Do you believe in psychics?

[EwwwwDavid]

I've been to a few psychics over the years and some things they've said have been weirdly accurate, some not so much.
I had a very tragic bereavement about 12 years ago and haven't seen one since but done things I was told almost predicted what would happen.
Does anyone have any similar stories?
Ps im very much atheist and not at all 'woo' but sometimes reflect on things that are weirdly accurate.

No I don't believe.
I work in an area where I meet alot if people and have to make very quick judgements and figure people out. I could probably set myself up as a psychic and be reasonably convincing. . Honestly you can tell an awful lot about people just on appearance let alone a quick Google. For example I can usually tell if someone has been through a trauma or bereavement. It's just good people reading skills.

They fall into two camps really. Those who are out and out charlatans and engaged in cold reading, etc. and those who might have genuinely convinced themselves they’re doing something (but aren’t). It’s nonsense.

At a Summer Fayre one year, one of our teachers volunteered to be a "Gipsy Rose Lee" figure. I knew exactly what she would say, because I made her "prop", a a crinoline lady whose skirt was made of many folded pieces of paper which unfolded to reveal a reading (copy of a Victorian toy). I wrote on each page the blandest predictions I could find from the horoscope page in magazines.
She was a wise, kindly lady, a former police officer, who could make a good guess about people from their appearance, but even she was amazed at how, with a few well-directed comments, people poured out their hearts to her, telling her their life stories etc. They emerged from her booth singing her praises and marvelling at her accuracy, seemingly unaware that her uncanny knowledge of details of their life stories was things they had disclosed themselves.
She had no interest in profiting from them, it was just a bit of fun for school fundraising, but it was a startling insight into how people's confidence can be won. In fact, she was so shocked by the experience, she refused to do it again.

Yes, I do but there are very, very few real ones.

No. They are charlatans.

I used to work with a man who was very hard-headed in many ways, but he believed that his girlfriend was a medium. I had a lot of respect for him but when I eventually met her I just couldn’t understand how he could believe her. She predicted that a mutual friend would have twins - 7 years later no twins have arrived.

MIL cut us out of her life on the say so of a psychic. The woman had got everything in the reading so very wrong - saying things that couldn't possibly happen. She said some family members were trying to deceive her and that she shouldn't trust them. She decided it was us, because we were really the only family she had apart from a sister she didn't like and wasn't in touch with. She just phoned us one afternoon out of the blue and started screaming at DH about being untrustworthy and said she never wanted to hear from us again. It was only after we had really really racked our brains trying to figure out what was going on, that I remembered I had a copy of this psychic reading that she had emailed to me and asked me to print out in a large font so that she could read it. We had a look at it to see if there were any clues. The reading was online - she'd never even met the woman. She was saying things like she was going to have a baby, and going on about career prospects. MIL is 85.

[quote EwwwwDavid]@WorraLiberty yeah you're right and I agree with you completely. Just wondered if anyone had some fun or weird stories. The psychic I went to see told me the name of my husband and son (before he was even conceived) and it's just a bit spooky I guess?![/quote]
She told you the name of your son before he was even conceived? Presumably you chose the name, so she just influenced you (or cold read if you had already picked one out)

A psychic told me when we were having fertility issues that I would have twin girls...
I had 2 boys 12 months apart but considering one of them has just took his nappy off and pissed down the back of the sofa shouting "winky waterfall" I'd say 100% they are boys! And not twin girls
I had one years ago tell me to drink more orange juice... how many people could you say that too and it could be relatable to them... about 90% of the population I'd say!

Psychics, religions, ghosthunters. They're all out to get something off the vulnerable and gullible. It's usually money but sometimes it's harder to see the 'win' to them.
We have modern medicine that can stop visions and voices, we have evidence of why these delusions occur.

[quote JollyJoon]@Kendoddsdadsdogsdadsdead
I dont think it's fair to say if they were talented they would do it for free. What about doctors or musicians who heal or lift people?

And as for preying on people: couldn't you say the same for psychotherapists and counsellors who see the same client every week or fortnight and simply smile and head tilt and two years later nothing has changed but they're still taking the money?[/quote]
Most of the careers you mention, these people undertake years of accredited training.

Joan from the pub who claims to have psychic powers and can speak to dead people, hasn't.

I believe in them. I went to one about 20 years ago, the very first thing is that she described my bedroom with incredible detail. She told me things which made me so skeptical as I couldn't even imagine doing these things in my life. Anyway, I wrote it down and forgot about it for about 12 years. I moved abroad and when settled in my new country went through a box of old stuff that I brought along but never sorted through prior. J was absolutely floored reading through these things, which happened exactly as she said. This is the reason I believe. I also believe that there are more fakes and scammers than genuine one, but there are definitely genuine ones though rare.

I'm cynical.

Around 20 years ago, I was doing work experience at a local newspaper. We covered a Spiritualist meeting, where the leader would talk to the congregation with 'messages from the dead'.

