Mediumship

Psychic powers and mediumship are very similar in that both involve the acquisition of knowledge by non-physical means, ie other than passing through the physical senses. The difference lies in the source of that knowledge. The distinction is a nebulous one with both psychics and mediums switching between faculties, often without realising.
In mediumship knowledge is received from distinct Spiritual entitles, often (but not necessarily) those that have previously lived on earth.

In psychism knowledge is received from other incarnate Spirits (as in telepathy, or mind reading) or by the seer using their own Spiritual part to reach out and obtain otherwise hidden knowledge of the physical realm.
The distinction doesn’t usually matter, as the information obtained is likely to be equally accurate. It should be noted that as the purpose Spiritualism is to offer evidence of survival (of the consciousness over physical death), mediums should aspire to employ only mediumship when operating in Spiritualist contexts.
Spirit encompasses all that is, including the physical realms, which are a particular product of Spirit.
When Spirit incarnates into physical form it is inevitably distant or distinct from its pure Spirit source. We are like islands sticking out of the sea, unique individuals on the surface, but all interconnected on the ocean bottom. Perhaps this is so it may better fulfil the purpose of it incarnation. A living entity that knew with certainty of its Spiritual nature might desire an instant return home without facing the growth producing challenges of physicality.
Human beings are Spirit temporarily clothed in flesh. We are not bodies, with - maybe - a Spiritual bit attached. Our essence is Spiritual, and the capacities of mediumship and psychism are natural.
However, being alive is hard work. Coping with the material world takes most of our efforts and attention. Additionally, societal pressure discourages the use of our natural, psychic talents. After all, science and technology have put men on the moon without need for such “mumbo jumbo”. So for most of us our psychic faculties are kept firmly under wraps.
Like all abilities some of us are born with a stronger psychic or mediumistic potential than others. As with other abilities, practice helps us realise our own particular potential.

People often seek consult psychics and mediums, or attempt to use their own psychic faculties, to discover what the future holds for them. This is necessarily an inexact science because the future does not exist until we, and other living entities, create it. What can be picked up psychically is greater knowledge of present potentialities than may be available through physical means. Additionally our psychic faculty may offer greater processing power o extrapolate those potentialities forwards. But if we do not like what we see, we may have the power to change it through exercise of our free will.
Note that I say, “may”, because although we have free choice we are also born to experience certain things and to learn certain lessons - choices we ourselves made before birth. How we are presented with those experiences and lessons is not pre-determined, but that we shall meet them in some shape or form is pretty well inevitable.

Mental Mediumship

Mental mediumship is by far the most common form of contemporary mediumship. Mental mediums see, hear or sense Spirit and relay their impressions to sitters.
Mental mediums may operate in a fully conscious state in which they are in control of both their words and actions, or in various degrees of trance, where a Spirit entity speaks through the Medium. In most cases the trance state is light enough for the medium to remain conscious of what is being said through his/her vocal cords.
Spirit communicates by projecting impressions onto the medium’s consciousness. Mediums receive these impressions through clairvoyance (clear seeing), clairaudience (clear hearing), and clairsentience (clear sensing).
Aside from the deepest trance states Spirit is limited by the medium’s knowledge and vocabulary, eg the medium will not be able to speak in a language not consciously known to him/her. Dog breeds, flowers, and other symbols will only be able to be named where the medium knows the name in his/her normal state.
In modern Spiritualist church sittings it is common for the medium’s address to be delivered in a trance state, but group demonstrations of clairvoyance are almost invariably given under full consciousness.

Automatic writing may be considered a form of mental mediumship. This varies from the subject consciously writing his/her Spiritual impressions through to trance state in which Spirit takes control of the subject’s hand, with or without his/her knowledge of the process.
Psychometry involves the reading of an object’s history by handling it. It appears the object acts as a link between the medium and Spirit. An alternative view is that the object somehow records impressions from its owner and events in its history.
Psychic artists are able to sketch or paint people in the Spirit world who are then recognised by sitters. Psychic artists usually accompany their drawings with some information about the person.

