Natalia O'Sullivan, author of Do It Yourself Psychic Power, is a renowned spiritual teacher and healer. She has a refreshingly open approach to spiritual matters; believing we can all learn to tune into our intuitive, psychic abilities
O’Sullivan has been working as a professional psychic since her early 20s but has been interested in the subject since her teens. Around this time she became ill with something that, “looked like a bit like the plague, with horrible sores in my mouth." Doctors found the illness impossible to diagnose and for a while her family were horrified that she might have leukemia. The baffling sickness vanished as mysteriously as it appeared but it left O’Sullivan with a strange legacy, “I realised that from the time of the illness I awakened or tuned into something; I became clairaudient (the ability to perceive what is beyond normal reaches of hearing) and would hear my name being called. I was terrified. I was brought up a Roman Catholic where the idea of being psychic is very connected with darkness and the devil."
She took comfort in the discovery that her ‘gift' was something of a family inheritance (a fact that had been kept very quiet) and that her great aunt was a spiritualist. “Often when we start out on the road to psychic awareness we discover that a grandparent or forebear was involved with the psychic realms. It's quite common for these intuitive abilities to be inherited but the gift often skips
a generation. Parents may often be uninterested in spiritual matters and find it uncomfortable that their child is so obviously involved or curious."
In her late teens O’Sullivan dropped out of a psychology degree to go on a course of psychic development; a spiritual journey that threw her into a whole new direction. But she still describes herself as having ‘a psychologists head’. “I don't think you can get away from the fact that if you're interested in that side of things that you bring it into your intuitive work. It's good to analyse that, for example, if you carry on with this particular attitude or pattern of behaviour in this particular situation that it's probably going to turn out a particular way. But I also believe that there is a certain amount of destiny involved that can encourage you to move in a different direction."
I ask if her sensitivity interferes in her day to day affairs. “I'm quite clairsentient (being able to sense what is unseen) - it used to happen constantly. I could walk into a room or I could meet someone and immediately feel everything that they felt inside of themselves. That sensitivity can be quite uncomfortable so I launched into a study of psychic protection quite seriously because I knew that while I carried on working in the field that those feelings could be with me all the time."
So how do we become more aware of these energies at work in ourselves? “Something I really want to say to people is that you really do possess the power - even if you don't think you do. One of the misconceptions of being psychic is that it has to be a rare skill, very dramatic and full-on all the time. This isn’t the case at all and it would be nice to rid the world of it. I know psychics that work in the field and we all say we're very down to earth and that the 'gift' is just something you live with. Some of us use psychic abilities without even realising it, though we can be aware that we're receiving information through an 'inner' sense but we don't often talk about it. There are many stories from people who have had psychic encounters: some can tell when a friend is in trouble or know who’s ringing on the phone. “All these feelings are intuitive skills that when taken a step further will enhance their abilities. Everyone has the ability to awaken these powers - we all have the potential but awakening yourself to these feelings is a journey that takes time and patience."
A good place to start
I asked O’Sullivan if there’s there’s a practical exercise that beginners can use to help them get started. “Psychometry (the ability to see psychically through touch) is a good place to begin putting your latent psychic powers into practice because it encourages your psychic awareness to open up. A fun way to learn about psychometry is to turn it into a party game - get everyone to place an object or piece of jewellery on a table, then invite others to 'read' them. But be warned - this game doesn't work so well if everyone is falling around drunk!"
But how, I asked, do you know what to look for? “The first thing to feel for is a colour, image or a word. Our brains acts like computers, picking up signals from the subconscious which works in feelings or pictures. When I ‘tune into’ my intuitive side I experience a sensation, then my brain goes, 'father mother, big person, small person, etc.’
“You would be surprised how many workshops I've run where the people find the telepathy extremely difficult but seem to instantly take to psychometery or aura reading. It shows me that everyone is on a feeling level and you become aware of things with a different part of your mind. I've seen people get quite territorial about the individuals they're working with. They sense an energy that attracts them so it's interesting that they have those feelings and don’t realise that they’ve awakened that facility. People can be surprised that they're functioning like that. I believe it's part of our survival instinct that goes back to before we used all our verbal skills."
Proof of the pudding
O’Sullivan placed a pack of ‘oracle cards’ in front of me and commenced a reading. She talked me through the imagery and offered an (often uncanny) insight into my life’s current pattern. “I like to talk about what a person's soul is like, what their journey is about, how they react to their environment and how their head works. It's funny that most people's heads and hearts are working in very different directions.” She looked at the cards I had drawn from the pack and smiled: apparently this was true for me too.
“When you're reading people it’s also about exchanging ideas - you get a lot out of it and I get better at it. Stonewalling really doesn't benefit anyone. If you tune into someone who you have no rapport with just say you can’t do it because you need some empathy.”
Suitably impressed with O’Sullivan’s insight I place some carefully chosen objects on the table and ask her if she experiences any immediate feelings. She picked up an old leather-bound book of homemade fishing flies that belonged to my father, passed down from my great grandad. I have very happy memories of my dad going fishing.
She hadn’t even opened the wallet to see what it was used for, so I was quite taken aback when she asked if it had belonged to my dad and that it represented peace and a pleasant escape for him; but had my grandfather died young? She was correct on all accounts. Next she picked up a book that my uncle had given me - an old-fashioned Glossary Of Printers’ Terms. But she identified the book as my dad’s and said there was a connection with the sea. I thought she was mistaken until, like all good psychic stories go, my uncle confirmed that my dad had lent the book to him; 50 years ago when they set up their printing business. So where was the sea connection? - they were ship’s compositors in the Merchant Navy... |
