The hair on the back of my neck rose as I heard footsteps approaching the wardrobe.

I held my breath and clutched on to the sleeves of a coat hanging in front of me as this shadowy figure paused right outside the wardrobe.  

I silently prayed for divine intervention while clutching onto the sleeves of the coat. I vowed to be a better person if I survive this. I pleaded with higher forces to let me off the hook this time.

For a few seconds, there was silence.

I could only hear the sound of my heart pounding. It pounded so loud, I feared that I’m not the only one who could hear it.

Through a slight opening of the wardrobe door, I saw the shadowy figure move again.

This time, it appeared to be turning back. 

I heard footsteps one more time.

But now, the footsteps were turning away from the wardrobe as it walked back towards the door of the room to leave.    

I breathed a sigh of relief.

And then, without any warning, the phone alarm in my pocket went off…

Where am I? How did I end up here? My heart kept pounding and I drifted in and out of consciousness while I tried to work out where I am.

It took a minute or two to anchor into my surroundings when I opened my eyes with the sound of an alarm clock blaring from my phone on the bedside table.  

I was relieved to wake up!

I took a long sigh of relief when I realized it was a nightmare all along. 

From my bed, I could see the wardrobe in which I was hiding with its door slightly open. One of the sleeves of the coat I was holding onto stuck out. 

Looking at the wardrobe, it hit me how thin the veil between my dream and awakened state is.  

After taking a few minutes to recollect and piece together the different fragments of the nightmare, I remembered frantically running away and hiding from a sinister force who just kept reappearing in different parts of my dream.

I intuitively knew who this “sinister” force was that I was trying to get away from.

It was something I kept buried deep in my consciousness and avoided looking at for many years.

It was a part of my past that I was ashamed of.

But, it came back to remind me that it’s still around and is not going anywhere until it’s acknowledged.

Astrologically, there is so much happening in the cosmos at the moment during this intense eclipse season shifting and shaping our inner and outer worlds drastically.

With a cluster of retrograde planets right now, we are forced to look inward (including into our past) as our outer world dismantles and transforms in ways we cannot ignore.

With Neptune also retrograde, our inner world of dreams and intuition is particularly highlighted. If we pay attention, we may even notice that some of our dreams and intuitive hunches are giving us a peek into our unresolved issues from the past.

Neptune is known for dissolving boundaries – including boundaries between dreams and reality as well as boundaries between our past, present and future.

My favorite quality of Neptune is the intuitive gifts it brings.

But Neptunian intuition can be subtle and difficult to grasp. Tuning into it requires knowing what our strongest intuitive power is in the first place.

Is it clairvoyance (seeing), clairaudience (hearing), clairsentience (feeling) or claircognizance (knowing)?

One or two of the above are our dominant intuitive gifts that we naturally possess.

But to be able to tap into our intuition, we need to be fully aware.  

Our intuition is heightened when we listen, observe and pay close attention – kind of like a detective who looks for clues in mundane things that others overlook.  Often these clues are hidden in plain sight.

The biggest challenge is that our intuition gets overshadowed by our ego-based mind, which is constantly vying for our attention especially when we don’t know how to quiet our mind.   

Even with a calm mind, another challenge is to know the difference between our intuition and our ego.

Here is a quick guide to help you differentiate the voice of ego from intuition:

EGO:

• Forceful & loud
• Repeats or insists
• Attention-seeking
• Attached to outcome
• Preoccupied with time
• Fear-based with a sense of urgency
• Judgmental
• Dramatic & sensational

INTUITION:

• Gentle suggestions
• Subtle
• Patient
• Peaceful
• Not attached to outcome
• Not preoccupied with time
• Non-judgmental
• Calm (even when in danger)

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