[Help] Building psychic skills?

[pixel_fortune]

Please read before giving advice: my situation isn't the typical one. At least read the sentence in bold.

So my visual imagination is fine. I can picture a grandfather clock, to use the classic example. I can imagine the smell and taste of an apple and the sound and texture when I bite in into it

But I'm not very good at sensing presence of entities/energies etc.

What I have is decent controlled imagination, but bad spontaneous imagination. So if you say "imagination an angel", I can. But if you say "this angel has a gift for you, a symbolically important object. What is it?" then it won't be anything, because I need to choose what to imagine - my brain rarely just generates images without prior instructions. (This lack of spontaneous imagination is a common feature of alexithymia btw, some brain architecture thing I think)

I'm decent at divination with tarot and a pendulum, but not with scrying - which I think involves a certain amount of collaboration with your spontaneous imagination

I've looked up advice for improving these skills (eg Mat Auryn's Psychic Witch) but they're always exercises in controlled imagination - imagine the smell and taste of chocolate, of a black rose, etc. But I already have that skill. It's not what's missing.

So I'm not sure what else to try, other than brute force practice.

(I suspect a lot of occultists became interested in the occult because they had spontaneous psychic type experiences, so they by definition have a natural high level of "perceiving the subtle" talent, and may not have ever thought about how to build it. Whereas I got here via just thinking about it and figuring stuff out, not because of experiences)

I'm using "psychic" narrowly, I don't mean telepathy or telling the future, just sensing the invisible

Post automatically merged: Feb 8, 2024

I think the above would also help with astral journeying, which I'm not good at it unless it's planned. (I can work in my astral temple, because I decided everything that would be there. But not going into unknown places)

 

[Ancient]

Just a shot in the dark here, but what about starting with a guided visualization that leaves some details out? Details - not entire objects like the angel's symbolic item.

For an example, try the following brief visualization, then read the spoiler. Take some time with this and go through it once or twice before the spoiler, really try to build the scene and commit it to memory. Then check out the spoiler while it's still fresh in your memory.

You awake in bed. Opening your eyes, you realize this bed is in a small meadow. The sky's light is muted, like dusk, but enough light remains for you to make out details. The bed stands on an patch of light dirt, small rocks scattered here and there. Grass grows a few inches tall, getting thicker the further away you look from the bed. Weeds and flowers rise amongst the grass tufts, providing pops of color. These give way again to grass, getting shorter as it approaches a forest, slightly stifled by the lack of light near the trees.

A breeze picks up, sending swirls of the fragrant loam across you, and you breathe in deeply, savoring the scent. You stand up from the bed, hearing the dirt and gravel crunch under your feet. Walking lazily towards the trees, you trail your fingers down to your side, allowing them to brush against the taller plants as you move.

Your eyes feel the light change as you approach the first few trees. Feeling a moment of trepidation at the heavy darkness deeper within, you pause, putting a hand on a nearby tree trunk for support. You realize you are not yet meant to go into the forest, and turn around to find the bed again. Spotting it, you feel the nervousness from a moment ago ease, and you move back towards it. When you have reached it, you climb back in, lay down, and close your eyes.

Spoiler: Do visualization before reading!

Going through chronologically, let's see if your imagination filled in any details spontaneously without you realizing:

1. Did you lift your head in bed? Did you sit up? Was your view 1st or 3rd person?
2. What colors did you see in the flowers and weeds? Did you recognize any of these plants?
3. Which direction did the breeze blow? How strong was it? Could you feel it in your clothes, your hair, on your skin? Did it make the grass move?
4. When the gravel crunches, are you wearing shoes, socks, sandals, bare feet?
5. Which hand did you let touch the plants? Left, right, or both?
6. Is there a difference in ambient light as your eyes feel the change?
7. Was there a physical feeling of trepidation? Racing heart, a nervous fidget, did your posture change?
8. Which hand did you put on a tree? Did you lean, or just touch it? What kind of tree is it? What color is the bark?
9. When you turned around and saw the bed, what did you notice about it? Is it yours, or one unfamiliar to you? What kind of frame is it on? Can you see underneath it? What do you see behind the bed in the distance?
10. Did you climb under blankets? Did you cover up with them again?



