What Your Unconscious Mind Is Trying To Tell You
Ever had that strange “ooh… I don’t like that” feeling when nothing obvious seems to be wrong?
I’ve been getting it more often while exploring questions about my life, my direction and my North Star. At first, it’s tempting to push an uncomfortable feeling away, but what if that feeling is actually unconscious communication?
In this deeper dive, we explore how the unconscious mind communicates through feelings, intuition, memories and emotional signals, and how becoming curious about an uncomfortable feeling can reveal what’s underneath it.
Rather than fighting anxiety, uncertainty or emotional resistance, I’m exploring a different approach: pause, listen, get curious, discover what you need, then choose your next step.
There’s also a simple process you can use to explore an uncomfortable feeling, discover what it may be trying to tell you, and decide whether you need to act—or simply give things time to settle.
This is another part of my own journey of personal development, finding direction, trusting yourself and creating a more meaningful life. I’m learning as I go, and sharing the bloody journey with you.
Don’t suppress the signal. Get curious about it.
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Paul
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And the transcript WARNING if you’re a lover of the written word this may make you frustrated, or angry – you have been warned – is it an ‘ism
#490 What Your unconscious Mind Is Trying To Tell You
Welcome to this deeper dive. Hope you’re well. Hope you’re feeling good because I’ve got a a little question.
This has been happening to me a little bit more often than late and I thought it’d be a good time to to share because I’m sure you’d experience this type of thing too. It’s that, you know, that feeling. What feeling is that Cloughie? Oh, nothing’s really happened happened.
You know, you’re not having a panic attack and you’re not running all headless chicken type thing. Nothing’s exploded. Nothing’s gone.
You know, it’s just, oh, oh, I don’t like that feeling. Oh, I don’t know. It’s just happened.
It just comes along. See if you can resonate with this because this is where I tend to find I get these feelings come along out of the blue. It’s, I find it when I’m writing my puzzle book, you know, asking a question.
And as I write the question down, I get that feeling. I just get that feeling. Or maybe it’s, I don’t know, making a decision.
I’ve got to make a decision about something. And while I’m thinking about it, it could be, I’ve known this to happen, that someone says something and it’s not what they say, not the actual words as such, but it’s maybe their tone. You know, the way they’ve said it.
You even get a look, don’t you? Well, do you? I do. If someone looks at me in a particular way and I go, oh, I get that funny feeling. And it’s like that word has maybe triggered something.
That look has triggered something. It’s from the past. It’s been anchored in the past.
And ah, I don’t like it. They’re like secret triggers because you don’t know what’s happening or what it is, but you know what’s happening. Let’s get it right.
You can even get it when you’re driving past place or walking past. You’re walking along and it’s like your unconscious mind catches something in peripheral vision. I say that again, peripheral vision.
And you go, oh, it’s like something is associated to something. But consciously, you’re not quite sure what it is because you don’t notice it because you notice the feeling first. You know, you can be thinking about something, just minding your own business, remembering something, and you get a feeling.
And this is where I’ve had it of late. And this is where it’s all really come from is when you’re considering a new direction and that feeling comes along and you don’t know, is it something really bad? Or what is it? Because it’s not, it’s just an uncomfortable feeling. Have you had that? For me, it’s normally just in the real pit of my stomach and it’s just there.
Yeah. So have you had something like that? One or all of them? And what do we normally do? When you notice that feeling, what do we do? We go, oh, please make it stop. I don’t like it.
I want to push it away. Remember I was saying, you know, you push it away, you push it down, trap it in a little box somewhere, hide it. It doesn’t work that, does it? Because it tends to come back, doesn’t it? Tends to come back a little bit and you go, oh, okay.
Maybe a little bit stronger. What would happen? Think about it. If we had a different response, what different response could we have? I’ll tell you.
Let’s just get bloody curious about the thing. Let’s get interested in it. You see, it’s not about this feeling not being right.
And it’s not about this feeling must be, it’s wrong. It’s just, but what if I thought this? Interesting. Interesting.
Something’s happened inside me. I wonder what I can learn from it. Wow.
