I’ve spent 20 years accessing extraordinary information through ordinary means. Here’s my approach, shared as simply as possible. Enjoy!
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Intuition can access vast amounts of data if we only learn to “reach out” with it from where we typically reside — just like browsing the web is much more powerful than reading information from your local hard drive.
Intuition gets undervalued and a bad rap sometimes because we are murky about which kind of intuition we mean when we use it:
Local intuition is the one that resides within us: knowing of how to act based on hundreds of repetitions and based on the data available through our senses like eyes and ears, etc.
Non-local intuition is about accessing data outside of our local senses: to reliably gain access to wisdom that typically feels given to us. Ideas, “downloads”, energy reads, inner knowing about what path to take without being able to point to why, etc.
In this post I’ll try to break down the mechanics of the former, so that you can stretch into the latter reliably. But first, storytime.
The flight that wasn’t
I was on a business trip in Utah a few years ago. I’m about to go to bed and set my alarm for my return flight the next morning. I do the math and set it to 5:15am… but my body shudders: ughh that’s early. So I check in with my non-local intuition, too: do I really need to get up this early?
And the answer came back very clearly: don’t set your alarm. Your flight will be canceled.
Huh. I check my phone, check my email, the flight app… none of them say anything about a cancellation. So I’m confused.
At this point I have to make a choice. Which data source do I trust? Despite having been in scenarios like this thousands of times, I sometimes get it a little off, so I hesitate and decide to set the alarm.
Well, what do you know. I wake up 5:15am the next morning and immediately check my email. And there it is: “Your flight has been canceled. New time: 1:20pm.”
Guess I could’ve slept longer!
Focal point
All right, so let’s break it down.
At any given time, our awareness is on something, somewhere. I call this our focal point. Think of it as your consciousness having a location. For most people, most of the time, we’re in our heads, in some kind of thought. So the focal point is in our head.
If we’re deeply engaged in a sport, a movie, a flow state of some sort, or observing a person or an object, our focal point will be on that. Or if you’re deeply immersed in thoughts about work or a memory, the focal point moves there, into the mental field.
I think of the focal point as an adjustable shape, often the size of a tennis ball. It can expand and be wide and large, or very tiny. It can split up and track multiple things at the same time. Or it can be deeply immersed in one. You can control it.
If I’m talking to you, I can sense where your focal point is. You can probably do this with other people too. Are they focused elsewhere or present with you?
Access data by moving the focal point
You can easily move the focal point to get data. You do this all the time. When you’re asking yourself what you’re in the mood to eat, you might move your focal point to somewhere in your body, likely your stomach, and check in. You get the answer from that location. That’s moving the focal point.
But notice: if you’re stressed you might make decisions from the head instead, without having actually listened to your body. This is like using cached or stale data. I find myself doing this with tiredness sometimes. My head will have an idea of how tired I am — usually based on what time it is — but didn’t actually move the focal point to check in with the body’s truth.
Now, let’s do a simple experiment. Imagine moving your focal point to the top of your left pinkie. Focus deeply on being in the pinkie. Imagine you become very small, a mini version of yourself, just sitting in your finger. Noticing the sensations there. Take a few breaths. Notice: what does it feel like here? Now close your eyes and be there while counting 10 deep breaths.
After a while you might notice tingling sensations, warmth, and if you really imagine yourself there, the rest of the world might fade away a bit.
Great, now come back to your normal resting spot. You just moved your focal point! Easy.
Principles:
Where you focus, sensations grow.
You can easily move the focal point. You already do.
Local intuition: The heart
Okay so before we go to non-local intuition, let’s use the focal point to access your local intuition and inner knowing.
First, recognize that you have many centers of intuition and deeper knowledge in your system. Your heart, your body, your mind, etc. For now we’re going to work with the heart.
Imagine moving your focal point to the center of your chest area. Go there and sit. Bring your entire awareness to the heart area. Notice what it feels like. See, sense or feel any sensations of what it’s like being there.
Stay with it. Have you been here before? How long ago? Can you sit with it? (Now close your eyes and stay in the heart area for a moment. See what it feels like to just rest there.)