Most of the attendees were in their 70s/80s.
The leader would say "does anybody know anybody who wore a flat cap and breeches?' Cue about 75% of the crowd putting their hands up.
The leader said "I'm getting a name through....Stan..." nobody put up their hand. The leader then went through every 'old fashioned' name until, finally, when saying "Albert" two people put up their hands.

They were being conned. The comedy 'Shirley Ghostman' illustrates this well.

30 years ago. Forgot how old I am!

Some of the examples given here are clearly charlatans...fishing for names, vague predictions.

Ok, I'll elaborate on one of my examples because bit genuinely shocked me.
I'll start by saying my Facebook is locked down and, regardless, the person she was talking about isn't even on social media so she'd have no way of knowing this...

I liked a guy at work. A lot. It was a secret though, so only my closest friends knew. I hadn't posted about him anywhere.

The psychic said that there was a man I liked, but she couldn't make sense of what she was seeing. She said he was a solicitor but he was working in a school, so she didn't understand. Absolutely true. He was there teaching A level law part time.
She said she saw Colin Firth in the Christmas jumper in Bridget Jones when she thought of him, just like Darcy. His (private nickname among me and about two people) was Darcy.

This was a speculative appointment. She didn't know my surname. She didn't know where I worked. She didn't know my friends.
It was odd.

It's extremely cruel for so-called psychics to prey on what are usually grieving and depressed people, desperate for answers about their dead loved ones. Not too many people go to psychics when they're feeling happy, unless it's for a laugh at a party or on Blackpool promenade, when you know what you're getting is entertainment and you buy into that.

My sister died at 27. I was 28 and an atheist. But I was so devastated by her sudden death, that I seriously considered going to see a psychic. Looking back, I wasn't in my right mind at all. I was very vulnerable and utterly desperate for answers. Answers to what, I'm not sure. My brain hadn't processed her loss and what I really needed was time. I'm so glad I didn't go.

@Hodl

I don't believe in psychics - especially after seeing Derren Brown - however, many years ago a friend and I had gone to a bar after work, it was almost empty apart from us and an old man. He came over to me when my pal had gone to the toilet and said 'I can tell your fortune.' I thought he was drunk and played along, however he told me things that NO ONE would have known, incl my childhood nickname in the family.

It was very, very weird.

What was your nickname?

No, I think children have a sixth sense though!
I've been to a few 'psychics' with friends. Friends came out in tears claiming they'd been told just everything. I came out each time with a face like a slapped arse having blatantly been cold read. Nothing at all they said to me was 1. Specific 2. Accurate.

However my sister was weirdly psychic when we were kids, she used to really freak my mum out with it. She had detailed dreams of things happening... which happened the same night she dreamt them! She used to 'zone out' too and when she snapped out of it she'd say "mum, did you know X person is pregnant? Did you know Y person is in hospital?" When she couldn't possibly have known, X person didn't even know she was pregnant herself at the time!
My own DC told me a relative was dying, completely out of the blue, she couldn't have overheard any conversations because none of us knew he was even unwell. We had a call the same night to tell us he had stage 4! I asked her how she knew and she was all "dunno, just knew"
My sister grew out of it and doesn't even remember her odd moments.

@merrymelody

Yes, I do but there are very, very few real ones.

There are no real ones. None.

I love threads like this! 🤗
OP, did they just say your DH's name out of the blue, first guess?
I'm a real sceptic but would love to be proved wrong.
Does anyone know where they supposedly pull the future from?
Is it your deceased family or friend? How do they know? Is the spirit state 'non-linear' so everything that will happen to us is already there?/unable to be changed in any way?
If the info is not from the Dead, but from cards for example? It can only mean that it's already mapped out can't it? 🤔

Any psychics out there, can you tell me what I placed in my family member's coffin? Feel free to PM me. You would never be able to guess, do don't try 😎

That would be Gordon Smith the ‘psychic barber’ who took over from Derek Acorah on Most Haunted, had his own TV show and a ‘talking to the dead’ tabloid column, and has published a string of books about his psychic powers?

Yeah, he’s totally uninterested in material gain.

And the ‘Glasgow University’ tests were nothing to do with the university. They were conducted by a crackpot long-retired emeritus professor Archie Roy, also founder and president of the Scottish Association for Psychical Research, and who, judging by his obituaries, embarrassed the university by turning to mediumship (he was called ‘Glasgow’s Ghostbuster’), writing spooky novels and ‘psychic research’ in later life. His big ‘scoop’ was a massive tome on how there is proof of an afterlife because ‘cross-correspondences’ between automatic writing ‘dictated’ to different mediums in different countries after the death of the Tory PM Balfour, reveal common classical allusions and references to a saviour that the dead (all former members of the Society for Psychical Research, it seems) apparently thought it best to scatter around the world in automatic writing scripts that total 14,000 pages.

Yeah, totally.

Sorry, that was in response to @AwaAnBileYerHeid’S post referencing a psychic being tested at Glasgow U.

None of them are real. Con merchants at worst, deluded at best. I despise them.

Agree with everything @Nesbo has said

They are wicked people preying on the vulnerable