So, I guess I was born a little odd. An extreme sensitive whose physical body was hyper-reactive, 24/7.
And I had wide-open unconscious empathy. I saw ghosts regularly, had daily conversations with non-physical beings, trees, animals and inanimate objects. To me, everything was alive.
I was lonely, but never alone.
I distinctly remember when I was about 4 years old… my parents had some adults over to visit. They introduced me to the two people who were entering our house. I stood at the door a while, waiting for them to introduce me to all the other people who had come with those two. They never did.
And it was pretty much that way a lot of the time. I felt very different.
As I grew older, I became fascinated with what was called the paranormal. (What an odd label… it was all quite normal to me!) I thought I would become a parapsychologist. Or maybe a ghost hunter. Or a house clearer.
But nobody in my family wanted to hear anything about these things. It scared my mother (she was Southern Baptist). And my friends didn’t want to hear about it, either.
I learned to keep it all very private. I tried to shut it down and make it stop. But it was not having it. My inner sight and inner hearing continued. In fact, my overall sensitivity to the vibrational world only increased.
Thus… My very first learning about sensitivity was the obvious…
If you are, you are. You can repress it, you can suppress it, but you cannot kill it. It’s part of your nature. It is my nature to be wired this way. And the same is true for lots of other folks as well.
I have been clairaudient all my life. In my teens I worried I might be schizophrenic, because I was clearly hearing voices. I read everything I could get my hands on about schizophrenia – and quickly realized I did not have that. (But I still had no idea what I did have.)
One thing was clear: Better to just keep my mouth shut, or someone might think I was kookoo and lock me up.
By the time I was 16, I was convinced that the majority of the people in psychiatric wards who were all messed up on meds were just unconscious psychics – folks who were wide open and around people who were not, and who didn’t get it.
And I was pretty sure that just because someone doesn’t see their deceased aunt May in the kitchen doesn’t mean she’s not there. I also figured out that I did not need to tell them I see aunt May, even if I did.
As I moved through my teens and 20s I did my best to repress my abilities. I had no understanding of how to use them. But now, I have been a full-time professional intuitive for over 30 years. I’ve recorded approximately 30,000 readings to date, nearly all by word of mouth referral. It would have to be that way – because I think this is a really funny kind of job. And it’s not one I would have consciously signed up for.
In fact, when I met my husband in my early 30s, he suggested I participate in a local psychic fair. I was certain I had no business doing so, “I am not a psychic” I told him.
Now, I knew I was highly sensitive, and I “got” information about all kinds of things. I’d been having “paranormal” experiences all my life. However, I’d never thought of myself as a psychic. (And I still don’t.)
But, at his insistence, I agreed.
It was terrifying. Hundreds of people showed up to experience maybe 24 or so different kind of folks like me, doing whatever they did. There were psychics, tarot readers, numerologist, astrologers…I think you get the picture.
I prayed I would not be a phony or embarrass myself. I didn’t know what would be worse: no one coming to my table for a reading, or people coming to me and me going blank.
Then the first person sat down in front of me. I felt physically like I was in a tiny vehicle, and with nothing but the intention to be able to accurately answer her questions. I suddenly zoomed into her energy bodies like one of the characters in the animation movie Tron. Like some software program, I dove in. With such passion to serve. I still remember that.
As she asked her questions, the answers revealed themselves as easily and obviously as if they were store fronts and neighborhoods. All I had to do was drive by in my little vehicle.
It was obvious it wasn’t me, Jacque. I didn’t know the answers to any of her questions – and there was no way I would even know how to make up what was coming through.
The responses were immediate, and according to her reactions and comments, shockingly accurate and surprising. Surprising to me, too!
Until that moment, I had never had anyone sit in front of me and ask lots of random questions about a wide variety of subjects. I had done energy work, past-life regressions, and breathwork. I practiced in the healing arts for years. I had done some dream interpretation, too – but never dreamed this would happen.
That first day blew my mind. And opened me up. People cried. Some praised my accuracy. But all I could feel was tremendous humility and gratitude. Somehow I was being utilized as a vehicle, literally, that could serve and help. That was what I’d always wanted to do… to be truly helpful.
Right after that psychic fair I knew I didn’t like that venue, but I did like and knew I could do that work.
When Monday came and it was time for my regular work with clients, what had opened up at the fair moved into fuller flowering. During my regular work sessions, I started being shown things very vividly, or told things to say. “Tell them about this. Or say this.” What?! And it became constant, sometimes urgent.
At the time, about half of my clients were very intuitively aware folks. People who were meditating and totally grounded in the knowing we are energy beings having a physical earth journey. The other half were conservative folks who were seeing me for pain management or help dealing with colitis through my hypnotherapy work. I was trying to stand in the middle ground. But after 30 plus years of my natural ability incubating, it was loose and would not be suppressed any longer. The Genie was out of the bottle.
During a session with a client, any client, I would get a physical nudge. A shoulder tap. An insistent urging in my ear… to share something, to say something. It would not stop.
Finally, I did the only thing I could think of. I said out loud and clear, “If this is truly helpful and accurate, you are going to have to give it to me (show me or tell me) three times, or I am going to ignore it.”
Honestly, I thought this would make it stop. Surely, I would not get much of anything three times.
Plus, the work I was doing was deep and intimate and transformative. Things often moved quickly in a session. I thought the odds of anything coming to me three times would be rare because we would be moving on, past that moment.
But, no. Soon, bits and pieces would emerge – in increasing detail by the third round. I felt obligated. I was hesitant, but a deal is a deal. I had said three times. On the third time I would have to reveal whatever was being given.
If my client was open, no problem. Here is some additional information to share…
But if my client was very conservative, and I wasn’t sure, I would carefully broach the additional information. Here’s a quick snapshot of an early moment…
I had a client with irritable bowel issues. We’d had progress and setbacks, back and forth, for about a year. One day her intestines absolutely insisted on talking with her. They wouldn’t take no for an answer. So, I asked her. She laughed and said sure. She was desperate.
For the next ten minutes I channeled her intestines and her colon. It was dramatic and life-changing for her. She was speechless when it finished. We were both astonished.
That information changed everything. Within a week, she had confronted her mother over a long-standing issue, broke up with her fiancé, and within six months she was symptom free!
For the prior year plus, I had tried and to some degree helped, but it wasn’t until something moved through me that real change happened.
Well, I was a believer. But, Wow!
Okay, I surrendered to spirit. I had prayed and prayed to be made useful. All through my teens, my desire to serve and help others was strong. But I had learning disabilities, and it was clear I would not be getting a college degree. My job choices were limited. My prayerful request to be made useful revealed it’s how…
And I fought it and argued about it. I felt like that guy in the story who is hanging from the cliff by holding on to a tiny branch. He prays for help and God says, “Let go.” And he says, “Is there anyone else I can talk to?”
I prayed and prayed, Make me useful. Then as this work revealed itself, and so strongly demanded expression, I kept saying “No, not this!” I would never want people coming to me for their answers, or to consider me the authority in their life…. “Tell them about this. Talk about that.” If it is true and helpful, okay. But really?
It took about a year to get reasonably comfortable with what was happening. And now, 30 years later, I’m totally okay when the phone rings. I’m over 30,000 sessions into this, and I trust that someone has something to say and the person I’m doing the reading for has a reason to hear it.
I guess it really is true… When we accept our nature and show up as who and what we are, spirit can move through us.