Women's development through personal knowing

Striking intuitive experiences may influence women to become active in working for social and political change and to pursue nontraditional career goals. These moments of insight, referred to a experiences of personal knowing, are the subject of this qualitative study of 100 excerpts from women's memoirs, journals and autobiographies. Personal knowing in these narratives includes an important personal insight, strong affect, an altered state of consciousness, suddenness and physical sensations. The first person narratives studied demonstrate that women spontaneously write about personal knowing to explain their motivations, life choices and self-development.Personal knowing experiences, which are often considered trivial or exceptional, are discussed as significant developmental events which combine cognition and affect and may occur throughout the life cycle.