I’ve noticed that there seems to be a large population of people who have attempted to learn and acquire psychic abilities, but have only achieved limited results. Maybe the results were a little cool, but overall, it wasn’t impressive or notable.

The question comes down to: what is the difference between someone with substantial achievements in their psychic pursuits, and another who simply has mediocre results?

Before I attempt to answer this question, let me make one thing clear: I don’t know the answer :-). I do not know how psychic abilities work, nor do I know the formula for success. What I can offer is my perspective and experiences. I believe I’m one of the many who has had notable results, and I think I might be able to help those that think they’re stuck at a mediocre level.

A Solid Base

First, let’s do some house cleaning. Priorities and overall goals are a large factor here.

You will probably be stuck at mediocre results if:

1. You want to develop psychic abilities because you’re bored, and it sounds cool. (Because you will only put in enough effort to cure your boredom).

2. You don’t actually practice, but you just like hanging out with weird folks online. (Because achieving results usually takes some effort, like learning any other skill).

3. You want to beat up someone at school with your awesome mind-control skillz. (Because your maturity will grow faster than your abilities… I hope).

4. You want to do something you saw in the movies. (Because movies are fictional, and at best are exaggerations of reality).

5. You want immediate results. (Because learning a new skill takes time, no matter what that skill is).

Those are pretty obvious, and I hope that if you’re reading this, you don’t seriously fall into one of the categories above. If you do, then that’s no big deal - but don’t get bummed out when you don’t have the results you were expecting. Becoming proficient in psychic abilities is just like any other skill, like playing the piano, or learning to speak a new language. It takes effort. The more effort you put in, the better results you’ll get (in general).

What are some good goals to have? Well, I learn and practice my psychic abilities because I am fascinated by reality and truth. I love doing things that others think is impossible, especially if at one time I thought it was impossible myself. It’s about outgrowing an old mindset, and stepping into a bigger world. This goal has allowed me to stay focused and motivated for a long time. I didn’t choose or design this goal consciously - it’s something that I feel inside of me that keeps me going automatically. If you ask some other people who have developed their psychic abilities quite a bit, you’ll likely find they have much more deeper goals than just doing something cool. Don’t get me wrong - psychic abilities are totally cool! But that’s not the prime motivating facility.

Don’t Listen to Anyone

No one knows how psychic abilities function. NO ONE. Including myself. So don’t listen to us. If someone starts preaching some “truth” to you, don’t treat it as gospel. My ego is flattered when people follow my instructions religiously, but ultimately - it’s not healthy. And it will lead to failure. If you are a follower, then you will probably be stuck at mediocre results. You will only consume whatever small successes the leaders have achieved. If you want to step it up, then you need to lead yourself.

There are phases that one should go through. Usually, when you first learn about psychic abilities, it’s a whole new world of ideas. At this stage, it’s highly encourage to read and take in a lot of ideas, information, and techniques. The reason for this is so that you won’t ask annoyingly broad questions, like “how do I do telepathy?” or “any tips for psychokinesis?” These questions make me irate :-).

After you have a solid foundation of ideas, and have practiced with the standard techniques for a little bit, you need to go into a new phase. You need to switch modes from learning what others have done, to creating your own path.

If you want more results, you need to take personal responsibility for your results. You need to be self-reliant, and do what makes sense to YOU. Stop asking for help. Stop looking for someone else to tell you what to do. Think for yourself, come up with a plan, and do it! Yes, sometimes you will fail. That’s the price you have to pay for meaningful results. You can either be stuck at mediocre, waiting around for everyone else to tell you what to do, or you can take charge and evolve your own understanding.

Practice Correctly

When you are just starting out, your practice routine should be exactly what the standard techniques tell you to do. If step one says meditate - then meditate. If step two says visualize - then visualize.

Once you finish with that phase and decide to start leading yourself, then you need to modify your practice. Don’t do what the standard techniques tell you. Modify the techniques, insert new steps, try entirely new approaches, experiment with different belief structures, skip steps, mix techniques, etc. This is now the correct way to practice.

When starting out, the correct way to practice is very procedural, and step by step. This will get you the mediocre results, which serve as a great start. But when it’s time to move on, then you need to start using your creative mind, and try new things without asking for permission.

Be Open Minded

Lastly, you absolutely must be open minded. This does not mean gullible. Being open minded simply means that when someone comes to you with a new idea, then take it in and digest it. Have respect for the person who is presenting this idea to you - clearly they must believe in it to some degree, so even if it sounds insane from your perspective, it is very real from their perspective.