What if you make your focal point even smaller and focus on the very root of the heart? Does it feel any different?
As you sit for a while, do you start to notice an emotional texture to it? Not just the physical sensations of your skin and chest, but the emotional sensations. What emotions are your heart emitting right now? Does it feel light… or heavy? Open or closed? Tired or excited?
Imagine asking the heart: what are you feeling? Then sit and imagine getting a response. (Just use your fantasy for now, and speak the answer out loud or write it down.) Then, keep going, ask the same question a few times. Keep holding space, asking and listening. Literally try to dialogue with the heart.
“It is possible to speak with our heart directly. Most ancient cultures know this. We can actually converse with our heart as if it were a good friend. In modern life we have become so busy with our daily affairs and thoughts that we have lost this essential art of taking time to converse with our heart.”
— Jack Kornfield, A Path With Heart
Now, whether you feel nothing at all, an emotion or even a full dialogue, it’s important to continue to keep the focal point where you’re reading. Don’t immediately react to it by going back to your head.
This is the most common mistake I see. We get so interested in the answer that we lose ourselves in our thoughts about the information itself, and stop the connection to the source.
Let’s say you ask about whether to go to an event tonight, and your heart says “absolutely not”. You might start resisting that idea from your head, maybe because you’ve already made commitments to people etc. And suddenly you’re in a thought loop.
Analyze later.
Hold space for whatever you’re listening to express itself fully. Be curious and keep your focal point there. End after 5-10 minutes, or when it feels complete.
How did that feel? Even if you didn’t feel much, don’t worry, you’re building your sensitivity. Perhaps a different area of your body speaks more clearly.
Principles:
You have different centers of intelligence. You can talk to each of them.
Don’t interrupt the flow. Keep the focal point where it is even as you’re receiving information.
You can use it for journaling by recording inner conversations with your focal point in different places. Before making important decisions, can you ask different centers in you for opinions, to arrive at a fully aligned decision? (I tend to query my heart, my body more generally, my higher self / soul, and my head.)
For those familiar with Internal Family Systems (IFS), it’s very similar to that, it’s just that we’re somatically tethered to a location in the body, and you’re interacting with the emotion / energy / data at that location.
Non-local intuition
All right, if you’re still here, I’m thrilled. Let’s access non-local intuition!
So here’s the key point to contemplate: your focal point can be moved anywhere, even outside of your body! And it works just the same way in that you can sense information from that location.
Yes, it’s true. I believe this is the mechanic that underpins so many of the brilliant spontaneous ideas, mysterious revelations, and inspirations people have talked about being able to access throughout history.
Remarkably, recognize that you already do this, too. Concepts, ideas, movements, other people, even rooms and places… they all carry an energy, and you already interact with them all the time. Think about the emotion present at a protest, a concert or a World Cup game. It’s palpable, right? Your system already knows how to access it. So now it’s about intentionally tuning in and out, with precision.
Let’s practice 🙏
We’re going to start by picking a source. It can be a powerful emotion like love or joy, or a person who’s inspiring to you, a teacher, guide or even a religious figure or deity you’re into. It can be your higher self. Perhaps even a friend, a place, or anything that holds a significant, positive energetic charge, that feels safe to interact with and think about.
Decide on a source. Take a few deep breaths and come into your body. Then, bring your source to mind. Visualize, sense or pretend it’s in front of you, while closing your eyes for a little bit. Try to make it really clear and real.
Then, imagine moving your focal point to this source. The same way you focused on your hand, just focus on the source. Place all of your attention on or in this source, really immerse yourself. Imagine a connection building between you and this source, like a cord.
Sit in that location and let your awareness build. Close your eyes and count 10 deep breaths. Allow the energy of this source to reach you, and let it flow into your body.
Then, let’s start noticing. What’s it like there? Does it feel hot or cold? Any other sensations? If you had to imagine it having a color, which color would it have? Would it be bright? Does it feel like a room or does any other image come to mind?
Now, ask it a question. Like, what is your purpose? What do you have to tell me? What am I missing? Any guidance for me?
