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Formulating Decisions:
The Psychic Dimension by Jacqueline Lichtenberg. (Belfry Books, October, 1997.) I’ve known a lot of good psychics and a couple of great ones. I’ve never envied them. There are at least two main reasons people seek out psychics (other than that they believe a psychic has some ability they, themselves don’t have): 1) To find the answer they’re anxious about, usually about the future; 2) To verify or prove to themselves that reality isn’t what they always thought it was. As we discussed last month, to be plausible, a story has to have all of life’s affairs in it, from mythology to confrontations with the Unknown, such as an impossible ability to foresee the future. When someone sets out to map their personal universe, as they do when consulting a psychic, they want to know not only what’s true for them, but what has been true for others—what do “I” have in common with humanity? How am I typical, but also how am I different? So when the notion comes up that there are certain people who are “different” in the way that they can perceive the underlying patterns of reality, some seekers go from psychic to psychic, exploring Tarot, Astrology, bones, Runes, tea leaves, and every other tool, never satisfied. So what do they really want? Reassurance? Or more issues to be anxious about? There are at least two assumptions that drive this search for someone to tell us the shape of our reality: 1) There exists “a” reality to be told about, an objective reality. 2) Someone knows something I don’t, and if I knew it, I could make better decisions. Each of these assumptions is worth challenging and verifying from at least two independent sources. Most schools today do not teach how to do original research from original sources. The Internet has fostered a kind of mental laziness that causes people to accept a fact as verified if it comes from two sources—one derived from the other, rather than independent. In other words, in our electronic age, the wide-spreading of a rumor or gossip item is taken as verification of it as a fact. So what is someone who is serious about walking the Inner Paths to do to clean up their thinking habits so it is safe for them to handle the power of knowing the shape of reality? First of all, have a talk with yourself about self esteem. Figure out why you think someone else has a better chance of discerning your future for you than you do—and meditate real hard on the concepts of fate vs. free will. To help with that, you might want to read the first volume in my book on Tarot, Never Cross A Palm With Silver (which is available on Amazon.com) and then read (for free) my ten blog entries on the Swords Minor Arcana posted every Tuesday from August to October, 2007, at http://aliendjinnromances.blogspot.com. In short, there are ways to change your “fate,” but this involves doing things you very sincerely want not to do. It involves facing and charting the unknown. It involves confronting truth, taking personal responsibility for your actions, and making choices. The Suit of Swords is all about those kinds of choices based on assumptions. The simple little kiddie show that grew up, Doctor Who, recently aired a new episode that delineates the role of assumptions in decision making by group minds. In the far, far future, all the survivors of New New York are trapped in a road-tunnel in campers, driving and driving eternally, suffering from the awful fumes. The Doctor’s new companion is kidnapped to be a third passenger to get one vehicle down into the “Fast Lane” because “everyone knows” that’s the way out of this decades long traffic jam. It turns out that those who had traveled for years thinking they were trapped were actually protected. Those who descended into the Fast Lane died horribly. The Doctor released the protected people because the external atmospheric condition they were protected from had finally dissipated. He opened the top of the tunnel, which was designed to be opened, and they were free, and free of their assumptions. It’s good SF because it says, “Look at your own assumptions and verify them. Don’t believe what everyone else says.” So if you find yourself going from psychic to psychic searching for something, examine your own assumptions and your sources of information (and their sources). A psychic is a professional practitioner, like a doctor, a lawyer, a psychologist. Essentially: garbage in; garbage out. You, as a client, must use your hired expert by doing your own part of the job if you want usable results. To discover how to use a psychic, read Sylvia Browne’s Insight, Case Files from the Psychic World. Here you will find a solid exploration of the use of the power of knowledge obtained psychically (plus many plot ideas). This book will give you the background necessary to be a good client and get the results you need, but only if you have your own mind sorted out first. Understand how it can be that everyone is psychic but only a few of us have the gift of giving insight to others. Understand your own talent, its power and its limits. And understand why even a psychic might need to consult a psychic. You can never “read” for yourself for the same reason you can’t correct your own typos, critique or copyedit your own story. You know what your life is “supposed to say” and therefore can’t see what it says. If finding the right editor is important for a novel—finding the right psychic is even more important for editing a life. You need to see your life through the eyes of another, from another perspective. At the same time, you should take the psychic’s advice the same way you take an editor’s—understand what they “see,” then find your own solution, not necessarily the one suggested to you. As an antidote to being too suggestible, I suggest reading an innocent little urban fantasy titled Magic Lost, Trouble Found by Lisa Shearin. It’s a hard-boiled magic user novel, with a female protagonist told in first person. Raine Benares comes from a family of smugglers, raised with no respect for “legality” but considerable caution about law. She’s being chased by goblins who are after a magic amulet that holds limitless power, which they think she has. This amulet would enhance her mediocre abilities, and could make her the most powerful of her kind. Ah, but what might such enhancement do to her soul? And what might induce her to sacrifice her soul to get the power? Here’s a quick quote from the beginning: “My name is Raine Benares. I’m a seeker. I find things. Most times the people who hire me are glad when I do, but sometimes they’re sorry they asked. Personally, I think people should be more careful what they ask for. Some things are better left unfound.” And at the end of the book: “I’m a seeker. I find things. Fate sure does have a warped sense of humor. Now I’m what the bad guys are trying to find. Most times people are glad when they find what they’re looking for. Sometimes they’re sorry they asked. If you ask me, folks should be more careful what they ask for. I cinched the buckle on my brace of throwing knives. Some things are better left unfound. Like me.” This series on formulating decisions is all about seeking data, scarfing up data from anywhere and everywhere until you have enough bits and pieces to make a picture in your mind of how the universe around you is shaped, how it works, how it responds to you personally. Finding and blending the objective and subjective universes in which you are embedded is the task of your life. Science seeks the Unified Field Theory, relating all the four basic forces that hold the universe together. Spirituality seeks to balance the subjective inner world, resolving psychological conflicts that separate us from our spiritual roots. Plug all the data you can gather into these two equations—the physical and the spiritual—that describe your world, and you will produce a picture, an image of reality from your own point of view. Once you can see that picture clearly, you can chart your own course with your own free will choices. Theory says this clarity of vision shared among us all will bring the world true peace.
Send books for review in this column to: Jacqueline Lichtenberg, email jl@simegen.com for instructions. |
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