Trusting Your Gut, Even When It Seems Crazy

A few years ago my intuition nudged me to give a class the assignment of writing a song. Only three students had musical ability (I came up with an alternate assignment for the others), and of those three students, only one young woman—Carmel Bracken, a workshop leader and educator from Ireland—was inspired to give it a try. She had never written a song before, and the song she produced still moves me to tears. It’s titled Dream This Dream With Me and you can listen to it here:

I’m offering this in case you feel inclined to ignore your quiet, whispering inner voice because whatever it’s saying doesn’t make sense or seems too outrageous or only one student in the class might grasp it. Creative expression, of whatever form, just needs an opening and the rest takes care of itself. If you are a teacher, trainer, coach, parent, mentor, or group facilitator, you have the opportunity to provide those openings for others. All you need to do is create the space for it.