The Dark Side of Being Psychic

We're told we all have psychic powers. They’re gifts of the soul. But not all of us have them in good working order. We are also advised by the church, saints and teachers not to pursue these powers, but to let them unfold naturally. This makes a lot of sense, especially from hindsight if you have not heeded this warning.

In my own experience I entered this life quite intuitive. I sensed things coming along, or “felt” this or that might happen. I soon learned to keep these intuitions to myself, even though they often were right on, as family and friends told me in no uncertain terms I was imagining things. Then in May, 1971 a dear friend lost his life suddenly in a seaplane accident. He left much unfinished business behind and felt deeply responsible for the welfare of many other people. It took about two weeks of utmost diligent persistent trying on his part to break through to me. Not only did my clairaudient center open, but I could also be shown things quite easily. But I had to be shown, I couldn’t directly view activities going on in other dimensions. Hopefully it is my guardian angel doing the showing and other noble teachers. My friend so recently deceased didn’t have that capability well developed either though we often found we knew what the other was thinking telepathically.

We were both over joyed at our success and ready to take on the whole world. Nothing like trouble crossed my mind, let alone danger. I forgot all about church warnings not to communicate with the dead. And if I had thought about it, I’d been sure it didn’t apply to me. After all I meant well and had important things to do.

Teachers and angels, I learned, will help when asked, but generally they stand back and let us make our own mistakes. And also help rarely comes the way you think it should. It wasn’t long at all before we attracted the attention of other discarnates. Many were friends and relatives eager to help. But also there were unhappy discarnates who wanted to communicate too. There were power struggles. Just as in physical life some persons have much more power and control than others and thus have an edge. I soon felt as if a war was going on and I was what they were fighting over. My friend, my parents, other friends and relatives soon gathered together to try to protect me. Under attack I felt whirling going on about me. Every now and then the opposition would score and I’d have a dreadful earache, or be doubled over with stomach cramps, or a violent headache.

Then suddenly the opposition overcame my protectors and a man’s face in a brown and yellow light clearly appeared to me. I knew, but did not clearly see, there were hordes of entities back of him, all clamoring to be heard. They were extremely rude and ill-mannered. He smiled triumphantly and told me he was my guardian and would help me. All I had to do was what he told me to do. By this time, of course, I was so battered and beaten that I wanted nothing more than not to be tortured any longer. In such a state you’ll agree to most anything. He had messages he wanted delivered. By morning, in the clear light of day, and no longer suffering, I thought better of this agreement and decided in conscience I could not possibly deliver messages to people I didn’t know. What if they were harmful? I had to be responsible, did I not, for passing on this fellow’s messages? Besides I wasn’t so sure he was my guardian angel. So I threw his messages away and went on about my day.

It was about four in the afternoon when the attack began in earnest. My deceased friend, and my Dad and others had gathered together double or even triple the force they’d had the day before to defend me. I soon felt this violent whirling going on around me so powerful my chair rolled around. Believe me, I was scared witless. Then something about the size of a wash cloth was plastered on the side of my head covering my ear. It was pulsing with sharp electrical jabs and extremely painful. I ran about trying frantically trying to shake myself free of it with no success. Then there was something similar on my back and then the base of my neck. I had an awful stomach ache. I was doubled over with pain and frightened out of my mind.

The thought came to me that I must not react in such wild fear. Did I not know I was an immortal soul and thus could neither be created nor destroyed. This calmed me sufficiently to phone a man I’d recently met at a lecture on the paranormal. He’d once been a disciple of Parmahansa Yogananda. When I was asking him questions after his talk, he’d given me his card. Now he listened to my tale of woe and said he understood perfectly what was going on. The very first thing I must do was to pray to Michael the Archangel for help.

Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock,
and it shall be opened to you. Matt. 6.

And then to light candles and incense and to continue to pray and that he would also pray for me. Immediately I knelt and from the bottom of my heart implored Saint Michael to come to my assistance. A powerful beam of pure white light shot from on high, like a bolt of lightening, and enveloped me. All the pain vanished. There was no more whirling, not a sound around me. My life was back to normal. I was exhausted, but remembered to murmur a prayer of thanks and slept soundly the rest of the night.