Physical Mediumship

Physical mediumship demonstrates the reality of Spirit through the production of various physical phenomena. Physical mediumship is currently much less common than it was in the nineteenth and early twentieth century.
Forms of physical phenomena may include:

• Transfiguration - in which the medium takes on the physical appearance of the communicating Spirit;
  
• Audible phenomena - knocks, raps, possibly in the form of a code responding to the medium’s, or sitters’, questions;
  
• Psychokinetic effects - the movement of objects, levitation;
• Direct voice - in which the voice of the communicating Spirit is produced and does not emanate from the medium’s voice box;
  
• Ectoplasm - the production of a white “substance” from the medium’s body;
  
• Apports - materialised objects, usually earthly objects appearing in the séance room from elsewhere on earth;
  
• Materialization - the communicating Spirit appears in physical form allowing physical contact with sitters.

Spiritual Healing

Healing is considered an important part of modern Spiritualism and is viewed as an alternative path of expression to mediumship, though many mediums are also healers and vice versa. Spiritualist churches generally offer healing sessions in which healers deliver healing through the laying on of hands. Spiritualist church services usually feature an absent healing component in which names are read from the healing list and prayers said for those in need of healing. Most Spirit healers say they simply act as a channel through which the healing energy flows from Spirit to the recipient.

Harry Edwards, the great healer and founder of the Harry Edwards Spiritual Healing Sanctuary likens consciousness to a “mirror of the mind” [Edwards, H; A Guide for the Development of Mediumship; Con-Psy Publications, 2003]. According to Edwards, the impressions received by the senses are projected onto the mirror, where they are interpreted and understood. However, we also have a “Spirit mind” which is able to receive Spiritual (and presumably psychic impressions).

Edwards writes, “the mirror of the mind is able to receive these Spirit experiences when the mirror is unoccupied by physical ones”. Thus to become aware of Spiritual or psychic impressions we must try to rid our mind of sensory input and to quieten the eternal flow of thought. Edwards describes this state as one of “abandonment”.
Edwards’ view is supported by research in parapsychology (the scientific study of psychic functioning) which found significant success in “Ganzfeld” experiments which involving mild sensory deprivation such as white noise played through headphones and ping-pong ball halves covering the eyes.
Daryl J. Bem of Cornell University reports in Ganzfeld Phenomena [http://comp9.psych.cornell.edu/dbem/ganzfeld.html last accessed Aug 2005]:

" In 1985 and 1986, the Journal of Parapsychology devoted two entire issues to a critical examination of the ganzfeld studies, featuring a debate between Ray Hyman, a cognitive psychologist and a knowledgeable, skeptical critic of parapsychological research, and the late Charles Honorton, a prominent parapsychologist and major ganzfeld researcher. At that time, there had been 42 reported ganzfeld studies conducted by investigators in 10 laboratories.
" Across these studies, receivers achieved an average hit rate of about 35 percent. This might seem like a small margin of success over the 25 percent hit rate expected by chance, but a person with this margin of advantage in a gambling casino would get rich very quickly. Statistically this result is highly significant: The odds against getting a 35 percent hit rate across that many studies by chance are greater than a billion to one. Additional analyses demonstrated that this overall result could not have resulted simply from the selective reporting of positive results and nonreporting of negative results."

Psychic Development Circles

Beginners are frequently advised to join a development group or circle. While lone development is possible faster results are likely to be obtained with the benefit of guidance from the more experienced. Circle membership may also help safeguard the novice from the influence of “negative” entities. One often hears of circles through attending a local Spiritualist church (eg by speaking to the medium after the service) or perhaps through ads in local papers or the psychic press.
The rule with circles is to be guided by your “inner voice” or “gut feeling”. If a circle is right for you it will instinctively feel right. Equally, avoid any circle with which you feel uncomfortable, even if you cannot verbally express the reason for your discomfort.

 

Ouija

Ouija is a technique related to automatic writing that allows messages to b delivered through more than one sitter. Ouija is a board with letters of the alphabet painted around the outside, and areas corresponding to “yes” and “no”. Sitters place their fingers lightly on a movable pointer that then travels around the board pointing to different letters. The simplest form of Ouija consists of cards or scraps of paper with the letters on with an upturned glass as a pointer. A variation is the planchette, a triangular pointer with a pencil at one corner that draws or writes as it moves.
Beginners would be well advised to avoid the Ouija and planchette as they can provide a means for negative entities to manifest themselves and there have been cases of sitters developing mental problems as a result of their experiences with these tools.

