EP 20: Listening to Your Inner Compass: Intuition, the Rational Mind, and the Protector with Louise Hansell | Deep Work Out Loud
Welcome to Deep Work Out Loud, the thinking that fuels our life, our work, and our leadership. I'm Julie Harris Oliver. This is the podcast where I sit with another professional coach, and we do some work around a single concept, a piece of inspiration, a topic we've seen come up in coaching, something we've been thinking about.
And if we're really lucky, while we're talking about it, we might demonstrate what coaching might look and feel like, but we'll see how this goes. It is still all an experiment, and with any luck, you will leave with something that you can apply and use in your life or your work, or both. Today, I am here with Louise Hansell.
Louise works with leaders, individuals, and visionaries who are ready to live and lead with greater truth, integrity, and purpose. She supports those who wanna move beyond surface-level growth and step into deeper, more lasting change. She is also a senior affiliate advisor with Aberkyn, part of McKinsey & Company, contributing to leadership development and [00:01:00] organizational change.
With a background in corporate leadership, culture transformation, and executive coaching, Louise brings a practical understanding of business alongside her work and personal development. She draws on approaches such as transformational facilitation, systems coaching, internal family systems, and mindfulness, integrating them in a clear and grounded way while bridging inner and outer transformation.
She also supports facilitators and coaches in refining their presence, craft, and impact. Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, she works with clients globally. She speaks English and French, and at the core of her work is a simple belief: Meaningful leadership starts from within. Welcome, Louise.
Louise Hansell: Julie. I just realized that bio was quite long. Thank you. So,
Julie Harris Oliver: Thank you for sitting through it.
Louise Hansell: That's great. Thank you. Nice to be with.
Julie Harris Oliver: So it's great to have you here. first, why don't you tell us what brought you to coaching?
Louise Hansell: Yeah, that's a great question. You [00:02:00] know, it's so funny. I think I was always a natural coach. When I look back at how I grew up and friendships, it's kind of the natural role I played. But how I, how I really got into it is I, I had a corporate background and I worked in the human side of things in the human resources world and always dealt with change and.
You know, I loved, I loved that work and I was doing really well, but I remember after the birth of my first son, I had this moment of, you know, what do, what do I, what do I really wanna do? Now I have this, you know, beautiful son, I'm raising, who do I really wanna be? And it, I went through this soul. Inner coaching period.
And I realized that I wanted to do what I was doing with myself, actually with other people. So do, bring, bring coaching to the world and helping people really live into their true, full potential. And it was so funny, just as I had that realization and opportunity came internally for me to do this work.
More facilitating it with, with leaders and getting trained to do that. So my [00:03:00] coaching journey started leading, leading transformation with a culture. We were transforming working with different leaders around the world in groups. So it was like personal transformation in a group setting with leaders.
And I loved the work the miracles of that. So that got me to say, this is what I wanna do full-time. Totally devote myself to this. And then I did my executive coaching after that development. So that's what brought me to the world of coaching. So I worked coaching with both individuals and groups.
Julie Harris Oliver: Beautiful and. I it amazing how babies can change
Louise Hansell: I know. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: So tell me what you, what you brought for us to dig into.
Louise Hansell: Well, yeah, it was funny. You know, you and I had a little chat about this and I, I've been thinking about some of the themes that I've noticed that have been coming up a lot lately, and just also my own,
Julie Harris Oliver: I.
Louise Hansell: own journey. It is really about listening to that inner voice within that and, and learning to [00:04:00] trust it.
So I guess we could call that, you know, intuition the little voice that guides us or internal compass, I guess would be a way of saying it. So I thought that'd be really fun to explore because I have a lot, a number of people coming to me asking about that as well. Yeah, do you know what I'm talking about?
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah, yeah, for sure. And even that very simple kind of statement, right? It, it has so many different aspects to it because I think the one part is hearing it at all. I think especially if we've just been working in performance and achievement and work, work, work, work, like you may not even listening to what that little voice is saying to you maybe until you're in crisis or until you're in a place where you can really hear it. And then the second piece is to it, trusting it. So how do you think about that?
