Enhancing intuition: focusing on indirect ways

In this paper we look into the modes for enhancing intuition suggested in the literature. Our starting point is that although the various intuition-enhancing techniques often work, it is rarely clear why. This also makes more systematic development of further techniques more difficult. First we provide a quick overview of the features of intuition followed by reviewing the intuition-enhancement techniques from the literature. We attempt grouping these techniques into coherent categories by speculating (in the style of Gestalt psychology drawing on well-known phenomena, empirical studies as well as lessons from the history of art and science) about why they work and relating them to the features of intuition to help deeper understanding and also to make identifying areas where further techniques would be needed. We do not currently aim for a final model that classifies all the intuition-enhancement techniques, we only want to make the first step on this road. For our exploration we conceptualise intuition only at the level of knowledge, disregarding the bodily, emotional and spiritual levels. We do acknowledge, however, that intuitive knowledge is also often accompanied by somatic effects and affective charge as these may be useful from the viewpoint of the intuition-enhancement techniques.