Introduction
(This is an excerpt from a University Of Metaphysical Sciences course at www.umsonline.org, please feel free to visit the school website)
The extra-ordinary powers of the mind known as “psychic abilities” are an inherent gift to all of us. Melita Denning and Osborne Phillips tell us in their book The Development Of Psychic Powers (1988) that psychic powers are our birthright. Some people more naturally express these abilities than others. For the others, psychic abilities may be developed through study and practice. It is also called “intuition” or “psychic abilities.” In more conservative circles it is called a “hunch” or “gut feeling.” The term ESP, “extra sensory perception,” was coined by the late Dr. Joseph Banks Rhine. He was a professor and head of the parapsychology laboratory at Duke University. Dr. Rhine was ridiculed by some and admired by others, and he was working with parapsychology at a time when it was considered taboo.
It is a good thing that the “6th sense” is gaining a revived recognition of its usefulness. Laura Day says in her book Practical Intuition: How To Harness The Power Of Your Instincts And Make It Work For You (1996), “As the end of the second millennium draws near, the limitations of logic, rationality, and the scientific method as the sole means of guiding our lives are becoming all too painfully clear. Increasingly our world is turning to modes of perception and understanding that don't rely on evidence presented to our senses, modes such as intuition and faith… The early Greeks [Greece being the birthplace of logic, philosophy, and the rudiments of the scientific method] recognized that rational thought is incomplete and needs the support of intuition.”
Belleruth Naparstek goes further by saying in her book Your Sixth Sense: Unlocking The Power Of Your Intuition (1997), “We’ve entered a new stage of our human evolution, a time when the development of our psychic capacity is essential to our survival. Without a new and stronger kind of psychic attainment, without a deeper sense of spiritual connectedness to the whole, and without a much larger sense of self than we as a species has ever attained, our planet could easily die from out-of-control aggression, territoriality, and greed. So it’s no coincidence that we find ourselves in a time of great interest in psychic phenomena, of widespread longing for connection to our virtual core. More and more people are looking for ways to join with the mysterious, the wider perspective, the divine, the world of spirit.”
People who are by nature very devotional and feel a close connection to their spiritual natures are most prone to having spontaneous mystical experiences that transcend the limitations of time and space. Specific examples of natural states that mystics and saints have been known to reach include levitation, ecstatic trances, and the ability to live on very little or no food. In India, yogis can slow their breathing down in meditative states so that their vital signs all but disappear. They are also able to generate amazing amounts of body heat during meditation. Tibetan monks have been known to meditate in the snow without adequate clothing, and they do not become cold. Many spiritual adepts lived on little or no food, and yet live healthy and vibrant lives.
In religious history, the Catholic Church has documented accounts of saints demonstrating special powers (called siddhis in India) which are very advanced psychic abilities. Once consciousness can bend space and time, this is the ultimate psychic ability. One of these is called levitation, which is the experience of floating slightly above the ground. Levitation happened usually when priests were caught up in the deep reverence of officiating the Holy Mass. St. Francis was a saint famous for levitation. He was said to float from the ground when he was in ecstatic states of communion with God. There are also descriptions of priests and nuns who spontaneously have bled at the hands and feet. Spontaneous bleeding of this sort is known in the Catholic Church as stigmata. These locations correspond to the wound sites where the crucified Christ was nailed to the cross (although some mystics had visions pertaining to the exact location being in the wrists rather than in the palms of the hands). The occurrence of stigmata in the upper body being more correctly located in the wrists is referred to by Eileen Freeman in her book Touched By Angels (1993). Here, she writes of a contemporary saint, and she declares that “in the twentieth century, the stigmatic Therese Neumann had a comparable experience.” These feats are also seen in people who can bend spoons and forks, or move objects. This is called telekinesis.
There are others who are quite accurate in psychic tests. They have participated with in-depth experiments in the past 50 years. Children are said to be exceptionally intuitive until they lose their abilities as they grow older. Young children are believed to be closer to the spirit world and spiritual abilities because they are not completely entrenched in the ways of human physical reality. Remote viewing is another well-tested and proven psychic ability that even governments and authorities make use of. Police departments have also been known to make use of psychics, or intuitives, in solving crimes. A psychic or intuitive is someone who uses their intuition consciously, rather than unconsciously. Most people use intuition unconsciously every day. Some have learned to use it with precision and accuracy.
As to the nature of psychic abilities in general, there are many schools of thought. Some believe it is by higher functioning of the human brain that psychic abilities are possible. Others believe that it is by God’s grace that these higher powers are possible in a human. However, ultimately, psychic abilities can be said to stem from the limitless nature of the larger Mind, synchronous with Universal Law. Because all of us are aspects of this one force, this larger awareness is part of our experience even while we focus our consciousness in the “limited” material plane of duality and identify with it. One way to describe our relationship to the Cosmic Unity is through what can be called the subjective or subconscious mind, which functions as the repository of memories and feelings. The subconscious perceives by intuition, and obeys the conscious mind, according to Dr. Joseph Murphy. In his book, The Power Of Your Subconscious Mind (1963) Murphy states, “The subconscious sees without the natural organs of vision... [and] has the capacity of clairvoyance and clairaudience.”