Louise Hansell: Yeah, those are, that's great questions. Absolutely. Yeah. Sometimes, as you said, in crisis, we all, [00:05:00] our options are out. So at that point we're like, where do I go? And then we hear the voice,
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah.
Louise Hansell: and then learning to trust it. So. What I've noticed is that it's so interesting 'cause it's always there and sometimes we, we get it in those moments or just we'll just have that, yes, I feel like I need to be here or no, that doesn't make sense.
And we don't know why. So it's always happening and we all have the capacity for it, but it gets drowned out by all the other voices in our, in our day to day. And and when we do listen to it, it really points us to our, like our soul's path, our authentic life, you know, what direction, what bring us bring us to our fullest expression basically.
But what I have noticed is that if you really think about it. We are we're not taught to listen to that voice. You know, our education system teaches us to, to use logic, analytical thinking our intellectual mind our families, you know, we [00:06:00] learn wealth and success is the most important thing, not necessarily alignment and joy.
Society as a whole as well, right? So we have all these different voices going around and they also make up part of what's going on. So there are also voices that we experience. So how do we learn to distinguish intuition or our soul's compass, our guiding compass, our inner voice from these different voices becomes very important.
Julie Harris Oliver: Well, there's so much competition.
Louise Hansell: Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: Like it. I think if you talk to a lot of people in their college majors, you know, is it what you wanna do or is it what your family told you to do? Or is it what you think you should do? I, I have a client right now who got deep into finance she started as an art major and then she, everybody told her, there's no way you can't make a living with art.
You can't do that. So she went into finance and now she's mid-career. Miserable. The only thing she wants to go back to is art and the [00:07:00] journey getting back to, let me go back to the thing that I knew I wanted to do in the first place that had all these messages that said that I couldn't, like, that's a long, hard journey and requires a lot of courage.
I,
Louise Hansell: Yeah, it really does. But she did listen to that voice. She heard it.
Julie Harris Oliver: she's in process.
Louise Hansell: Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: She's listening. Yeah.
Louise Hansell: So that, that, that's so she heard the voice. So we, that's the other thing that happens is may not be the easy way out or the most comfortable way out and could require a lot of change. Sometimes we hear it and we don't really wanna hear it, and then we, so listening to it, as you said earlier, is definitely part two of it and can require
Julie Harris Oliver: Okay.
Louise Hansell: courage.
Julie Harris Oliver: Because we hear it and we ignore it.
Louise Hansell: Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: And then even simple things like we, we know a thing and we ignore it and we go forward and then afterwards, you know, oh, I knew it. I knew that's how that was gonna
Louise Hansell: Yeah. Right.
Because we don't always hear it. We're so [00:08:00] trained to, to listen to our mind, to listen to other parts of ourselves, to listen to externally. You know, it's almost like we put more trust in external systems than, than we do our own inner voice. So. Yeah, I think really knowing that this voice is actually softer, more subtle is really important because it's almost like we're training ourselves to listen to a whisper in the middle of a screaming room, you know?
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah.
Louise Hansell: So knowing that it's there, it does exist and it speaks in a different language. It's more subtle, more soft and sometimes it speaks to us for our body. It's like whole body listening I think becomes really important. Our, the, the voice of our inner compass, our soul. It speaks to us through our heart, through our gut and when we really listen to it, we can feel it.
It's like, oh, that feels aligned, or that doesn't feel aligned. Have you ever noticed that when you ask yourself something, you'll get kind of a [00:09:00] whole body Yes. Or a whole body? No.
Julie Harris Oliver: Oh yeah, I, yeah. I'm thinking of a time when I, it was really when I was making the decision to go into coaching or go back into a job I'd had before that I, I knew I could do well, and I knew I could make good money, and that seemed like the really rational thing to do.
Louise Hansell: Mm-hmm.
