How Do I Know What Spirit Is Asking of Me?

A NeuroSpiritual Reflection on Discernment, Stillness, and the Language of the Nervous System

There comes a time on every spiritual path when the once-clear waters of intuition turn cloudy. Prayer feels unanswered. Signs seem mixed. The inner compass spins without rest.

We whisper into the silence, “How do I know what God — or Spirit, or the Universe — is asking of me?”

But what if the silence is not absence?
What if it is invitation?

The Body’s Role in Discernment

From a NeuroSpiritual perspective, discernment is not only a spiritual act — it is a physiological one. When our nervous system is dysregulated, trapped in anxiety, grief, or survival mode, the body cannot hear subtlety.

The sympathetic nervous system prepares us for action, not contemplation. In that state, the quiet nudge of the soul is easily drowned out by the noise of self-protection.

The mystics have always known this.
The desert fathers spoke of stilling the mind.
The Quakers call it waiting in the Light.
Neuroscience simply gives us a new language for the same truth: when the body shifts from vigilance to safety, from tension to trust, we begin to hear again.

The Felt Sense of Spirit

The voice of Spirit is not a command shouted from the clouds.
It is a felt sense — a resonance.

Often it arrives as a gentle spaciousness in the chest, or a loosening around a truth we’ve resisted. Sometimes it’s a peace that makes no logical sense.

If we listen only with thought, we will miss it.
If we listen with the whole nervous system — breath, heart, gut, silence — we begin to discern not with effort but with attunement.

Discernment, then, is not about figuring out what to do.
It’s about becoming the kind of presence that can hear.

Where Stillness and Science Meet

The meeting point between neuroscience and mysticism is found here — in the slow re-regulation of the body until it can perceive the subtle movements of Spirit.

When we rest, when we allow our systems to soften, our awareness widens.
Spirit is felt not as information, but as safety.
As belonging.
As love.

When your breath lengthens, when peace returns to the space behind your ribs — that is where guidance begins to move.

The nervous system recognizes the sacred as safety.
And the soul learns to trust that the next right step will always reveal itself — not in panic, but in peace.

A Quiet Practice for Discernment

When you feel lost or uncertain, try this simple practice:

• Sit somewhere quiet, or walk slowly in nature.

• Place a hand over your heart, and breathe until your body begins to settle.

• Imagine yourself surrounded by Light — or whatever word you use for Presence.

• Ask your question gently.

• Then listen, not for words, but for a change in your felt sense — a softening, a lift, a breath of relief.

This is how Spirit speaks: through the nervous system, through the quiet body, through what feels safe, alive, and true.

Reflection for You

When have you mistaken the silence of Spirit for absence — and later realized it was presence waiting for you to slow down enough to listen?