This week has been of the quiet relaxing kind, with just some healing sessions scheduled here and there. That's completely fine by me, as I prepare for my mother to come visit from Norway tomorrow. Let's just say, I have some cleaning to do before then.

I've been wanting to write today's post for a long time, as I do bump up against misconceptions about psychics and mediums all the time. The first one I want to address is probably the most common one.

Misconception 1: That psychics and mediums are always tuning into everything around them, or that they are always "on". 

My understanding is that there is no on or off switch per say (unfortunately), but it's more about what our attention is on and also our state of mind. Us psychics and mediums are always "on", but most of the time, when we are going about our day, we aren't paying much attention to our psychic senses because we are busy focusing on other normal everyday things. Personally, I don't want to constantly be picking up on random spirits or energy.

I don't speak for everyone however. I do know that some famous mediums and psychics claim to not be able to "turn off" their abilities, and I also know that many people who are just starting out developing, or just never learned how to control their abilities, have a hard time "turning it off".

Even though I love to do readings, I don't want to be doing them all the time. Asking us at parties or other places "to do a quick reading" for you is not ideal for many reasons. First of all, we might not be in the right state of mind for it. It takes a certain calm and centered-ness to connect and do a reading. We also don't want to be working all the time (just like everyone else), and if we are working, we prefer to get paid for our work (just like everyone else), as this is our livelihood.

Now that isn't to say that I haven't done readings pro bono for people in dire economic situations, or that I don't do impromptu readings for close friends. I also try to provide reading-opportunities for people with low income, through low-cost events and similar. With close friends I am constantly exchanging energy with them, meaning they do stuff for me, and I do stuff for them, without one of us getting drained from it. But other than that, I don't have the time or energy to do readings outside of my work schedule. Believe it or not, I do have a life outside of my work, with two small kids, a husband, cats, and other interests and responsibilities.

Misconception 2: That this is a gift that only a few people possess. That psychics or mediums are special.

This is one misconception that I hear quite a bit, especially from people who want to take a class in mediumship or psychic development, but are afraid that they aren't able to learn because they weren't "born with it".

There is a lot of debate about whether or not mediums/psychics are born or made. In my opinion and experience, mediumship and psychic readings is something that anyone can learn to do, just like anyone can learn to play the piano. This is because everyone is born with what we call intuitive/psychic senses which is what is needed to be able to perceive spirit or psychic information. It's just that most people haven't learned to use or develop those senses.

When we are born, those senses are usually very active, but they gradually shut down out of lack of use, or from this sort of thing being discouraged. For some people those senses never shut down, which is why you sometimes see mediums or psychics saying "they were born with it" as if they are different from other people. Other people will go through a sort of awakening process later in life that awakens those senses again spontaneously. And yet other people are just drawn to learning more about it and develop their abilities that way. They are all just different ways of developing the same abilities. One way is not more authentic or better than another.

The only thing that makes me different from people who aren't psychics or mediums is that I have put quite a bit of work into developing and honing my abilities. And all the psychics and mediums I know that did grow up seeing spirits etc. still had to do quite a bit of developing and honing of their abilities to become good at it.

I think that in our society, we feel there is a certain novelty to a person who saw ghosts when they were little. Or with people who go through extreme circumstances like a near death experience. But that doesn't mean that people who didn't experience these things aren't able to develop their abilities to be equally good or better. After having taught classes for several years, I have yet to meet someone who isn't able to learn to do readings themselves.

I hope you all have a wonderful week. I am off to do some cleaning!

The past few days have blessed us with sunny and almost spring-like weather here in Portland, Oregon. The orchid in these photos is one that my mom got me two years ago after the birth of my son, and it has just started blooming again, so I took the opportunity to take its photo.

Last week I had some wonderful sessions. I am getting better at my self-care, so I took all of Saturday off from any work, but I worked quite a lot all the other days.

Though last week was a great week for me, I had two very interesting experiences with people who don't believe in psychics/mediums. The first was during a facebook-live I did with my colleague and dear best friend Priscila ( from www.innerlighthealer.com ). We were doing free psychic mini-readings together for anyone who wanted one. In these kinds of readings, the guidance is short as we don't have time to go into lengthy readings for everyone. We are essentially just dipping our toes into the person's energy. We were having quite a bit of technical difficulty during it, and I apparently could only see half the comments for some reason, which was probably a good thing.

