A Warning

Yes, I know…it’s been pretty bare here, lately.

Today, there’s just a quick note: if you have kidney problems, be extra careful in watching for any untoward symptoms while you’re practicing.

One of the things that they tell people on dialysis is to limit potassium intake as much as possible. The kidneys are pretty heavily involved in regulating blood levels of potassium, to keep said levels from going too high.

Why do you care if they get too high? Potassium is lethal in high doses.

Lethal –> Deadness

Deadness = Unshiny

One of several useful kidney-related links is: http://dpc.convio.net/site/DocServer/potassiumarticle060717_000.pdf?docID=202

Does this mean that everyone with kidney issues needs to be extra-careful? Probably. It’s not that different from the extra care required if you have diabetes.

Does this mean that everyone with kidney issues needs to avoid extra potassium in his/her diet? Probably not. In fact, sometimes folks with kidney problems need to add more potassium to their diets. The opposite problem is simply more common.

If you have kidney problems, or anything other health issues that affect your metabolism or biochemical balances, you might want to consider checking with your friendly neighbourhood health-care professional concerning the safety of your practices and the types of snacks that are safest for re-fueling afterward.

Be well.

(No, I’m not on dialysis. How did I come across this bit today? That’s a longer story.)

About Dowsing-Related Books, Sites, Societies, and Suchlike

You all know what dowsing is: the use of a mechanical movement to amplify a (presumably psychic) signal in order to answer a question or locate an object. The movement in question usually involves of some kind of device, such as a pendulum or a pair of rods or the famous forked stick. Some people use the movement of a finger, considering it to be more convenient or less conspicuous.

Dowsing is an important component of psionic medicine and of radionics. Most people who practice psionics use some form of dowsing from time to time.

That said, you will find that there are dowsers who are quite indignant about the idea that their art and science would be associated with psychic or psionic activity. The very idea offends them.

Be aware, therefore, that you might encounter some unflattering and possibly heated commentary if you hang out on dowsing sites or with dowsing societies, and your colleagues there find out about your psionic practices. That said, there are many very nice and very knowledgeable folks on those sites and in those societies. And, there are many excellent books devoted exclusively to the finer points of dowsing.

In any event, I’ve found that such disagreements are usually more polite and restrained than the squabbling that erupts periodically between online psionics communities. So, it isn’t anything to actually worry about. Just be aware of it.

Two of the excellent and useful books about dowsing are The Art of Dowsing and The Diviner’s Handbook. Both of these novel-length books start with very basic concepts and methods, and work their way through to practical applications. They discuss some theories about how dowsing might function. Several chapters are devoted to common uses of dowsing: archaeology, finding good locations for wells, locating underground pipes and cables, and finding oil and other minerals.

Another, much shorter, introduction to dowsing is the friendly “Letter to Robin” which is freely available in several languages at the LetterToRobin.org website. http://www.lettertorobin.org/Home.html

Title: The Art of Dowsing
Author: Richard Webster
Publisher: Castle Books
City: Edison, NJ
Year: 2001
ISBN: 0-7858-1430-2
Format: hardback book Reprinted from Dowsing for Beginners published by Llewellyn Publications of St. Paul, MN in 1996

Title: The Diviner’s Handbook
Author: Tom Graves
Publisher: Warner Books
City: New York
Year: 1976
ISBN: 0-446-89402-8

Protecting Electronics

Some people have a small problem with electronics: such devices tend to break or malfunction when these people are around.

Wearing a watch on the wrist is a sure way to destroy the thing in a matter of hours or days, unless it is one of the old-fashioned wind-up types. Wind-up watches with no electrical parts are increasingly difficult to come by.

Computers, cell phones, mp3 players, CVC players, television sets, electronic pH-testers, Geiger counters…you name it, and if it has an electronic component, some psionicist somewhere has probably destroyed one of them by coming too close to it.

This topic had come up in the chatroom a week or two back, but we didn’t discuss it in much detail at the time. Therefore, a short blog post is in order.

If you have problems with electronics, consider adding a layer to your Shields. (You do maintain Shielding, don’t you?) There are several options for the format of this layer, but a basic bubble or buffer Shield should be fine. It doesn’t need to be fancy. The intention to program into it is a clear separation between your field and the electromagnetic field of the device. A psychic firewall, if you will. For this Shield, density is your friend.

For some people, it is sufficient to construct the Shield only around your hands or the head. For others, it is better to just put the thing around your entire body. If you tend to project from your belly, for example, you’ll want to go with the full-body Shield.

It is also possible to set a Shield or Ward around the electronic item itself. This is a good choice if more than one person uses the device. The only real difference between Shielding the device and Shielding your person is that it is important to make a “port” for the device’s plug to go through. That way, you won’t be as likely to cut off the device’s power and communications. Likewise, if it needs to communicate with a wireless connection of any kind, add a port or antenna or the like for that purpose.

As always, Shielding is shiny.

Book Review: Quantum Touch

The third chapter of this book has perhaps the most straight-forward and easy-to-use introduction to energy working that I’ve ever seen. And, it is summed up in a nice, simple healing method.

The rest of the book is background and “apologies” trying to convince people to give this stuff a try. If you’re reading this blog, you’ve probably heard of psionics and energy work before.