All of a sudden, as soon as you say that, what can I learn from it? It’s as if that feeling changes a little bit too. It’s a bit like, oh, they’re listening to me. And you see the meaning that you’re attaching to that feeling, that negative, you think it’s negative and that’s why you’re pushing it away.
But it may not be that. It may not be that at all. Because that’s the meaning that you’ve consciously put on it.
And it’s an unconscious signal. Yeah. Do you want to play? Do you want to play with me? Come on.
All you got to do is take a bit of time, take a bit of time out and play. It’s not deep, but you’re thinking about and remembering. So I want you to remember something.
I want you to remember a time when you did have a feeling like that. Not a mega, mega, mega one. No.
Ten was the worst. Zero. It doesn’t exist.
A four out of ten, even a three out of ten. Something that you can remember it by. It’s rememberable, if that’s a word.
But it’s not mega. Because I want you to, just for a moment, if it’s okay, let’s just be by ourselves. Because I want you to explore it.
Let’s get curious. Let’s get that thing interesting. Oh, what can I learn from this? But before we go into that bit, let’s just notice, noticing it.
So where do you notice? Remember, bring that memory to mind now, where you felt it. Not what was going on, just the feeling. Recall that feeling.
Where do you notice it? Not externally, internally. Where do you notice it? As I said about minds, normally they’re just a pit in my stomach. And as you remember that, just remember it.
If you could, and you can, put all your attention right there. That’s it. All your attention right there.
What do you know? And now we can just notice all sorts of things. Does it have a size? What size is it? If it did have a size, what size would it be? Because it’s there. Is it tiny, tiny, tiny? Maybe it’s a tennis ball shape, or size, I don’t know.
And the shape, is it round? Maybe when you think about it, and you really get into it, it’s a bit more, it’s not really round, it’s more oval. Or maybe it’s a bit more square. And when you really get into it, really get curious about it, does it move a little bit? Because sometimes you go, oh, it’s actually just vibrating slightly.
That’s how I noticed it. Yeah. What about its temperature? Is it warm? Is it cold? Does it have a temperature? Curious, isn’t it? And get even more curious now.
Is there a pressure to it? Whatever that means, do you use it pushing, pulling? Is there a pressure? If you could know, and you could feel the edges of that, that feeling, would it have a texture? Does it have a texture? I’ve known feelings to have a slight direction. And when you really get into it, there’s always an intensity, isn’t there? Doesn’t have to be mega, as I said, but there is, oh yeah, I can feel it now. I can feel it.
It has been moving. It’s even got a colour now. Oh yeah.
And you see, you are now owning this as well, because you’re describing it to yourself. And when you describe these things by putting your attention to it, you become sort of associated, dissociated, as you teach yourself with curiosity. You see, we’re just simply acknowledging it.
What happens when you simply, I love the word simply, simply allow yourself to notice it without needing to change it? Because we’re not changing it. There are processes that do change these things, but we’re not. We’re simply acknowledging it.
And that’s a powerful thing. That’s the powerful thing. Just acknowledging and noticing can make all the difference.
It’s you and your best friend getting together. So that curiosity is the key. And you’re teaching yourself to listen with curiosity, to look with curiosity.
No more resistance. No more pushing. No more trying to bury these things.
We go, oh yeah, interesting. What can I learn? You see, because you’re owning it, you’re becoming one with it. And that’s it.
Just be with. Being with. And that’s all I want you to do.
Just notice. Just sit there. Notice the form.
Notice the shape. Because there’s even more to come now. You see, you could ask it a question.
What are you trying to teach me? But we’ll go into that shortly. Or maybe did that come up? Okay. So take a deep breath.
Because I want to change it now. Change our direction of curiosity. You see, and you can do this in the future.
When that feeling comes along, you can be observant. What am I reacting to right now? Oh, it is that voice. It is that look.
It is this place. It is that question I’ve just asked in my puzzle book. Ah, but what’s below the surface? You see, now from curiosity, we are diving into discovery.
And when you get things like the questions in your puzzle book, you can even think, what might I need? What is this feeling giving me that I might need something, need something more before I make a decision? What is this question bringing out in me? You see, we’ve been looking at maybe a trigger, what am I reacting to? But now we’re looking to a response. What might you need? And that makes it so much different. So much.