After we ended the live-stream, I noticed a rant of comments on our video from a stranger. He felt that the readings could apply to anyone, and that we must be making good money on giving people hope. He also called us pathetic before he  went on his way and blocked me. I have a lot of thoughts around this, but first I do find it interesting that someone who is not the recipient of a reading can judge the accuracy of another person's reading. As my other colleague pointed out to this man, just the sheer amount of people on this earth means that quite a few people are going to have certain life-circumstances in common. Meaning that yes, the guidance coming through in the readings could probably apply to several people. But that doesn't mean it isn't spot on for that one person receiving the reading. Should we then refrain from giving that guidance, because somebody else might think it's too vague? No, that would be nonsense.

I am however a big proponent of providing evidence in a full-length reading. Evidence means specific accurate details that applies to the recipient's life or to the spirit who might be coming through. This helps the recipient also take to heart the guidance that comes through in a reading, because they can trust that the psychic or medium is actually connecting. But that is not the goal in mini-readings that we do for free for random people in our spare time. Nor was our goal to convince anyone of anything. Our goal was simply to provide some free guidance for anyone who might need it at that time.

This was one of my first run-ins with a cynic (Luckily it's happened only once before). Most skeptics that I meet are open to learning more about what I do, which I find great because I believe most skepticism and cynicism around psychics mainly stem from false ideas about how psychic abilities actually work.  I am always happy to squash some myths around psychics and mediums. Let me be clear though: I don't try to convert skeptics. If someone doesn't believe in this stuff, that's fine. But if someone, for example, doesn't believe in psychics because they think that psychics should somehow be omniscient, and of course nobody is actually omniscient, then I am probably going to explain to them how psychic abilities really work. If they in the end still don't believe in psychics, I really don't care. I just don't want them to go around believing that we're claiming to be omniscient. Anywho, cynics are different from skeptics, because they are much more set in their opinions about the way things work.

I do believe skepticism is a good thing, by the way, especially when it comes to psychics and mediums. Not everyone who calls themselves psychic are psychic, nor do they all have the best intentions, and some who do have the best intentions probably shouldn't be doing readings anyway because they just are terrible at it. I will write another blog post soon on my thoughts around this, and how to go about finding the right psychic for you.

Anyways, my second experience last week was fascinating and hilarious in a bizarre way, so I thought I would share. In mediumship, we often encounter spirits who were religious when they were alive. Most of the time, this is not a problem when they try to come through in a reading. Sometimes however, they will keep their distance with me, because they just aren't into mediums. They might say hello and give some brief distinguishing information, but they usually won't go on and on as other spirits will (all depending on the individual spirit of course).

Last week, I got to experience connecting with the spirit of a woman who was ultra-religious when she was alive. As I initially connected with her I could sense her gender, her personality, as well as her distinguishing traits in her relationship with my client, but that was about it as she kept her distance from me. So I did as I would normally do: I asked her to come closer and merge with my energy (it helps us connect better). She came close enough that I could feel her almost merge with me before she abruptly said "NO THANKS, MEDIUM" to the merging part, because she clearly did not like that I was a medium. This made perfect sense to my client, as I explained to her that this will sometimes happen when the spirit was really religious.

I had to laugh, because it felt very much like what I can imagine it must feel like to someone who works in customer service, whose job it is to be nice to an incredibly unpleasant customer. My client wanted me to connect with this spirit, so I had to deal with just being insulted by this spirit. It turned out fine, because the spirit did eventually give a few more messages. And she did acknowledge that it was the ultimate irony that she would communicate through a medium after she'd passed (essentially proving herself wrong in many of her beliefs, I would imagine). This was my first time connecting with a spirit who was so blatantly against mediums.

Clearly, mediumship or psychic work is not the type of work to pursue if you are afraid of confrontation with people who have zero understanding of your work. It's definitely a controversial career. Me telling someone that I talk to dead people professionally brings up all sorts of reactions, and to many it can (understandably) feel like I have wrapped in quite a few statements in there: that there must be a 'God', that there's such a thing as a heaven or hell (I don't believe that actually), that I care what they believe or that I'm trying to convince them of something, or that I prey off of people's grief (Side note: if I know that someone has just lost a loved one, I am much more likely to lie to that person if they ask me what I do for a living, because I don't want them to think that I am somehow taking advantage of their grief. I always try to be VERY sensitive to the grieving process).