Intuition is an ability you already have and use every day. Exercising intuition makes it stronger, and making it a conscious process makes it more accessible. Laura Day says in her book Practical Intuition: How To Harness The Power Of Your Instincts And Make It Work For You (1996), “Intuition is a capacity you are born with as a human being, like the capacity for language or thinking or appreciating music. Intuition is not a power one acquires. It's an integral part of every human mental, emotional, and psychical process. Each moment¾right now¾you receive information intuitively; you're simply unaware of the process. You use your intuition in practical reasoned decisions you make every day, from choices as mundane as to what to eat for dinner, what to major in, or who to marry. The trick to using your intuition more effectively is to bring the unconscious data it supplies to a place where your conscious mind can interpret it.
“You may be wondering why, if intuition is an innate ability that you use all the time…why, you might ask, should we make ourselves work for what we already have?… until now, using your intuition may have been a hit or miss proposition. The skill comes in knowing how to access and apply it effectively. Learning to understand the information you receive intuitively requires structure, Just as thinking is improved with the structure logic provides. Whatever intuitive skills you've retained from your childhood, you can develop them, like any other skill, with guidance and some practice… Training intuition [enables] you to use the different capacities together more effectively.”
We use our intuition all the time, but we don’t realize it. Why don’t we recognize intuition if we use it every day? Laura Day continues on this subject, “At a very young age… we learned to distrust our intuition. As we grow up we learned to judge data as real or pertinent or objective, and to weed out what is not real by society’s standards. Over the years, this mental censoring becomes an unconscious, automatic process… Another reason you don't recognize intuition is that it speaks a different language. Intuition is often symbolic and fragmentary. Only on rare occasions does it speak in complete sentences. What's more, intuitive information often does not make sense, especially when it involves the future. As a result, we train ourselves to dismiss it.”
If you doubt the validity of intuition, you can either allow it to prove itself or you will prove it doesn’t work yourself. Your belief in whether your intuition works are not, or the information of others works, will affect the outcome of your experience. If you are skeptical, your experience with intuition will most likely be a disappointment. If you're optimistic, and approach with curiosity, you will most likely receive positive results.
Most people are skeptics. Many people do not believe that intuition can find answers, and even those who wish to develop their intuition may be skeptical about their abilities. However, as with all new skills and abilities, to pretend is where it all begins. Set-aside your rational mind and your doubts about your own abilities, and just pretend that you are able to use your intuition to find answers to anything and everything for a little while, and see what happens. You are always welcome to go back to a rational belief that you do not have these abilities, but for now give it a whirl and see what happens.
Laura Day expounds on the value of pretending in her book Practical Intuition: How To Harness The Power Of Your Instincts And Make It Work For You (1996), “As we become older and ‘mature,’ many of us lose touch with this important ability to pretend because of the overwhelming social pressures to be logical and sensible. Even young children are encouraged not to make things up. What's more, our ability to pretend and to create has been replaced to a large degree by technology, like videos and television and advertising, which gives our brains most of what they need to keep entertained. All of this is too bad, because pretending performs some very useful functions. Pretending is also a valuable ability when learning a new skill. Before we master something, it helps to pretend that we've already acquired the skill… even modern science is based on pretending… pretending often precedes faith. Indeed, pretending often generates faith, and, before we know it, we no longer need to pretend.”
Intuition is not limited by space or time. Intuition does not require that you know anything about the subjects you're inquiring about. It doesn't even require that you understand all the impressions that you receive. This is the beauty of intuition. Even though you may know nothing about refrigerators, a refrigerator repair man may come to you and ask you why a particular refrigerator is resisting repair. You can find out through intuition, by describing feelings, pictures or words coming to you about the dysfunction of the appliance. The refrigerator repair man can then use your clues to determine the problem. You can know the answer to any question. You have access to all the answers. It is not the same as knowing everything consciously. It is a different kind of knowing.
Intuition plays a part in all your decisions. Feelings are emotional senses without explanation, and we tend to dismiss feelings as unreasonable and untrustworthy, but feelings are facts. Feelings are often what overrides the rational mind in the decision-making process, and in fact can be a very trustworthy steering mechanism through your reality. It is not uncommon for someone to delay a trip based on a feeling, only later to find out that a disaster had been avoided, or an opportunity would've been lost if they had left. Feelings, or gut feelings, can be very accurate indicators of the right choices for you.