Julie Harris Oliver: And everyone around me was like, yes, of course you should do that.
We have many children in college. My therapist thought it was a great idea, you know, every, everyone around me. And so I went to work talking myself into it. And at the last minute, like the whole thing fell apart and I had so much relief in my body.
Louise Hansell: Okay.
Julie Harris Oliver: I was like, oh, thank God. Like I didn't wanna do that. I didn't want to. But it felt like the responsible
Louise Hansell: Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: the mature choice the I like, I didn't know what any other choice was. Like it felt like the right thing to do. But then when I felt the relief in my body, like I couldn't deny that. I was [00:10:00] like, okay, I'm done pretending that this is gonna be a thing.
I need to actually like make a pivot and be courageous and do thing. But it was visceral.
Louise Hansell: Congratulations for that. That's a, that's a really big step. So that visceral Wow. I am so relieved. Is your soul rejoicing basically?
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah. Thank God. Yay. I don't have to do that.
Louise Hansell: Yeah. And did you notice that going in as you were talking yourself into it? Because that's the way our mind works, right? It's like this, it speaks in shoulds and shouldn't, you know, you need this, 'cause you need this, you need that. And we get all tense and our shoulders are tense and we feel contracted.
Did you notice that?
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah. Well, I had to put on a whole persona in order to do
Louise Hansell: Okay.
Julie Harris Oliver: 'cause, you know, I had to go have an interview. I had to go tell people I definitely wanted to do
Louise Hansell: Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: and how I was gonna do it, and how excited I was to do it. Like, I, I did a, I did an entire acting role. [00:11:00] Um, if they're listening, like, sorry, I would've done a good job. But it, yeah, the whole thing just felt like, God, this isn't who I am anymore and I really don't, yeah, the whole thing. Was really just a cover, part of it was binary thinking. I didn't know what else, I didn't know what else I could do. I, because I was thinking, oh, I'll just do coaching on the side and I'll like fit it in somehow with this job that I know is gonna be a 60 hour a week job, that I could do this other thing. But I, I wasn't allowing for any other alternatives then. I was forced to, or not forced to. I guess I had the, the big opportunity to.
Louise Hansell: Yeah. Yeah. And, and, and that sense of relief is so fascinating, isn't it? Because it was kind of scary. You didn't really know what was gonna come from it, but at the same time, you felt relieved.
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah, and I, and I also realized, like I was so focused on it, it, fall apart had to be so [00:12:00] spectacular. There was no coming back. 'cause it wasn't like, oh, let me tweak it and keep going forward. 'cause if it had been, I might have. It had to be a total, absolutely not. This is not gonna work. In order for me to, I guess, allow myself the permission to listen to what my voice was saying, it had to be so obvious.
Louise Hansell: Yeah. Had to really whack you over the head.
Julie Harris Oliver: It whacked me over the head.
Louise Hansell: And
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah.
Louise Hansell: then, have you noticed a different relationship with your inner voice?
Julie Harris Oliver: Oh yeah. Yeah, for sure. I I, I feel like I'm pretty committed Not, maybe it's in terms of what I'm not gonna do right, is the contrast. What I'm not gonna do is put on a big pretend costume and go do something that feels really out of alignment and that I don't wanna do. Like that's pretty clear. I,
Louise Hansell: Yeah, I mean, you can sense when you're, when you're doing that more now.
Julie Harris Oliver: Or when [00:13:00] I get the impulse to do it. And then like I feel the energy like coming up and then I'm like, am I really gonna do that?
Louise Hansell: yeah, yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: I don't know. How does it show up for you?
Louise Hansell: Well, you know, it, it, it's actually been really a lifetime of listening and learning to trust. So for me, like for example, I think my first real indication of it came when I had that opportunity to leave my kind of traditional career path and do this other type of work. I was so pulled.
I had this voice inside saying, this is where you need to be. But part of me was like, well, I'm leaving my secure path. I'm leaving what I know. Everybody's telling me not to do it. Oh, I had so many people telling me not to do it.