None of these things were specifically described, but I'm willing to bet your mind filled in at least a few of them. You might even be able to spot a couple others I didn't mention. Perhaps an approach of this could help train you in a couple things - allow your conscious mind to relax and let the subconscious do its thing, and teach you to recognize the things it already is doing.

So in summary I have no clear advice, but I did have this one creative idea. Hope it can take you somewhere.

 

[pixel_fortune]

Just a shot in the dark here, but what about starting with a guided visualization that leaves some details out? Details - not entire objects like the angel's symbolic item.

Oh wow, thank you so much for writing this out! I haven't tried it yet (or read the spoiler), but I will definitely give it a shot! Will report back

 

[Diluculo_DelFuego]

Clairsentience is a skill that needs development just like Clairvoyance or Clairaudience.
Brute force practice is one approach.
Going to haunted houses is another, such as the Poe museum in Richmond, VA.
Ouija boards also came to mind.
Seances another idea.

 

[HoldAll]

Try to look at it this way: If you can't see the gift the angel has for you, it may be because he has no gift for you at this time, period. So it's not failure or lack of ability on your part, just an outcome you may not particularly relish but one that has meaning nonetheless.

You are already spontaneously creating imagery in your dreams. Ideas, for example, have a habit of coming out of the blue, also a spontaneous occurence. Hence the ability to have spontaneous visions is not totally foreign to you. And I'd say those exercises where willed visualisations lead you to the brink of having spontaneous visions like the one with the angel are perfect. I'd rather draw a blank at this point than inadvertently delude myself according to some trite NewAgey narrative.

 

[theil]

For myself, distinguishing between mental projections like used in Gestalt* and actual entities separate from self developed slowly. I would focus on comparing the differences sensed between imagined characters and servitors and/or existing entities linked to sigils. Also, I would tell my younger self to pay attention to body sensations (

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and

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). Being aware of the body before starting work to notice changes during practice.

*

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"The empty chair technique is a therapeutic approach used in Gestalt therapy that encourages clients to explore and express their feelings towards an imaginary person or an aspect of themselves. The idea is to have a conversation with the empty chair as though it were occupied by someone else or another part of themselves. This helps the client gain insight into their thoughts and emotions. The therapist may guide the client through this process, helping them articulate their feelings and then use the empty chair in promoting a dialogue that could lead to resolution or acceptance of their experiences."

 

[pixel_fortune]

distinguishing between mental projections like used in Gestalt* and actual entities separate from self

So for me the problem isn't distinguishing between different sensory experiences. It's not having any at all.

If you can't see the gift the angel has for you, it may be because he has no gift for you at this time, period. So it's not failure or lack of ability on your part, just an outcome you may not particularly relish but one that has meaning nonetheless.

It's definitely worth considering as a possiblity (the angel specifically was just an example, but there's heaps of suggested journeys that involve some degree of "keep going, past the point the audio has described to you:.) I'm not seeing anything because there's nothing to see.

It's also possible (Aidan Wachter's principle of "A witch takes what they are given" re: aphantasia) that I should just be happy that divination works for me to communicate with entities, and not stress about the methods I don't have available to me

I was reading a review of (Did you know Frater Acher set up a kind of highbrow, London Review of Books style occult book review site? I didnt!) and came across this passage"
The key to luminous epiphanies, according to Iamblichus, lies in our faculty of imagination (phantasia). What happens is that the external light has an effect on the luminous vehicle of our own soul (ochēma), and this allows the gods, acting with their own volition, to “take possession of the imaginative power in us”. In other words, the human imagination was considered not as an agent of illusion, but as a faculty of perception that made it possible to perceive the gods. The priests were merely facilitating their appearance, by using procedures and techniques of proven effectiveness

Source:

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And that is the concern I have: That without that capacity for spontaneous imagination, there's no levers an entity can pull to demonstrate themselves.

 

[Pyrokar]

Don't hate me but another shot in the dark -
your issues would be resolved by turning the focus on dreams or trances
in this way you are not the primary operator of what happens "on screen"
yet it seems harder to set up and maintain.
either way these kinds of approaches don't need you to narrate the scenery
i feel good about this conclusion even though i don't partake.
Lemon should have the deciding say there as i understand he is our resident dream walker expert

 

[pixel_fortune]

Don't hate me but another shot in the dark -
your issues would be resolved by turning the focus on dreams or trances
in this way you are not the primary operator of what happens "on screen"

I don't understand what you mean? (I can't find anything that would remotely annoy anyone but you said "don't hate me" so I feel like I'm missing something)

So what I'm talking about is happening in trance. (Ideally - working on getting into trance is a skill in itself. But I'm doing okay there).

