DIVINATION: TELLING THE FUTURE OR TELLING THE PRESENT

article

by Erika Ginnis

I have thought about divination for years, not only because I personally want to know what is around the corner sometimes, but because I have worked as a psychic for going on 19 years (hmm... I must have started at age 2, since I am only 21 now. right?). One of the things I get asked a lot is whether clairvoyance (the type of reading I use in my practice) is foretelling the future. I think that the answer depends on who you ask, but for me I define clairvoyance simply with a translation from the French, as "clear seeing." I always tell people when I do readings for them that I will give them information mostly about the energy and circumstances in the present and not predict the future. I do so because of the way I was trained to read and also because of my belief that we have free will and can alter our paths to a large extent by our choices.

"Free will versus fate," simplistically put, can be argued from either side, and I have to say I can see value in both points of view. While I believe we are at choice, I also believe that the greater capital "I" of us may be at a higher level, making choices of which we are not always consciously aware, and the result can look a lot like "fate" or "luck."

I also think we set some ideas up prior to birth, a lesson-plan or playing field. That's where astrology fits into things for me. If I want to see trends far in the future, I look to astrology and the transits that are taking place, or the progressions. I find that astrology is one of the most accurate ways to get that kind of broad view into what is unknown to my conscious mind about the lessons I have chosen.

Other types of divination can put us in touch with aspects of ourselves and the Divine (hence the word) that we may overlook in everyday life. While I don't generally read the energy of someone else's future, I will often use meditation or some form of divination to get a deep sense of where I personally am at a given point in my life.

Wonderful tools exist out there to get in touch with what we are seeking. The caution, in my opinion, is to remain mindful of the source and not become dependent on particular tools to the extent that we forget that each tool is simply a pathway to inner knowledge or the Divine. It can be easy sometimes to lose the essence by focusing on the tool. You can also then miss the wisdom that is around you all the time. The statement "I have to have this particular amulet or I can't know what's right for me" is very limiting.

I have heard it said that you can use anything to gain insight into an issue, opening a book and reading a random paragraph, seeing how the ripples fan out across a mud puddle in the street or watching the changing shape of a flock of birds. Whether you can use such things has a lot to do with your state of mind and how you view things around you. If this reality is all in some way a manifestation of the Divine, then if one is tuned into that source behind and inside all, one can use whatever is at hand. It's like swimming in a sea of information, or like walking through a field of computer terminals all connected to an amazing network, depending on your paradigm.

Even with all the work I have done in this field, I still find myself amazed that this stuff works! As an example, recently I played with a great computer program called "The Oracle of Changes," which throws the Chinese oracle the I Ching (I highly recommend this program; check out http://www.iching.com for more details). I found myself surprised that the program would be accurate. Then I started thinking along the lines above, and I started to wonder how anything wouldn't work for divination! As if God/Goddess/the Divine would exist everywhere except my computer! So much is about perspective.

When I was meditating a while back on divination and the tools I use, I came across a new perspective I'd like to share. As I mentioned earlier, in my practice I generally I use my clairvoyance to do whatever kind of "divination" I do. I normally don't think of my practice as divination at all, because I have thought of divination as the act of foretelling the future, and I don't put much focus on the future. What I do when I read is to look at energy and bring into conscious awareness information not otherwise available to the person I'm reading for. So, in a way, my reading is a type of divination. Also, one might ask, "What constitutes the future?" Is it "more" future if it is 20 years from now or 20 minutes from now? These were the kinds of things I asked in my meditation.

When I read, I adjust my energy so that it is vibrating at a slightly higher level than that of the person I am reading. This adjustment allows me to tune in to information that hasn't quite manifested on the physical plane yet but is just coming into being. I suppose this practice actually is reading the future, the future just beginning to manifest - creations always start at the spirit level first. Free will comes into play here, since I believe that you can change your future based on your beliefs and the choices that you make in the present.

One thing I was profoundly moved by when I meditated on these things was the question whether there is any "future" at all. I believe that everything is happening all at the same time and that we have this particular "time and space" area of reality set up in which to learn things. When I started really looking at what I do when I read and how I adjust my energy to find what I am looking for, and why that works, I came up with some very interesting insights.

I got that past, present and future, which we normally visualize as on a horizontal timeline, might more accurately be seen as on a vertical vibration line or spectrum. The lower/slower vibrations correspond to the "past," and the higher/faster vibrations correspond to the "future." When I raise my vibration slightly to read the energy someone is just beginning to manifest as spirit, I am putting myself in that person's "future" to take a look. It of course looks like my "present."

In my yoga class, my instructor is always saying that we are the past tense of God or Goddess (or whatever word you choose), and that God is who we are in the future. I am actually beginning to get what that is about, and it is the same concept.

What I see we are doing with meditation, magick or prayer is raising the vibration in the body over "time and space" toward some culmination point where time and space cease to exist in this linear form. In fact, the idea of "raising energy," as we do in a ritual, works great with this idea, because raising energy puts the thing that we want to happen into this higher energy level and hence into our "futures," so that we can catch up to it later in our body's reality - in other words, manifest it. As we increase our vibrations, we decrease the time it takes to catch up with our creations.

In my own practice, I talk about present time a lot, as being the point of power. The importance of working from present time also holds true because the present is where our bodies operate, since that is where they exist. When we work in present time, we can do our energetic work and be in alignment with the body, allowing it to evolve through its cycles and staying present with our energy to be able to respond as spirit.

If we fall back into "past time" (with nonforgiveness or blame especially), depression can hit, since our energy is falling back into a slower/lower vibration. Also, if we as spirit jump headlong into the "future" (with worrying or being two steps ahead of ourselves) and try to take the body there, the body will stress out and get very fearful, since then it is trying to vibrate at a rate higher than it can at the moment.

The more that we, as the magickal, spiritual energy beings that we are, allow ourselves to harmonize with the body by matching our vibrations in alignment with the body's "present," the more we can draw our bodies and personalities up in vibration over time, and ultimately get to that experience of the unfolding moment.

I see that this gentle drawing up of our vibration into the future (which already in reality exists) is the goal of my kind of divination. I accomplish this drawing up by continuing to clear my own field by meditation, and also by the release I get from reading other people. This process is somehow cumulative; at some "place" in the "future," we are all one thing. So whenever any one of us assists another to draw themselves up, by divination or healing or anything else, then in some way we each get lifted.

I have found this a very valuable idea to meditate on. I knew it to be significant information when it came to me, and then I promptly forgot it! The exercise of writing this article brought it back to me so that I could get it down on paper.

I know I have more to do along these lines. I am looking at all that I do in new ways. As I do my own magick, and meditate and teach and generally live my life, greater possibilities present themselves. Or, probably what's really true is that I can see what was already waiting for me, which is just another form of divination.

Erika Ginnis offers spiritual counseling and coaching, psychic reading, healing and classes though her practice "Inspiration is the In-Breath of Spirit." For more information on Erika and her work, contact her at: (206) 669-5881, erika@inbreath.com or http://www.inbreath.com.

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