yourself why.

Instinct, which has been around since the dawn of man was probably a reliable source of survival for cavemen … especially against ravenous dinosaurs. It seems, however that the more scientifically advanced we become , the less intuitive we become as we rely more on our things and less on ourselves.

Intuition as a Deterrent to Violence & Crime

There is more discussion of intuition today, I believe in large part because of the increase of crime in modern society. There are many books written on the subject, such as Gavin De Becker’s, The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals That Protect Us From Violence.

In an excerpt from the book, De Becker tells the true story of a young woman who allows a nice looking, friendly young man to help bring some heavy bags of groceries to her apartment door. Once at the door, he insists on taking them on inside for her. Against her better judgment (and instincts), she allows him to come inside.

Three hours later, after raping the young woman the predator assures her he isn’t going to hurt her; tells her to stay where she is, and goes into the kitchen.

Her instincts tells her differently. Somehow she knows he has gone in search of a weapon and plans to use it on her. Snatching the sheet off the bed to cover herself, she stealthily makes her way through the house, and out of the door to find help.

Later she would learn that her attacker had indeed previously murdered his victims, so the instincts that led to disobeying him were absolutely right.

Intuition As a Guide in Every Area of Life

Although De Becker’s focus was avoiding violence, we can improve our lives in so many ways simply by learning to listen to that little voice inside that guides us in taking a certain action.

• Getting the résumé updated

  For indefinable ( or very small), reasons you feel the company may be in financial difficulty; or despite assurances, that less than stellar evaluation tells you trouble may be looming on the horizon.

• Looking behind you

  Although you didn’t hear anything, you sensed something.

• Not going out with the cute guy/girl you met at the party last night

  Something about the way he/she looks at you; or some small comment makes you feel uneasy, or puts you on guard.

• Choosing the least attractive college

  Although college X has the best curriculum, the best campus, the best everything, for some reason you just know you would be much happier at college Y.

• Refusing his marriage proposal

  Although you’ve been dating him for a while, and really care about him … possibly even love him, something tells you those small problems will turn huge, even insurmountable over time.

In my fiction novel, The Secret of the Veil, the heroine senses a sinister presence in her life. Of course, she ignores her instincts and tries to rationalize the strange incidents that are happening to and around her, until rationalization becomes impossible.

One of the reasons I feel intuition is so important is because I believe it is divine. Our Father is trying to guide and help us with small and large occurrences and events in our lives, and sometimes in the lives of others; if only we would slow down and listen to what we’re feeling.

When looking back on my own life I can honestly say, if I had paid attention and actually listened to my intuition in certain cases, I would have made some different, and better choices along the way. Luckily for me, I had some experiences early on where my intuition saved my butt, therefore I learned to listen.

The Sixth Sense

I’m betting the same is true for most of us. We have become hardened to what some people call the sixth sense, which is in fact, more defined in some people than others, but is present in all of us. When we do ignore our feelings, in the end we often suffer the consequences.

Then again, maybe I’m totally wrong and intuition has no place in today’s high-tech society.

Nope, I just don’t feel that’s true.

Similar articles include:  Do You Believe in Miracles? Captain Sullenberger Adds New Dimension to Conversation”.

Signs, Messages, Blessings and Miracles: Subliminal Spirituality

Identity is who you are within a culture. Each person possesses different characteristics that give them their own identity. The word identity is dealing with the self and not a group although; a cultural group can also have certain identities. For instance, one can be identified by race, language, or even features.

In the poem, Sure You Can Ask Me a Personal Question by Diane Burns (Meyer p.741), the speaker struggles for her own identity and not that of her culture. I was able to sense the tone of frustration in the speaker’s voice. It seems as if Burns was trying to show how frustrating it may be for someone to be continuously identified or stereotyped by their physical or cultural differences. In the end the speaker states “This ain’t no stoic look. This is my face.” With that being said, I felt Burn was simply stating: this is who I am.

