BOOK EXCERPT FROM "THE PSYCHIC DEVELOPMENT PROJECT"

I was filling the coffee pot with water while staring out the window and watching a squirrel.  I decided to shake things up this time and started yelling "4!" over and over in my mind until the urge to stop yelled back.  I stopped the water and set the pot down to settle the water.  No surprise; it was precisely on the 4-cup mark, for the millionth time. 

Yelling "4!" in my mind was pretty creative, and I surprised myself when I did it.  Most of the credit had to be given to the fact that I was in a bad mood.  Yelling at something, even in my mind, was a product of my mood, and the coffee water was a safe target. And it kind of made me laugh at myself.  I wasn't really mad, but I was fed up with how easy it was for me to apply psychic ability to trivial things and little tests.  Why about bigger things?  How hard is it to open up psychic awareness for real life situations?  I appreciated that I had become so good at this simple use of psychic ability that I could now take it for granted.  But it made me think, I really need to be creating new ways of using and testing my ability.  Little tricks and tests were becoming way too easy for me.  I needed something more challenging. 

Little tricks like testing my psychic ability to tell me when the water level was exactly where I wanted it to be without looking or guessing were great practice.  I hit the mark every time, no matter how fast or slow the water ran.   And I wasn't counting or doing anything else to time the running water.  It didn’t matter what I used to “turn on” my psychic perception, it worked every time I applied my intention of doing so.  These little daily tests were becoming insignificant to me.  Still amazing, yes, but I needed to figure out more important uses for applying intention for psychic perception.  The coffee water had only been a test, one of many.  I'd use anything I could to practice my psychic ability on because, after all, being right wasn't my goal.  My goal was solely to learn in what ways my psychic senses could bring me information that wasn't coming to me through any of my other normal senses.  The easiness of my simple tests summed it up perfectly….all I needed was the intention of information through psychic awareness, and opening up the channel to receive it.  It didn’t matter to me how the information was conveyed, so long as I noticed it.  Whatever manner the information came to me, I accepted as a direct response to my intention. 

For instance, with the test of the running water, my intention was to hit the 4-cup mark perfectly on the line.  So sometimes the urge to stop the running water felt like the gesture of someone putting their hand up in the air, palm facing outward, the way a policeman does while directing traffic.  Sometimes the urge to stop felt like the feeling of rushing forward and suddenly coming to a halt.  Sometimes I'd choose something to stare at and wait for the feeling of my consciousness zeroing in on the object so acutely as if I were about to have an out-of-body experience.  In this morning's case, the urge simply felt like the feeling of someone yelling "stop."  It wasn't lost on me that my yelling was responded to with yelling.  I was the creator of my experience, and I was the creator of my Guidance.  My psychic guidance was given to me from me, just me in another perspective.  How could I use this concept to create more challenging experiences for my project? 

I stood there finishing making my coffee while contemplating all of this.  I knew that the signals I'd receive if I continue to focus my efforts at practice on the coffee water were quite possibly endless.  Or perhaps I'd grow accustom to one or two more than others and my own preferences would establish themselves.  But my goal in developing psychic ability wasn't to use it on the coffee water.  It was time for me to broaden my targets of practice once again. 

I thought to myself that most of my practice targets were related to things I was doing on purpose.  And the idea struck me that it would be intriguing to focus on opening psychic awareness in a more general sense, still related to what I was doing but without purposely having a known target and specific goal.  How could I do that?  It would be neat if I could just go about my day as usual but with an open frame of mind for receiving psychic awareness as necessary or beneficial to me, without me purposely targeting psychic awareness in the moment.     

Trying to come up with new and challenging ways of using, testing, and developing psychic ability was a challenge in itself.  I was kind of getting bored with just manipulating my abilities to tell me the results I wanted.  I wanted to use it for much more than that.  And it wasn't just a matter of manipulating my focus of awareness to see what lies ahead.  In a way, I wanted to combine the two.  So I had to ask myself, How can I get what I want without setting out for a specific goal or target?  How can I use my ability to not only receive a specific piece of information that can verify that my psychic perception is real and trustworthy, but also have it give me something that comes into my awareness based on what I am thinking, feeling, or doing naturally without having to force a specific target or goal in mind? 

