Would anyone listen to a psychic? Or is it total rubbish?

[MartyMcFlown]

I'm feeling potty even asking this, but my very old Grandma has been reading the tea leaves for a long time and I was visiting her and as I was walking out she told me that I was going to marry the man in the blue and white striped shirt, and that he was quiet and didn't give much away but that I was going to love him more than I have ever loved anyone; and to be kind to him and gave me a bit more advice.

I was then quite weirded out when the man I am dating walked into a date last night in a blue and white stiped shirt.

I hadn't told Gran I was seeing anyone, but the whole thing had me wondering if I should take the advice she gave me.

Are things like this just total random rubbish or would anyone listen to it?

Pile of shite.

Spoken like a true disbeliever, hereandthere.

There's nothing wrong with telling it how you think it is, providing you accept that others may hold beliefs which are entirely at odds with your own and that all beliefs have validity for those who ascribe to them.

I know it sounds totally ridiculous to even ask but it's a bit like that feeling where you think superstition is bull crap but still don't walk under ladders just in case!

I think it just affected me in the head for whatever reason because she hardly talks sice she had her stroke, and she seems all wise and was so convinced of herself! Maybe I just wanted to believe her so a bit of it went it.

It was quite creepy though! She said I was seeing a man who was shorter than I would like with black hair and a quiet way and he had a blue and white striped shirt on, and she told me he was the one I was going to marry but that I had to stop pushing him away.

I had personally seen it as playing it carefully, but I suppose I have pushed him away. Maybe these things trigger what we are thinking about in ourselves.

It was creepy though. Just as I left her he sent me a picture message of him at work with a little bit of blue and white stripe in it, then that night walked in wearing it.

I asked him about it and he said "I almost worse my other one, had it half on and then changed to this one".

It was a bit weird! But I suppose life is full of that.

Anyway, I told him what my Gran said, and he said that sounded totally legit, let's get married, and then we had a good laugh!

I have regularly predicted stuff that turned out to be accurate. I have done tarot spreads where even when shuffled the same cards have come out in more or less the same position multiple times on the trot. Tarot cards warned specifically against marrying my first husband repeatedly (I didn't listen)

It is easy to dismiss stuff as ridiculous. Maybe it is. But if you mess around with it for any length of time you have your doubts. Maybe they are just a way of drawing out what you already know, on which case I'm amassed by how much more I can draw out with the cards than without.

My cards are sat in the cupboard because actually they rarely tell me what I want to hear; often they make decidedly uncomfortable reading. Personally I don't often share my views or what I can do with them because I don't like playing the part of mad cassandra.

I doubt your nan does either

tormentil

But looked at objectively:

-you were under pressure
-you didn't know where to start
-in that case you would prob look somewhere you'd 'been before'
-someone throws you an idea of somewhere nice to live (it could have been your mum or a friend. It could have been me. In this case it was a psychic)
-you look in that area for a house

Now, you could have house hunted there and though nah, not for us and you'd have forgotten the psychic's prediction.

You could have moved and hated it. The psychic would then have been wrong and you'd have either forgotten the prediction or felt a bit miffed.

However, you found a house you liked and happily lived there for 10 years. So the psychic's 'prediction' fits nicely. If you are someone who is predisposed to 'believe' it would fit the confirmation bias theory.

How many things did the psychic say that were wrong? Or at the least guessable or applicable to thousands of other people?

Am not having a go at all, just think it's easy to scratch the surface with these phoneys and see them for what they are.

As you say, a bit of fun - until vulnerable / grieving people come to rely on them.

Oh yes the lottery number thing. Boy I wish it worked like that, sadly it doesn't.

It's more like suddenly knowing your grandads dead at exactly the right time before anyone in your family were told. I don't often go around suddenly knowing my grandads dead (and then only remember the occasion I was right). Nor does it happen all the time but some people it happens more often and easier with.

MartyMcFlown

Yes, superstition is generally nonsense. But some is based on common sense. Therefore, something is more likely to happen in that scenario than in normal circumstances. It means some superstitions are self-fulfilling prophecies and adds to the sense they are real.

For example: don't walk under a ladder. Well no, don't, coz something might fall on you or the ladder might be unstable. Nothing to do with 'superstition' just straightforward common sense.

