I keep feeling and sensing things around me like I’m being watched or someone is trying to communicate with me. I have been very sensitive for years to spirit and people's feelings and emotions. I keep getting visions when I close my eyes at night and a tingling in my third eye every night as I close my eyes to sleep. Lately, I’ve been getting visions of big black spiders and last night my TV turned on by itself. It was on standby and hadn’t done this is years. Any insight into what’s going on?
—Jean, United Kingdom
Dear Jean,
Psychic sensitivity runs the spectrum of subconscious influences and activity all the way to superconscious visions and dreams. The important thing is to develop the calm, clear intuitive sense of what is “from above” and what is “from below.”
To add to the spectrum described above is the reality and truth that there are disincarnate entities ranging from demons to angels, sprites and fairies to gods, goddesses, saints, masters all the way to God as bliss!
Yogananda’s guru, Swami Sri Yukteswar, remarked to him (when he resurrected his earth body after his “death”) that the subtle, astral, energy universe (which we call commonly heavens and the lower regions as well) is, in size and complexity, compared to the physical cosmos in relation to the size of a hot air balloon basket is to the balloon itself. The astral world with all of its entities is immense compared to this material world.
Therefore, perspective is needed here. And, so far as your own inner experiences are concerned, the difference between that which arises from within your own consciousness and that which exists “outside” yourself (in the form of disincarnate entities) is not as important as it might seem viewed only intellectually. Just as a dream seems very real when you are dreaming but evanescent and even silly when you are awake, so too one cannot so easily dismiss the psychic experiences you are having on the basis of “it’s just in your mind.”
Yet, at the same time, without perspective, well, one could go down the “rabbit hole” of mental illness!
What is needed, then, is simple if not easy: living from your own center within. What is needed is daily and deep meditation, dismissing psychic phenomenon during meditation and focusing one-pointedly in self-offering to the highest “entity” — God (Divine Mother, etc.) Only from the perspective of your own unshakeable center in relation to the highest reality, can you handle the plethora of phenomenon and sensitivity that swirls around your astral body and senses.
Learn, for example, with calm firmness, to dismiss those errant big black spiders. You must learn to command them to go away. Ignore them. Chant to God and guru if necessary. Dismiss them as your own subconscious imaginings and fears, or, if prefer, as astral entities bent on striking fear in your heart. Either way, makes no difference for your response should be the same warrior-like power!
And in sensitive awareness of other people’s emotions and thoughts, there, too, you want to be centered. Not every person’s issues are yours to fix or dwell upon. By remaining centered and asking for Divine guidance, a word, a glance, or a compassionate act might be what your soul is subtly asking of you.
Be a channel, therefore, of Divine blessings to all but without losing your sense of inner Self in tune with God and guru. These thoughts I am sharing are really the same for everyone because I find that even as more ordinary people take up meditation and prayer they, too, become increasingly sensitive to the thoughts and feelings of others. This is natural, therefore, but what is needed is not just feeling but wisdom.
If you are highly sensitive all the more this is needed. It is the ego that reacts to all things, outer or inner. But the inner things are closer to the ego which lives on that plane and hence, like the monkey mind itself, is a formidable force to calm and re-direct. What you need is Emperor Soul to rise and the pretender Ego to subside.
When you feel the energy at the third eye upon attempting to sleep, I recommend you allow yourself to focus on it but with calm and deep relaxation. It may actually help you sleep, or, may prevent you from sleeping as soon as you might ordinarily. But either way, if you have the courage to do so, I suggest you at least experiment with where it can take you. “Falling asleep” is a process that, sometimes, one can slip into a state of superconsciousness (on the way “down” so to speak as the conscious mind turns off but before the subconscious takes control).
I hope these thoughts are clarifying and helpful for you,
With Blessings and Joy,
Nayaswami Hriman
Seattle WA USA
www.Hrimananda.org
