After seven years of planning a luxury wellness retreat in Costa Rica, I finally had to let the dream go. What felt like failure led me to a difficult truth: it was never truly my dream. Sometimes the bravest thing we can do is stop forcing the path ahead and become quiet enough to hear where our heart is asking us to go.

Trusting your gut is advice often heard but rarely unpacked. The concept seems straightforward—your intuition, or “gut feeling,” is a...