My issue is that if I don't operate it, nothing happens. That's exactly the skill I don't have ("spontaneous imagination") and that I'm asking for help with. I gave the examples of when I'm the primary operator to try and make clear the distinction between what I'm struggling with and the skill I DO have (controlled imagination - being the primary operator), so people would know which bit I was asking for help with

So, I'm already focused on spontaneous imagination in which I am not the primary operator (in trance), but my question is how do I gain/improve that skill?

(Dreams is a connected but different piece of work imo, and I can see ways of developing that, so I'm not lost there)

 

[Pyrokar]

Well the shot in the dark part. It was pure assumption on my side.
But now that i read a bit more into it, i actually suffer from the same
problem my imagination is on the mid/upper tier as well

Perhaps try to add as many attractive attributes to the contact you wish to achieve, back to the basics.
If it's fire related add heat moisture etc, if it's angelic or whatever go back to projecting their symbols sigils etc
and then continue asking for audience?
I felt presences before but never in psychic terms, or mental space i don't know what to define it,
due to the same issue you pointed out so i stuck to the meat reality.
I recommend an invocational chant. pick any being you might like or have affinity towards and hit that sucker with
let's say fifty to a hundred repeats a day.

 

[pixel_fortune]

Seems worth trying!

I've also just been listening to Jack Grayle who I respect enormously (seriously listen to a podcast interview with him, he's a delight) and he says he has zero traditional psychic ability and it hasn't held him back

Everyone uses different tools to get to the same result, it's fine

(But still, it's not a bad thing to try and gain skills you don't have)

Post automatically merged: Feb 27, 2024

I recommend an invocational chant. pick any being you might like or have affinity towards and hit that sucker with
let's say fifty to a hundred repeats a day.

"Tell me you're doing Sorcery of Hekate without telling me you're doing Sorcery of Hekate"

 

[Pyrokar]

Tbf i already told you i was giving facebook dad a try

but i did remember something i wanted to add, though not exactly what you asked for
i remember one dude wrote about picturing getting a massage, or some such ( let's imagine getting mummified yall!)
by a priest of a particular (i don't see why one couldn't place any deity) god. the aim being placed on feeling sensations
which along with what i said before, adding elements satisfactory to the presence you're aiming for should be inviting
it's still controlled imagination though.
this is interesting to me if you achieve any results consider letting me know!

 

[pixel_fortune]

Tbf i already told you i was giving facebook dad a try

I assume that means you're seeing effects from the daily invocational chant though, which is valuable intel!

I do japa as an offering (like "Mercury, please let my presentation go well" followed by a round or two of 108 Mercury mantras) but never as a daily practice

i remember one dude wrote about picturing getting a massage, or some such ( let's imagine getting mummified yall!)
by a priest of a particular (i don't see why one couldn't place any deity) god. the aim being placed on feeling sensations

So actually one place I do have spontaneous visual and tactile stuff is the elemental directions

When I open my temple space, I go to each of the directions, where there is (astrally obvs) a gateway to elemental landscapes - desert, river delta, etc

In front of each gateway is a pedestal basin full of the appropriate element - flames, dirt, water, smoke. So I go around to each gateway and put my hands in the basin to connect to the element. And there is almost always some sort of response. Like the earth will climb up my arms and encase them, or the smoke will pour through my hair, or water will fountain out of my palms, or a flame will jump from the basin to my third eye. It's different every time, but some minor "greeting" like that, which is visual and tactile (I feel warmth, or wetness, pressure of dirt under fingernails, etc).

That is more or less every day, and I don't interpret it as having a meaning beyond "hi", unless it's quite dramatic or completely absent. Sometimes it seems to be letting me know if I'm letting some elemental habit drop (like the dirt palpitating my calf muscles when i hadn't done calf exercises in ages because I'm lazy and calves are the easiest to drop off the schedule)

So that's neat. But not transmitting a tonne of info (I don't think elemental spirits HAVE a tonne of info) like what you might hope to get from a summoned entity

 

[Ancient]

So actually one place I do have spontaneous visual and tactile stuff is the elemental directions

Excellent! This might be your route into finding ways to practice and strengthen the skill. This sort of "addition" to a pre-determined visualization is what I was trying to get at with my earlier suggestion. I think of things like this as trying to get into a large rock with a hammer and chisel. It's usually just a matter of finding the right place to apply the right pressure. Knowing that you have this spontaneous imagination when calling the quarters is like finding a crack in the boulder. Placing your chisel there is more likely to yield success, or at least more information - perhaps the crack will spread out and show you an even better location to attempt.

