I firsthand know what it is like to have cloudy discernment. After my marriage ended, I truthfully thought my intuition had been wiped from my internal disc. I’d made a lifelong covenant with a man who attempted to destroy me. And while my marriage only lasted a few years, the residual damage remained much longer. It didn’t appear straight away, but instead reared its ugly head when I started dating again. I noticed it was difficult separating my intuition from fear or past experiences. I didn’t know what was the Holy Spirit’s warning and what was my own clouded lens. Was this a precursor to red flags on their way, or had I let my experience bleed into something good? This created a pattern in my dating life that was frankly not sustainable. It wasn’t until I Googled the symptoms of my own short-circuiting that I landed on relatable stories of women whose lens, too, was smeared. And I’m confident that if I could learn how to trust my intuition again, you can too.
So where do we start?
I want to start with your why. And you may be thinking, “Mi, it’s because my gut feels mixed up. I know why.” Yes, that is a fraction of it. But I want you to reflect on:
• Why is it important for you to relearn how to get in touch with your intuition again?
• What will happen if you keep doing nothing to fix your clouded lens?
• How can trusting your discernment shape your future?
For me personally, it was a sentence one of my dearest friends said to me during my first relationship post-divorce. I’d entered into a dynamic that was fueled by chemistry and borderline toxicity. And while I’d flagged behavior that felt misaligned, I stayed. I’d suppressed so much emotion in my broken marriage that finally being desired clogged the drain of discernment. I was driving in a puddle of tears when I called my friend, and she said to me:
“You get to now choose the man your little boy will call dad. If he treats you like this, what will that engrain into your little boy?”
It was evident to me on that phone call that I’d selfishly been so preoccupied with “feeling something” that I hadn’t considered the very reason I’d left my shamed marriage. If I didn’t stop entertaining the wrong man, the wrong man would be raising my son too. And the sobering realization of that catapulted me into relearning how to trust my intuition.
Now that we have your why, let’s lean into the how.
The first step to relearning how to trust your intuition is trusting your intuition.
Ha, yeah—I saw that dazed look on your face. I had the same one when one of my longtime mentors recommended I try that too. I thought, “CAROLINE, IF I KNEW HOW TO TRUST IT, I’D ALREADY BE TRUSTING IT—HELLO!!!” It truly made no sense to me at first, but now I laugh because it actually makes so much sense. You see, somewhere, someplace, you abandoned your intuition.
This could look like:
• Making up excuses for someone when deep down you knew it wasn’t right
• Staying past the expiration date of a relationship
• Being gaslit by someone into undermining your concerns
• Not holding true to what you value in a relationship and disowning that for someone
And here’s the really hard truth:
Your inner you learned by experience that it couldn’t trust you.
This is how it happened, and the beautiful part is that Jesus is our restorer. And I’m going to give you three essential tools in relearning how to trust your intuition again—all learned through my too-lived experience as a single mom in the wild.
1. Set both your non-negotiables and what you value in dating
Your non-negotiables are the things that, no matter how attractive, fun, or great they seem, you will walk away if they intersect with them. If you go on a few dates with someone and maintain incredible chemistry only to find out, by the third date, they are stringing you and others along—you walk away. You don’t linger, you don’t beg, you don’t “stay to see if they’ll realize how incredible you are.” You leave.
See it as a series of lines you’ve drawn around your dating court, and when someone steps over that line, that is your answer. I’ll forewarn you: this will take practice. You will need to date, and you will need to walk away. And disclaimer, yes humans make mistakes. And at some point we all will in choose in covenant someone to weather hard things and fallibility with. But this, is not that.
The second part is your values. I think innately we all grasp what we value in human connection. But I think to really, truly see that play out in a person we’re dating takes time. It takes observing—not from a posture of suspicion, but guarding your heart above all else. If you value travel and exploration but find yourself fond of a person who wouldn’t care if they ever left their backyard, that is noteworthy. Do not lay down what ignites or moves your soul just for the sake of connection.
2. Learn to listen to your body
This is easily my favorite part, and I’m eager to teach you this.
Picture this:
You are sharing your first phone call with a cute guy you matched with on Ark. The conversation is alright until—oh no—yep, you were rubbed the wrong way. You’re suddenly not enjoying the conversation, but shoot, you’re *on* the phone. Your internal dialogue says, “Stay. You owe them this. Maybe it’ll get better!”
Let’s unpack this. That tiny twinge inside your stomach, that nagging anxiety, that feeling that something is just off that you can’t seem to shake *is* your body. And I want you to get off the phone. Leave the date. That could look like breaking up, You do not owe first off a stranger anything, and you aren’t in covenant with your boyfriend. Dating is an observational period. You observed, and you’re done observing. You are allowed to change your mind in dating.
And let me tell you this:
“Often the early moments that show misalignment that you overlook will be the very things that rupture the dynamic.”
Your homework is to date and walk away at the first sign of unease. I can already hear the internal doubt of:
• “What if I make a mistake?”
• “What if I walk away from something good?”
• “What if something like this never comes around again?”
You will not miss out on the good things of God. His goodness does pertain to you.
And I can literally shake on this:
If you truly walked away from something meant for you, then God will bring it back around. But be more willing to remain aligned with your own inner compass, guided by the Holy Spirit, than in a relationship.
3. Start intentionally building a beautiful life
One of the greatest things you can offer your future partner is a doubly beautiful life to be added to. I want you to take that Pilates class. Take a ceramics class. Make core memories with your kid. Take a chance on something you’re wildly passionate about. Eat new food. Host a bagels-and-Bible-study at a funky café. Read lots of books. And I say this because when we’re living a life we ourselves adore, it’s much harder to abandon it for cheap comfort. The more you want to actually wake up and experience your life, the easier it will be for you to walk away from someone who won’t add to it. And I say that from my own lived experience.
All of this to say:
To relearn how to trust your inner compass will take trial and error. It may take you ending a connection before it really had time to grow. God may have you say no 100 times before you get to say yes. You may be fully invested in love, only to uncover that they crossed the lines you drew to protect you. And you’re going to ponder forgiveness in the name of staying. But typically, patterns repeat themselves. Sometimes mercy looks like praying for them to be restored to the Lord while also walking away. And I know that’s utterly heartbreaking, but it’s true. And the more you stay hand in hand with yourself, the easier it will be to say no or to walk.
I know firsthand the grief of doing motherhood alone. I’m living the fatigue of being stretched thin in a space God designed for both man and woman. And single mom to single mom, I am so proud of you. This is hard stuff. But I guarantee you these methods can protect not only your heart but your kiddo’s too. You won’t always get it right—I sure don’t. But if you’d have told me six years ago I’d be writing an article for Ark’s dating app as a dating coach on intuition, I’d have laughed out loud. I’m with you, and I’m for you. This is not unsolvable, and you are not broken. Our Father is a redeemer and a giver of good things.
Keep going, mama.
Big love,
Mi
Written by: Miah Huber | Relational Clarity Sessions Available HERE
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