And then when you’ve got that feeling, that sense that you know the answer, you can ask yourself, do I need to act on this information right now? And there’s two answers to that question. Could be no. Sometimes I get that feeling, I got an idea where it’s going, what I need to explore.
But I’ve also had the feeling, no, let’s just chill for a moment. Let’s, well, let’s let everything settle, settle in, settle down and let things integrate a little. And I found I’ve had answers then bubble up a little bit later.
Or it could be yes, you’re going to move. You know, the epiphany is already here, the aha moment. But if it’s going to settle, maybe that epiphany, that aha comes with a little bit of clarity after.
Because you’re not just reacting, reacting, you are asking a question, do I need to act now? Do I need to explore this information a bit deeper? Let it go. And think about that to see what you think. You see, think about this.
In the past, if you’ve come with me on my, my little adventure of discovery, we’ve talked about intuition, and we’ve also talked about intuition versus overthinking, haven’t we? And to me, sometimes that intuition, overthinking comes, well not overthinking, but thinking comes together. And it’s a little bit like, if I could hear that little voice inside, it’s saying something like, hey, Cloughie, hey, go this way. Think about this.
You forgot to think about this part. Just maybe take a different direction, because you slightly off direction, because there’s just something you’re getting from this, simply a bloody, it’s a weird, uncomfortable feeling. You know, it’s not about looking for them.
We’re not worshipping, looking for every different feeling. No, no, no. When it comes along, all I’m saying is, don’t suppress it, don’t push it down, but get curiously, curious, curiously investigated.
Notice it, notice its qualities. Because when you notice the qualities, again, I think it helps you to ask those questions. And it helps you to get the answers from those questions.
It’s really strange. Just to share a little bit of personal things. And I love, this is the direction the podcast has gone a little bit, from my personal change work.
I know we’re all doing it when we’re in this adventure of life, and you’re in personal development, you want to make the best of the life you have here. That little bit of, can I improve just a little bit each day? You know, would the person I was, maybe a year ago, be proud of what I’m doing now? You can then think, well, here’s my take on it. I’ve been doing a lot of asking questions.
I’ve been asking a lot of questions. There’s a better way to put it, Clovey. I’ve been asking things like, where the hell am I going? Things are changing in my life.
So where am I going? Because sometimes we don’t ask that question. We just get confused. We just move.
We take random steps and actions, and then wonder what the bloody hell we’ve done. And when you do ask that question, you don’t always get an answer. Oh, well, Clovey, here we go.
What you’ve done is this, and what you should be doing is that. No. But by asking that question, you’re getting to know the things that you know, but you don’t know that you know.
That’s weird, isn’t it? But we want to get inside and get our unconscious mind, our best friend, to start sharing that extra knowledge. Even asking, what the bloody hell do I want? I’ve been asking that over the last few months now. What do I really want? I’ve got all these things, but do I really want them? What is my value on this? Why is it important? Is it important? Is it just something I’ve thought about, that I thought was good to do? And when I think about that thing, I get that weird feeling.
Then I go inside it. What’s triggering this? What do I need to know? What’s happening? And I get a sense of the right direction for me at this time. You know, if you go back either the last, longer, deeper dive, the one before that, who the bloody hell am I? Who do I think I am? You know, you get that question, and we’ve had this.
Just that, I think this was the last one, probably. You know, what would happen? And what would somebody who’s already done this before do now? Those type of things stir up this feeling. And the feeling is just saying, it’s just another way of telling you, maybe.
Don’t look into it as gospel, but I just think more times than enough, it’s your unconscious mind trying to communicate with you, but not in the way that you recognise. But now you’re going to ask the question, what’s happening inside me when I start moving in this new direction? Because sometimes it could be your unconscious mind saying, yeah, but just wait a moment. You see, what I found was, and this is a weird thing, when I asked questions like, what do I want? Where am I going? It didn’t produce a massive excitement.
In fact, these things, for me, it was, I got angry for a reason. And as I looked at that feeling, just below that anger, I experienced a feeling of sadness, and then grief. I know they’re very close, but there’s a difference.
