Can’t Tell If It’s Intuition or Anxiety? There’s a 5-Second Rule for That

You ask for a sign. You think you get a sign. Then immediately your brain goes, “Okay but…was that real, or am I just projecting?” Cue the spiral. The Googling. The screenshots you overanalyze like they’re evidence in a trial. Suddenly your inner voice feels less like calm guidance and more like an anxious group chat that refuses to mute itself.

On Dear Gabby, host Gabrielle Bernstein digs into this exact mental tug-of-war: we say we want intuition, but the second it shows up, we interrogate it. Whether you’re into spirit guides or just trying to make a decision without second-guessing yourself into oblivion, this convo offers a surprisingly practical framework for cutting through the chaos.

Can’t Tell If It’s Intuition or Anxiety? There’s a 5-Second Rule for That

How to know if it’s guidance or just your brain

We have roughly 60 thousand thoughts a day. And according to Bernstein, most of them aren’t revelations—they’re mental reruns in different outfits.

“A lot of those thoughts are negative loops that are constantly replaying and repurposing,” she explains. What real intuition feels like is something else entirely. “It’s those moments when new thoughts start to puncture in. Thoughts that are not the typical loop, not the typical routine. Thoughts that feel inspired. Thoughts that feel intuitive. Thoughts that feel directional.”

Another tell? Anxiety loves the future. It spins out into endless what ifs, worst-case scenarios, and imaginary timelines where everything goes wrong. Intuition, on the other hand, lives in the present. It doesn’t spiral—it just lands. Sometimes, Bernstein notes, it’s a thought you don’t even fully understand, “but it feels good inside.”

So here’s the shortcut. If the voice in your head is catastrophizing and acting like you need to decide immediately or everything will fall apart, that’s likely anxiety. If the thought just shows up, feels grounded, and doesn’t demand a PowerPoint presentation to justify itself, that’s the one to listen to.

Why your signs aren’t showing up

This part might be the most annoying—and also the most freeing. “Sometimes not getting a sign is the sign,” Bernstein says. “If that sign that you’re asking for isn’t coming to you, it’s probably because you’re not ready to receive it. Or maybe the guidance that you’re ready to receive has to come through a different frequency than the one that you think you’re looking for.”

You could be so locked in on one specific outcome that you’re missing what’s actually trying to get your attention. Same message. Different door.

And then sometimes the block isn’t the universe. It’s the over-efforting. “If you’re asking specifically for your guides to show you a sign but you’re not receiving it, that probably means you’re looking too hard,” Bernstein explains. “Stop looking, just do nothing.”

This might sound counterintuitive, but research supports it. When we’re in a state of hypervigilance—scanning for signs, analyzing every coincidence, desperate for clarity—we actually impair our ability to access intuition. The seeking itself becomes the block. 

“It’s when we’re in that looking and searching that we’re playing games with the universe and playing games with our guides,” Bernstein says. “Whereas if we’re just allowing, that’s when the signs can come through naturally.” If you’ve been white-knuckling your way toward an answer, the move might be to let go entirely and see what surfaces on its own.

The 5-second rule

For those moments when you actually need to make a decision and can’t afford to wait around for a sign to materialize, Bernstein offers a practical tool she learned from psychic medium Mary Ann DiMarco: the five-second rule.

“Ask your guides a question: should I do this or should I not do this?” Bernstein explains. “And what is the first thing that comes out of your mind? Five seconds. Don’t think, just answer. And that’s an intuitive decision that you’ve made.”

The logic here is that intuition moves fast. It doesn’t need to build a case. If you give your brain time to deliberate, anxiety will inevitably hijack the process. But that first flash—before the overthinking kicks in—often carries real information.

The catch? This only works if your nervous system is somewhat regulated. If you’re already in a state of panic, your first thought is going to be whatever your anxiety is loudest about. Bernstein emphasizes that connecting to intuition requires getting into a calm, grounded state first.

“In our worldly experience, we’re in this pretty frantic, hypervigilant vibration,” she says. “We’re constantly assaulted with messages from our phones or social media alerts.” To actually hear your inner guidance, you have to slow down enough to match its frequency.

This doesn’t require a specific meditation practice or spiritual framework. Bernstein’s advice is simply to do whatever makes you feel most relaxed—whether that’s breathwork, a walk, journaling, or just sitting in silence for a few minutes. The point is to downregulate your nervous system so the quieter voice has room to come through.

For more insights, tune into Dear Gabby, streaming now wherever you listen to podcasts.

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