I understand that my doing this work challenges people's beliefs, and it can be a lot to wrap your mind around if you haven't had a lot of exposure to it before. But I honestly don't care what people believe in, nor am I in the business of converting people. I love to educate others, but I think trying to convert people is a waste of time.

I definitely don't do this work for the ease of it. I do it for the healing it can bring. Luckily, that same reading that had the ultra-religious spirit, turned out to be incredibly healing for my client. That alone is what makes it all worth it in the end.

Anyways, I just wanted to share those two experiences with you, and especially for any of my students who might be reading this.

I hope you all have a lovely rest of your week!

Happy New Year everyone! I hope you had some lovely holidays and time with family and friends. I have been busy with life and readings. This past weekend we celebrated my youngest child's birthday, as he turned 2 years old. We also spent weeks trying to find the perfect car for us, and we finally bought one! This means I am back to offering in-person sessions for those of you who have been asking about that.

Since it's a new year, I thought I would share some of my tips for daily habits that I find helpful for the intuitive person, whether you do readings or are just really sensitive to energy. These are habits that I incorporate into my daily life to support my work as a psychic medium. They may seem quite basic or simple, but from experience I know that they are essential to feeling good while doing this work.

1. Meditate
I always meditate before a reading, and I normally meditate on days when I don't do readings too. With everything going on this past year, I fell out of my normal daily meditation practice. So this year I am committing to it again. Already I am feeling so much more connected in my every day life again. I take time out of every day to remind myself what I really am connected to, to what my essence really is, and fill up my reserves. I get to quiet the mind, and practice getting into an open relaxed state. It's my favorite, and something I absolutely recommended for the highly intuitive (or anyone wanting to develop their intuition). You get to know your own energy better, which is essential for discerning between what is yours and what belongs to other people.

2. Move your energy
Doing energy work is great for clearing your energy so that you aren't as affected by other people. It also increases the energy you are able to channel in your own body and increases your spiritual stamina for doing readings. Even if you don't do readings, you are probably picking up on stuff from others throughout your day, and moving/clearing your energy is going to help you release that.

Some examples of energy work are doing chakra visualization exercises (guided chakra meditations are plentiful on youtube), or the Microcosmic Orbit. Working on your energy centers in this way allows energy to flow more freely through you, and as a result, helps your readings flow better.
Another technique that can help you release energy is doing some daily smudging. This means to burn herbs such as sage, and using the smoke of it to clear your energy-field or a room. 

3. Move your body
The physical body is so closely interconnected with the spiritual/energetic bodies, that you are losing out if you focus only on the spiritual during your development process. In the same way that energy work is beneficial, physical exercise is helpful to move and clear energy in your body, and increase your physical stamina for doing readings. It keeps the energy moving through your body, instead of getting stuck anywhere. The good news is that the physical exercise doesn’t have to be strenuous. Some great examples are dancing (even if just in your living room!), yoga, running, or even just going for walks. Yoga and dancing both have made a huge difference for me in my development, and through them I have released a lot of old negative energy my body was holding on to.

4. Make tuning in a habit
Make a habit of tuning in psychically to everything throughout the day. Ask yourself fun questions, both things you can validate later on, and things you might not get much feedback on.
Which road is fastest to drive to work today? Who is going to win this season’s Iron Chef? What color clothing will my friend wear today when I meet her? It’s important to have fun with this. If you’re wrong, just say “oh well, no big deal”, brush it off, and try again. This is a great way to get familiar with how your own intuition works and when it’s just your mind talking. It's also a great way to start defaulting into your intuition rather than "logical thinking".

5. Feed your body right
As I said above, your physical and spiritual bodies are interconnected, so what you feed your body is going to affect you on all levels. This is something that I've had to become very aware of this past year, and luckily I have figured out which foods were causing me more anxiety or foggy thinking (both horrible for doing good readings or just being in tune with your environment). This is going to be completely individual, because all bodies are different and what works well for one body won't work well for another.

I hope you all have a lovely rest of your week!