I decided that today I'd just go with the flow of my feelings and thoughts, doing whatever I felt like at the moment the way a child plays, moving from one curiosity to another.  I set my intention to move the clutter of thinking and planning aside, and instead create an open-to-receiving, mindless state of being with the idea that I'd receive psychic awareness about my future events related to me that were helpful or beneficial but not something I specifically decided to target. 

Whew.  Does that sound complicated enough?  I honestly didn't even think I'd end up with any results, but I did. 

Standing in the middle of my kitchen, eyes closed, I let go of the feelings and thoughts which were causing me to feel emotional.  I let go of my typical impulse to plan out the chores and errands that I'd normally focus on.  I focused all my attention and awareness just on the present moment.  I raised my mood with some loving thoughts and asked myself what I felt like doing.  And then I did it.

I played Plants vs Zombies on the computer, ate the leftover bacon, washed dishes, polished all my glassware, and then began cleaning the kitchen counters.  I mindlessly stayed in the present moment of what I was doing without thinking about past or future events, worries, or emotions.  My next urge was to re-arrange my kitchen countertops.  I surveyed the space and studied my options.  Not much to work with.  But I considered that if I had another big glass vase like the one housing my ladles, then I could get those odd-shaped things out of my drawers, like the strainer, the meat hammer, the potato masher, and all those tall meat skewers.

Then the psychic thought came into my head, “If you go to the Good Will store, you’ll find an identical vase.”  I was skeptical, but couldn’t ignore the thought that had popped into my head.  It was an exciting feeling.  Would I really find an identical vase to the one I already have or was this just wishful thinking?  I was reluctant to allow myself to go on a little shopping spree especially since I'd just spent over $900 getting my car fixed.  I kept note of the idea in the back of my mind but decided to hold off on going shopping.

I then poured myself some coffee and sat down on the couch to watch television.  Nothing really interesting was on but a 10-minute workout infomercial caught my eye.  I sat and watched the entire thing, already convinced that I just had to have it but unwilling to justify spending $120 on the DVD's, recipes, and resistance bands.  I got up and moved the corner table out of the way and tried doing some of the exercises I'd seen.  It was hard to remember how to do them, and I didn't have one of those resistance bands.  Then I thought about the Good Will store and how if I went there for the glass vase maybe I'd be lucky enough to find a workout DVD.  The psychic thought came to me, “You won't find a DVD but you will find a good resistance band.”  Ok, now it was really getting exciting, and I had to try and curb my impulse to hop in the car and go.  I decided to hold that thought and really let it sink in.  Maybe this was all just wishful thinking and an excuse to go shopping in order to cheer myself up for the sad mood I'd been in lately.  I didn't want to give in to bad habits, especially when money was going to be tight for a little while.

I put the table back and went to take my shower for the day.  I decided that after my shower I'd work on putting my psychic development notes and book notes in order and into plastic page protectors so that I could file them into binders.  It was more than a year's worth of paperwork but it really needed to be done in order to make for easier organization of my psychic experiences.  But after doing my hair and getting dressed the mood struck me again for listening to my Guidance and heading to the Good Will store.  So I did.