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah, I have a baby. Like,
Louise Hansell: Not only am I going to be, I travel now as well.
Julie Harris Oliver: yeah, it's impossible. I.
Louise Hansell: And I'm not very good at it. Like I was starting with something that I didn't feel skilled at either. I mean, it was very visible. I had to put myself out [00:14:00] there, which terrified me, but I just couldn't ignore it. So I knew it was really strong. And what I noticed is that when something is really clear for me, it comes just a real clear yes.
But then there are times where it's a lot more subtle. And those are the ones that I've had to really learn to listen to. And what I have realized is that the voice of my, my inner voice where my knowing is where my soul's guiding me it's much more subtle. But it also comes in, in the first three seconds.
So if I ask myself a question is it a line for me to do this? That first three seconds is when the truth of my soul is speaking. That's true intuition for me. Then my mind starts coming in, and then the other voice, which I call the protector, the ego protector. Starts coming in. So my mind will say, well, that's frigging crazy.
Like, you can't go that far and go do that. And it just [00:15:00] doesn't make sense. You know, to spend that money or to open this up, whatever it is. And my the voice of my protector will say that's way too risky. Like, you're gonna get hurt, you're gonna get rejected, you're gonna fail. So I have all these different voices.
I, I see them as those three voices that come in. So I have to really be attuned to that first few seconds and and notice that first 20 seconds, you know, what's happening in my body now. And then, and then really listen for that full body. Yes. So that, that's how it happens for me. But with the more subtle things where I, I had mentioned as well is sometimes I don't know right away.
And that can be interesting 'cause I'm like, I wanna know right now, like, I wanna know in no uncertain times, tell me exactly what it is. I don't want to have this, you know, hanging over. I wanna have it resolved. But it doesn't come.
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah, I don't wanna live in uncertainty. That's no
Louise Hansell: Yeah. Right. So that's so I recognize that can be a little bit of a fear that comes in, which is often the [00:16:00] voice of the protector.
And but what I realized is if I just give it a little bit of time and I'm prepared to sit in that discomfort and that uncertainty, something will emerge. But it might not be exactly what I was hoping for either. But something clear will emerge eventually. And if I listen to it it always works out.
Julie Harris Oliver: Hmm. I have several questions. One is that. The clarity you have around my inner voice comes in the first three seconds after that is the protector, which is the fear after that is, I don't remember what you named the other one, but it's more like a,
Louise Hansell: Kicks in, you shouldn't
Julie Harris Oliver: yeah, like the rational, the how did you come to be able to like separate name, recognize.
Louise Hansell: Well, I re, I researched it. I got like, I did, you know, I, I, I sensed into it and then I did research on it. Learned more about intuition and that's how I started to recognize it. And so,
Julie Harris Oliver: Interesting.
Louise Hansell: and then [00:17:00] what I realized is the voice of the mind is always the logical, rational one. So it's, it's, it's the mind.
Our intellect is just a real small part, right? Of our, of our brain, our neocortex. It's gonna come in and give us great guidance and strategic thinking and we need that logic. But the thing is, if we let that run the show it's quite limited. And what it can see, like the soul has a much bigger vision for our lives.
So whenever I let my mind come in, I noticed I was feeling anxious and uncertain, and I would, I would go into over analysis. So that's how I knew my, my mind was at stake or my mind was kind of being a big voice here. And I'd be in shoulds or should nots, I'd be rationalizing it to death. So I'd be totally outta my heart.
Totally outta my body. And then the voice of the ego, the protector ego, I call it. I know that voice is gonna show up in a way that it's urgent. It's like reactive, it's defensive. Like, oh my gosh, this is [00:18:00] really visible. Like you could fail. If you put your, if you launch this new program if you do this podcast, like it's visible, you could fail, you know?
