🧠Weekly MindSweep No. 215 | What’s On My Mind | Intuition
February 2026
Week 212: Curated Conversation: Intuition
Week 213: Mind Your Business: Intuition
Week 214: Manage Your Mind: Intuition
*Week 215: What’s On My Mind: Intuition
New to the Weekly MindSweep? Past issues live here.
Let’s Sweep The Brain!
🎬 Rather watch or listen instead of read? Now you can!
Subscribe to YouTube @chickbookcreative
In the MindSweep this week:
Weekly MindSweep: Past issues live here.
Jamie’s Second Brain Corner: Links to references & MindSweep Mapping
Collaboration: with Shannon Giordano and the MetroWest Chamber of Commerce (First Friday of every month)
My face and a link to schedule your free consultation.
A Quieter Relationship With Intuition
How Your Nervous System Shapes What You Call “Intuition”
Three weeks ago, we started February with a simple question: When your intuition speaks, what do you do with it? I thought we would talk about instinct, discernment, and maybe confidence.
I didn’t expect that the real work would be less about defining intuition and more about understanding the state we’re in when we interpret it.
In Curated Conversation, Mind Your Business, and Manage Your Mind, we moved from talking about intuition as a theory to sharing real experiences. We discussed hesitation around pricing, fear that looks like wisdom, and urgency that seems responsible.
We also talked about the subtle signals our bodies send before our minds create a story around them. Over time, a pattern started to show up for me.
Intuition wasn’t the dramatic lightning bolt I used to picture. It was quieter, and it took steadiness to notice it.
Intuition isn’t something you define. It’s something you interpret.
Intuition Through the Lens of the Nervous System
As I paid attention to my own patterns this month, I realized something I had missed for years. Intuition doesn’t show up the same way in every nervous system state.
When I feel calm, safe, supported, and not like I have to perform, my intuition feels clear and steady. It doesn’t rush, argue, or push for immediate action. It feels solid, like standing with both feet on the ground. The information is just there, without any drama.
But when I’m stressed, overwhelmed, or quietly afraid of being more visible, that same inner “knowing” feels different. It feels sharper, more urgent, and more convincing. It has a sense of urgency, as if waiting would be risky.
In those moments, fear can sound almost the same as intuition. Both can feel strong and convincing, but one is steady and the other is tense.
Noticing the difference between steadiness and tension has changed how I listen to myself.
The difference isn’t in the message itself, but in the state you’re in when you hear it.
The Record Skip Before Expansion
Inside Curated Evolution this month, we laughed about life being an aggressive game of nervous system dodgeball on a fifth-grade playground, all while spinning on a flying rock through space. (Thank you for this summary, Liz!) Humor can help us loosen up.
We also discussed how we can get stuck in the record groove of the comfort of what we know. In that relaxed space, I noticed something revealing: my own “record skip” shows up right before growth and expansion.
It appears before I:
Raise a price.
Pitch a bigger idea.
Claim authority without disclaimers.
Step into visibility more fully.
The inner script can feel familiar: I need another credential, I should take another course, I should tweak the wording, or I should wait until everything feels just right.
Many Creative ADHD Entrepreneurs know this pattern well. Our minds are great at making arguments. We can easily explain away hesitation, call avoidance preparation, and see perfectionism as being responsible. But when I slow down and look at what’s really going on, I often find something simpler: fear of being seen, fear of responsibility, or fear of success.
Hesitation doesn’t show up when we’re comfortable. It shows up right at the edge of growth.
Your hesitation often appears just as you’re about to grow.
Why This Matters for the Creative ADHD Entrepreneur
For the Creative Entrepreneur, this distinction is essential. Many of us experience heightened sensitivity, rapid pattern recognition, and emotional intensity. Early on, we learned to push past discomfort to be productive or likable. We became adaptable and capable, and people praised us for our flexibility, even as we masked our overwhelm.
With a nervous system like that, feeling activated can mean excitement or threat. Telling the difference takes awareness, not just quick reactions.
Our thinking brain wants certainty because it feels safer. But intuition rarely gives us certainty. Instead, it offers alignment.
Certainty asks, “Will this work?”
Alignment asks, “Is this congruent with who I am?”
Certainty focuses on the outcome.
Alignment focuses on identity.
When we are dysregulated, certainty will always feel safer. But certainty is not clarity.
Certainty relates to outcomes; alignment relates to identity.
When Pause Is Discernment and When It Is Avoidance
Another theme this month was the urge to call inaction wisdom. Sometimes, pausing is a sign of discernment. There are times when we need to let things settle, and rushing would be a mistake. But sometimes, waiting is just avoidance pretending to be maturity.
Differentiating the two requires uncomfortable questions:
Am I calm or braced?
Am I gathering data or protecting my ego?
If this risk worked, what would it mean about me?
That last question sticks with me. We all know about fear of failure, and it’s easy to talk about. But fear of success often hides behind things that seem respectable. It can sound like being responsible, being careful, or waiting until everything is perfect. But underneath, it’s really about being nervous to step into a bigger role.
Pausing is powerful when it comes from steadiness. It is limiting when it comes from fear.
Small Action Expands Capacity
For Creative Entrepreneurs, small actions are often the best way to break out of paralysis. These aren’t big, permanent moves, but small experiments. Sending a proposal, adjusting a rate, or starting a conversation. Each small action helps your nervous system grow. It creates a collection of real-life proof.
Instead of asking if we’re ready, we start gathering proof that growth isn’t dangerous. Each small step makes the brain feel safer. Evidence takes the place of assumptions, and real experience replaces guesswork.
