I need to blog about this subject because there are more and more people turning to psychics these days with little understanding of how we work. My family was down in Chicago this last weekend giving a talk at a theater followed by questions from the audience.

We came away from the experience all saying we don’t want to do the readings for people on stage like that anymore. We love the portion where we answer questions about the paranormal, but when it comes time to do readings, people have deep intimate questions and they are hoping we will give them a five second answer that will clear everything up for them. One lady came running up to me and asked if I could quick tell her about her past lives. OMG. And there are many others who wanted us to connect with their deceased loved ones.

Yes, these are things we can do, but not in thirty seconds or less. I just want to shout out to the whole world, it doesn’t work this way.

We are in a theater with 200 people and people start firing questions at us: “Tell me my life purpose. Why am I angry? How is my grandmother? Tell me about my health.”

We do the best we can in a very limited amount of time knowing that other audience members are hoping we get to them. We ask people to only ask one question and they ask two anyway. We are opened up psychically which means it’s very difficult to sort through who the information is for when looking out at an audience of a couple hundred people.

The part I’m frustrated with is that people only know how psychics work from what they see on TV. The Long Island Medium for example. From that show, people get the impression that all of us walk up to strangers on the street and bring through deceased relatives. First of all, 90% of us don’t do that and secondly, what you don’t see is the hours and hours of filming they do to put together one hour on TV.

The media wants it quick and quicker and folks, I’m here to tell you, that’s ridiculous.

Many years ago, I was on a morning talk show in New York. They kept telling me that I needed to go fast and I told them I couldn’t guarantee that I could go as fast as they wanted me to. I was there to promote one of my books and do quick readings for the audience. Oh My Goodness. We talked about the book for maybe 15 seconds and then she asked me to read someone in the audience. There was no way I could go that fast, so they cut to a commercial break and went on to the next segment. During the commercial break, I was very drawn to a woman so I went out into the audience and gave her a reading. My hands heated up and I gave someone else a healing followed by a reading for another audience member. They never came back to me, they went on to a cooking session but it turned out to be a good thing that it wasn’t televised because the lady I read was dealing with cancer and it turned out to be a very intimate reading. The cameraman came over and told me I did a great job and then said it was time for me to go. Of course my ego was terribly bruised because I had wanted to do a really good job on national TV, but it wasn’t in the cards.

So what am I trying to say?

All of this takes time, it takes energy and it doesn’t happen in two minutes or less. Instead of assuming we all work like the TV psychics, ask each of us how we work, and find out for yourself. Many of us are shut down psychically when not working so that we can live normal lives like everyone else. If you have important life questions, don’t try to get them all answered in a matter of minutes standing in line at the grocery store. (Yes it’s happened).

Psychics are not entertainment monkeys. I can only speak for myself, my family and the true, gifted psychics that I know personally. We take our work seriously and want to give people as much help as possible. We are not psychic twenty-four hours a day, so please don’t come up to us expecting a spontaneous reading. Asking questions like what is your life purpose is something you should ask in a reading where the psychic has 45-60 minutes to give you that kind of information. Asking about your deceased loved ones is another thing. I can’t tell you how many times people come up to me and ask how their deceased loved one is doing.

The media is very limited in what they know about psychics or want to put on TV about us. It’s not important to them to educate you about how we work, it’s important to make it spectacular and sensational. If you’re going to psychic for a reading, find out how they work. We are all different and have different skills. That way it will be a good experience for both of you.

We can’t read your minds, although a sometimes thought gets transferred from you to us, which is called mental telepathy. If you are sending strong thoughts we may pick them up, but I don’t know any psychics who intentionally try to read people’s mind. There are some psychics who haven’t got a clue what boundaries are…so beware of them. Only go to psychics that you’ve been referred to or have heard good things about. There are a few whack jobs out there for sure, so be cautious. And last but not least, if anyone tells you that you have a curse on you that can be removed for thousands of dollars, run the other way because you’re being conned.

Echo Bodine first discovered she was born with psychic abilities and the gift of healing at the age of 17. In 1981, Echo began teaching classes on psychic development and spiritual healing, and today, she is the author of 11 books. From 2003 to the present Echo has been the director of The Center for Spiritual Development where she teaches numerous classes on spiritual development, living by intuition, ghost busting, psychic development and laying on hands healing classes. In 2010 she began teaching on-line psychic development classes with instructor Leigh Hopkins of Viva Institute. She has appeared on numerous national television shows including Sally Jesse Raphael, Sightings, Beyond with James Van Praagh, NBC’s The Other Side, Un-explained Mysteries, NBC’s Today Show, A&E, and Encounters. Paranormal Borderline did a feature story on her family, calling them the “world’s most psychic family.”