So then I feel that fear come up and then it takes a whole life of its own. Then I don't even hear the voice of my, my soul again, but that voice I know is there. In us, as we know to, to, to protect us, to keep us safe. So I think the, the, so that's the gift of it, but the issue with it is, is it doesn't always make a difference between, it doesn't discern between a real threat.
A perceived threat. And sometimes just the act of doing something that's more expansive, which is where your soul always guides. You can be unfamiliar and can be threatening. So your, your ego, your protector will come in. So that's why you need to just, you know, sit with it for a minute. You know, what's really going on here?
Like, do that whole body listening, right? Full body listening, not just your mind.
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah, say more, say more about that. 'cause [00:19:00] the, the question I'm, I'm intuiting other people may be having right now how do you how do you make that separation that you're not just swept away by your thoughts, but you have a certain amount of distance where you're observing your thoughts.
Louise Hansell: Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: So what is your, what is your process to get there?
Louise Hansell: Well, I, I, so one thing that I think is really helpful is to, well observing it. Is helpful. Number one, like developing that mindfulness is really helpful, that awareness of what's actually happening in my body. So I know if I'm going into some shallow breathing little bit of flight flight, then I know that that's my protector that's taking over my, my fear is starting to take over.
And if I, if I notice that I have a lot of energy in my head, for example, so that's why developing that awareness of, of what's going on then I know my mind is is very involved if I get a bit of a headache, if I have a lot of tension there.
Julie Harris Oliver: If I just wanna go to sleep,
Louise Hansell: totally. Do you get that as well?
Julie Harris Oliver: oh yeah, I [00:20:00] gotta go to
Louise Hansell: Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: I reset.
Louise Hansell: Yeah. It's just exhausting.
Totally
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah.
Louise Hansell: Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: So what is that feeling of, oh, this is my inner voice talking to me.
Louise Hansell: So that's, that's it's, it's a calm, subtle voice deep within that is actually quite accessible. If we learn to just listen deeply. And what I have noticed is. Silence is really helpful to be able to listen deeply to that voice. So being able to cultivate that muscle is allowing yourself to sit in silence 10 minutes a day, for example.
You know, ideally first thing in the morning. When before you check your phone, before you get the day going just cultivate a few minutes of silence for yourself and just check in. You know, what, what's true for me right now? What am I noticing? And, and you'll hear, you'll start to notice that inner voice, but if you [00:21:00] don't cultivate that ability to be in silence with yourself.
It's a lot easier to hear all the other noises going on in the party room. So, so, so when you do cultivate that silence, what you'll notice is that that inner voice is calm, it's relaxed, and it's actually persistent as well. So you might have a thought that comes up and you're like brushing it off, going, that's ridiculous.
That doesn't make sense,
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah.
Louise Hansell: but it keeps coming back. Has that ever happened to you?
Julie Harris Oliver: Oh
Louise Hansell: Yeah. So that's that persistent, you know, thought. So if, if you're present enough to listen to it. Which is actually not that hard because we're all doing it anyways and we've already had experience of this as you can already see.
It's persistent and it's we notice with our body that it's more expansive. We feel less contracted. We feel lighter, we feel relieved. Sometimes it'll come up really clear, like we'll get [00:22:00] goosebumps or, or tears. So you know that. For me personally, it's usually much more subtle. But it is a, it's like an, it's just a clear knowing.
Yeah, that makes sense. With no explanation, no justification. I need to be here. You know, sometimes I'll get that with, you know, meetings that are on the other side of the world. Somebody will say, do you wanna come join us? And I'll be like, actually that makes no sense to fly two days there for a two day meeting.
But his voice will say, yes, you need to be there. Absolutely no explanation. Yes. Clear is Bell. Even though I can make all sorts of reasons why I shouldn't be there, so
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah, sure. There's still a couple threads I wanted to pull there. Okay. So one is the, one is the knowing. And then I think if you have any people pleasing in you at all,
Louise Hansell: Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: then it becomes very difficult to like, if, if that knowing of the thing you should do is not at all what everyone else around you wants you to do, holding onto that decision in the face of everyone telling you you're [00:23:00] wrong.