Fr Chris, Yogananda’s disciple, phoned the next morning to ask how I was and was thankful that his advice had worked. He said he should see me and learn more about what was going on in order to help me stay safe. I gladly went to his place and told him exactly all that had been going on including how it began. He asked what had happened in the plane accident? Was it deliberately caused? I listened but received no answer. Then he asked what had happened to my friend's body. This time I clearly heard, “The fishes got it! What a horrible experience to see your body being ripped to shreds!” Fr Chris then asked if this concerned a lot of money? I nodded. And if bankers and lawyers were involved. Again I nodded. He slowly shook his head saying this battle is going on in the astral world for control of this man’s purse, not just for control of you, though that is part of it. The battle is, or will be soon reflected here in the physical world too. “There is an old saying,” he smiled, “As above so below.” Then he continued, “However, you are somehow involved.” And he waited for me to answer. I nodded saying, yes, my friend had named me in his will to take his place in his business affairs. Fr. Chris was silent for a long moment thinking, and listening to his inner voice. Finally, he shook his head and said, “The opposition is much too strong for you. You’d best give this up.”

I could plainly hear Jack crying out NO! We mustn’t give up! I repeated aloud, “He says No, too many people will be hurt, employees, stockholders. People will lose their job, their savings. These robbers must be stopped!”

Again Fr Chris was silent, going within. And again he sadly shook his head, “Not to be. An impossible task. I see you want to try. Perhaps if you could get help from others, but it is a very difficult task. For all practical purposes his estate has been lost.” He reached over and most sincerely advised, “Not just for your own sake, and safety, but his as well, do not go on with this. The forces in opposition are very powerful.”

Since the pain was history, for the moment, and since my friend implored me to help him, that he’d reveal to me the information I needed, and we’d turn this thing around, I agreed. He had many friends, he said, who would help. All I had to do was ask and help would be provided.

There were many friends who did help, but in the end the dark forces prevailed. By the grace of God, when I finally realized Fr Chris’ original advice was right, I had painfully learned a great deal. At first whenever I would hear about a psychic reader, a psychic fair, or Spiritualist groups, off I’d go for another reading. Some were very good especially in telling what had already transpired in my life. But 50% accuracy in predicting the future was a good score. One of the better psychics was a woman who gave a talk for our Spiritual Frontiers, Oregon Chapter group. She counseled businessmen and claimed she had an 80% accuracy rate. A news reporter challenged her to predict the outcome of Evil Knievel’s Hells Canyon jump. Hours before he jumped, she told the reporter Knievil would make it, just barely, but would fall and be injured. She was correct. They made her prediction the Saturday headline. I was properly impressed and made an appointment. She wanted 3 questions from me. She confidently went within to answer me and after some while replied, “This is very strange, but I cannot break through a war like zone. What on earth is going on with you? I’ve never encountered anything like this before. It would be dangerous to persist. Then she said she would try some other things later and would get back to me. She did do that and her answer was much the same as Fr Chris’.

I heard from her from time to time. She became more and more erratic. She was often ill and needed money. I finally heard of her untimely death after a severe nervous breakdown. It was these kinds of experiences which helped me to be far more respectful of the dark forces than I’d been in the beginning. Also, I’d joined a meditation and spiritual study group as I was determined to progress in this endeavor which I soon realized involved serious effort for self-improvement. There I made a new friend, a man more clairvoyant than I. He brought with him a band of American Indians who took me under their wing too. I stopped trying to hear my friend or communicate in any manner away from the group. Even so I was still physically attacked and abused especially in church or meditating. But I persisted on the path I’d chosen and gradually I learned to pretty much ignore those who would attack me.

The last time I saw Fr Chris some months after he first helped me, one eye blinked uncontrollably. His elbow was so very painful he was unable to use the arm. He said his guide who had helped him so much all the years he’d been giving public readings, had been overcome by dark forces and so now he was quitting. I worried his suffering was because he’d tried to help me. But he shook his head at me and warned, “If you persist in going on, the same thing can happen to you.” Believe me his crippling experience dampened my enthusiasm a lot. My clairvoyant friend said yes, there were discarnates, and earth bound entities who tried to get his attention too, but he simply ignored them and they went away. I couldn’t figure out why some people were severely attack and others were not. One possible answer was that perhaps those not attacked were more holy than the rest of us, better protected. It was also clear that those who used alcohol, or stumbled and fell from grace would attract to themselves discarnates with problems wanting a vicarious experience or a way to vent vicious anger and hatred. I began asking psychic readers about attacks. Most of them denied they personally had any problem. Some even looked at me as if I might be an evil person. Invariably they counseled me to bring in the white light, surround myself with the light and say the Lord’s prayer and I’d be safe. I did do a lot of praying which probably kept me out of the loony bin. One quite elderly spiritualist told me, yes, you could be targeted. What she had, she said, were American Indians guarding her.

