A person who I will call for purposes of anonymity “one of my students” sent me an interesting email the other day. She was upset. Apparently after I had shown her a few of the basic lines in the palm and how to “cold read” those lines to fit any person, she was suffering a strange sort of skeptical guilt:

“I’m not sure if I have gotten in over my head or not. I’m not sure even how it happened. I was talking with several people there and we all started talking, we were talking about Facebook Friends and somehow I said, ‘well I could find that out if I could read your palm’ And a friend stuck his hand out. I haven’t ever done a palm reading but I’ve wondered if I could bluff it. But I was awesome, at least in their eyes. I just gave him a reading based on the things I already knew about him, and just general things that are common to most people like “you would love to travel more but just can’t seem the time to go” and I also told him things that I had heard as gossip about him. He agreed to everything and was totally amazed. I had told him that some of the things I was seeing are kinda personal and maybe I shouldn’t say them, he said, “no, tell me, I don’t care”

Other people who I knew were shocked too, and they stood farther away after I kept getting hits. They startde daring each other to get a reading from me reading, but some were having none of that. The went back and forth and I said I don’t want to read the palm of anyone that isn’t comfortable with that. One person kept saying that I would discover too much about him.

So then I started to realize that maybe I shouldn’t have done this, I didn’t want to tell anyone that it was all crap, that I was reading him, repeating gossip and just stating general things. It would make him look stupid for believing it, and me look like a liar. Then it got worse, the guy I was reading just opened up to me and starting telling me all about his relationships. He has never been a private person, I know he tells his girlfriend everything. But we didn’t have that kind of a friendship, mainly we would just talk about small talk and I liked it that way.

So now I am not sure what to do.. I suppose I will just not say anything unless someone presses it. I will tell anyone that asks that I don’t think it is a good idea for me to do anymore readings of people as I might say the wrong thing. People like their privacy and I shouldn’t be prying into that kind of thing.

If anyone seriously asks me, or if they make a big deal out of it, I guess I will just have to say something about how palm reading is just reading things about a person, if you know them it is easier. Gosh Mark, this was so easy to do, he just filled in all the details as I said stuff which just led on to more things. I could have “read” him for an hour and not repeated myself. It was very odd.

Now I’m kinda mad at myself. But it is done and I need your advise on how to handle this as I don’t like the idea of letting people believe that I can read palms. I can read people and so can most people, maybe that is what I can say. Maybe I can give an example as a way it is done..

I could say, ‘Lets see if you can do this also.’ I can point to someone in the place and say, ‘tell me what you see about that person’ then I can help them make general statements about them, ‘they love to eat’ or ‘they love the outdoors’ just by looking at them and explain how we make those general statements. I think that is how I’m going to handle it if it is brought up…”

So we can certainly say in this case, a little knowledge proved to be somewhat dangerous can’t we? Perhaps just this sort of playful repartee is how a person like Sylvia Browne or James VanPraagh first fell into? Getting the credit and adulation of appearing psychic can quickly turn even the most high-minded skeptic down a dark path. What starts out as a fun little lark can transform any social situation into a nightmare. It’s a fine line to cross. When we are with friends, we do indeed know a lot about them, but we wouldn’t necessarily divulge what we really “deep down” think about them would we? People like Sylvia Browne who have learned how to get a hook into their prey and hold on for dear life do this all the time without the slightest twinge of remorse.

When you offer anyone a reading no matter what you use, you are setting yourself up for an experience that at its best can be entertaining. Other times – not so much. For a person who is skeptical, reticent or incapable of playing that role, it can be an uncomfortable ordeal. It takes getting used to. Even in jest, if you get hits (and you will) you can’t tell them it was all bullcrap – because much of what we would naturally see in a friend or relative is true! What is a skeptic to do?

Well, as they say; if you can’t handle the heat, stay out of the kitchen. This guru-psychic-medium stuff is best left to the …ahem, …professionals. Professional con artists don’t have a hard time at all. In fact they love it when you fill in all the blanks with as much information as you can possibly give them. How you re-package and sell it back to them in a cunning way is waht seprates the pros from the dabblers.

The real question that raises it ugly head is when this happens, (at least in their minds) …is it at all psychic? Of course not. You and I knowm it isn’t, but Joe Average doesn’t have a clue. If you happen to get stuck in this bind, just BE HONEST. It’s that simple. That’s what I did for over ten years when I was on a 900 line and that’s still how I handle my “psychicness” if it becomes a problem.

For example: Tell them about the time they told you about their dog Megs that they also conveniently forgot they told you about. Let them know that facial expressions can sometimes literally allow you to “read their mind.” Tell them about body language, NLP and that generalities fit everyone and the more privileged information you might have “fed back” to them was nothing any aware person who can read which way the wind blows might have offered. They may fight and struggle to accept what you may need to say, but if you stay on point it will eventually sink in. That pretty much takes the wind out of that sail quite quickly. Two problems will likely present themselves:

1) Are you willing to make this type of “breakthrough” for the person …or are you beginning to see the benefits of this power tripping? Hmmmmmmm.

2) The second problem any honest person who gets caught up in this kind of situation usually faces is this: Even though you get down on your hands and knees and beg for most people to accept these facts as the honest truth that was accessed through purely normal means, many people will still ascribe some connection with something psychic to you!

They may tell their friends, “Well, …I know she knew about my dog Megs, but when she said I was going to do something creative like with art! How could she have known that just yesterday I dragged that paint by numbers set out of the garage! It’s just unreal!”

So really, you can’t win.

Now on the other hand, if you want to make lots of money in your spare time…

BOTTOM LINE:Try if you must to see for yourself how easy it is to be a psychic, it can be most illuminating. But beware of the traps that will open up beneath your feet if you dare to become too accurate – even if that happens by mistake. If you choose to let slepping dogs lie and carry on like a Sylvia wannabe, eventually you will have a terrible burden to shoulder if you have even the smallest bit of a conscience. Trust me, I know. I have been there and back and I still have qualms even when I’m dressed as an obvious gypsy parody working a sideshow venue. Yo Chip, Sylvia and VanPraagh: How are you sleeping these days? Are those big lumps of cash in your pillow cases keeping you awake at night? This racket is always new to somebody and a sucker IS born every minute. Unless you are a legit counselor (and there’s plenty of sickos in that business too…) it’s probably best not to “dabble” with being a psychic.

Leave to us pros…