what does a medium 'hear'?

[GoodDaysBadDays]

I'm a sceptic who'd quite like to be a believer.

What puzzles me most is why, if a medium can communicate with those who have died, can those spirits not just day "hi I'm john smith, I have a message for tracey smith"? Why all the cryptic clues and names that sound like others etc.

Is it hard to understand them? Do they not 'speak' as we do?

I'm not trying to start a debate about the rights and wrongs of mediumship, just curious as to what they hear and see.

Mrschuffthemuff - do keep records, follow up with clients, or offer a moneyback guarantees if the predictions don't come true? Just wondering how you judge the sucess rate?

Nah snorbs, there are only so many people interested, and there are a lot of tarot readers! Also, at maximum you should advise a client to have no more than 1 reading every six months, roughly, maybe a bit more if they the shit has hit the fan for them or there have been lots of changes. So it's not like you will get repeat business on a frequent basis.

Also I charge peanuts so I'm a long way from a million!

That is a good point himalaya. Generally readers will give a client their card and say 'let me know how x turns out or if y does happen' but of course that relies on the client! It would be an excellent idea to take basic details, say mobile number or e-mail, and follow up 3 months later. Bloody good idea. Tarot is still a bit in the dark ages I think...

You can't offer a money back guarantee as regards to 'I am predicting you will return to studying within the next twelve months and if not you can have your money back.' Not only will you not know if the client is trying it on or not in order to get cash back, but also in the end it is down to the clients choice. It may, at the time, within pre-existing conditions, most likely that the client will return to study, but many factors come into play. The future is not set in stone - but there are likely outcomes. That is what we predict.

But tarot is not just about predicting the future, it's about where you started from, how you got there, what options are open to you in a particular situation and what the likely outcomes are based on the options you take.

I rely on the feedback I get from the client. In a good reading, the client should feel that you spoke to them as if you have known them all their lives, know everything about them and are able to access their deepest emotions. Sometimes I have felt a clients emotions, (clairsentience) and that helps me understand where they are coming from. Not every tarot reader will do that though.

A good reading will score hit after hit and your client will just be smiling and nodding and not feeding you any information. You feel absolutely sure that what you are saying is 100% right - no trying to make it fit, changing it, or second guessing. If the client is confused, not sure what you are referring to, or straight out says, 'no that's wrong' then I would apologise and not take any money. If the client was happy to take it, I woulod offer a free reading at some other time, and hope that I can do better for them.

Sorry I am rambling on, tarot has been used in my family for 4 generations so it is something close to my heart!

When I say 'I rely on the feedback from the client' I mean either a face like this or will tell me I am spot on with what I am say, whereas is a miss. Sometimes you get a if you say something true but uncomfortable. I am glad to say I have had only two clients go . But it gave me the same feeling as a bad auditioner on the Xfactor when they get 3 'No's.

Calamity, that thing with the dowsers was funny - they were so earnest. It was in a Richard Dawkins series, he was very nice to them - they played square and did a proper trial. Even funnier was when he consulted a medium who was happily communicating with RDs father 'on the other side'... only thing was, at the time his father was alive ...

The thing is though Mrschuff, most people can pick up on other peoples emotions, you don't have to be clairseant.

And then when you say people are nodding and smiling but not giving you information - nodding and smiling is giving you information! It's telling you that you are on the right track, and to keep going.. Can you be sure you are not subconciously picking up on these clues and expanding on interpretations that seem to be hitting the spot, while skipping over those that fall flat.

Why not try a Randi test on yourself?. Say ask 10 friends to volunteer get them to pick their cards but don't show them or tell them anything. Write down your reading. Have another friend collect all the readings and 6 months later give each volunteer the write ups of 3 different
readings - their own plus a randomn 2. Ask them which one most closely matches their experiences over the past 6 months, and how closely. See if there is a correlation.

My concern there would be that people may have a poor or limited recollection of where they were at 6 months ago.

If you could get them to keep a diary of life events and things, then that would be better than trying to remember that far back.

However I do quite fancy a Randi test of reading poeople 'blind.' But I would prefer say to do 2 topics per client and them see if they could identify their reading afterwards? This would mainly check existing facts though. A follow up would be good - but as I say predicting the future is not the whole of tarot. You try to show people the paths they can take and the probable outcome, but you cannot 100% guarantee because of the pesky thing called called free will. Although there are many many spreads you could use, it's worth noting that in a traditional celtic cross spread there are 12 cards and only 5 of them deal with future events.

I do like the idea of following up on clients though...