Then I began reading the Lives of the Saints, both East and West. What a relief it was to learn that some of our greatest holy people suffered miserably from the dark forces. Padre Pio, the Capuchin who had the stigmata some 50 years, through whom many remarkable healings occurred, was thrown about his room, bruised and battered and one time received a broken collar bone from demonic forces. Teresa of Avila was unmercifully tormented. As Gautama, the Buddha, sat beneath the bodi tree after his enlightenment, he was brutally assaulted for 8 hours. But not once did he take his mind from God. Milarepa, Tibet's great yogi, deliberately developed supernatural powers in order to avenge the theft of his father’s estate. After destroying his uncle’s grain fields and generally wrecking havoc on his uncle’s property with hail storms and wind, and the family was begging for mercy, he began to be ashamed of what he’d done. He sought out a remote cave and dwelled there meditating for seven years with little to eat, mostly nettle soup. When his sister finally found him, he’d turned a green shade. During these years as a recluse hordes of demons tormented him. But he learned to ignore them. This takes tremendous self control. But after all, they cannot destroy you unless you let them.

One time in the PARAPSYCHOLOGY JOURNAL an anthropologist reported meeting a young woman in an African tribe who had been trained from childhood to be a Shaman. The tribe decided it would be good to send her to England to college so when she returned and took up her life’s work, they would have the best of both worlds. When she arrived home she was utterly appalled at the crude, unscientific witch doctor methods and made up her mind to have absolutely nothing, not a thing to do with them. She ridiculed as silly superstition throwing the bones to see what diagnosis would come up. She initiated modern methods everywhere she possibly could. Then she began having horrible nightmares. The minute she closed her eyes, her deceased grandfather would be right in her face telling her she must return to the old ways and use both ways to help her people. She did her best to ignore him, but he and others became more persistent until she’d wake in the night tossing and turning miserably unable to sleep. But she stubbornly clung to her decision to outlaw old superstitions. Then her back began to ache and she suffered severe headaches. She had continual stomach cramps and diarrhea. She became very weak until finally she was unable to get out of bed.

As she was trying to make up her mind whether to just die or give in, her friends came and sat with her. She realized they knew very well the ancestors were tormenting her and why. At that point she shrugged and said, “Oh, all right. Why not?” The pain left. She was famished, and they brought her food. Within hours she was in her place counseling and helping her people combining the old ways along with the new methods. .

We don’t have to be dedicated to spiritual development to experience psychic attacks. An acquaintance, a devote Catholic woman’s husband died suddenly. He was just 51 years old. His heart stopped just like that one hot summer day as he was delivering vegetables from their truck farm. She felt sadness at his untimely passing, but it had been many years since their relationship was a loving one. There wasn’t even much respect left because he had been a hard driving man with material possessions his goal. In a few days the funeral was over and she began to take stock of her situation. He’d never entrusted any of their financial details with her. As a matter of fact, he made her feel all their money was his. She made herself a cup of tea and headed for the dining room table to study some of the paperwork. As she sat down at the table, she glanced back to the dining room door and there stood her husband. She dropped her cup of tea so frightened was she. She just stared unable to make a move or speak. She half expected him to yell at her not to touch his books. Then she noticed he had a very sad look. There were tears streaming down his face. The thought he communicated to her was one of deep sorrow and remorse. He asked her forgiveness. Suddenly she was angry. Very angry. She shouted at him to get lost. What happened to him served him right! He vanished. About a week later she had a ringing in her ear. Nothing she could think to do would stop it. She went to first one doctor then another, but the ringing continued. Doctors called it tintinutis and said there was no known cure. It was driving her crazy. Everywhere she went along went the ringing in her ear. When I heard about this, I felt immediately it was her poor distraught husband howling in her ear, begging her forgiveness. I debated telling her this though, but as I noticed her bedraggled condition getting worse and worse, I decided why not. So I told her what I thought and said if it’s hard to forgive the man, at least pray for help in forgiving and forgetting. And pray for him too. She looked horrified and avoided me thereafter.