Just as I reached the parking lot a psychic feeling hit me....that I was going to find a brand new box of those plastic page protectors.  Now that was hard to believe!  This had to be wishful thinking.   Why would there be brand new page protectors at the Good Will store??  I parked the car and went inside.  No workout DVDs whatsoever.  I moseyed around the corner of the aisle and found a nice 3-inch, 3-ring binder filled with brand new page protectors, and underneath it was a brand new box of 100 of them.  Wow!  That was quite a lucky find.  I made a beeline for the exercise and sports section of the store knowing that the resistance band I wanted just had to be there.  But I didn't see one.  Hmm.  I was so sure I had felt it would be there.  I decided to walk over to the section with all the vases and glassware and quickly scanned the shelves.  There on the top in the back row was the vase that was identical to the one in my kitchen. And there was only one like it.  Wow, that was pretty unbelievable.  I’d found two of the three things I was certain would be here. I decided to give it another shot at looking for that resistance band that I was so certain my Guidance had told me I would find.  And there it was, on the same shelf I had just looked at a few minutes earlier, staring right at me.  During the time I was looking for my vase someone must have put the resistance band here.  I quickly grabbed it and gave it a good look.  Perfect condition and the perfect size for me.  I had to give myself credit for finally developing my intuition to a workable, successful ability.

On any given day you can’t just find three uniquely specific things at the Good Will store.  It wasn’t coincidence.  It was Guidance. 

I believe we all get these guided suggestions on a regular basis, but most of the time we’re usually too busy to notice.  Or we quickly throw them out and call it wishful thinking.  We allow logical thinking to talk us out of listening to it instead of listening to our “gut”.  Most of the time those gut feelings are a way our Guidance is trying to get our attention.  If you notice, the way I received my “gut” feelings in this experience was having those psychic suggestions come into my mind literally as if spoken to me.  It’s always in second person, telling me “You will…”  I don’t think to myself in second person.  If I plan on doing something, the thought is like, “I think I should run a load of laundry.”  Or, “I wonder what I should make for dinner tonight.” 

From the looks of my progression of psychic experiences over the years, I can see that in the beginning I wasn’t getting the direct guided-thought kind of experiences.  I was getting inspiration or ideas, or gut feelings, or coincidences.  Like maybe, instead of the direct suggestions to go to the Good Will store I might instead have ended up going there for another reason.  Say perhaps while visiting my mom she might have wanted to stop there.  And while there I might have accidentally come across those very things.  And while coming across them I would feel myself thinking, “Wow, that’s neat.  I was just thinking about wanting to do some exercises with a resistance band.  Maybe I should get this one.”  Or, “There’s a vase that’s identical to the one in my kitchen.  That’s funny.  I should get it because it would not only match the one I already have but it would help me clean up some clutter.”  Or, “Wow, a box of brand new page protectors!  What a great find.  I certainly can use them, and it’s a fraction of what I’d pay in a retail store.”  I’d be happy for the lucky finds, and enjoy that “what a coincidence” feeling.  But I’d probably not have put two and two together and realized that I was guided to finding them. 

It has taken me several years to learn how to put two and two together.  And in that process I’ve seen the way my psychic coincidences, ideas, and nudges, have turned into full-blown visions, feelings, and words, being given to me seemingly from someone else!  Sometimes in the form of The Voice which sounds like someone speaking directly into my ear.  I think these are truly special and incredible experiences, and I’m grateful for them.  But I don’t think they are only for special or select people.  I really do believe that everyone has basic psychic ability and experiences, but developing your senses and skill is something you have to work on and want to work on.  There are genuinely some who are born so gifted that it just comes naturally.  But I’ve heard some of those people say, “What I do is a gift.  I don’t know how I do it.”  Well, I want to make people aware that the average person can do it too.  I want to tell you that you can have these gifts too.  Your senses of perception are what you make them.  If you want to have better eyesight you can wear glasses.  If you want to hear better you can wear hearing aids.  If you want to work on your health and strength, you can do things to improve them.  Well why not improve your psychic senses of perception?  What do you want to use them for if you could?  What do you think you’ll gain or learn from doing so?  How will it change you or your beliefs about reality? 

USED BOOK SALE...ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK!