And as I felt those feelings, just as we’ve got here, I explored those feelings with curiosity. I got some understanding, understanding from what had happened to me in the past, some of my actions and reactions of the past, owning it, taking responsibility for things that I hadn’t really taken responsibility for. And now I was able to move on.
But it could feel like a resistance. You know, that anger, sadness and grief could have stopped me in my tracks. You know, I’m not asking this question anymore.
I’m not going in the right direction. But no, I just sat there. Oh, I understand.
I’ve got to acknowledge something from the past so I can learn from it, clear away. Because once you clear away the emotion, the negative emotion around events of the past, you get the learning from it. And when you’ve learned from the past, those feelings disappear anyway.
So you might might think we call it resistance, such as grief, fear, uncertainty. I had a lot of that. So the old memories coming back, I don’t know, you know, conflict of identities, who the bloody hell I used to think I was this.
And now I don’t know who I am. That makes a feeling in there. And sometimes it was just way Cloughie.
Just stop for a second. Just stop for a second. All right, when I did stop, I let things and I know the word is not mature.
But it was like, they just settled inside me. And I used to go to my back to my puzzle book, because things didn’t solve themselves immediately. But because I was exploring with curiosity, I’d write them down, maybe write those questions down.
And then over time, and it wasn’t a long time, because I had the intention of changing. I had the intention of finding that direction. I just had to settle down and learn a little bit.
You see, you could, you could do the same type of thing. Those questions in my mind tend to come quite naturally now, because I’ve been practicing for quite a few years now. But you could have a list.
I used to have a little list of questions at the front of my my puzzle book that I could refer back to if I was lost in the feelings of things. And I was getting a little bit, I don’t know what to do, I’d go to the front of my puzzle book, and look at my list of questions, go, that’s a great question. One would jump out at me and go, that’s a question.
I’d write it down as I got that feeling, and then answers would come along. So what type of questions could you put down? Have a think. Because I don’t want to say puzzle book, you know, you know, I’m talking about a book with blank pages.
But it could be just a lot of sheets of paper, but they do tend to get lost. Could be a journal, could be one of those little field books, could be anything whatsoever that you write down so you get it out your brain, and you can come back to it at a later date. Even if it’s in the afternoon, or in the following morning or evening, it just allows it to settle inside and then come back to you with a bit more clarity.
So what might they be to get your unconscious mind working? Because you know, you have a question, your unconscious mind seems to go away and find the answers. Especially, I used to have a real problem one time, I used to ask questions and just think, my unconscious mind is going to come back with the answers. But I was bloody lazy.
My unconscious mind thought, I think anyway, this is what I think it thought, was, well, if you can’t be bothered to set your intention, Cloughie, and really, you know, you have to do a little thinking yourself, have to get curious, have to come with me, then I’m not going to answer the question. But once you set your intention, I really want to know, I’m curious, as if your unconscious mind goes, in that case, come back in a little while, and we’ll find out. So what type of questions could you write down, ready to play, to get curious? You know, we had those questions from the beginning, right? You know, what was happening at the time? What just happened? What was that feeling? Can you describe it? Put your attention? Maybe what was I thinking just immediately before? Because sometimes, you notice the feeling, and you’ve forgotten what just happened.
So, you know, what triggered? What was going on? What triggered that feeling? Because sometimes you go, oh, and as you get into that trigger, you go, I remember that thing of the past. And it’s like your unconscious mind is saying, just don’t do the same thing again. Let’s learn from it.
Lovely question could be, you know, what are you protecting me from? What is it you’re protecting me from? What are you trying, how are you trying to keep me safe? Because sometimes your unconscious mind tries to keep you safe by giving you negative feelings. But if you go, well, maybe there’s a better way, a better way to keep me safe. Maybe I could be aware, just noticing things, calm.
Maybe you could just ask, you know, what do I need right now? That’s a great one. Because sometimes it’s, you think, oh, what do I need? I need more information. No, sometimes you just need to step back.
Sometimes you need to take a breath. Sometimes you need to just go and ask somebody. I’ve had that before.
What do I need? Well, that question, who’s done this before? What would they do? And you think, oh, I know who to ask. I’ve even done it before in our head. Think of that person, ask them that question in your mind and notice what they tell you.