Other experiences far more common than most people want to believe are feelings of depression and even of suicide after the death of someone close to you. I had a friend whose husband didn’t take care of his health as he should. He was far over weight and would come home from work and expect her not only to have his supper ready, but to be served a cocktail first as he lounged in front of the TV. Then suddenly he had a heart attack and died. In a few days she happened to be in a high rise building, standing in front of a large window looking out over the city, when she felt a push! She caught herself just in time. She felt her husband had pushed her,. Further she told us, she felt he was miserable and he wanted her to join him and continue waiting on him hand and foot.

One hears reports, most often after praying to a Saint for help, of smelling roses or orange blossoms. Saint Terese of Liseaux, has been kept very busy with petitions for help, and responds with an unexpected rose coming your way, or the scent of roses, when she can help. There are also other unexplained scents around us. One time I smelled the nicest tobacco, but I couldn't associate anyone with it, though I felt someone brought that scent because he thought I’d recognize it, and I was sorry to disappoint him. Also, there are unexplained reports of smelling sulpher and brimstone, or something rotten. .

Have you ever found yourself coughing and choking uncontrollably with no physical reason to account for it? Some spirits hanging around us have developed this ability and seem to be trying to remind us or warn us of something; or object to whatever it is we are saying. Taking a deep breath or two or three helps to stop this interference. Itching is another miserable kind of attacking, especially in embarrassing places. You may think something is wrong with you, but when you can find nothing wrong, you might think in terms of discarnates making a point. Learn to ignore them and eventually it will go away. When hearing of these varied attacks, I’m often reminded of the Lil Abner cartoon and the devil on one of Abner’s shoulders and an angel on the other. We’re always given choices. It’s important to make the right ones. And to remember God loves us all including the little black sheep.

Recently on the TV program, PARANORMAL BORDERLINE, a real life experience was told of a family hounded by frivolous, if not malicious spirits. Doors slamming in the middle of the night. Footsteps on the stairs making you think there was a prowler in the house or far worse, utensils flying about, art work and furniture. The wife described a butcher knife thrown so forcibly into the door it was difficult to remove it. The children described seeing apparitions. The family did everything they could possibly think to do to rid themselves of these tormenting entities. Ghost busters had been employed. Paranormal investigators advised. They’d moved 17 times in 25 years, once into a new home, bute spirit tormentors moved right along with them. Finally, they’d given up trying to run away from these devils and began to hold prayer vigils. At first, they sensed scoffing, ridicule and raucous laughter, but they have persisted and the violence has gradually subsided. They wondered why them? The paranormal advisors asked did they know any of these intruders? They solemnly shook their heads saying they’d asked themselves that same question over and over, but they were baffled. Even though it is extremely sad to think spirits would have nothing better to do than attack persons incarnate, it’s far too common an experience to deny it happens. It puts one in mind of the reports of seeing ghosts in old buildings, walking up and down the stairs for a hundred years or even two hundred years. After researching old records for that site, it is usually learned someone had died a violent death there, creating a powerful energy field in which that spirit is trapped until the field dissipates. But in this instance of a random attack by a marauding band of discarnates makes one wonder how a Swedenborg would have explained it. Maybe they are like street gangs, totally irresponsible? Yet, the family was not seriously harmed. Did their guardian angels protect them?

Emmanuel Swedenborg, the famous 17th century Swedish seer, was a devote Lutheran, but after his clairvoyant center opened, he began to teach and to write about a broader, more universal religion which included descriptions of heaven and hell and those who inhabited those places. It was then he began to suffer extremely painful electric like shocks to the soles of his feet. Many times his feet were much too painful to walk. He made careful, detailed notes of all he clairvoyantly saw and learned. He often had known the individuals in life which, he said the angel of the Lord was pleased to show him their present state. He tells us that the masks we wear in the physical life are no longer available after death. Whatever emotions we have are visible to all. And the emotions most powerful in our personalities, driving motivation, dominate. Thus, if we suffer from greed, we may find ourselves stuck in a greed mode maybe in a counting house counting stacks of money. If lust was a problem, then we may be condemned to hang around brothels seeking a vicarious sexual experience. On the other hand, if we were moved by kindness and love for all of God’s creatures, we would find ourselves among others with similar feelings. All we have to take with us when we leave this world are our emotions and our thoughts.

Build up treasures in heaven. Make for yourselves purses
that do not grow old, a treasure unfailing in heaven. For
where your treasure is, there also will be your heart. Luke 12.

Once again we can see the wisdom of the church’s teaching to watch carefully every thought, word and deed as we go about our daily lives.

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