gutfeel.com

Gut in the literal sense means stomach and feel signifies the experience. Gut feel is a personal opinion or intuition towards a particular issue. You might have a hunch about an issue, which might help you in decision-making process. This intuition may or may not be the same as logical decision making process but it might affect your judgment.

The process by which a gut feel is formed is relatively simple. The media or a personal experience may act as a stimulus, which is analyzed by the brain, and then the individual comes up with his or her very own personal opinion. The opinion is directly linked to the individual’s own understanding of the issue and the information which he or she has gathered.

There has always been a dilemma of sorts about the importance of gut feelings or intuition vis-à-vis logical decision-making. I firmly believe that along with logic, gut feelings also play a major role in a person’s life. It was this belief that was one of the major reasons for the inception of this blog.

Though everyone has gut feelings, you will agree that some of us are more intuitive than others. In my opinion the difference lies in the awareness about your own feelings. The people who use their sixth sense are imaginative, fore-sighted and think more deeply on issues as opposed to the practical and realistic approach followed by less intuitive people. Thus, less intuitive people might not give enough importance to their somewhat subconscious feelings and use their logic to arrive at decisions.

However, in daily life your feelings do play an important role.

In general, the ability to take swift decisions or decisiveness differentiates leaders from other people. The leaders often combine gut feel with intelligence along with the knowledge available to arrive at the most desirable option. Though it is not all intuition, I would say that leaders take calculated risks. On the other hand, some people may not give enough weightage to gut feel, as they base their decision on logical analysis using facts and figures. Though it seems quite rational, however there might be circumstances where too much unfocussed analysis might lead to analysis paralysis, which hampers decision-making. In addition, people who fear uncertainty and wait till all relevant info becomes available are often left behind.

That is why in today’s competitive business environment, emotional intelligence (EI)—which takes into account one’s gut feelings—is the current buzzword when it comes to strategic decision-making. Along with the required technical skills, EI aids a person to take apt decisions and have a proactive approach.

The gut feel works not only in the corporate world but it works in everyone’s daily life too. So whether it is relationships or battlefield, trading, stock markets, or diagnosing a patient, gut feel plays an important role.

However, as I said earlier, the balance of head and gut is required and gut feelings cannot and should not be totally ignored. In order to derive maximum advantage out of them, you need to be thoughtful and aware of your own perception and with practice you can slowly acquire a skillful perception. Once you become aware then expression is very important. And I believe that positive expression always helps and creates way for fresh positive thoughts and feelings. In a nutshell, this is the raison d’être of GutFeel.com and I hope expression of your feelings will help you in one-way or the other.