The reason this is important is because of the axiom of this article: no one knows how psychic abilities function. Never treat anything as gospel, and never outright dismiss someone else’s perspective. There is a happy middle-ground, where ideas are treated as ideas, nothing more, nothing less. Truth can be evasive, so you must always stay alert.

Conclusion

In conclusion, there is a certain mindset that a lot of successful psychics have. Meaningful goals, independent thought, and open mindedness has shown itself to be stronger than any individual technique. Why do you think experienced psychics argue over techniques? Because we usually create them ourselves, over a long time of trial and error, and feel a strong sense of pride and ownership for them :-). If you are stuck at mediocre, then stop walking behind us, and start walking beside us.

I was thinking…

I enjoy this site :-). In my mind, it’s a success.

I’m glad people are using the video board, and it’s fun to see what videos people post. I always watch them and read the replies, though I don’t always reply. The most requested feature seems to be an Edit button - I’ll probably add that soon.

The lottery game gets it’s fair share of use, though it’s dieing down a little bit. I was using it as a “warm up” before picking numbers, but my current strategy strictly forbids any form of “warm up”, so I’m not using it as much right now. Either way, I want to create more games for people to play with. I’m not sure exactly what the games will be, but I like having the statistics viewable to the public, so everyone can see how each other are doing. Maybe I’ll add a card game of some sort…

I enjoy the blog, but I do want to add some form of permanent content. Not just a stream of consciousness from me :-P. I’m not sure exactly how I want to accomplish this, or what permanent content I want to have, but the feeling is there :-). I always read the comments and internalize peoples’ questions and suggestions. Adding a comment to the latest blog entry is a better way to ask questions than sending me an e-mail. I have a hard time keeping up with my e-mail.

For December, ALW is averaging 390 unique visits/day. Our peak was August at 455/day, and last month at 419/day. We’ve been hovering around these values since June. My goal is not to attract random people to the site, but I do like to attract intelligent people who have experience in the weird topics we discuss. Eventually, I hope to attract people to the site who didn’t come here via PsiPog.net - not because I want to shy away from PsiPog.net, only because I want ALW to stand on it’s own feet. Alexa ranks ALW at 1,325,716th most popular site on the web :-). PsiPog.net is currently at 220,160th, by comparison.

I feel ALW now has an identity. We have a solid chunk of content and unique features that defines what ALW is all about. My next project will probably be to add another game or two, and then work on some non-blog content. Maybe spruce up the design a little bit (that large blank area to the right of the logo is really annoying :-P).

A huge thank you goes out to everyone who is reading this right now :-). I know a lot of people didn’t like the idea of archiving PsiPog.net, and creating ALW (I still get e-mails to this day about it) - but it was a big step up. So thank you for reading the blogs, using the video board, and playing around with the lottery game. And thanks of course for the honest feedback, which I always listen to :-). I hope to expand ALW for the new year by adding creative and unique features to the site, and developing strong content. Thanks again!

Also… if you didn’t notice, I updated the logo for the holiday season. If the website has an orange banner at the top, then hit Refresh on your browser :-).

I was reading my past couple posts, and noticed that I’m ragging on intention manifestation quite a bit. I want to clarify exactly what I think intention manifestation is, and exactly what parts I take issue with.

First, for those that don’t know: the idea of intention manifestation is basically that if you think good thoughts, and follow your emotions, then you will attract good things. It became popular for a short time with the movie The Secret, especially once it got the Oprah bump. It’s a very empowering mindset, that states we attract whatever we think and feel about. If we think/feel bad things, then we attract bad things. If we think/feel good things - then we attract good things.

Using that, the next logical step is: whatever you want in your life, you can attract it, by thinking positive thoughts about it as though you have already attained it. Visualize. Feel. Get into it. And you’ll send out the attraction-vibes out to the universe, and then the universe will respond.

Ok.

Here is where I take issue: there is a distinct difference between attaining results, and explaining results. If you can attain something, that doesn’t necessarily mean you can explain how or why you were successful.

For example, I am really good at math. When I was in high school, I could learn math very easily, and I advanced quickly through the grades. Can I tell you WHY I’m good at math? I have some ideas - but really, I don’t know. I was born this way, I suppose. I really don’t know exactly why I’m good at math.