Discernment

One of the hardest things for those beginning on the path of development is to be able to distinguish between impressions coming from Spiritual or psychic sources and those from their own subconscious. In time it should be found the Spiritual and psychic impressions have a different, more vivid, quality.
In all things there is a need to be discerning. Never accept any message, whether from your own work or from a medium or psychic, that does not feel instinctively right. Spiritual communication must be received through imperfect human mental equipment and can be distorted. If it feels wrong, it probably is.

Abandonment

Sit in a comfortable - but not too comfortable - position. Take the phone off the hook and play some gentle New Age or classical music. Try to empty your mind without falling asleep. This will be difficult at first. Aim for just 5 or 10 minutes initially. If thoughts come in, as they inevitably will, gently dismiss them and let them go.

Visualization

Close your eyes and try to see the room around you. See the object s, the details. Keep it going for a few minutes. Then open your eyes and compare your visualization with reality. Try visualizing somewhere familiar, the town centre, your workplace, a friend’s house. Visualize something from your past, eg your grandmother’s house, somewhere you once stayed on holiday. Visualize something imaginary, eg the house you’d buy if you won the lottery. Practice often.
Try some guided meditations. Invent a scenario, a walk along the beach or through a forest. If it helps, tape-record a commentary. Imagine yourself experiencing the scenario. See the sights, hear the sounds, experience the feel, the smells.
Visualize a psychic screen in your mind, like a cinema or TV screen. Practice seeing it blank. Then allow images to spontaneously appear on it. Never mind where the images come from at first.

 

Psychic Activities

Shuffle a pack of cards. Without looking try to sort the cards into piles, one for red, one for black. Roll a dice. Guess if it will turn up an odd or even number. Then try willing the dice to produce an odd (or even) result. Can you beat chance? Scores considerably below chance may also be psychically significant.
Imagine the morning mail. How many letters will you, and other members of the family, get? What are the sizes and shapes of the envelopes? Who are the letters from? What do they say?

 

Prayer

Pray to God, the Great Spirit, or the particular deity you consider to be the supreme power of the universe. Thank the power for all it has provided for you. Ask for protection for yourself, your loved ones, the world. Then ask to be granted Spiritual and psychic powers. Tell your deity why you want these powers, and that you will use them only for good.

Dreams

In the dream state the physical concerns of daily life are removed, or at least lessened. Thus in dreams it is easier for psychic or Spiritual impressions to come through. Not all dreams are of a psychic or Spiritual nature. You may notice that some dreams are extra memorable, clearer, brighter or just special in some way. These are candidates for psychic/Spiritual dreams. Get into the habit of recording your dreams as soon as you wake. Keep a dream diary. Look back at your dream diary a few days later. Note any recurring or prophetic dreams.

 

 

Psychometry

Psychometry is the process of reading an object’s history from handling it. Psychometry is a common technique in Spiritual development circles. Try to clear your mind and accept whatever impressions arise when handling the object. Psychometry is more valuable when the actual history of the object can be verified, but once the faculty becomes awakened it can be interesting to visit antique and used goods stores and simply allowing the impressions to flow.

Discipline

Psychic and Spiritual development requires both discipline and patience. Patience because development does not always occur smoothly. It may be some time before any results are seen at all. There may be massive leaps forward, only to be followed by the disappearance of the emerging talents. Discipline is required to stick with the training through good and bad. The physical mind is lazy and may sometimes prefer to simply watch TV that attend a circle or undertake a meditation or visualization. Discipline is also required to keep Spiritual and psychic work in its place. For example, if Spirit tries to come in at inopportune moments it will be necessary to tell them politely but firmly, “not now”.

The most important thing to know is that you are already psychic. We are all psychic. Because we are all essentially Spirit temporarily clothed in flesh. In order to survive and thrive in the material world (all ultimately part of our Spiritual growth) we have to distance ourselves somewhat from our Spiritual essence, and in so doing we lose touch with our natural psychic ability. For example the child is told to abandon his/her "imaginary" friends.

This presents a program of simple techniques that allow anyone to begin reawakening their natural, powerful but dormant mental faculties to start improving their lives right now.
To fulfill your psychic potential you simply need to reverse this materialistic conditioning and allow yourself the time and space to re-connect with your true Spirit within.