Time for more brainstorming:
- Can you ask these elementals to help you out some more? Write and perform a ritual. No need to go much beyond what you described opening your temple. Talk to them at that point and ask them to show you more. Maybe you just play around with the basins some more and really pay attention to the details, strengthen the skill with something familiar. Maybe you go through each of the gateways in turn for the sole purpose of experiencing something spontaneous, hoping for something new.


- Can you create a new relationship in a similar structure to what you have with the elements and see if it gives similar successes? Calling the quarters and having a basin for each element at each gateway every time you open your temple is an act of respect. Doing this daily or near daily builds a strong relationship. Is there a spirit, deity, or servitor that you might welcome into your temple in the same way? You could create a habitual moment of interaction with them like you do with the basins, allowing a space for this visualization to happen.

That's all I got for now. Good luck!

 

[pixel_fortune]

Excellent! This might be your route into finding ways to practice and strengthen the skill. This sort of "addition" to a pre-determined visualization is what I was trying to get at with my earlier suggestion. I think of things like this as trying to get into a large rock with a hammer and chisel. It's usually just a matter of finding the right place to apply the right pressure. Knowing that you have this spontaneous imagination when calling the quarters is like finding a crack in the boulder. Placing your chisel there is more likely to yield success, or at least more information - perhaps the crack will spread out and show you an even better location to attempt.

Time for more brainstorming:
- Can you ask these elementals to help you out some more? Write and perform a ritual. No need to go much beyond what you described opening your temple. Talk to them at that point and ask them to show you more. Maybe you just play around with the basins some more and really pay attention to the details, strengthen the skill with something familiar. Maybe you go through each of the gateways in turn for the sole purpose of experiencing something spontaneous, hoping for something new.


- Can you create a new relationship in a similar structure to what you have with the elements and see if it gives similar successes? Calling the quarters and having a basin for each element at each gateway every time you open your temple is an act of respect. Doing this daily or near daily builds a strong relationship. Is there a spirit, deity, or servitor that you might welcome into your temple in the same way? You could create a habitual moment of interaction with them like you do with the basins, allowing a space for this visualization to happen.

That's all I got for now. Good luck!

These are really good ideas, thank you! Both specifically and the overall Chisel Theory

(I still haven't tried your original visualisation experiment, but I haven't forgotten about it)

 

[Caliban]

DAILY practice with centering and grounding your OWN energy, as a starting point, for a baseline of what energy feels like when its clear and stable. That becomes your measure against feeling something different.

Practice with an oracle to develop intuition to the point where you can confidently discern the difference between sensing something actually going on, and imagining you do because you want to/are afraid to.

This isn't a months or weeks proposition, though you may find you have certain knacks that come easily. Skills develop over years of invested practice.

 

[pixel_fortune]

DAILY practice with centering and grounding your OWN energy, as a starting point, for a baseline of what energy feels like when its clear and stable. That becomes your measure against feeling something different.

Practice with an oracle to develop intuition to the point where you can confidently discern the difference between sensing something actually going on, and imagining you do because you want to/are afraid to.

This isn't a months or weeks proposition, though you may find you have certain knacks that come easily. Skills develop over years of invested practice.

Hello!

So I this is sort of addressing the opposite problem to the one I have. Your advice seems good for a person who gets a lot of visionary images/voices/etc and who needs to separate out what's real communication from what's mental detritus

My problem is not getting any visions/voices (unless I deliberately generate them. Which is then very easy to discern because I did it deliberately)

(You're right about the importance of daily practice as a baseline for any skills a person is struggling with though. I do have a strong daily ritual & meditation practice, but it's only been regular for the last 6 months or so. Maybe all it will take to see results is patience, but I don't think so for this particular issue, I think an actual targeted approach is required.)