What if I was convinced that I’m good at math because I eat a lot of chicken? People might ask me for help in math, and I would instruct them: eat chicken! That’s what I do, and look at how good I am! I might conclude that there is a chemical in chicken that helps stimulate the part of the brain responsible for logic and math.

Now the idea is silly - but the point is very valid. Just because I’m successful at something doesn’t mean I can give a reason WHY I’m successful. Back to intention manifestation…

I believe that a lot of smart people started to notice that weird things happen in reality. “Coincidence” simply couldn’t explain the weird events in their lives. So they invented an explanation: intention manifestation. It’s a wonderful theory that can explain weird events without relying on the idea of “coincidence”.

I believe the theory is incorrect. When I say that, I’m NOT saying that people don’t experience weird things. I don’t believe the theory of “coincidence” is correct either. I DO believe we can manipulate reality in some metaphysical way, to produce results. I’ve seen that with my own eyes. But there is a difference between attaining the results, and explaining the results. I have attained the same results others have - I simply don’t like the explanation of intention manifestation.

I am not skeptical of the results - I’m skeptical of the explanation. I’m not saying, “Prove to me that intention manifestation can produce results!” Not at all. What I am saying is: “Prove to me that intention manifestation is the correct explanation for these results.”

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I offer an alternate theory for explaining the weird results we see using intention manifestation techniques. My theory is that intention manifestation techniques are actually sending out a telepathic broadcast, that others pick up on subconsciously. These telepathic transmissions influence our decision making process.

Now, if you’ve been paying attention, your response might be: “Prove to me that telepathy is the correct explanation for these weird results.” I can’t offer that much proof, except personal experience as evidence.

I have been successful with intention manifestation when using it on things that humans affect. For example, I have been successful using intention manifestation on attracting females, helping out friends and family members, getting more play time in soccer, meeting new people, etc. Each successful application of intention manifestation has had a human mind in the equation that could be influenced telepathically to help me achieve my goal.

I have had extremely limited success with intention manifestation when using it on things that humans have very little affect on. For example, I have been mostly unsuccessful using intention manifestation to make red lights turn green, win scratch off lottery tickets, and win drawing-based lotteries.

This leads me to conclude that the normal explanation for intention manifestation must be incorrect. If it was as simple as letting the universe fulfill my desires, then I should have had equal success across the board. Instead, the human-related attempts were overly successful, and the hard-reality-related attempts were mostly failures. This leads me to believe that a human being is important in the equation, and that telepathy of some sort could then be involved.

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In conclusion, when I attack the idea of intention manifestation, please understand that I am attacking the theory. Not the results. I completely agree that weird things happen, and that doing intention manifestation techniques can produce results. What I am attacking is the reason WHY the techniques produce results. I do not believe the universe is listening to us, granting us our wishes based on what we think and feel. My results are not congruent with that theory. Instead, I believe a better explanation is some form of group telepathy, where one person’s strong desires can influence a group of people subconsciously.

I love using the term “dangerous thoughts”.  It encapsulates precisely what I feel the need to describe.  A dangerous thought is a destructive thought that is tempting, but ultimately not true.

For example, racism.  Imagine if you grow up, and know a lot of black criminals.  A dangerous thought would be to think that black people are criminals.  From your perspective, it seems true - your experience has led you to believe it.  In reality, the thought is very destructive, and is ultimately not true.  Crime doesn’t originate from skin color, it originates from social conditions (and some other things probably).

Racism is an easy example though.  There are much more clever dangerous thoughts though.

What about intention manifestation?  I believe that intention manifestation is a dangerous thought.  This is why:

Intention manifestation says that: “You get what you think about, in accordance to the law of attraction.  If you aren’t getting what you want, then you need to change your thoughts.  If you’ve changed your thoughts, and you STILL aren’t getting what you want, then really you haven’t changed your thoughts… you are canceling yourself out with other thoughts.”

Why is this dangerous?  Well, first - it’s tempting.  We would all love to think that we can wish and get whatever we want.  It’s a really nice idea!  I want a genie too!  All I have to do is think the right thoughts (and listen to my emotions), and I’ll get what I want!  Hurray!

But there’s a much larger reason for why this thought is dangerous.  Any failure is a failure of the believer - never a failure of the theory.  Now, forget that we’re talking about intention manifestation for a second.  Imagine we are talking about some random theory about reality.  And imagine that this random theory states at the end, “If you observe this theory to be untrue, then this theory states that it is a result of you not believing entirely in this theory.”