Louise Hansell: Wow.
Julie Harris Oliver: That's a good trick, right? How do you do
Louise Hansell: Such a big thing. I mean, I did, I have so many clients who, who deal with this. It's yeah, that, that is the challenge, knowing that it's not gonna be comfortable. It's not always the easiest path, and it will likely not please people if you're clean, and I, I use the word clean if you're very, if you're clear on it.
It's just a matter of being true to that and not making it a bigger deal. Like I've had an experience where I had a very clear, no, it is not resonant for me to, for example, work with this client. And I knew that I was gonna be disappointing to people by, by not doing that, the story I made up around that.
Wow. It was crazy. And I actually made it a drama thing, which it didn't need to be. And I just said, look, it's really not resonant. It's, it's, it's not the right fit. It's not resonant. It would've left it, it just like that, ev and, and I [00:24:00] actually, even if it didn't please them in the beginning, it would've been better than what it became.
So I think the fear of not pleasing or the fear of upsetting people is actually, probably makes it worse than the moment.
Julie Harris Oliver: Well,
Louise Hansell: Very upset.
Julie Harris Oliver: Because let me come up with 35 reasons why I don't wanna work with you. That's terrible. That's terrible to
Louise Hansell: Terrible. Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah.
Louise Hansell: Whereas if we just say, Hey, at this moment in time it's not resonant, I'm not available for it. Or it just doesn't feel aligned at this moment in time. Let's see what happens in the future. Very clean. Right? No, nothing. Nothing more than that. Just absolute truth around that.
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah. This, this goes back to like, no is a complete sentence.
Louise Hansell: Exactly. No justification
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah.
Louise Hansell: don't even know why. Right. Sometimes.
Julie Harris Oliver: Right. And it may be revealed
Louise Hansell: Exactly.
Julie Harris Oliver: So speaking of being revealed later, you said something earlier about when you're in a position where you don't have a clear answer and kind of sitting in that [00:25:00] uncertainty I feel, I feel that
Louise Hansell: I.
Julie Harris Oliver: Clearly a lot of times, 'cause when I think about big decisions, think about, like my philosophy going in is kind of like, you know, you have a sense of what the thing is.
And I always say, you know, you kind of tap gently on doors and see which ones fly open
Louise Hansell: Nice.
Julie Harris Oliver: and that's probably the direction you need to go in. And if none of those doors are flying
Louise Hansell: yeah,
Julie Harris Oliver: maybe, maybe sit with it and don't force something.
Louise Hansell: yeah. And.
Julie Harris Oliver: 'cause usually the forcing of the decision is not, is not what you should be doing.
Louise Hansell: Yeah. Yeah. And when you've done that, how has that worked for you?
Julie Harris Oliver: Oh, it works great if you wait till the till the doors fly off the hinges and the path is clear and the whole thing is aligned, and then I find that things fall into place very
Louise Hansell: Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: if you do
Louise Hansell: Yeah. Yeah. So it's that temporary discomfort, right, of why isn't, and it's really easy to go into that. Why isn't this more clear, or why aren't things opening up? But the fact is, is it's just something, something [00:26:00] life is gonna emerge through you in some way. It's just hasn't come yet. And it may be little things like another doorway that leads to another doorway that leads to another doorway.
It's not, I, I find the more we're not attached to the outcome. Or what it would look like in our own mind, the easier it is to sit in that because maybe there's a whole other way that we hadn't expected that, that that will open up for us.
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah, we're gonna get more information that's gonna help make that easier. But if you're coming from the I say hashtag. Stuff. Girls in LA say when you come up in the age of the secret
Louise Hansell: Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: manifesting and thinking that you can just manifest everything that you want. So you have to have this plan and just make it happen. That becomes tough if you can't see a path ahead and you have to sit in it and be like, okay,
Louise Hansell: Yeah, yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: I'm gonna wait for
Louise Hansell: What's wrong with me? Like how come I can't manifest it?
