It started when I had a dream. There were crowds of people all out of control and police were marching in formation while windows were smashed and cars were burning. I awoke knowing that I had to tell someone that this was going to happen. I had to. If I didn’t, people would get hurt.

But I didn’t tell anyone. Instead I told myself that no one would believe me, that it was just a dream and to forget it. But I couldn’t forget it. The images stayed with me and intensified. My sister and I decided to go and see a film in Auckland city on a Friday night which was the same night a rock concert was on in Aotea square. A crowd, whipped up by a stoned rocker, went feral and starting looting, smashing windows, overturning cars, throwing bottles at police and rioting.

The cinema manager locked the front doors and came into the theatre at intermission saying that the police had shut the cinema and we had to leave.

When we were ushered out of the cinema, the images of a rioting crowd were exactly what I had seen in my dream. The same people, the same gestures towards the police, the same smashed windows, the same police in formation.

What the hell was happening to me? How did this image get into my head?

This was the start of my journey. I learnt that my grandmother had a gift and this had been passed on to me and my older sister who I have a wonderfully close connection with.

This would show itself when she left to go overseas and I woke up in a lather knowing that something had happened. As it turned out, she had a major breakup with the friends she and her boyfriend were travelling with, and we tracked it back to the same exact time when she called a little later.

Before that, when Jennifer had left the house before me and when I was travelling the same way, I knew that she had broken down and that I needed to stay in the left hand lane so I could stop and help her. Sure enough, there she was stopped on the side of the motorway.

Why? How did I know this?

It developed into an awareness of other people around me. When away on a holiday with my friends, we were in a convoy of cars travelling up a steep, and twisty hillside. In the lead car, in the back seat, I suddenly heard a siren go off. I said to the others in the car;

”Do you hear that?”.

”Hear what?” They asked.

”We have to go back. Something bad has happened.”

And something bad had happened, one of the cars had a crash and there were minor injuries all around and the car was damaged and not driveable.

It is difficult to predict when the gift will show itself. I find today that it can be dormant for a period of time, or rather buried because I am tired or stressed and my receptors don’t seem to work as much.

It can be difficult sometimes.

I have seen death. I know that death is coming and is present, but I’m not sure who for, or when. Concerned that it is for myself or my family, I exercise care in the decisions I take. But it may not be me.

A recent experience occurred when I knew that in travelling to London that I would come face to face with death. I thought it would be someone in the audience I was addressing, but actually it turned out to be someone who died on the tube I was going to catch.

Or, an event which I am still dealing with, where I saw a young man on the side of the road sitting on his bike and was told by the gift, that I had to go to him. But I didn’t. I justified my decision because it was cold and wet, traffic was bad, access to him was very difficult in my car, that I couldn’t do anything.

And he hung himself.

I have a gift for a reason and that reason is to help people. If I don’t use the gift when I am told too, bad stuff can happen.

The gift manifests itself in other ways too. Sometimes, I would freak out co-workers by telling them that someone was going to call in the morning or the next little while and that they would have an order. Sometimes it would be just as the phone rang and I would say ”That’s Client X and he wants to speak with you…” This would usually result in people being weirded out and a little spooked about what else I knew, particularly when I could tell something was up with them and would take them aside and check in to say ”I can tell something isn’t right, what can I do to help?”

Why does this happen? My grandmother was a deeply religious person, and she attributed her gift to being close to God.

I’m not sure where it has come from before Nana, or how other predecessors would have used the gift. Given that we come from a family of English commoners, perhaps my ancestors were Druids, Shamans, medicine men, healers or preachers.

My sister shares the gift and has visions. My niece sees dead people and ghosts so vividly that when she was a toddler walking along a wall, holding Jennifer’s hand, she walked around a space on the wall. When Jennifer asked her why she did that, Chelsea told her that she didn’t want to step on the lady that was sitting on the wall. She then went on to describe the lady in absolute detail. I think my son has it, and I am exploring this with him, and my Dad John, has had experiences where he has known that Jennifer was in trouble despite being thousands of miles away, just like I did.

