Until you’ve got your schedule filled, say Yes to as many things as you can. Even with a full schedule, you should often reconsider removing a standard item from your schedule and make room for a new Yes. Try out new things, whether that is a friendship, a gig or joining a cooking club. As long as it doesn’t clash with your principles and is reversible, you’re good to go. Most things have a trial period and don’t require lifetime commitment, so a Yes to a trial shouldn’t be too costly. 

Become comfortable being uncomfortable. Even though you haven’t done something before and are objectively uncomfortable, feel OK with that situation and know that feeling comfortable will make the objective discomfort go away quicker.

There are many excuses not to act on that idea of yours. You don’t have the equipment, you don’t have the fitness, you don’t have the finances and you need someone else to join you. It is only when you go do the thing that you notice you didn’t need all of the excuses or at least not in the amount that you expected.

Sometimes I waited for a perfect opportunity before going on a hiking trip for a few days. Eventually I decided to simply go and plan a trip in two weeks, regardless of who might join and what equipment I have available. By being so decisive and making your plans clear, it is more likely that others will join you on the trip. Even if they don’t, you now have an opportunity to spend some time alone and explore yourself this way.

That old backpack might hurt when the non-padded straps cut into your shoulders, but this is easily fixed by adding a towel or shirt in between. You might be surprised by your creativity when you forget your spoon. You’ll ask others for a spoon, improvise utensils with twigs or even completely forego cutlery and drink a soupy meal straight from the pan. You’ll find ways to make do with what you have, and often realise that you don’t need as many things as you thought. It’s a shame to miss out on the experience because of your excuses. The inconvenience or even pain will be forgotten, but the memories will stay.

It is better to go on that adventure and find improvements for next time, than optimally prepare for it and never actually go. You can still be realistic in your expectations and maybe shoot for a hike with 15 or 20 kilometres per day instead of a daily 30 kilometres one the first time and with unknown fitness. Next time you can increase your daily distance, or just stay at your current level if you’re having fun. There’s always a level you can start at, and you’re ready to start now.

You will one day be in a situation where your body arouses a state of anxiety and unease. You can’t explain why right now, but you know that something isn’t right. Only after the situation has built up to the climax you’ll be able to reason through your discomfort. You’ve experienced your first gut feeling.

While on a holiday I had to change some money into the local currency during the evening. We found some folks that could help us, but they spoke fluent English whereas the rest of the locals didn’t speak English that well. We’ve discovered earlier that day that those who could speak English are out for your tourist money and sometimes even outright scams. This was already a first sign in the buildup of my gut feeling.

The first guy seemed really helpful and found us a place to eat for almost no money, but we had to pay for his beer. As the conversation progressed, he offered to help us change the money at a good exchange rate. That which sounds too good to be true, usually is. Another sign for my instincts. Still, we wanted to try it out with a part of our money. Our friendly guide walked us to the hotel to get the money, then we had to follow him to a sketchy neighbourhood.

My travel partner handed over the money so the guide could exchange this at his friend’s place. My instincts took over and I grabbed the money from his hands. From that moment my partner and I decided to always have the money in one of our hands. Suddenly the mood of our amical guide changed whilst proclaiming that he didn’t like me anymore, I suddenly wasn’t his friend anymore. Still, we went along and visited the friend together with our guide.

The friend appeared with a roll of bills. They could give us ‘big bills’, which was useful as we didn’t want to carry around a huge stack of bills. There was indeed a ‘big bill’ on the outside, the whole roll being kept together with a rubber band. They wanted to exchange our money for theirs quickly. Whenever someone is in a rush in a deal and makes you hurry up, you’re usually getting screwed.

We insisted on having a look at the bills. It took a few minutes back-and-forth discussing our apparently shady activity of exchanging money and being reminded that we had to hurry before arousing suspicion. Eventually, my partner could enter a bar with one of the guys to ask for the validity of the outer ‘big bill’, while sneakily checking some bills in the roll. When they came back, I heard that all the bills that were seen on the inside were of really low value. They most likely wanted to give us a roll of low value bills and one of our wanted bills rolled around it. If we were to accept the deal, we would have lost 98% of our money converted to the local currency.

Our own money still in hand, we handed back the stack of money. We turned around and walked back to our hotel at a hastened pace. The guys didn’t follow us or try to talk us into staying. I think they knew we caught their malintent. During the whole ordeal I felt a tingling sense of unease. Nearing the climax of the coming unfair exchange the feeling became increasingly unsettling. Looking back, we could have stopped at the first, second or at most third stage of this story. Our instincts knew at those first signs what the outcome of this adventure would be.

This gut feeling develops over time. It takes some experience to be able to match a new situation to a familiar one. Allow yourself, emotionally, but also safety-wise, some room for mistakes when you first enter a new domain. Be careful at this stage to not immediately shoot down ideas based on your instincts. Balance your gut feeling out with saying Yes to new things often.

Instincts should not be confused with fear. An instinct is a more trustworthy and objective form. It is your model of the world that is continually tested and hopefully adjusted once proven wrong. Fear is an irrational model of the world and will often protect you from dangerous situations, but at the same time withhold you from beneficial situations too. Be honest with yourself in recognising which feelings are from the gut and which stem from fear.

As you get older, you learn to trust your instincts more. You start to get a better sense of when the feeling is right. It makes sense to sometimes go through with the adventure to challenge your gut feeling. Maybe the feeling turns out to be wrong and you will adjust your reaction for the next scenario. Eventually you’ll reach a point where you cannot easily explain your decisions to someone else. You just act based on how a situation feels.

Reading a situation based on feeling is a skill that I’ve developed mostly with slightly dangerous sports such as rock climbing or surfing. Once you’ve been exposed to many environments, have moved in multiple ways (sometimes crashingly) and seen others fall, you will instantly react to similar situations. You become better at instantly reading a person’s type and connecting them to a common hazard for their type. A climber who appears weak on the ground will start showing trembling arms during their climb and fall shortly after. Someone that appears energetic will rush into the climbing route with no regards to surrounding hazards when they try a sketchy jump.

Observing others and myself, I’ve come to the conclusion that two types of gut feeling exist (even in conjunction within the same person). There are those that have a strong primal sense of danger. These are usually the type of person that invests heavily into looking inward, being in touch with their true self. Another type that fits in this category are those that are blunt and simply have a good survival instinct.

The other type of gut feeling is the learnt variant that grows with exposure to risk and evaluations of these situations. These instincts are developed in situations that are unnatural: you have to put yourself in those situations as you don’t normally encounter them. Rock climbing, in my case, has been an example of this.