Everyone has psychic power or ability

HERE ARE more question from the Ateneo de Manila University’s independent publication called Katipunan:

What psychic gifts do you possess?
Truthfully speaking, I do not possess any special psychic gift that is not possessed by everybody else. People have a wrong notion of psychic ability. They think it is possessed only by a few so-called gifted persons. In fact, everybody has psychic power or ability to a lesser or greater degree. This is a natural talent, like singing or drawing. Everybody can sing or draw pictures. But some can sing or draw better than others. The same is true with psychic ability. Everybody has it because it is a natural ability or power of our inner mental faculties.

People are often frightened by things they do not fully understand. What can you say about this?
It is natural for people to be afraid of the unknown, because we cannot tell whether it is harmful or not. For example, death is scary for us because we do not know what will happen after we die.

Do we just disintegrate like a bubble, or do we live again as a spirit? Do we come back to earth in another life, as the Hindus and Buddhists believe, or do we get stuck in a presumed heaven or hell?
Anything that comes directly from the spirit world is scary to the living because we have not bothered to study this field. The cause of our fear, therefore, is ignorance.
What is the antidote for ignorance? Isn’t it “knowledge” or “fact”? Once we have knowledge or fact, then the unknown ceases to be mysterious. It becomes the “known.” What we “know,” we can handle already.

Does everybody possess the gift of, say, telepathy, telekinesis, intuition, clairvoyance?
Yes, but as I pointed out earlier, some people are better at it than others. That’s all. But everybody is psychic, no exception, because the word psychic comes from the Greek word “psyche” meaning mind or soul. So everybody who has a mind or a soul is psychic.
The problem in the Philippines is people have falsely associated psychic with a fortuneteller or a person able to tell the future. This is absolutely wrong. There are many forms or types of psychic powers that do not involve knowing future events, such as those you enumerated: telepathy, telekinesis and clairvoyance. There are also people who can do remote viewing, heal the sick psychically, communicate with spirits, but cannot tell the future. They are all psychics.

Is it possible to develop this psychic gift even if you do not have any, or must you be born with it?
We all have psychic ability, as already mentioned. No one can say he does not have any. This ability can be developed or enhanced. How? The simplest and most important technique or method to develop psychic powers is through regular meditation. Fifteen to 30 minutes of daily meditation is sufficient to experience a growing sensitivity to psychic forces. A special form of meditation to stimulate or activate the psychic centers (or chakras) would be faster. But this should be done under guidance of a knowledgeable person or teacher to avoid pitfalls or problems. People can also attend seminars on how to develop ESP. For example, I conduct regularly a seminar to develop such powers as telepathy, psychometry, sensing the aura, psychic diagnosis, remote viewing and telekinesis. This is usually held in Makati but I can also conduct the seminar anywhere else in the Philippines, or even abroad, if invited.

In a world ruled by science and technology, how would you distinguish what is real from a hoax or trick?
We can use the scientific method to know what is real and what is not. But there are other methods. For example, we can ask several known psychics or clairvoyants to verify what other so-called psychics are doing. They can see if it is fraudulent, a hallucination or only a magic trick.
Remember what the philosopher Soren Kierkegaard said: “There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn’t so. The other is to refuse to believe what is so.”

Next week, I will answer questions about the Inner Mind Development Institute and what science has to say about paranormal phenomena and the mystical.

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Answers to FAQs

Part I
IN connection with an article she is writing for Katipunan Magazine, an independent publication of the Ateneo de Manila University, Julian Qua sent in a number of questions concerning my life and work.Since many of the questions she asked were also often asked by other people, I thought it best to answer them in this column.

Personal questions:
When did you first realize you wanted to pursue this kind of “career”? Why?
You are right in putting the term “career” in quotation marks, for I do not consider what I do to be a career. It really started as a hobby. I was interested in those areas that science considered to be out of its scope, thereby completely ignoring them.Events that cannot be explained scientifically are considered to be “anomalous” phenomena or “paranormal.” I believe, however, that such events are normal and natural. And so I sought to prove this theory.

In time, my hobby or avocation became a vocation. I have now written 15 books on the subject over a period of 25 years. I also have three more manuscripts under preparation.
Who is the most interesting person you’ve met? Why?

There are several persons I’ve personally met whom I consider to be most interesting. One was Pope John Paul II. I met him at the Vatican in 1986 in a special audience. I spoke with him for less than two minutes, but it was a most memorable meeting with the head of the Catholic Church who would later be nominated for sainthood.Imagine meeting personally a would-be saint? It’s not every day you meet one, you know.