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah, how come I can't make this
Louise Hansell: Yeah. I mean, fact of the matter is, is [00:27:00] often. Our solar, our inner compass, which is a highly sophisticated navigation system, which adds to our toolkit can see much bigger than our mind can possibly see. And I think knowing that makes it easier because our mind is limited by the past, the future.
Like that's, those are the two things, you know, what's happened in the past that's worked? What, what can we predict? You know, based on that in the future, but the soul is limitless and it can see all these different possibilities that we cannot even conceive of. So if we can rest in that knowing and, and trust that, or sometimes trust is maybe a step beyond, allow ourselves to play with that. Maybe a better, a better experience. And we'll, we'll, we'll discover new things, new doors, new possibilities that we may not even have thought of. Because our mind will have us attached to an outcome, which I think the secret manifesting, you know, I'm, I'm going [00:28:00] to create, I wanna manifest, you know, I don't know, $10 million or something.
So we get very attached to that. But we can't be attached to the outcome because we don't know. So it's, it's more aligning to authentically what is our highest expression, which we have no idea will look like. So just following those little crumbs will guide us there. Does that make sense?
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah. Yeah, I'm, I'm kind of sitting in this right now, like, I this idea of eventually I need to end up in Seattle for various reasons, and in order to get there, I need to sell my house in la We need to move out of this house in Tennessee. Like, there's a lot of moving parts and for the last year it's been very, like, I don't know how it's, I don't know, timing.
I don't know, you know, I don't know anything except I think these things need to happen. Once I pulled the first trigger House, sold in seven days. Did a, we did a little inquiry about this house in Tennessee and they said The best time to sell is right [00:29:00] now. Suddenly we're off and running. So all those doors are flying open. I still don't know what's gonna happen on the Seattle side. Like we still we're moving with the intention that we are going to move there and buy a house and, and settle there for whatever period of time that is. But I don't yet have clear line of sight. And, I've been saying this whole time, like, and I'm very open to see what happens. there may be a reason that these houses are gonna sell and something else is gonna happen and we'll be very happy that, that we have the proceeds and that something else will come up. So I'm trying to not, you know, I've set my intention, but I'm trying not to be attached to the outcome or the timing.
'cause I think there's so much I don't know. And who knows? I mean, we've learned anything since. I think 2020. 'cause we really know very little about
Louise Hansell: Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: how things are going to happen.
Louise Hansell: Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: And so yes, that what is in front of you? What is resonating? You know, setting your intention, but then [00:30:00] as the steps reveal themselves,
Louise Hansell: Mm. Yeah, trusting. And did you, did you notice that every little time, you know, when you sold your house in LA and then you asked that question about your house in Tennessee, did you notice that every time your self trust started developing around it, the trust in your voice started developing or strengthening, I should say?
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah, because you're just getting more evidence,
Louise Hansell: Yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: get more evidence as you
Louise Hansell: Yeah. Yeah. And what's your, what's your sense right now about Seattle? If you sense into your intuition in this moment?
Julie Harris Oliver: Well, it's funny 'cause I. You know, I've told everybody we're moving there. I'm told, I've told everybody we're gonna move there before the end of the year. I intend to go house hunting in two months. Like that is my whole intention. And I'm still wondering like, is that really gonna happen? Like,
Louise Hansell: Yeah,
Julie Harris Oliver: I don't
Louise Hansell: yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: I don't know.
Louise Hansell: that voice there. It felt a little bit different. Did, did like, is that really gonna happen? It felt, felt like the voice of the mind popping in, [00:31:00] right?
Julie Harris Oliver: Oh, interesting. It, it might be oh, this is something I was gonna bring up earlier. Like, sometimes that first voice that comes in, that's intuition. I'm not sure it's always right. Or what I think I'm hearing is always right. 'cause you know, I always think I'm so intuitive and I think I'm a little psychic, and so I tend to think, oh yeah, I know that that's true. But I also also have been proven wrong several times.
