Imagine wearing a name tag, 24 hours a day, every day for nearly two decades. Even to bed.
That's what Brooklyn based entrepreneur Scott Ginsberg has been doing after an attempt to make friends in a big city, evolved into a world record breaking social experiment.
You have to admire his dedication.
Scott likens himself to the kid from the much parodied Bruce Willis film, The Sixth Sense. Only it's not dead people that he sees, it's living, breathing, friendly people.
In episode two of my podcast series, Scott revealed why he has no plans to stop wearing his nametag. He even has it tattooed on his chest.
Unsurprisingly, this makes Scott the centre of attention everywhere he goes. What you can learn from Scott is that trusting your instinct is important, but first you need to learn how.
Listen to Scott talk about how he learned to trust his instinct now
It might not be immediately obvious why I chose to interview Scott when exploring the theme of instinct and intuition for the series. However, as Scott explains, soon after he started the experiment, he realised that wearing a nametag was beginning to affect him on both a psychological and physiological level.
With 16 years experience of wearing the name tag, Scott is now able to anticipate how people will react to him, in a split second. It's similar to the Rorschach inkblot tests that psychologists use. It's less about the name tag, but the reaction to the badge that allows him to understand why strangers behave the way they do around him. However, the most important lesson Scott has taken away from the experiment, is how he can use his intuition to decide how to he responds to them.
We live in a world where science and reason rule heavy over the heart. It might surprise you to know that only 20% of the brain's grey matter is actually dedicated to conscious thought. The other 80% is taken up by non-conscious thoughts. It's that 80% we have to tame, so we can begin to trust ourselves.
If we constantly question our decision making process, instead of trusting ourselves, then we give up some power. The only way to combat that is to have faith in those intangible feelings such as instinct and intuition. Go with your gut and learn from each experience. There is no right or wrong decision. Learn to train your intuition like a muscle and it will make you stronger.
Chatting to Scott made me realise that if you quieten down your inner critic and focus on your inner voice, you'll question your instinct less. That's important because every time you question your instinct, you are choosing not to trust yourself.
You can listen to the whole series on audioBoom or subscribe with iTunes, Spotify and Google Play now.