Try to remain really open. Imagine your mind having a big gate that opens towards the location of this source, allowing information to stream back in to your head. And see what you’re noticing.
If you’re getting a lot of downloads, it’s a good idea to start writing them down, or else it’s easy to slip into processing it. If you can type on your computer while focusing on the source, that’s great. Pen and paper works too, etc.
If it’s hard to do a proper dialogue, see if you can at least bathe in this source and let its energy and information come into your system. Take a few breaths where you imagine light from this source flowing into your body.
Do one last check whether it has anything to tell you, then begin withdrawing. Thank the source for letting you access information from here, and see, sense or feel yourself withdrawing, and closing the gate. Bring your focal point back to your own body, stand up, shake a bit, and take a few breaths.
That’s it! Non-local intuition! ✨
Principles:
Your focal point can go beyond your physical body.
To access a non-local source, bring it up in your mind’s eye first, and then move your focal point into it.
Always end by disconnecting properly and coming back to yourself.
This mechanism of intentionally moving your focal point to a location and sensing there is incredibly powerful and versatile because it gives rise to lots of different phenomena and capabilities. I believe things like remote sensing, healing, downloads / higher intuition / channeling, visions, even telepathy, are all using a variation of this technique. The focal point is like the keyboard and mouse for exploring the non-local world. There’s a whole world out there, and we have more than our five senses to explore it!
Over time, a strong usage of the focal point in several non-local, loving sources can become tremendously strong guidance and help in life. I’ve been using this technique for 20+ years and all of my best decisions come aided this way.
All right, this is a long post so I think I’ll end it there. If you liked this, let me know and I’ll post some more. I’ll attach an appendix below with some curiosities, and please share your questions.
With love and gratitude,
Jon 🙏
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Appendix: Q&A
Q: How do I know that I’m not just guessing?
A: At this point you probably won’t know. As you saw in the airplane example, you can develop this to the level of verifiable data, repeatedly. Your own accuracy and data will likely confirm this the best for yourself over time. I’ve had so many reps of using my focal point for various reads that I do not question it in my life. See for yourself and have fun sitting in the question until you know for sure.
That said, one thing that can help is to deeply focus on the focal point for long enough until you start feeling sensation there, while actively reducing sensations and information coming from other parts of your body. This way you’ll be cleaner in your readings.
Q: I don’t get any sensation at all.
A: One thing to experiment with could be to imagine where you’re sending your focal point from. Often when we focus on something, we send the focal point from our head. Some people are more sensitive using the heart. In that case, imagine the focal point, again, as a little sphere of your consciousness that you can move around, and imagine it moving out of your heart to another source. Then do the same steps from there.
Q: Could this not just be a way to focus the five senses more sharply and then use your intellect to have an educated guess?
A: It could be. But I find that it always produces more information than the five senses, and works reliably remotely too.
Q: How can it work remotely?
A: I don’t know. It seems like the energetic layer (where emotions live) isn’t tied to a physical location. This matches my experience as a human where I can feel deeply impacted by politicians, artists, countries etc without being physically next to them.
Q: What about privacy?
A: It’s real and important. And also something we’re going to have to figure out new rules for. I try to never access data that I don’t believe the person would want me to know, or is only in service of me or my ego or my curiosity, etc. I’ll do a follow up post on this but for now, try to always ask for permission first (through the focal point) if you’re reading a real person.
Appendix: Guidance vs data
To me, non-local intuition can be both information (“I’m feeling this emotion coming from someone else”) and guidance (“It’s like something is telling me this is the right move for me”).
What’s powerful about the focal point method is that it works for both. You can access non-local data using the focal point, and you can ask questions to whatever source you’re in contact with to receive guidance!
If your spouse is mad at you, that’s data, and you can probably feel it even if you’re not in the same room, or actively moving your focal point to them. That’s not necessarily guidance, it’s data. Whereas if you connect with a person’s heart, a mentor, religious figure or a guide, etc, they’d typically hold more guidance for you.
Hope this helps!
Blessings,
Jon 🙏
Thank you!!💟
Love this! I call this my zoom in and out lens🥰