I heard about the used book sale at the library and planned on going.  I was looking forward to it until the morning of, when for some strange reason I found myself obsessing over it.  What had been something I was excited about for the past three weeks had suddenly turned into an anxiety-ridden thought, and I almost felt like there was a reason I shouldn't go.  Should I arrive early but wait in the car, or wait at the doors?  Should I carry with me the books I need to return and do that first when the doors open, or do it after I've already browsed the book sale?  Would it be better to be there first thing, or go later instead?  I didn't know why I was feeling anxiety.  I knew it wouldn't be a large book sale, being held in the small meeting room of the library.  Perhaps my anxiety was only due to the fact that I'd be disappointed over not finding anything I wanted.  I psychically scanned to see if that was going to be the culprit, but it didn't seem so.  My anxiety seemed to be coming from other people, as if I were feeling protective of something.

I arrive just ten minutes before the doors open and I see a very long line of people at one of the library's two front doors.  In typical human behavioral fashion, I stand at the end of the line even though I have no idea why there's a line in the first place.  I notice that most everyone has either one or two cardboard boxes or several large tote bags, and it doesn't take me long to realize that the reason for my apprehension and anxiety was due to the fact that this crowd who'd beat me here to the book sale wasn't here for the same reasons I was.  I was merely looking forward to taking my time browsing the books, reading the backs of many, and selecting only those that captured my interest.  Everyone else was here to shove as many books into their boxes and bags as they could for the sake of turning around and selling them at a higher price somewhere else.  Ugh.

I was instantly annoyed at this realization although pleased to solve the mystery of this morning's unusual anxiety.  The aggravating feeling I'd been sensing in my energy, I now knew, was because of all these people who'd also been excitedly planning on coming to the book sale, and their intention and my intention were definitely not in alignment.

The line kept forming long past me.  Of the two men directly behind me, the middle-aged one using walking canes that could barely help him ambulate was doing most of the talking between him and his younger buddy who didn't seem as gung ho to be there.  For the next several minutes he gave his buddy the detailed skinny of the art of used book selling with such haughtiness you'd think he'd invented it himself, which made me wonder why his younger friend didn't already know all this since they drove together.  Was he this guy's son and Pops was teaching him the family biz?

He pointed out that so-and-so was at the front of the line, and then ironically, so-and-so just happened to turn and notice them and began walking toward us.  "Are you here to find your fortune?" the (what's a nice way of saying crippled?) man called out to him cheerily, to which he replied he was doing the usual, just scouting out the sales.

Then ensued a brief monologue from annoying crippled cane guy (yeah, I'm not being nice anymore) about how such a small book sale sure had brought out a big crowd, but that's what happens when there are so few book sales this time of year until the bigger ones come in the summer, and how no one thinks spending four hours on the road is worth their while going down to the Springs on the chance they might not find enough bargains.  "I don't mind spending $300 if I know I'll make it back eventually and it stocks up my supplies for the long term, but I'll only do it if I think it's worth the effort."  The man from the front of the line was cordial, nodded and agreed, and then went back to the head of the line.  Then, to someone else in line, the gregarious man with the canes called out and uncreatively repeated, "Are you here to find your fortune?"  The other book dealer came over and shook his hand and then less enthusiastically replied "no" because he didn't expect to find anything good at such a small book sale.   But he requested that if they saw any art history books, could they grab them for him.  And after he went back to his spot in line, the man with the canes who was still talking nonstop said to his buddy, "Do you think all these people are finally catching on to what we've been doing for years?"  (Ok, at this point I wanted to grab one of his canes and beat his smug arrogance with it).

It took all the strength I had not to turn around and ask if it had ever occurred to them that some people just like to go and browse books, hoping to find something interesting to read because not everyone is a here to buy books to make a profit?  I was genuinely irritated to the point of shaking my head and biting my tongue so as not to say something to these guys.  I knew it wouldn't do any good.  By the looks of half the people in line dealing books was obviously what a lot of people do, but I felt sorry for the rest of us who had been naively excited about a little used book sale!

Once we got inside, I was also feeling sorry for the young mom who had her newborn in a stroller.  And the mom who had brought her preschooler.  And the much older man with one eye who had come only because his wife wanted to.  Once we were inside I saw why everyone had lined up outside.  The room was so small that it had an occupancy sign that said 73, and someone was clicking a counting device as we filed in.  Not everyone got in.