If the theory is, in reality, untrue - how could you prove it?  What if my theory was, “Trees have learned to speak English.  If you cannot hear a tree speak English, it’s because you don’t believe they can, and trees can also read minds and become offended by people like you, so they refuse to talk to you.”

Now, of course trees can not speak English, nor are they capable of such highly accurate telepathy :-P.  But how can you disprove such a theory?  Any attempt to disprove it will result in “well, of course you never hear the trees - they won’t allow disbelievers to hear them.  You just proved the theory is true!”

You can see how ridiculous this is.  And hopefully you can also see why I label this sort of thinking as “dangerous”.  You can easily get caught in a loop - forcing yourself to believe something in order to test the theory.

I propose a new thought-suggestion:

Thought Suggestion 132: I will not attempt to test theories that require belief in the theory in order to be tested.  It is the fault of the theory for not providing a way for healthy thinkers to verify the theory without mandating a belief system.

You’ll notice that a lot of religion gets cut deep with this suggestion as well.  “If you observe Christianity to be untrue, then really you’re just being fooled by the Devil, and you must believe even more in Christianity in order to overcome the Devil.”

Ouch :-P.

AndPious sent me the following link: http://www.haloorbital.com/.

The story goes that the owner of the site, Stan Deyo, has created a propulsion vehicle that basically functions like the sci-fi UFOs.  Apparently his site will open in 2008, which is just around the corner.

Now, of course we’ve seen things like this in the past.  Steorn immediately comes to mind.  I would love for it to be true, but part of me just says: I’ll believe it when I see it.  Nonetheless, my curiosity is certainly piqued :-).  I’ll be checking out the site regularly until 2008, to see the status.  If I notice anything significant, ALW will be the first to know.

I’ve been on vacation the past week, soaking up some rays with my mom in Florida. Before leaving for the trip, I purchased the book The Ultimate Time Machine by Joseph McMoneagle. By the end of the trip, I had finished the book (and actually started on another one which I’m now half-way through).

Well… I hate to be a nay-sayer… but the book is pretty terrible.

It starts off with McMoneagle’s history in remote viewing, and his work with the STARGATE program. No problems so far - I had already known McMoneagle to be a reliable and accurate remote viewer from my past research. From what I can tell, McMoneagle can accurately use remote viewing to psychically receive information on military targets. So, with that knowledge, you might think the rest of the book would be a great read… Well. No.

The book first starts to go sour with McMoneagle’s understanding of “time”. First he asserts that there is no past, and that we create the past in the present with our beliefs. But then he asserts that there is an objective past, that we can access using remote viewing. Well - does the past exist, or doesn’t it? Clearly the answer is that there is an objective past, and there is also society’s current understanding of that past. While society might be wrong, that doesn’t actually alter the objective past. McMoneagle struggles with this simple concept for some reason, and he constantly confuses society’s current understanding of the past, with the actual objective past.

But whatever… maybe I just don’t get what he’s trying to say. Ok, fair enough. I kept reading.

The second half of the book is dedicated solely to McMoneagle’s predictions for the future. The book was written in 1998, so I was especially curious if McMoneagle would talk about any terrorist attacks on 9/11, the Iraq war, or global warming. At one point he does mention a war in the Middle East, but he predicts the war will be a result of Hussein invading Iran.

Here are some other predictions:

1. In 2005, temporary tattoos (made with a special kind of dye) will be the new fad.

2. In 2002, male pattern baldness will be fully eradicated, via some magic pill.

3. Fully automated, or computer controlled highways, will be tested by 2005.

4. Before 2001, a country in the Middle East will suffer a biological warfare accident, resulting in the death of nearly 100,000 people, and permanent abandonment of a large city.

5. In 2008, the standard RAM in a computer will be 128 MB.

6. Between 2005-2008, a new form of clothing style, consisting of a jumpsuit with colors on the shoulders, will be ushered in.

7. By the year 2010, the SATs will “go the way of the dinosaurs.” (p.146)

8. By the year 2019, the average student will be scoring the max on the SATs, and they won’t matter anymore. (p.239)

Er wait…

Yes that’s right. McMoneagle contradicts his own predictions. First the SATs will disappear, then 9 years later they will be getting maxed out.

The majority of McMoneagle’s predictions happen decades in the future. But judging by his accuracy so far, I honestly won’t be holding my breath.

I feel conflicted, because part of me really respects McMoneagle’s remote viewing training and talent. However, I really can’t let this book slide. His predictions are… terrible. Don’t bother reading this book. Sorry.