Also it would be daft to pick friends as you already know so much about them and could probably predict quite a lot of future events from that informatiom. So my friend X who is addicted to shopping with her credit cards and has just lost her job, well you wouldn't need to be psychic to say 'hmm I sense you are worried about finances... I predict a letter will arrive, concerned with a sum of money you owe... I can see you moving into a very small house...'

Hang on! Have I just switched sides of the debate??!

I think this casts an interesting light on tarot.

Yes but it's just someone's opinion!

I have a very well known psychic who has been paid to find oil! (she did)

Reiki is a thriving business, and also used by the NHS in some areas - mainly pain control and post operative treatment.

There are many businesses that do use astrology (not a fan myself) and tarot for business decisions - and many many business people who pay for those services privately. You can understand why they don't shout about it. I have a friend in New York who specialises in assisting corporate clients!

The crystal energy one is ridiculous - never have I heard that crystal energy is being touted as a replacement for electricity. It bascially works on the same energy principal as reiki. Less popular though.

As for the military, well, the United States at least has spent millions on the remote viewing program - with good results. Did you hear that? GOOD RESULTS! Not faked, not cold reading, not derek fucking acorah, the US government got results good enough to continue funding! Remote viewing is a technique that many people can be trained to use.

We don't know what the human mind is capable of, I for one don't think we should dismiss everything with amusing diagrams just because we don't understand it / think it's weird / out of the ordinary. Be sceptical, absolutely, in fact it's a must, but I am constantly amazed at how people dismiss things without knowing the first thing about them / how they can / do work. Read up. Then you can build a solid arguement.

"United States at least has spent millions on the remote viewing program - with good results. Did you hear that? "

Bullshit. The US military's remote viewing programme was widely considered a) as a joke, and b) mainly as a means of putting the wind up the goddam commies. The project was cancelled after it became clear that there was no solid evidence of any such abilities. If it worked, it wouldn't have been cancelled, would it?

"But isn't it strange that such information never seems to be concrete things such as surnames and dates of birth?"

Snorbs I have. Checkable facts, full names, address and other verifiable details.

I am a post cog and as a child I used to "see" images that overlaid the "real" world. When I described these images, people and events my parents were rather shocked but years later as an adult they were able to verify them. I described events that had happened in their life time, many years before I had been born. Family events that had never been spoken about because of shame.

I experience things as though in the first person now with physical feelings and more recently I have picked up on things that happened many years ago. DH was rather skeptical at first but after some research we were able to verify that the deceased for whom I had full name, address, time and place of death, husbands name and other details, had existed and all facts were correct.
Someone fairly close to my family died young in suspicious circumstances and unfortunately for me she wouldn?t leave me alone until I knew what had happened and that she wasn?t ready to die. This information was also put to the test by one other psychic who has no connection to me. Someone in the deceased family consulted a medium who told them what I already knew.

So what now, what use is this skill, because it's not a gift, it?s a slightly inconvenient nuisance at times and I have no desire to make money from it.

I saw Sally on TV trailing around after katie price, wouldn?t it be fair to say that she was vague and non specific and that she would also have a lot of prior knowledge of her clients

Simple answer - they don't.

nemo, indigo and mrschuff - thank you so much for being able to say what i have not. i too adm very reluctant to say anything about my abilities - someof my close friends know and my db knows, dp i have said something to a couple of times but he prefers to be sceptical.

there are, unfortunately, cold readers who are very, very vague and cause sceptics to tar us all with the same brush.

fwiw, as with people who have other abilities - such as carpentry or electricians, mediums and psychics differ in the abilities that they have. some can use crystals etc adn with very good results, and i have seen this in my own family.

i, personally, don't see the point of cold reading someone - it is cheating (for both the reader and 'readee') and unfair on the person asking for the reading.

i gave messages to someone i considered a very close friend, the accuracyof the reading and what i could see (in a kind of 'fly on the wall' feeling) was very scary for her and i lost a friend because of it

other people charge for their abilities - it's called wages - why can't mediums?????

FFS, this is 2011. It's like the Enlightenment never happened.

Believe what you like but as soon as you start talking about fairies, ESP, chatting with the dead or unicorns then you reveal yourself as a grade A loon.

"other people charge for their abilities - it's called wages - why can't mediums?????"

Because there has never been any convincing evidence whatsoever that mediums have any supernatural abilities whereas, on the other hand, there are endless examples of mediums who claim such abilities but who turn out to be frauds and/or liars?