The other most interesting persons I’d met were:
• Uri Geller, the Israeli psychic who became famous for bending spoons through telekinesis. I met him in Düsseldorf, Germany, in 1994.

• Luis Gasparetto, the amazing mediumistic painter from Brazil. He can paint a great masterpiece in less than 10 minutes while in a trance. I met him in Argentina in the 1990s.

• Olof Jonsson of Sweden, probably one of the greatest psychics of modern times. I met him in the Philippines during the administration of President Cory Aquino. He helped Marcos find the Yamashita treasure. He died several years ago in Las Vegas.

• Dr. Russell Targ, who led the scientific experiments on remote viewing at Stanford Research Institute (now called SRI International) in Menlo Park, California. He studied for 20 years and scientifically proved the existence of this mental ability.

There are others I consider very interesting personalities that I’ve met, like Tom Johanson, famous spiritual healer from England; Deepak Chopra of the United States; Dr. Hiroshi Motoyoma of Japan; Dr. Hans Naegeli of Switzerland; Dr. Alfred Stelter of Germany; and Dr. Karl Pribram, a neuroscientist from the US.

Who is the person you admire the most?
Aside from the above mentioned individuals, I would say I admire most Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Epictetus, Homer and Shakespeare.

What is your most out-of-this world experience so far?
When I spontaneously went out of my physical body in 1975 and saw my body from the ceiling. I was looking down at my physical body while suspended or floating near the ceiling. That was the strangest thing that ever happened to me, my first conscious out-of-body experience or astral projection.
It was this experience that proved to me the existence of the astral plane and our ability to travel in that realm.

If you could have any kind of power, what would it be and why?
To run faster than a speeding bullet, stop a train with my bare hands, jump a building in a single leap, and have X-ray vision. Ooops! That sounds like Superman! No, seriously, I am happy with whatever I have right now. They are not much, but they are above-average abilities.I think it is wrong to pursue power for the sake of power alone. Power should only be used as a stepping stone toward a higher purpose.

Next week: More questions about psychic gifts and how to develop them will be answered and discussed

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Thinking with the whole brain

AT first, people thought they had only one brain. Then Dr. Roger Sperry demonstrated that we had, in effect, two brains, the left and the right.Dr. Paul MacLean of the California Institute of Technology proposed the Triune-Brain (or three-in-one) theory of the brain.

According to Dr. MacLean, the human brain evolved millions of years ago in three distinct stages. The first to appear or develop was the reptilian brain composed of the brain stem, the mid-brain and the basal ganglia.

This primitive brain’s function was simply to recoil and attack. It recognized habit patterns and territorial integrity. As long as its territory was not touched or crossed, there’s no problem: the reptilian brain would not react. But when it felt that its territory or habitat was threatened or endangered, it would attack or retaliate.This is the brain we have in common with reptiles. Thus, the name “reptilian.”

The next portion of the brain to develop over long periods of evolutionary process was the mammalian brain or limbic system. It is the seat of emotions and controls the body’s autonomic nervous system (breathing, heart beat, etc.) This is the brain we have in common with rats, dogs, horses and other mammals.

The last part of the brain to develop is the neo-cortex, which enables humans to think, especially in an abstract and rational way. The neo-cortex is divided into two hemispheres, the left and the right.

Civilized society
The emergence or development of the neo-cortex enabled humans to discover and develop language, science and technology. In other words, it gave birth to civilized society.
As if these new theories on how the brain works were not enough, along came Ned Herrmann, who proposed that we not only have one, or two or three brains, we have in effect four!
As head of General Electric’s Management Training and Development Department, Herrmann was concerned about improving the way the company trained its staff and managers. He had to learn how people learned. He developed tests and, because of this, his efforts resulted in a novel way of looking at the brain.

He said a person thought in four different ways depending on which part of his brain was dominant or more preferred. He divided the brain into four theoretical quadrants, each representing a distinct pattern of thinking.

On the upper left quadrant, he said people thought “factually, logically, rationally, theoretically and mathematically.” On the lower left quadrant, their thinking was “ordered, detailed, sequential, controlled and conservative.”

On the upper right quadrant, they thought in an “artistic, holistic, intuitive, flexible, imaginative and synthesizing manner,” and on the lower right quadrant, people thought in a “musical, spiritual, emotional and empathic manner.”

Examples of upper-left brain thinkers are scientists, military officers and mathematicians. Lower-left brain thinkers are accountants, lawyers, statisticians. Upper-right brain thinkers are entrepreneurs, novelists, creative writers. Lower-right brain thinkers are entertainers, social workers, sales personnel, etc.

