Is This Anxiety or Intuition?
- Mae Winters
- Jan 13
- 4 min read
Learning to Trust Yourself Again
The Moment Everyone Knows
This rarely shows up in a dramatic way.
It slips in during ordinary moments — rinsing a coffee mug, sitting at a red light, halfway through your day.
A small knowing taps you on the shoulder.
And almost instantly, another part of you steps in to interrogate it.
Is this anxiety? Am I reading too much into this? Why don’t I trust myself anymore?
If you’re here, chances are this isn’t the first time you’ve asked that.
And it probably won’t be the last — at least not yet.
I work with people every week who are deeply self-aware, emotionally intelligent, and still completely unsure whether to trust themselves. They don’t lack insight. They lack permission. Permission to believe their own internal signals without immediately interrogating them.
If that’s you, I want you to know something right away:
There’s nothing wrong with you for not knowing the difference. Especially if, at some point in your life, trusting yourself wasn’t safe.
The Story We Don’t Talk About (But Live Inside)
Let me tell you a familiar story.
You notice something feels off in a relationship. Or at work. Or even inside your own body. You pause — just long enough to ask yourself if you’re overreacting. Then the self-doubt kicks in.
I’m probably just anxious.
I always do this.
I don’t want to create a problem where there isn’t one.
So you push the feeling down. You explain it away. You override it with logic.
And then — weeks or months later — something confirms what you sensed all along.
That’s usually when clients look at me and say:
“I knew it. I just didn’t trust myself.”
But here’s the part most people miss…
The problem isn’t that you confuse anxiety with intuition.
The problem is that you’ve been taught to mistrust your internal experience altogether.
And that conditioning runs deep.
Why Anxiety Feels Like Intuition (And Why That’s So Confusing)
Anxiety is urgent.
It’s loud.
It demands action now.
Inner knowing — what some call intuition, gut feeling, or wisdom — is quieter. It doesn’t shout. It doesn’t argue. It doesn’t panic.
From a neuroscience perspective, anxiety is your nervous system trying to protect you from perceived threat. It’s fast, reactive, and focused on worst-case scenarios. The amygdala doesn’t care if the threat is real — it cares if it feels familiar.
Here’s the catch:
If you grew up needing to stay alert — emotionally, relationally, or physically — your nervous system learned that urgency equals safety.
So when anxiety shows up, it feels important. Authoritative. Convincing.
Inner knowing doesn’t compete with that volume.
The Question That Changes Everything
Instead of asking - “Is this anxiety or intuition?”
Try asking - “Is this feeling asking me to react — or to pay attention?”
That distinction matters.
Fear-based urgency wants you to do something immediately — send the text, end the relationship, replay the conversation, fix the feeling.
Grounded inner knowing doesn’t rush you. It invites curiosity. It gives you information, not instructions.
Most people miss this because they’re listening for intensity instead of quality.
The Telltale Differences
Let’s talk about what these two actually feel like — not in theory, but in real life.
Fear-Based Urgency:
Feels tight, sharp, buzzy, or overwhelming
Comes with pressure to act right now
Loops the same thoughts without new insight
Is often rooted in past experiences, not the present moment
Grounded Inner Knowing:
Feels steady, even if the message is uncomfortable
Doesn’t demand immediate action
Comes with clarity, not chaos
Feels more like recognition than alarm
Here’s the part that surprises people:
Inner knowing can coexist with anxiety. One doesn’t cancel out the other.
But anxiety drowns out knowing when you’ve learned to doubt yourself.
Why You Learned Not to Trust Yourself
Many of my clients didn’t grow up being asked,
“What do you think?”
They were told who they were, what they felt, or why they were wrong.
Maybe your emotions were minimized.
Maybe you were labeled “too sensitive.”
Maybe trusting your instincts led to conflict, rejection, or abandonment.
So your system adapted.
Self-doubt became protective.
Over-thinking became a survival skill.
Second-guessing became the price of belonging.
None of that means you’re broken.
It means you learned brilliantly.
This Small Shift Makes All the Difference
Here’s the shift I work on with clients — and it’s deceptively simple:
You don’t need to decide whether a feeling is “right” before you listen to it.
You’re allowed to gather information without judgment.
Instead of asking - “What should I do with this?”
Try asking - “What is this trying to show me?”
Anxiety wants certainty.
Wisdom tolerates ambiguity.
That alone begins to quiet the noise.
Why Your Mental Health Isn’t Improving - And How to Fix It
This is where many people get stuck.
They keep trying to eliminate anxiety — regulate it, reframe it, out-logic it — without rebuilding trust in themselves.
But anxiety doesn’t soften when it feels ignored.
It softens when it feels understood.
And inner knowing doesn’t strengthen through force.
It strengthens through relationship.
Therapy isn’t about giving you answers.
It’s about helping you hear your own again — without fear hijacking the conversation.
What Changes When You Rebuild Self-Trust
When people begin to trust themselves again, something subtle but powerful happens.
They pause instead of panic.
They respond instead of react.
They stop asking everyone else for permission to feel what they feel.
And here’s the quiet miracle:
They don’t need to be certain to be grounded.
That’s when anxiety loses its grip — Not because it disappears, but because it’s no longer in charge.
A Personal Note From Mae
If this resonated, it’s likely because you’re not broken — You’re listening.
And maybe for the first time, you’re wondering if you can do that without second-guessing yourself into exhaustion.
That’s the work I love most.
I’m Mae Winters, LPC, licensed in Virginia, Maine, Connecticut, and Vermont, and I specialize in helping people who are insightful, capable, and deeply tired of doubting themselves.
If you’re ready to stop arguing with your inner world — and start understanding it — I would love to work with you.
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