What are Psychic Abilities?
What first springs to mind when you think of psychic abilities? Most people name such things as predicting the future, talking to the dead, maybe healing or even levitating, or just about anything ‘paranormal’, really. The list of such abilities is quite long. Ian Parkin – clairvoyant coach and owner of http://www.psychic-junkie.com – lists nearly 190 of them (OK, maybe I lost count). Among them are some better known, such as clairvoyance, astrology, telepathy and channeling, and some really ‘weird’-sounding, like ichthyomancy (prophetic observation of head and entrails of fish) or belomancy (a form of divination using arrows). How to make sense of these and, even more importantly, where to start? It would perhaps help to broadly classify psychic abilities into two general categories:
Perceiving information
A large number of psychic abilities fall under the category of perceiving information via the channels that surpass the usual five senses. This information could be about something that has happened in the past, is happening currently or will happen sometime in the future; it could be about yourself or other people, objects or events. For example, seeing auras, viewing objects or events that are miles away (remote viewing), reading information about someone from a photograph or using Tarot cards to predict what would happen tomorrow or the best option to pursue – are all about perceiving information. This category of abilities is commonly referred to as Extra-Sensory Perception (ESP).
Influencing the reality
Another category of psychic abilities is about influencing the reality. We could be influencing ourselves, other people or various objects in the material world or outcomes of situations and events. A variety of magical rituals exist that aim to change the circumstances of our lives, e.g. clear negative energies, attract wealth, luck or perfect relationships. We could direct our efforts to learn to heal ourselves or others, hypnotise people or move physical objects using the power of our mind. It’s all about manipulating energy – our own or external – to produce change.
Some psychic abilities are a mixture of both, e.g. healing usually involves ability to understand what is wrong, diagnose (i.e. perceiving information) and then treating the problem area, or the actual healing (influencing); telepathy could be reading people’s thoughts (perceiving), but also transferring our own thoughts or emotions to others (influencing). Regardless of which particular psychic skill you are interested in, you’re likely to be engaged in either or both – perceiving information and influencing reality. Perceiving is passive, receptive, open. It’s about understanding how things are and why, the cause and effect, the available options, the possible outcomes. Influencing is active, involved and powerful, it requires directing the energy to produce the desired change – within ourselves and in the world around us.
There are probably as many psychic methods of perceiving and influencing as there are practitioners. You can choose your own, depending on your goals and personal preferences. Some skills and practices, however, are so important and powerful that they are must-haves for any person on a path of spiritual or psychic development. For example, you are very likely to be doing some form of meditation, mindfulness, visualisation, and physical and emotional healing (even if only for yourself). Again, the choice of any particular method for these would depend on your goals and personality type.
Psychic abilities in a sense are not different from what we do in our everyday life, you could view them as an extension of everything you do already. We all perceive information – we see, we hear, we touch, smell and taste, we talk to people and ask them questions, we read books and watch TV. And we all influence reality one way or another – by loving, laughing, working, creating and simply breathing. Psychic abilities are not separate from everything else, they simply provide another channel of perceiving and influencing – a powerful, exciting, and deeply meaning way of relating to the Universe.