Perhaps physiologically it is the result of an enlarged pineal gland, which can give the gift of insight. Perhaps I feel changes in energy and auras more acutely than others. But none of this explains why days before or in situations like with the young man on the bike, I can tell that something is not right and that I must act.

It could stem from being tuned into other peoples emotions and behaviours so deeply that I notice the combination of the extremely subtle differences in their behaviour. The difference in their breathing, their posture, the way they speak or the tiniest change in their body language.

Maybe it’s something in my DNA or the way my brain works, with the neuroreceptors to certain areas in my brain being more connected than other people.

Maybe it is god given in the same way some people are naturally great singers, athletes or academics.

Perhaps I am just closer to a caveman than I realise!

It is special and unique, and I am built a little differently to other people.

The gift showing itself will vary according to how tired I am, how grounded I am, and how much I am looking inward instead of being receptive. But sometimes it is just so powerful that it can’t be ignored.

I don’t usually connect with dead people or spirits but I have had those experiences. When I was working late in the office one night, I jumped in the lift to head to the basement garage and was immediately aware of a presence in the lift. It wasn’t scary and I had no bad feelings at all, but I knew it was there. So much so that I spoke to it saying ”Hello, I know you are there but I can’t see you.” The spirit rode down in the lift with me, walked across a dark and deserted garage and got in the passenger seat of my car, shotgun style. We left the garage and drove up the street and around the block, before stopping by the central police station at which point, it got out.

When I was walking on my own on the Camino (see my Camino blog chapter ‘Casper and other ghosts’ for the full story), I came face to face with what I believe now to be a dark spirit or something from another place. Walking down a cutting with steep walls and thick brush on either side, about halfway down I was startled with a loud noise by a large creature behind me high on my right hand side. This wasn’t something small and it was clearly focussed on me.

Immediately my flight or fight reflex kicked in so I turned to face it and stared it down for 30 seconds or so, before I turned and walked slowly away. Immediately on turning I was surrounded by all the people who have died in my life. They were talking with me, they were beside me, inside me, all around me, and they filled me a white, warm and pure presence. At the end of the cutting they left.

I was uplifted and fulfilled by this. It was the strongest and most amazing experience I have had with my gift and it was no surprise that it happened when I was relaxed, super tuned in, and without the distractions of day to day life.

It also showed me that other spirits could connect with me, both good and potentially evil, and that I needed to be aware of this.

Having the feeling of being followed or being watched has happened on other occasions too. When out walking in the woods, I have turned and confronted unseen spirits or beings who I know are there, and who have been watching or following me, but soon stop when I confront them. Sometimes it takes two or three turns and a quick walk away, but it happens.

Am I paranoid? Is it just fear and I am reacting to situational threats? I don’t think so, as there is a clear difference between that feeling of being watched and my gift telling me to be aware, and the more general human reaction of being scared by being alone in the woods at twilight.

The gift can also tell me when something bad has happened in a certain area. I walk in one area of my local village and every time I have gone down a particular path, the gift tells me that there is something bad that has happened there. A murder or killing of some sort. I just know.

What to do with my gift is something that is on my mind. Do I try and develop it by finding other similar people? Do I actively work to recreate situations where I can connect with my gift in a deeper and more frequent way?

Having not told people about this other than those closest to me, for many years, I am now of the age where I am writing this blog both to help me make sense of my gift through the cathartic release of writing, and also to bring this out into the half light, safe in the knowledge that only a few people have access to this blog amongst the billions of web pages on the internet.

I know one thing. I will never, ever ignore it again. Doing that could lead to more death, or more unhappiness, not just for me, but for others I believe I am here to help.

#PsychicAwakening, #SpiritualJourney, #TrustYourInstincts, #PsychicAbilities, #SpiritualAwareness