Post automatically merged: Mar 1, 2024

Practice with an oracle

What do you mean by oracle? Divination in general or a specific tool/method?
(I use tarot and am decent enough at it, but this doesn't seem to have much carryover to what I referred to in my post as "spontaneous imagination")

 

[Taudefindi]

My problem is not getting any visions/voices (unless I deliberately generate them. Which is then very easy to discern because I did it deliberately)

I don't know if I understood in full what is your issue, but I do think that maybe you're "trying too hard".And I don't mean that as when people use it as a an insult, I literally mean that you might be focusing too much, doing too much rather than just letting things "be" and "come".

It's like trying to feel to wind, but you're seeking a place with strong winds rather than letting yourself feel whatever breeze may come by.I don't know if my comparison makes sense.
One thing you can try, if you're someone that prefers a shower over a bath, is to be under the shower and not think anything.Just let your body feel the water and focus on that only.Not on your head, on your body.

If something ends up coming to mind, so be it.

Maybe you should focus less on occult work and more on getting in-tune with your body's senses.Try to walk backwards with only the feeling coming from your back as your guide for if something is near you or not.It sounds crazy but trust the process.

 

[Caliban]

Tarot is what worked for me, but some people have different knacks - I can't get much sense out of runes, or oracle cards, for example. I leave the specific choice open, with the unspoken advice to find what suits you.

I almost never see spirits, unless I put a lot of work - essentially self-hypnosis - into evocation to visible appearance, which is a heavy lift, and not usually necessary, but something I undertook as a test of my own ability. Rather, I sense spirit as a feeling, a hunch, a mood. This is where getting a feeling for one's own energy, by directing it in a daily attuning, centering meditation, is useful. To learn what energy feels like, that's where I was instructed to begin, and for me anyway, it worked.

I have also had to learn to assess my own state to monitor depressive or, more rarely, obsessive, tendencies and simply taking care of my own mental health has helped me assess when Something Else is going on.

Once one notices Something There, one extends to trying to gain a sense of what it wants. This feels like a hunch, to me - but with a quality hard to describe, but distinct to itself. This is where a sharpened intuition comes into play.

I don't mean to be vague, but the sensation is vague until practice makes it distinctive and familiar. It's subtle. If I am not in a clear, stable place - if I am dealing with stressful responsibilities or distractions - I can't do it at all. But I know not to try.

Magical retreats are useful for this reason. I was lucky enough to find myself in similar circumstances, suitable for such work, which is where I received the majority of my notable successes or discernable progress.

Getting to that point was experimental, trial and error, "what happens when I do this" and hit-or miss. I've been at this for a while.

 

[pixel_fortune]

And I don't mean that as when people use it as a an insult, I literally mean that you might be focusing too much, doing too much rather than just letting things "be" and "come".

No I know what you mean - I think that's definitely possible, knowing my tendencies

Maybe you should focus less on occult work and more on getting in-tune with your body's senses.

So this is actually very relevant to the work I've been doing - IFS therapy with a therapist and then a practice given the terrible name of "Focusing" at home. They are both about tuning into your body and your what they call your "felt senses" - emotions located in the body. I've always been a very living-in-my-head person so this has been amazing for me and something I am trying to bring into occult work, but only very recently (I can't pull back on that, I'm doing the Helios Unbound operation, which is a pagan/PGM Abramelin, but I can bring an approach to it that might be more in line with what I need to be balanced). So it's good to hear you say that!

I almost never see spirits, unless I put a lot of work - essentially self-hypnosis - into evocation to visible appearance, which is a heavy lift, and not usually necessary, but something I undertook as a test of my own ability.

So by "see" I mean closed-eye imagining, not literally see. I mean that, if you tell me to imagine a grandfather clock, I can make a picture in my head of a grandfather clock. But if you say, "and you open the clock, and find something written on the inside case. What does it say?" then my mind will not come up with anything. The writing will not say anything, because I didn't decide in advance what it should say. So I can do controlled imagination (Imagine things I choose to imagine) but not spontaneous imagination (things I imagine never do things or appear in ways other than what I've decided they will do). When people do journeying, they go into an internal landscape and encounter spirits and new locations - I am incapable of doing that, because the landscape will be empty unless I decide to make up spirits and put them there

So I can use tarot because it doesn't require my brain to spontaneously generate images (it just requires me to notice patterns etc in the cards). But for the same reason, I'm not sure how tarot could help me with spontaneous image/voice/etc generation