"most people can pick up on other peoples emotions" - actually I think this is something that is on a scale or a continuum, some people are obviously better at it than others, and there must be some people who are on the extreme ends of the spectrum who have abilities that the normal population would view as 'gifted'.
My personal opinion is that there are people who have an extreme sensitivity to emotions, intuition, etc which helps them to read people. Almost like the opposite of those who are unable to identify other people's emotions at all, but have an extreme ability to identify patterns/analyse/process logical connections. We know that there is an inheritance aspect for those who have things like Aspergers syndrom, and there's often a 'my mother, my grandmother, her grandmother' aspect in those who have these extreme empathetic abilities as well. It's just not generally thought of as a medical problem so hasn't been 'named' or made a syndrome.

aurora thanks :) Well done in being brave in giving your friend a reading. Perhaps she had to react this way in order to allow you both to grow? A challenge in a way. Also though, a feedback for yourself to know that you are receiving the correct information. All good.

I find it very difficult to convey into words that people who have not experienced it for themselves (the seeing dead people, talking to you in your mind etc etc) therefore I don't bother trying to prove myself really. It all gets a bit too draining. Also, I wouldn't have a clue how to cold read anyone. I hear thoughts in my head, and I see visions/daydreams call it what you can, and I certainly don't think I have any medical problems. I have written more about it on other threads on here. I don't disclose to my closest friends what I can do, but slowly I let them know about some dreams I've had and things like that. I feel that this is somehow accepted as more normal - as loads of folk have dreams. I am slowly slowly not being afraid to be myself, and if this is the way I am, then why shouldn't I be me? Others are themselves.

I am not a practising spey wifey, but I do know what I hear, see and feel is real. It can't be explained or proven, and I don't even know how to begin. It's better that I say that this is my reality, and if you believe in God, devil etc, then that's yours. It's like something hasn't been designed yet to measure it (whatever it is), if that makes sense. When electricity was discovered, did they all stand around saying, well - we can't see it, so how can it be real. Oh, I know - let's invent something that can measure it, then it will be tangable and real?

I don't even know if I'd consider myself a medium, a psychic, an energy reader, a normal woman!!!! I might put myself to the test on here and see what I can see for those I've never even met. Who knows?

You know that horribly feeling you get in the pit of your stomach when you meet someone, or the nice little butterflies? That's part of your intuition/instinct. It's my belief that some are more tuned into that than others. And then there are those of us who speak to angels, and the odd unicorn. :) I wonder if animals can converse with spirit...........

Cold reading is an art and a discipline in itself. Most so-called mediums aren't even good at it. If you know how it works, the clumsy efforts of TV mediums are actually funny.
If there is indeed an afterlife, it seems to be crammed with red indian spirit guides and buffooons wanting to tell someone down here that "Uncle Albert says "Hi." Having such a celestial overview, you'd think they would have something more profound to contribute. What about a tip on the Grand national, Uncle Al?
Tarot cards and runes have a fascinating history and anyone with an interest in the esoteric will find much food for thought and contemplation in even the most cursory study of them. Anyone who tells you that they can read them and predict anything of value to you through them is deluding themself, you or both.
The only lasting impression they will make is on your wallet.

There are loads of people on here who could have James Randi's million bucks. What's stopping them?

I saw a medium last week and it was the biggest crock of shit ever. Lots of "your Gran's still alive then , oh no she's dead, she's showing me some unfinished knitting (she never knitted or sewed, etc).

Stuff like "I'm seeing horses, why are there horses". Well I reckon most people even if they don't ride would know someone who did, etc. Especially round here which is like horse central county.

Best bit was "you know someone in the armed forces". I told them I didn't. "It could be a neighbour or a friend not close family". Told them I still don't know anyone. So they told me someone I know must be raising money for Help for Heros as they can see the wristband. Told them no. So then they said I was going to be asked to donate some money for Help For Heros. Talk about grasping at straws.

But they did tell my friend that her dad was there and gave her his name straight away which was correct.

Somebody said thart Derek Ackorah started his gig with "Does the name Mc Donald mean anything?"

In Edinburgh.

It wouldn't surprise me. No doubt there was a ready audience of mugs astounded by his psychic insights.
I once attended a psychic fair out of idle curiosity and one of the "gifted mediums" plying their wares asked the audience, "Has anyone bought a hat recently? I'm getting something about a hat."
And yes, it was the middle of winter. My friend and I were asked to leave. Apparently our laughter was interfering with the vibrations- or something like that.

I went to a psychic fayre recently with a friend. She got a reading done and the guy was so obviously cold reading! The things he did get right were logical guesses. For instance, he asked where she was from. She is from the US. He then predicted a move in her future, which while correct, is also a logical assumption given that she's already moved continents.

indigo - i knew it was the correct info, i never asked her questions just told her.