Decision by Intuition - how does that feel?

Yesterday morning at the Language School, the subject turned to decision-making. I was doing this particular dynamic with one of my tutorials: a business-related maze in which the student organizes an event on the basis of decisions made from beginning to end of the planning process, and the resulting success/failure of the event is determined by points scored from each decision made along the way. I had already done the same dynamic in about 5 or 6 other classes, and in each case, the student in question had their own reasoning process for coming to their conclusions, which inevitably created some differences in the options they chose and the scores they got at the end.

This particular student, a young woman named Emma, really impressed me with the way she made her decisions. She would read the four options for resolving each dilemma, think for a moment and then quickly say "A" or "C" without explanation. So of course, this being an English class, I would ask her why she chose that option, and each time, her analysis of the situation included a new slant on what others had stated in their analyses. In one particular case, the reasoning behind the option she had chosen, which was one that most of the others also chose, was completely unique and downright exciting to see.

Suffice it to say that she ended up racking up the most points I'd ever seen and the results showed her to be excellently skilled at pulling off an extremely successful event. So I asked her how she came to her decisions and she answered, haltingly (because she still needs more confidence and help with the correct grammatical structures to express herself well) but in very comprehendible terms, "I have learned over time to listen to my intuition when I need to take a decision."

"Intuition? What's that?" I asked. "Well I feel it right here," she pointed to the area of her diaphragm, "a kind of ... inside" (she made spidery movements with her fingers against her diaphragm). My eyes opened wide and I said, "I don't have that!! I've never had that feeling. I've never understood what intuition is, although my husband is always talking about his power of intuition."

At this point, she explained that, according to her understanding of the human brain, left-hemisphere-dominant people (like this student and my husband) are usually more prone to planning and keeping things scheduled and in order, while right-hemisphere-dominant people (like me) are more spontaneous (prone to chaos??). That's why left-brain people can usually feel their intuition coming into play.

"Oh, so that's why I don't have any intuition," I lamented sadly. "Not necessarily," she said, eyes sparkling (she really is a beautiful woman). "Maybe it's simply that we left-brainers have to stop to listen to our intuition, while you right-brainers live by your intuition. That's why you don't feel it kicking in. It's a permanent fixture!"

"WOW!" I said, and was speechless with all the new input. In fact, I'm still contemplating the whole idea! Guess it depends on what you believe as far as right/left hemisphere traits, the dominance of one or the other in people, the concept of 'intuition', etc. All I can say for sure is that, when it comes to making decisions, I always try the different tricks I've learned to help me through the process, and none of those tricks include intuition. My one aim is not to regret whatever I decide, though I've got to admit that there are some decisions that I do end up regretting (and that's a topic for another blog entry)!

Maybe I just need to understand the concept of intuition better!