All the stuff we’ve been doing here, you know, going into hypnosis, maybe we’ve got 65 free hypnosis tracks for you at paulclough.com forward slash podcast. Go there, get a little email from me, click on the link and you’ve got your access to all of that. And they’re all downloadable.
It’s great, great resource. So just take a little bit of time, allow your unconscious mind to do its work for you, work for you, with you. Yeah.
And you see, we’re not forcing an answer. We’re working with, and that’s what it’s all about, isn’t it? Working with our unconscious mind, with our thoughts, looking for new directions, maybe looking for new ways to just enjoy life. Maybe we have a project and you get that funny feeling.
Okay, what do I need to do? Maybe do I need to stop? Where is this taking me? Is this in the right direction? All these things are some great questions. You can just play around with them. And you see, it’s all about not asking for this feeling to go away.
It’s just there for a reason. And when you get curious, curious about these things, and you learn a little bit from it, guess what happens? It bloody disappears anyway, because you’ve got the learnings. It’s done what it’s meant to do.
It’s given you that little insight. You just got it. It’s just the way it communicates.
It’s not the way that we would communicate ourselves. You see, I don’t know. Let’s just think of everything that we’re doing now.
The direction we’re looking for. For me anyway, it’s like looking for a new direction. But it’s going to come along.
There’s new ways. I can remember now when I go back to when I always had little new direction changes. As new opportunities came, they were a direction change.
But it’s like taking me back online. And we go back to that thing and you get that feeling. Maybe it’s just time to pause, listen, but listen with all your senses.
What’s that mean? Going inside sometimes. Look, the senses are sight, smell, taste. What words are you hearing? Auditory.
And those feelings. So just listen. Listen to the message you’re getting in, because it comes in all different modalities.
Maybe it’s a memory as well. And then explore what you get. And when you’ve got what you feel is right, then you can decide to move on, move in a direction, stay still, do what, because it’s your choice.
And the one thing about this is when you do it this way, you can, well you can choose wisely, because it’s your choice. Whereas before you’d have just reacted. Now you’re choosing the right path.
Not the one over there, but the right. You’re making the right steps. Sometimes just pausing is the best thing you can ever do.
And then what I’d love you to do as you do this, fucking celebrate. We never celebrate enough. You know, being alive should be a celebration.
How lucky am I to be alive right now, to have this opportunity to make a choice. That’s what I’m thinking. You see, if you get stuck, just remember, you don’t know that you know, but you just don’t know that you know.
And as you take this time to pause, to listen, to explore, to decide, everything will become clear. Because your unconscious mind is trying to tell you, it’s just doing it in a weird way. And it’s great to be weird.
Be as weird as you can, unique as you can, and live the life that you were destined to live. And sometimes we just go off, go off kilter, go off direction a little bit. And as we listen and choose wisely, we get to have that wonderful life.
Enjoy my friend. If there’s anything that you need, anything that has stirred up a little bit maybe, and you need a bit of help with that listening, send me an email, feedback at personaldevelopmentunplugged.com and I’ll answer it personally. And also, I’m sure it would be part of a new episode.
Because other people I know will have that similar feeling. So be brave. Ask the question of you and of me.
And always, always two things. Subscribe and follow so you get every new episode. Don’t miss out on one.
And share. If you share this, it just helps in numerous ways. Obviously, by sharing more people listening, it makes this podcast more popular.
And when it becomes more popular, the old algorithms then start pushing it out to other people too. And then that gets more popular. And more people get to, they get to listen for a change.
They sit down for a change. Change is always possible. And the thing is, when you do that, it’s like paying it forward.
I heard a lovely thing about when, if you think about, as you give things out, the ripples go out. And you never know how far and wide those ripples go, but they do. But when they hit, they come back.
Think about it. It actually happens. Those ripples go out, they maybe hit somebody, and then they come back to you.
And they come back to you in a better way. A wonderful way. And that’s the thing.
You know, doing things selfless service for no want of reward, but you do get it. You do get rewards. But what shape or form they come, only you will know.
Have fun. Go have a wonderful life. And have more fun than you can stand.
Enjoy every, I’ll see you later.
Transcribed by TurboScribe.