Other things like magpies or 13 are total nonsense. However, if you see three magpies and hear of the birth of a baby girl, you may think, 'ah! The magpies were right!' If you don't hear of the birth of a baby girl or the birth of a baby boy, you won't give it another thought. Likewise if you hear of the birth of a baby girl and haven't seen three magpies - that is disregarded.

It'll just be the three magpies / birth of baby girl that'll be remembered.

Human psychology is truly fascinating!

I went to a psychic show one time. Anyway the psychic picked out somebody from the crowd. The psychic then said your mother has passed over am I correct? The lady she was reading was about 90 years old! Fail!

It's bullshit. The phoenix nights episode with the psychic is funny, shows it up for the rubbish it is.

I walk under ladders.

I don't walk under them if there's someone up them.

Yeah I'm not sure I would go to a psychic show if I genuinely wanted a psychic reading.

You ask that friend who probably never mentions it but has that dusty pack of cards on the shelf. They won't charge you, probably will warn against it, would probably rather you didn't mention it again but still do it. (Partly to see if they have still got it).

Or sit and dismiss that random offering from your obviously bonkers old aunt (who has nothing to gain by mentioning it)

Yep Mermaidhair. I had a friend who worked in a regional theatre. They had one of those pyshics that sounds like Doris STokes but was not - if you follow.

Anyhow, we watched about 300 little old ladies from Leeds walk in - these would have pretty much all been miner widows. The woman comes on stage, does her voodoo magic and then goes 'Has anyone here husband died recently?' FFS. Why stop at that? Why not say 'Does anyone here have any trouble 'down below'?'

I think your Grandma's guess was so general and would apply to so many potential partners that you are bound to find some kind of match eventually. Perhaps she wanted to encourage you to stick with a relationship as she wants to buy a new hat

It's really not difficult to make guesses about people and their situations. Anyone consulting a "psychic" is probably wrestling with some sort of decision in their life and it doesn't take a miracle to work out what. You might think you're sitting there being all non-committal but you will have an involuntary reaction when the "reader" hits on the subject you're concerned about.

Anyone who is interested in human psychology and really listens to others will find it relatively easy to make informed guesses about that person. I have been asked if I'm psychic (jokingly I'm sure) before when I've asked someone "Out of interest, did [X] happen during your childhood?" All that's happened is I have noticed in what they've said (paying particular attention to word use) a similarity with others who I know have experienced X, Y or Z.

one consulting a "psychic" is probably wrestling with some sort of decision in their life and it doesn't take a miracle to work out what.

One of my first readings, I was a young teen having a laugh with a tarot deck I had just picked up for a laugh. I was doing a "reading" on a very dead pan friend. I basically totally described a very recent non serious event event I knew absolutely nothing about. I still thought I was just having a laugh until much later and she told me otherwise. If I had been cold reading I had done a truly awesome job because it was a really random situation to have picked and made no sense (not to me anyway).

Meh. Maybe I do cold read who knows, certainly not me.

The only time I went to a psychic was when I had left my first husband and moved to another country. I could feel that something awful was going to happen (despite having just met a fabulous man, sex great, head over heels). I was 29 at the time.

On arrival, the psychic looked at me funny after hearing me speak, she then said she couldn't do a reading as her brother had died in the country I had come from and she was, understandably, upset. Her partner did the reading.

Obviously, this was bad. I really wanted to leave there and then. However, I continued and was told I was going to get bad news but that I would deal with it (I could see the hangman card and did feel crestfallen).

A couple of months later I was diagnosed with a tumour (thankfully turned out to be non malignant) on my ovary. I had fertility sparing surgery.

Despite this, I just think the reading was a coincidence. Pity the cards didn't foretell that the fabulous man, sex great etc; - reader I married him - turned out to be an emotionally and sexually abusive shit who left me after 3 children for someone else (on reflection, poor woman).

Toffeelatteplease

But perhaps you are good at cold reading, picking up on body language, sub-consciously remembering things you've heard etc. I think this is, in fact, what those 'good' psychics who really believe they have a gift actually do. The human brain is an amazing thing - we've barely scratched the surface in our understanding of it.

Elendon

Yep, I love that one: something bad is going to happen. Well, yes, this is life, something bad is going to happen!