Preferred modes
These are styles or preferred modes of thinking. They are not fixed or unchangeable. They show which theoretical part of the brain our preferred thinking pattern uses.

People’s thinking preference will gravitate toward any one or a combination of these quadrants. If you find yourself at home in all four quadrants or styles of thinking, then you are a whole-brain thinker. That means one quadrant is not more dominant or preferred than another.
This theoretical whole-brain model of thinking proposed by Ned Herrmann has gained much acceptance in business and industry abroad. Training programs have been developed to train executives for whole-brain thinking.

This brain skill is especially true as one goes up the organizational business ladder. The person at the top must think in a whole brain manner to survive competition.

We are now in the midst of a tremendous and often dizzying knowledge revolution. The only way to survive is to use our whole brain in problem solving and decision-making. Otherwise, we will most likely be left behind.

My next ESP and Intuition Development Seminar will be held 9 a.m.-5 p.m., July 15-16. Call 8107245 or 8926806 for details.

http://showbizandstyle.inq7.net/lifestyle/lifestyle/view_article.php?article_id=9108

Are you a right- or left-brain thinker?

THE human brain is probably the last organ we bother to learn about. A car owner, for example, may know more about his vehicle than his brain. Even doctors don't bother much about how a patient uses his brain that may be contributing to his health problems.

Before the pioneering experiments by biologist Roger Sperry, scientists always considered the brain to be a single, integrated organ with different locations for different sensations and memory. Sperry proved this was not so.

After years of painstaking and meticulous research and experimentation, Sperry came up with the startling conclusion over 30 years ago that we had, in effect, two brains—the left neo-cortex and the right, each thinking in entirely different, even opposite, ways.

The left side of the brain, he discovered, was responsible for verbal, analytical and logical thinking. It was dominant or active when we were solving mathematical problems, engaged in technical writing or quantitative reasoning. It also thought in abstract symbols. The right half of the brain was responsible for non-verbal thinking, such as intuition, creative, problem solving, imagination. It was responsible for synthesizing or seeing things as a whole and determining depth and perspective. We are right-brain dominant when we make up stories imaginatively, or creatively, when we daydream or when we decide things intuitively.

Discovery
How Sperry discovered the different functions of the two hemispheres of the human brain reads like a detective story worthy of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle of Sherlock Holmes fame. Sperry was working on hopeless cases of epilepsy where drugs no longer had any effect. He hit upon the idea of making an incision in the corpus callosum, a part of the brain consisting of about 300 million brain cells and connecting the left with the right part of the neo-cortex. One of the functions of the corpus callosum is to act as a communication link between the two hemispheres of the brain.
When he made an incision in the corpus callosum, the epileptic patient recovered completely. Epileptic attacks or seizures ceased and, for all practical purposes, s/he was cured. The patient appeared to be normal and socially functional. But Sperry noticed some changes in the personality of the so-called "split-brain" patients. For one thing, they could not express emotion verbally and they lost coordination of right and left hand movements.

After years of research, he discovered that the left half of the brain thought differently from the right half. For his accomplishment, Sperry received the Nobel Prize for Medicine, although he was not a physician but a biologist.

His discovery paved the way for a better understanding of how people thought and learned. It also explained the behavior patterns of people under different conditions. Why, for example, are women, in general, better at details and people tasks compared to men who, in general, are better at abstract and analytical reasoning? He found it had something to do with how their brains were naturally wired and had nothing to do with race or genetics.

The popularity of Sperry's discovery also inspired many jokes about what eventually became popularly known as "the split-brain" theory. One joke goes like this: "Two men sitting at a park. One reads a newspaper that says the left half of the brain is dominant in right-handed people, and the right half is dominant in left-handed people. That's why left-handed people are the only ones in their right minds."

Left brain-dominant people learn better if things are presented to them in a systematic, logical and orderly manner, preferably in writing. Right brain-dominant people learn better if things are demonstrated to them personally, where they can interact with the other person and ask questions.

Knowing the client
Sales and marketing people can improve their work and close more deals if they know the brain dominance of their prospective clients. In selling a car to a left-brain person, the sales pitch should focus on the technical and scientific aspects of the car. If the client is right brain-dominant the salesman should emphasize how he looks in the car and how his friends will admire him. The appeal should be more to the emotions and imagination rather than to the abstract intellect.

There are many more practical applications of the split-brain theory than was at first realized by Sperry and his associates.

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