Growth becomes something you can actually feel, not just an idea.
Taking small, imperfect steps helps your nervous system get used to growing.
When Other People’s Fear Becomes Your “Intuition”
One thing that surprised me this month was how often we water down our own clarity when someone else is afraid. If you learned to feel safe by reading the room, you might put someone else’s comfort ahead of your own alignment without even realizing it.
We might take someone else’s anxiety as a sign that we should hold back or slow down. When we do this, we sometimes call it intuition.
But sometimes, it’s just old conditioning.
Other people’s nervous systems aren’t good guides for our own alignment.
Someone else’s fear isn’t always a sign that you should pull back.
The Five Truths I’m Carrying Forward
Here are the five main lessons I’m taking with me after our conversations this month. Each one is a practical way to use intuition more effectively in entrepreneurship.
Intuition is state-dependent. Regulation first. Interpretation second.
Fear is loud. Intuition is steady. Urgency is data.
Small action builds capacity. Evidence reduces threat.
Overthinking drowns intuition. If you are looping, your body signal is muted.
Noticing is the work. Awareness precedes rewiring.
These lessons are not just ideas; they are tools I rely on when making business decisions.
They remind me to check how I’m feeling, both emotionally and physically, before I think about strategy. I treat urgency as a signal, not a command, and I remember that real clarity comes when I feel steady.
Being aware of my state always comes first.
What This Means for the Creative Entrepreneur
If you’re an entrepreneur going through a period of growth, this month’s conversation is an invitation to try a new approach.
It means pausing long enough to regulate before interpreting what you’re feeling inside.
It means noticing when urgency feels intense and asking yourself if that feeling is fear, not alignment.
It means taking small, experimental steps instead of waiting until you feel completely certain.
It means realizing that overthinking is often a sign your nervous system is tense.
It means asking yourself, not “Is this intuition?” but “What state am I in?”
It means understanding that your hesitation doesn’t mean you’re not good enough. It’s often just your protective system at work.
And it means remembering that you don’t have to get rid of fear to grow. You just need to build your capacity.
Regulate first. Interpret second.
A Quieter Relationship With Intuition
February wasn’t about turning intuition into something mystical. It was about separating it from urgency, old habits, and fear-based stories. It was about seeing that your nervous system shapes business decisions just as much as strategy does.
As this month ends, I have a quieter relationship with intuition. I don’t expect it to show up like a lightning bolt anymore. Now, I see it as a steady presence that I can access when I feel safe enough to listen.
The question is no longer whether I trust my intuition.
It’s about whether I’m listening from a place of steadiness or from stress.
And, that difference changes everything.
My questions for you this week:
If you knew you were safe in every way—financially, emotionally, and in your reputation—what choice would you make differently this week?
How has your idea of intuition changed in the past month? What do you know now that you didn’t before?
Reply and share with me!
Ready to Listen From Steadiness?
If you noticed you’re making decisions from stress, not steadiness, you’re not alone.
A MindSweep Mapping Session isn’t surface-level work. It’s a structured, brain-based way to map your patterns, nervous system, business decisions, and the stories shaping them.
We can slow down. We'll separate fear from alignment and spot where urgency rules. Then, we build practical capacity, so your next move comes from steadiness, not strain.
You leave with clarity.
Not sure if a MindSweep Mapping Session is a good fit? Start with a free consultation. We’ll talk about where you feel braced, where you feel stuck, and what expansion asks of you. No performance or commitment, just an honest conversation.
You don’t need a louder intuition. You need steadier ground.
Decide if you want a free consultation to talk through your current state or book your MindSweep Mapping Session now. Choose what fits your needs and reserve your spot.
👉 Learn more about working together at chickbookcreative.com
Curated Conversation
If this conversation resonated, you don’t have to sit with it alone. Curated Conversation is a weekly live space for heart-centered, ADHD-wired entrepreneurs to slow down, reflect together, and learn to distinguish intuition, conditioning, and fear disguised as logic.
If you’ve never joined us, your first month is free. Come sit in the room. Listen if you want. Speak if you’re ready. Stay if it feels like home.
Mondays at 8 a.m.
Start with coffee.
Belonging included.
Was this blog forwarded to you? Sign up!
Jamie’s Second Brain Corner:
Words in bold within the Weekly MindSweep are all topics we’ve covered in Curated Conversation. You can dig into them here by searching for the word.
What I’m reading
Brain On Fire.
The title grabbed me; the story changed me.
Brain On Fire is a powerful memoir that tells the story of journalist Susannah Cahalan’s sudden struggle with psychosis, which was later found to be caused by a rare autoimmune disease called anti-NMDA receptor encephalitis. The book mixes medical mystery with personal storytelling, showing how easily identity and thinking can be shaken when the brain is affected. It also highlights how determination, science, and advocacy can help find answers when symptoms are overlooked. This memoir serves as both a warning about the limits of medical knowledge and a moving story of recovery, resilience, and the need to listen to patients.
Collaborations!
Join us Friday, March 6, 2025
Join Shannon and me at the MetroWest Chamber of Commerce for a special session featuring the Chamber's own Luiza Barros De Oliveira, Marketing and Member Specialist, and Reyad Shah, President and CEO, for valuable insights on the power of networking and relationship-building.
Register now to reserve your spot!
Free: Registration is required: https://bit.ly/MWCoC_March2026
In other news…
Feeling #FOMO about Curated Conversations? Join us!
