I knew something was off. Not a thought, exactly, more like a feeling at the back of my neck. Something in me was waving its arms, trying to get my attention. But I couldn't articulate it. I had no evidence, no logical reason to be concerned. So I talked myself out of it, extended trust, and moved forward.

I shouldn't have.

I suspect you have your own version of this story. A person who set off some quiet alarm in you before they ever gave you a concrete reason to be cautious. A situation your body understood before your brain caught up.

We've been trained to distrust that. To wait for data. To say nothing until we can back it up with evidence. And sometimes that discipline is wise. But sometimes dismissing our own inner knowing costs us something, occasionally something significant.

A book arrived at my door this week that I'm looking forward to getting into. It's called You Already Know by Laura Huang, and the premise is this: information is important, and so is the intuition and experience you bring alongside it. Both are real and necessary.

I heard about the book on The Lovable Podcast, where former Cubs manager Joe Maddon recommended it. Joe was known for bringing analytics to the clubhouse while also trusting the human being standing in front of him. His unique managerial style brought numbers and intuition together.

It's an important balance, because the cost of ignoring our inner knowing can be high, just as is ignoring any data available to us. Our culture places a higher value on data, and we tend to override the red flags we feel and end up exactly where part of us knew we shouldn't be. We can talk ourselves out of the right thing because we can't defend it out loud. And over time, if we dismiss that inner voice often enough, we lose touch with it altogether.

There's a theological word for this, though we don't always use it this way: Wisdom. Wisdom isn't simply information or knowledge exactly, it's what comes when experience, attention, information, and something deeper yet all work together. It's the capacity to perceive what is true before you can fully explain it.

I think God moves in that space, not bypassing our reason, but by working through the whole of who we are, including the parts that sense and feel and know before they can articulate why.

Perhaps you've experienced the quiet nudge to check in on someone, or have felt peace in your soul before the available information said you should. Or, maybe you've had the prickly feeling on the back of your neck that told you to be cautious.

You already know more than you think you do, because you're more than the cells that make up your body. Biologically, I know that there are a gajillion neurons in my brain processing a boatload of information much faster than my consciousness knows what to do with it. I also know there's an ancient wisdom that the mystics called the soul, and that my belief calls the lure of God toward the best possible moment. Instead of discounting "knowing" that we can't quantify, perhaps we can learn to understand and value it on its own merits.

It's why the life of faith invites us into spiritual practices like praying, meditating, connecting with nature, taking walks, journaling, or other practices. The more connected we are to our bodies and all of creation, the more we have the eyes to see, the ears to hear, and a soul that knows.

My wish for you this week, Reader, is that you would be kind enough to yourself to slow down, to take the walk, to sit in the quiet, to let your whole self speak, and to listen deeply. You already know more than you think you do. Now, trust it. That's the fiLLLed life.

Live a fiLLLed life, Melissa