Full Title: Quantum-Touch: The Power to Heal
Author: Richard Gordon
Publisher: North Atlantic Books; 3 edition (Aug 17 2006)
City: Berkley, California
ISBN-10: 1556435940
ISBN-13: 978-1556435942
Format: Trade Paperback, not currently available as an ebook

Book Review: Energy Medicine

We’ll start with the nutshell version: buy, read, and study this book.

Seriously.

Unlike many energy-healing textbooks, this one goes into considerable detail about how to clean, maintain, and repair your field. There are several approaches, and some of them look as stupid as any other psionic healing does. (Ever watch someone rattle his or her field, and then scrape the debris off? Does that look like an activity that any sane adult would admit to?)

Most of the instructions are very close to idiot-proof, which is useful, and the illustrations fill in most of the remaining blanks.

Many, but not all, of the methods in Energy Medicine are connected to the points and meridians of Traditional Chinese Medicine. Don’t panic, though. She explains them pretty well, and there are helpful pictures to point out where the points and meridians are. Therefore, you don’t need to be familiar with the meridian system to use this book.

In fact, you could use this book with no prior exposure of any kind to any sort of energy work. The first edition was written with the presumption that the reader had never encountered energy work before. And in 1998, that was a reasonable assumption for readers in many parts of the world.

Aside from its thorough treatment of field hygiene, this book has useful things to do about the sorts of illnesses which seem to plague psionicists particularly (weird immune disorders, chronic fatigue, etc).

Title: Energy Medicine: Balancing Your Body’s Energies for Optimal Health, Joy, and Vitality
Author: Donna Eden, with David Feinstein
Publisher: Jeremy P. Tarcher / Penguin
City: NewYork
Year: 1998, updated 2008
ISBN – 10: 1585426504
ISBN – 13: 978-1585426508
Available as trade paperback and as ebook (Kindle, at least)

Book Review: The Psionic Generator Pattern Book

This one is a cut-and-paste book of fun psionic toys to play with. It is long since out of print, but is sometimes found on eBay and from other used-book sellers. If you find a copy and it is selling for a reasonable price, you’ll want to buy it.

The book is printed on heavy paper, with the intention that the reader will cut out the shapes and assemble the various devices. They are great fun to play with, and they make a nice change from the now-ubiquitous psiwheel. There is also a text section with quite a bit of interesting information about dowsing, speculation about the nature of psi, and some historical documentation.

This is not a fashion how-to book for Psion Guild members. 🙂

Title: The Psionic Generator Pattern Book
Author: John P. Boyle
Publisher: Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey
Year: 1975
ISBN: 0-13-736975-1
Binding: workbook printed on thick paper

Dampers

Dampers are delicious quick-breads cooked over a campfire or in a Dutch oven…

The word also refers to devices which pull, negate, or otherwise interfere with psionic signals. The device could be a Shield, but more often the word implies something with more substance.

For example, for some people a good solid piece of hematite (an iron ore) causes a sedating effect and cuts down on incoming telepathic and empathic signals when worn or held against the skin. It can also produce a disorienting effect, and cause weird “burning” sensations. I strongly suggest not driving while using one.

Shields are shiny. Having a Plan B is even shinier.

Hematite was the crystal that convinced me to take crystals seriously. I’d pooh-poohed most crystal stuff until one day I happened to pick up a hematite, and it pulled so much out of me that I staggered. It was kind of cool…in a startling, what-the-fluff kind of way.

For other people, hematite produces no effect at all.

Some people find that amber and/or onyx do the same thing.

If you wish to experiment with this, I suggest starting with hematite. It is cheap and fairly easy to get. By “cheap”, I mean you can sometimes find the stuff in gumball machines for a quarter. “Magnetic hematite” is not the same substance, but feel free to try it, too.

Gargoyle Constructs

Just a short note again today. For those of you who like practical jokes (or an extra defense against jokers) on Halloween, consider putting together a gargoyle construct on your house shield.

You do have a house shield, right?

A gargoyle construct can have an actual gargoyle shape, or it can simply be a blob that produces the illusion of a gargoyle when triggered. The only movement it needs is a lurch forward or a looped flight. No AI is required.

Book Comment – Psionic Medicine

This is a very interesting read. Mostly concerned with homeopathy and medical dowsing, this introductory textbook is addressed to medical doctors in the UK.

Title: Psionic Medicine
Author: J.H. Reyner in collaboration with George Laurence and Carl Upton
Routledge & Kegan Paul, London: 1974, 1982
ISBN 0-7100-9088-9
Trade paperback

Under the Weather

As some of you know, I’ve been a bit under the weather lately.

The testing of blood, urine, and so on is not the most pleasant of activities, but it is an example of the mundane uses of psionic training.

The average, run-of-the-mill “Blue Psi-Ball” approach to getting rid of a headache or toothache is also useful for numbing the site of the blood draw.

At the same time, it can be useful to increase the blood pressure a little, if blood draws normally have a bit of trouble getting any blood from you. Increase the flow by making a spot on your hand warmer, while stroking the “energy” around your arm downward to your fingertips. An imaginary curry-comb is perfect for stroking purposes. If you’d prefer to decrease it, make another spot warmer instead…or make the hand colder.

If you discover that you need to produce a urine sample, a similar energy-stroking from a couple inches above your belly button downward to just a couple inches below it is remarkably effective.

I’ll refrain from mentioning the obvious sophomoric and crass practical joke applications of this… Hmm, I guess I didn’t refrain from mentioning it. Oops, my bad.