I have found that following the pulse involves following the physical promptings that I receive from life in the moment. This is very different from having an innate sense of things and following that as my guidance. The latter is what is often known as the conscience which is both fixed and socially determined. In a sense it is the exact opposite of the pulse.

Consider the predicament that Mark Twain's wonderful character Huckleberry Finn finds himself in. He befriends the runaway slave Jim even though that act keeps on gnawing at his conscience. Huckleberry Finn finds that his conscience tells him that it is wrong to aid and befriend a runaway slave, that he should turn Jim in at once.

The conscience is not an enlightened part of ourselves as is commonly supposed. Instead it is socially created, reflects society's values and is fixed. Thus, in a slave-owning society the conscience tells every free person that it is wrong for a slave to be free. That the slave must be turned in and face punishment for seeking freedom. Conscience can not reason, can not hold shades of grey and is instead, literally in this case, black and white.

Luckily for all of us who love to read, Huckleberry Finn disregards his conscience. As the narrator of the story, Finn actually tells us, the readers, that he is going to disregard his conscience even though he 'knows', i.e. is brainwashed into believing, that to help Jim is 'wrong'.

What Huckleberry Finn does instead is follow his pulse, which tells him moment by moment to be good to Jim the runaway slave, treat him as an equal in all respects and in so doing gains a friend and ultimately lights the path to freedom.

May the pulse be with you!

Abhay