Louise Hansell: Now, did you hear it in the first three seconds?
Julie Harris Oliver: See that's the question. I think now I need to pee, pay more attention to what this is. And is it something that I've like conjured up that I think is true? Or is it really the first thing that came in?
Louise Hansell: Yeah, because that, I think that's what I've been really honing in lately, is that first three seconds, that's the true intuition. Flies in, but so quickly our mind grasps onto it or we have some sort of fear about it and then our mind grasps onto the fear around it. That's why it's really helpful also, you know, with coaching and mentorship to work through that to really.[00:32:00]
Hone in on what is the sound of my, my voice, my intuition, the messages I'm receiving, but also what are some of the fears that could be coming up that are preventing me from really hearing it or limiting me. That some of the, some of the fears I'm ready to, to release, to integrate. So there's some work also to do around that.
But what I invite you to do right now is just play with an experiment with it, with low stake decisions, you know. It was like, okay, so what am I gonna eat for lunch today? Am I gonna have a smoothie or am I gonna have a soup? You know, personal thing. What really resonates for me right now, because I notice, I, I so easily can go to my mind.
Well, I had a soup yesterday. It was really easy. I'll just do that again. But that's really what I truly wanted in that moment. What I, what truly resonated or driving home from work, you know, which, which road am I gonna take today? Am I gonna take a different way or am I gonna go the way I go every day?
Hiking, which path am I gonna take? So just play with it like that and see [00:33:00] what is the, the answer that comes in right away, that first three seconds. And then you can play with what I call the full body scan, which is just lengthening it to 20 seconds. What am I noticing in my body right now as I say that?
Oh, I feel expansive. I'm gonna have a smoothie today. Or, oh, I feel constricted. No, I'm gonna have a soup today. So yeah, that, that the body. It's so interesting. The gut, the enteric system and the heart both have their own neural pathways and they both actually provide more information to the brain than the brain provides to them.
There's research done with heart math and. And other things that, that show this. So your body actually knows before your conscious mind does that innate wisdom. Doesn't need to know why. It just knows. So just playing with these low stake decisions can help you really start to discern what is the real voice of my [00:34:00] intuition very quickly, and how efficient is that right?
Yeah. So that, that would be the invitation for you, Julie, to play with that, that first few seconds.
Julie Harris Oliver: Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Looking at the time, is there anything you would leave us with around this?
Louise Hansell: Yeah, I, there's this beautiful quote by I have it written down. Let me just find it by Einstein. I don't know it fully, offhand, and I don't want.
Julie Harris Oliver: Hi Einstein.
Louise Hansell: he had, he had this all picked out years and years ago. So the intuitive mind is a sacred gift, and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.
Julie Harris Oliver: Hmm.
Louise Hansell: So ideally what we'd love is to really. Allow our, our internal voice to our, our inner compass to guide us and then the mind be a servant of that and all our energy to follow that. So that would be like the perfect partnership. [00:35:00] And I really think that where we are in the world right now, that is so needed.
Julie Harris Oliver: Amen.
Louise Hansell: yeah.
Julie Harris Oliver: Thank you. Where could people find you?
Louise Hansell: So they can find me at, on my website, louisehansell.com or on LinkedIn.
Julie Harris Oliver: Okay, great, and we'll link to that in the show notes. Louise, thank you so much for doing
Louise Hansell: Thank you, Julie. It's been a pleasure chatting with you. It's always fun.
Julie Harris Oliver: This has been deep work out loud. I'm Julie Harris Oliver, i'd like to thank Louise Hansel for joining the podcast. If any of this resonates with you, please subscribe, leave review, send it to your friends, all the things, and if you'd like to work with me, you can find me at julieharrisoliver.com and let me leave you with this invitation.
Try spending some time in silence and checking that inner voice what comes in in the first three seconds. Take this on as an experiment. Try some things, report back. Thanks for listening. See you next time.
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