How to Strengthen Your Intuition As an Expat (and Finally Hear Your Own Voice)

A few months ago I was on my bike when a clear voice said: pause your 1:1 coaching, stop taking new clients. On paper it made no sense - it’s a big part of my income. I trusted it anyway, and it turned out to be one of my best decisions. My energy came back, and I had my second-biggest revenue month ever.

That's intuition. If you feel like you've lost yours, like you make every choice from your head and can't hear your own voice anymore, you haven't lost it. As a life coach for expats, I promise it's still there, buried under noise. Because living abroad simply does generate a lot of noise. Here are five ways to strengthen your intuition.

Why you can't hear your intuition anymore

Everyone has intuition. For most of us it's just buried under noise, our own mental chatter and everyone else's voices. If you're always analyzing and deciding from your head, your own signal gets drowned out. The good news is you can turn the volume back up. These five habits are how.

1. Assume you already have intuition

If you keep telling yourself “I'm not an intuitive person,” you'll keep proving it right. Flip it. Say it out loud, daily: I have an intuition that's guiding me, and I'm ready to hear it. It sounds small, but it changes what you start to notice.

I have an intuition that's guiding me, and I'm ready to hear it.

2. Quiet the noise

One of my clients couldn't hear her own voice. When I asked about her day, every gap was filled: a podcast the second she woke up, something in her ears on her lunch walk, more while cooking. If every waking moment is full of other people's voices, when does your own get a word in? Stop filling every space. Skip a podcast (even This Expat Life ;)), sit in some quiet, let a walk stay silent. Your voice needs room to be heard.

3. Let your body answer, not just your head

A line from my 9-month coaching training stuck with me: your body already knows what the mind isn't yet willing to hear. Most of us live as walking heads, analyzing everything, while the body carries its own wisdom without the attachment to the outcome. So test a choice physically. Say option A out loud and notice what happens, a tight throat, a knot, a headache. Then option B, an exhale, ease, room. When I was choosing between Lisbon and Mexico City, Lisbon made sense on paper. But my body said a quiet no, and I went with the no.

Your body already knows what the mind isn't yet willing to hear.

4. Practice on the small stuff first

Don't save your intuition for the life-altering choices. Build it where the stakes are low. At the supermarket, ask what you actually want to eat, not what the list says. On a free day, ask what you want to do, not what's productive. Take the route your gut points to. Then check: was it right? Journal it, and over time you gather data on what your intuition feels like when it's spot on.

5. Make room for space and play

Intuition rarely shows up in a packed, rigid schedule. When every hour is booked and every day is doing, there's no room for a quiet signal to reach you. Loosen the schedule. Leave space for the spontaneous. Let yourself play and experiment. That open space is exactly where your intuition speaks up.

FAQ: strengthening your intuition

How do I strengthen my intuition for big life decisions?

Practice it first on low-stakes choices and body-check your options, so that by the time a big decision arrives you already trust the signal. Quieting the noise and leaving space in your days makes it far easier to hear.

Can a life coach for expats help me trust my intuition?

Yes. Hearing your own voice and finding the courage to act on it is the core of the work I do. That's exactly what we build inside my 1:1 coaching and The Co-Pilot.

Learn to trust your own voice

These five tips come from episode 118 of This Expat Life, on strengthening your intuition. Listen on Spotify, then let's work together. Inside The Co-Pilot, my group program for high-functioning expats, we help you hear your own voice and find the courage to act on it. Prefer 1:1? My private coaching is here for that.

After you listen, DM me at @amandamaxime and tell me which tip you're starting with.

Your intuition never left. It's been waiting for you to get quiet enough to hear it.