The short story, Baglady by Antonia S. Byatt, portrayed a woman that didn’t seem to be too happy with her identity or her cultural background. The woman, also known as the character Daphne Gulver-Robinson was depicted to be an ordinary woman. She decided to go on this trip with her husband, which included people of what may be known as a “prim and proper” person. Their first stop was the Good Fortune Mall. I believe this mall signified social status. “Lifts that say they are going down go only up” (Byatt p. 504), in my opinion, this line represented Daphne wanting to live up to the social status of the people included in her trip. Throughout the story, Byatt did very well in portraying how simple it is for one to lose themself in the process of getting caught up in another person’s way of life. Byatt shows how Daphne ends up looking for her belongings, but ultimately loses them all trying to get back down to ground level. The loss of her belongings in that matter signifies Daphne losing herself.

In the short story, Clothes by Chitra Divakaruni (p. 215), it was very interesting to see the practice of a young Indian woman named Sumita being set up for marriage without her acknowledgement. At one point, throughout the story I was beginning to feel that it would be unfair to impose marriage on someone without the approval of the person getting married, but that rationalization eventually faded upon realizing that it was a way of life for that culture. Ultimately, the husband – Somesh, whom was also of Indian decent with an American cultural lifestyle, was very compassionate to his new wife. This impacted the story in a very positive way. Although, there was a point of loss, I would say that this story ended on a positive note, because Sumita made the decision to continue learning about her late husband’s culture in America although she could have easily returned back to India, a place she was accustomed to.

While reading Latin Women Pray a poem by Judith Ortiz Cofer (p. 780), I felt that this poem is very serious and full of anguish. This poem reflects Cofer, whom is also of Latin decent, with a note of self-confidence that Latin women are just as equal to that of Anglo and Jewish women. She states “Yet year after year, before his image they kneel, Margarita, Josefina, Maria and Isabel, all fervently hoping that if not omnipotent, at least He be bilingual.” (Cofer p. 780) That statement indicates that these women of Latin decent pray in the same way that Anglo or Jewish women pray, however it seems as if their prayers are going unanswered. Cofer did not have anger against the Anglo or Jewish cultures; however through this poem she was trying to emphasize equality.

The poems, Theme for English B and Dinner Guest: Me by Langston Hughes (p. 935), were much more of poems addressing culture and identity of African Americans. Although the two poems were written by the same author they possess two different point of views. In Dinner Guest: Me (Hughes p. 898), the speaker seemed to be very confident in the lifestyle he lives. His diction creates an effect to the reader to allow him to show that it’s the other race, the white race that seems to have a problem, not him. In other words he insinuates that their race can not accept the fact that he too being the “Negro Problem” is also able to “wine and dine” (p. 898).

On the other hand the poem, Theme for English B, a black student has been asked to write a one page paper, one that will “… come out of you.” (Hughes p. 935) it was a paper that was requested by his teacher that also just so happens to be white. In the beginning it seemed as if the student may have had a problem with writing this paper as he seemed to not know exactly what kind of response his white teacher may have been looking for. He questions “so will my page be colored that I write?” (Hughes p. 935) but then states “Being me, it will not be white. But, it will be a part of you, instructor. You are white -” (Hughes p. 936). After questioning his culture, he was able to see that what he was asked to do had nothing to do with his race alone. It was about him as a person. He was able to see that although, he was of a different background or culture, and he ultimately liked and did the same thing as others. In the end he was able to fulfill the assignment; he provided a reflection of himself.

In the movie, Fools Rush In directed by Andy Tennant, emphasis was placed on how love can be difficult for people of different cultures. In the movie, the director chose two different characters that came from different backgrounds, culture and different ethnic views. Isabel Fuentes, is one of the main characters – a Mexican photographer. Also, there is Alex Whitman, the second main character – a young white American construction supervisor. Alex and Isabel may have come from two different cultures but their love for each other was the same. They were complete opposite in their religions, cultures and lifestyles, and these things caused the relationship to have many problems. In the end, they realized love is love no matter what culture you’re from or what your values may be. The question, “What if finding the love of your life meant changing the life that you loved?” was asked and answered by Alex and Isabel as they endured out of love and nothing in their life before was greater than that.

When all’s said and done these readings have caused me to assess many of the assumptions I’ve had about different cultures. I was able to appreciate the perspective offered in each piece due to my new found understanding of the cultural practices or way of life. Both culture and identity play a major role in our everyday lives and as a society we should be more open-minded toward the cultural and racial differences. Though there are times we might not understand one’s point of view, we should still try to acknowledge and learn – everyone is unique in his/her own way. Lastly, but not least, one should remember to never judge a book by its cover.