This is a tremendously popular topic on my blog, The Weiler Psi. There are an awful lot of people out there who are absolutely starved for good information. And it’s not surprising that this is so. Research into psychic ability is fairly common, but understanding about the characteristics that lead to psychic ability is not. This is not to say that researcher’s haven’t tried very hard to pin those characteristics down, they have, but it isn’t very easy to do. Psychic ability is a unique ability.
Most people have no idea what constitutes a psychic person and it’s hard to learn from TV, which presents a rather distorted picture. Is anyone for example really as good as Allison from “Medium?” (No, no one is ever that accurate. It’s a TV show and subject to the need for drama over realism. However, much of what she does and how she does it is in line with what psychics actually do and certainly her personal life in the TV show reflects many of the challenges that psychic people actually face.)
Part of the problem is that being really psychic doesn’t necessarily translate into good performance on tests for psychic ability. Psychologist Jim Carpenter, (who will be my guest on Jan. 15th in the Evolver Learning Lab) has a comprehensive theory of psi known as “First Sight” that explains this.
Psi is a pre-conscious ability that is “on” all the time. However our normal conscious process is to ignore it for the very practical reason that our five senses do a much better job of helping us interact with our normal environment. Our mind is constantly forming patterns, making connections and providing us with a generally uninterrupted experience of reality all of which tend to override psychic input. Pre-consciousness is guided by our subconscious intent, which is guided by our personality type and experiences. That’s what makes it tricky.
A normally introverted person who subconsciously avoids attention might do poorly on a test for psychic ability because they subconsciously either wish to avoid attention, (psi-missing) or are not motivated by it. So it’s not something that you can just decide to do because everyone has difficulty overcoming their subconscious intent. A person might personally have lots of psychic experiences, but not be able to demonstrate them at will. For that reason, scientific testing for psychic ability is usually limited to extroverted people. It can lead to the conclusion that extroverted people are more psychic, but that is not necessarily the case.
Psychic ability is tied to certain personality traits such as creativity and empathy because many of the same thinking processes apply to these types of thinking. Creativity and psychic ability both require an ability to suspend judgment and have extended periods of ambiguity. As such, people who rely primarily on logical, linear thinking, external motivation and using their five senses will have fewer psychic experiences and people who rely on feelings, internal motivation, non linear thinking and internal feelings will have more psi experiences.
There also appears to be a strong connection between psychic ability and overall sensitivity. Highly sensitive people, who feel their emotions strongly. Those people general find that they relate to these ten traits strongly: (By psychologist Kyra Mesich)
1. Emotionally sensitive people feel emotions often and deeply. They feel as if they “wear their emotions on their sleeves.”
2. They are keenly aware of the emotions of people around them.
3. Sensitive people are easily hurt or upset. An insult or unkind remark will affect them deeply.
4. In a similar vein, sensitive people strive to avoid conflicts. They dread arguments and other types of confrontations because the negativity affects them so much.
5. Sensitive people are not able to shake off emotions easily. Once they are saddened or upset by something, they cannot just switch gears and forget it.
6. Sensitive people are greatly affected by emotions they witness. They feel deeply for others’ suffering. Many sensitive people avoid sad movies or watching the news because they cannot bear the weighty emotions that would drive to their core and stick with them afterwards.
7. Sensitive people are prone to suffer from recurrent depression, anxiety or other psychological disorders.
8. One the positive side, sensitive people are also keenly aware of and affected by beauty in art, music and nature. They are the world’s greatest artists and art appreciators.
9. Sensitive people are prone to stimulus overload. That is, they can’t stand large crowds, loud noise, or hectic environments. They feel overwhelmed and depleted by too much stimuli.
10. Sensitive people are born that way. They were sensitive children.
There are a couple different responses kids have to their sensitivity. One type of sensitive child is the stereotypical kid who gets picked on by bullies, and is a well-behaved, good student because she cannot stand the thought of getting into trouble. The other type of sensitive child more often experiences the stimulus overload mentioned in the previous paragraph. These children are thus over stimulated and have difficulty focusing, which causes them problems in school.
Sensitive people typically exhibit all or nearly all of the above descriptors.
One of the sure signs of a truly sensitive person is that he feels animosity toward his sensitive nature. Most sensitive people whole-heartedly wish they were tougher and more thick-skinned. They feel like their sensitivity is a weakness. They wish things didn’t bother them so much.
In addition to these emotional traits, there are also physiological traits that are common with psychic people including being left handed or having good bilateral handedness; problems with an overactive immune system, such as allergies or in more serious cases, lupus. There appears to be a connection between strong psychic ability and epilepsy, bipolar disorder, dyslexia and possibly Asperger’s Syndrome.
In general, those who demonstrate psychic ability most consistently tend to come from families that were supportive and encouraging of psychic ability. Although there also seems to be a connection between traumatic childhoods and psychic ability as well, possibly because psychic ability became a useful tool for avoiding more trauma.
In addition to all of this, there is a social aspect of being psychic that I will only briefly touch on. Psychic people face a number of rather formidable challenges. They are generally creative and creative people don’t fare well in our society. In addition, psychic people are a bona fide suppressed minority and suffer many of the same issues as other minorities, especially gays, especially the problem of “coming out.” It is hard for psychic people to form communities because of both their scarcity and a general predisposition towards minimizing social contact.
Psychic people should also be aware of the scientific controversy surrounding psychic ability. I’ve written a book on this subject, (Psi Wars: TED, Wikipedia and the Battle for the Internet) which uses a controversy at TED this year to highlight the problem. And it is a problem. The scientific view of psychic ability directly affects the ability of psychic people to have legitimacy and status for their ability in our society.