It was literally wall to wall people, save for the space being taken up by tables.  This was no fun at all.  I wasn't able to stand there reading each title and picking up books to read the jacket, let alone kneel down to go through the boxes of books underneath each table.

I was trying to move with the flow of the crowd and find a spot near a table (hard to do since I had to have my purse in front of me instead of behind me because every time someone passing me bumped into it, it almost knocked me backwards) but then someone stepped on my heel, suddenly freeing my foot from my shoe mid-motion of a step which nearly sent me airborne.  Had I not caught myself I wouldn't have gone far.  The nearest person to catch me was only 9 cm away.

The one-eyed man was lucky for being so tall.  He was able to stand in one spot and see over people's heads, but I had to systematically alternate between standing on my tippy-toes or leaning over to stick my head in between two other heads.

The young mother with the big baby stroller wasn't fazed, although I could tell that if she had known what this was going to be like she would not have brought her baby or the stroller with her.  But it wasn't until another woman carrying an armload of books tripped over one of the stroller's wheels that she decided to leave.  The load of books came directly down over the baby, whose mother fortunately caught them and shoved the books back into the other woman's arms.  The young mother didn't say a word but gave her a look that said "I so would have smacked the hell out of you if those books had hit my baby."  The other woman didn't say a word either but looked like she was thinking, "Wow that was close but it wasn't my fault."

This is too crazy, I thought.  I abandoned my hopes of a fun day of used book browsing for myself and decided to see if I could just get something for my daughter and get the heck out of there.  Abby had told me that if I saw any of the Hunger Games books to please get them for her, which I promised to do and to which I added that I'd channel my inner Abby and get her anything else I thought she'd like.  So I was determined not to leave this madhouse without at least something.

I managed to stand on my tippy-toes and found that the Teen section was all the way across the room, in the corner.  No one else was over there.  I squeezed myself through the crowd to the corner and immediately found the first two books to the Hunger Games series.  (Yay!  Small victory!)  I also grabbed Abby a couple other books I thought she might like.  I took the same way back through while worming my way to the front and bumped into the side of the tall, one-eyed man.  He was still standing in the same place he was before.  He reached his arm out around my head, so that my face was now in his armpit, and he grabbed his wife's arm and said, "C'mon, we're leaving!"  He was not happy.

I finally paid and left.  Later after school I brought Abby back as I assumed there wouldn't be a crown then, but much of the selection was gone.

As much as I love books, that's not something I'm going to do again.  I felt sorry for the older people in this community.  Coming to a used book sale where a book is a dollar is right up their alley; searching for books to buy on line from these vultures who jack up the price isn't.  Browsing shelves of books, seeing old ones you know or new ones you don't know, it's all part of the fun I was expecting to have until I found out it's been ruined by people taking advantage of an old and outdated pastime! I'm glad the library makes money that way, I know they need it, but I wished there was a way they could stop the vultures and just let people enjoy themselves.  Then again, that's what the library is for.  (Except for me.  The three-week checkout isn't enough time and I always have to recheck my books out.  Plus, books hold energy.  If I enjoy reading a book I also enjoy the energy I felt while reading it, and so I want to keep it.  Is that just me??)  After I left I happened to run into Mom, who'd just checked out some books.

"What's going on over there?" she asked me.  I told her about the vultures but that at least I got some books for Abby, and she said she just wanted to check out some books before the big snow storm heading our way tomorrow.  Mom said she doesn't like buying books, where would she put them all?  That made me chuckle.  I happen to love buying and having books.  I'll never get one of those electronic book readers.  Holding a book and turning the pages, there's just something about it. My favorites are those trade paperbacks, the soft cover books that are larger than the old pocket paperbacks, because they're easier to hold.  And books smell good too, you know?  They have that book smell that I love so much.

Well, there are still a couple good places I go to get good used books that isn't on line, where there are no vultures, and where I can stand browsing and reading book covers and taking my time.  And I'm not telling where they are.