A. The misconception that intuition is a spiritual skill.
There are three primary types of consciousness:
- No intuition: Where there is awareness only of externals and emotional feelings.
- Intuition: Where there is an awareness of the richness and power of the mind, but there is no integrated understanding or control of this power. Reason is undeveloped.
- Total knowledge: Here there are no "intuitions", but a continuous mind with no division between reason and intuition.
It is a mistake to see these three as progressive stages. The first does not lead to the second, and the second will not lead to the third. Reason, and reason alone has the capacity to carry one into the realms of all-knowledge.
This is not to say the intuitive mind is without value. Then what is the intuitive mind? It arises when the mind is clear enough for it to make clean and unhindered associations through connective thought. It enables one to tap hitherto unavailable sources of insight. To those who experience this mind for the first time, such a power seems beyond this world, and is easily mistaken for enlightenment. Furthermore, the talent of intuition is often accompanied by the realization of the interconnectedness of all things in Nature. This feeble mental advancement can be the cause of great excitement and monstrous self-deception with it.
Unfortunately, intuitive powers are usually more of a hindrance to spiritual growth than a help. A shallow brute of person, concerned wholly with externals, is often more in touch with reality than the sensitive and intuitive person, who cannot place her feelings in context with the real world. This is because intuitions invariably degenerate into superstitions, if they did not surface as such.