Right up there with:

-you are going to meet someone important soon
-have you got someone in spirit?
-you've got an important decision to make
-I've got an older person here, they had something wrong with their heart towards the end
-I'm seeing financial worries
-they say their name is....er, I'm getting a B, no a C, D? E?, G? P, T, V? OK, I'll get my coat.

You could have 2 and 200 you know. There are one too many charlatans out there, but on the other side "2" do exist. :) I've only went to a psychic once and I got disappointed, but you never know...

See there is the problem.

If you get it right you tend to chalk it up to coincidence, at least at the start. But you find you very rarely end up hearing things in a way that makes sense or if it does make sense you rarely want to hear

Eventually i decided i rather not know.

Pity the cards didn't foretell that an emotionally and sexually abusive shit.
If the cards had have predicted that the reader is unlikely to have told you. Ethically you don't tend to read the bits you can't put a positive spin on (can't remember where I read that)... of course you can read them for yourself. Also often spreads only tell about the most pressing thing (even if you don't realise at the time it is) or most immediate thing. I can also want to do a spread about one thing and get it about something entirely different. That's why I would never read for money. You never know what you are going to get.

MagicalMrsMisstoffolees

*But looked at objectively:

-you were under pressure
-you didn't know where to start
-in that case you would prob look somewhere you'd 'been before'
-someone throws you an idea of somewhere nice to live (it could have been your mum or a friend. It could have been me. In this case it was a psychic)
-you look in that area for a house

Now, you could have house hunted there and though nah, not for us and you'd have forgotten the psychic's prediction.

You could have moved and hated it. The psychic would then have been wrong and you'd have either forgotten the prediction or felt a bit miffed.

However, you found a house you liked and happily lived there for 10 years. So the psychic's 'prediction' fits nicely. If you are someone who is predisposed to 'believe' it would fit the confirmation bias theory.

How many things did the psychic say that were wrong? Or at the least guessable or applicable to thousands of other people?

Am not having a go at all, just think it's easy to scratch the surface with these phoneys and see them for what they are.

As you say, a bit of fun - until vulnerable / grieving people come to rely on them.*

If that was the case, I would have gone there first. It wasn't just the last place I looked, but the last place possible to look...

It is utter utter rubbish. These people prey on vulnerable grieving people and have no thoughts other than to make as much money as possible before they are found out. Don't want to out myself but I work (on mat leave) in an industry that knows the ins and outs of this...

I think most "psychics" believe their hype. Like other pp have said once theyve got 1 question right its all up for grabs. And then it gets to the point where they have told the lie so often that they believe it to be the truth or they are just genuinely schizophrenic...

You only have to read the online reviews of the big names and they are all terrible. Either not getting anything correct or when they have found a poor sucker person, who has a J name in the family (John, Jessica, James, Julia etc -it is sooo easy) they are ridiculously insensitive. There was one woman I know of whose son killed himself by hanging. a big name psychic (who I won't name just in case it does out me) managed to weedle this out of the lady and basically said "I can still see him swinging" - this is exactly what you want to hear when you are grieving and have paid an extortionate amount of money to someone who "might" get something right...

Psychics should be banned.

Fwiw You should also look up a brilliant man called James Randy who has been trying to find a genuinely psychic person for about (it might be well over) 40 years - anyone who is proven psychic wins a million dollars. No one has won and afaik no really big names have attempted it. It's all on YouTube and is very fascinating.

I don't know is the honest answer.

I'm generally agnostic but atheist on grumpy days.

I have a friend who is training with the spiritualist church and tells me about her clairvoyant and clairaudiant experiences. I have no reason to disbelieve her (the experiences are not related to me) yet I remain open-minded rather than a believer.

She has said a couple of things to me that I cannot explain. Again, they didn't directly relate to me, and were very specific yet insignificant things that were happening to my sister that day (she lives 250 miles away and has no contact with my friend). When I called her, she said they were spot on.

It still doesn't make me an out and out believer though.

It's as real as women's claims of equal division of labour in the home.

It's as real as women's claims of equal division of labour in the home.

It's one those things that very few people have a genuinely open mind on.

If you are deeply sceptical. You are unlikely to put any evidence otherwise down to anything more than coincidence.

Part of the problem is it sits uncomfortably with the idea of freewill.