The Gift

Sci Fi has a new show coming out this summer called The Gift. It's a reality show that tests people on their psychic abilities, eliminating one person each week. Unfortunately I am not able to apply because according to their rules, professional psychics are excluded from participating. A professional psychic, their website states, is anyone "who has offered services as a psychic to the public for a fee." I guess I'm a professional!

What was eating Kyle Huff?

Kyle Huff, 28, killed six people and then himself on the morning of Saturday, March 25, in Seattle. Since there were no arguments and thus--in the eyes of the media and police--no apparent motive, nobody knows why he did it. Well, the universe offered me an explanation, and I feel the need to share it.

Kyle Huff was isolated and lonely. For several years he had tried to make connections with people, with varying degrees of success, but usually still felt uncomfortable around them. It wasn't so much that people didn't like him; it was his own perception of himself that led him to have negative feelings. Despite having an identical twin brother, he failed to ever feel truly connected and accepted in this world.

He didn't know what to do with his negative feelings. He couldn't admit to them, let alone talk about them. He was unable to admit--even to himself--that he felt isolated and insecure. To him, admitting those feelings would have been a sign of weakness. Weakness was not an acceptable trait for him to have, in his eyes.

Kyle didn't like the way he felt at all. He needed to get rid of those feelings somehow. He couldn't keep them inside of himself because they were hurting him, slowly eroding his self-worth. He couldn't get them out by talking about them because that would have been an admission of weakness and defeat. But he had to do something. So he decided to lash out at the people who were, without any fault of their own, the cause of his insecurities: his would-be friends.

When Kyle entered the rave scene a couple of months ago, he was already playing with the idea of killing people. But he also still had hope to finally make the connections there he had been seeking for years. He knew how accepting and welcoming the rave scene was, and if he could make friends anywhere, it would be there. And people did welcome and accept him. But he still couldn't shake the feeling that he was different from them, that he didn't fit in. He felt that they accepted him by default and not for who he truly was. He was jealous of all the guys he met there because of how easy-going and outgoing they were, how easily they seemed to navigate the world of dancing, dating and sex. He was also jealous of all the girls because of how comfortable they seemed with their bodies and how nice they were to him in spite of his certainty that none of them could ever truly like him with all of his insecurities and perceived weaknesses.

As Kyle started meeting people at raves, he still felt pretty uncomfortable around them. He despised that people had that kind of power over him, the power to make him feel uncomfortable. He wanted to be like them, light-hearted and loving life, but he didn't see a way for him to reach that point. It was killing him to see that even the nicest and most accepting people couldn't make him feel comfortable with himself. So he decided to kill them. His motive was revenging his own isolation and insecurities.

Cracking down on the rave community is not going to prevent actions like this in the future; neither are stricter gun controls. What we really need to crack down on is isolation. We have to find a way to make sure that people don't feel isolated, and that everybody has a safe and peaceful outlet for their deepest, darkest insecurities. We need to find a way to assure people that they are not alone in their insecurities and weaknesses, so that they don't end up the lone gunperson at a mass killing.

I know all of this because Kyle appeared to me in a dream last night. I am not in any way trying to defend his act; I am just offering an answer to the question everybody is asking right now and nobody seems to know the answer to: Why? This is why.

In the spirit of the Reverend at Williamson's Church who said "Where there once was anger, let there now be peace", rest in peace, Suzanne, Melissa, Jason, Jeremy, Sushi, Deacon, and Kyle.

Notes from Path of Empowerment

Last fall I read Path of Empowerment by Barbara Marciniak, and these are the parts I highlighted in that book:

Everyone one Earth is here to participate in and contribute to the mass awakening of humanity to the truth that your thoughts create your reality.

[...] your thoughts not only set the course and direction of your life in the physical 3-D world, they also ripple into and affect many other realities.

All of existence is filled with energy that is responsive, alive, intelligent, vibrant, flexible, and telepathic; and given that you are a part of existence, you are imbued with the same qualities.

[...] when it comes to power, you will always be tested to see if you will abuse and misuse it.

[...] you must first seek to know yourself before the answers begin to make sense.

Mass agreements about the nature of reality are unconsciously debated and considered on a psychic level of reality at the speed of thought.

When you can lovingly recognize yourself as your own creation, you free yourself from the mass-induced trance of powerless living.

Conditions, excuses, competition, or wishing you were someone else will get you nowhere.

Many millions of people have proved to themselves that thought creates reality by using their intuition to tap in to the non-physical and invisible energies that permeate time and space and all of existence.

The current fashion in Western civilization promotes doubters and skeptics who are recognized and rewarded for their worrisome speculations.

The love you seek from others must be generated by you, for you.

To cultivate a loving relationship with yourself, take time everyday--morning and evening--to sit or stand in front of a mirror for five to ten minutes for an intimate eye-to-eye appointment with yourself.

[...] all real healing involves a compassionate reinterpretation and energetic understanding of people, places, times, and events.

Seek the path that brings fun and joyful living, where you attract meaningful and significant life experiences.

[...] be certain to make the best use of all your nows.

Be reasonable and generous with your possibilities, and gift yourself well in your mind.

You qualify for the time of your birth, just as you would for a particular type of employment.

You can fool yourself, but you can't fool your frequency signature!

Your Internet is a symbolic model of [the] web of existence--an attempt in the material world to mimic the web and replicate its boundless energy.

To be able to proclaim: "I was there, and I lived it. I did it; I began to design my life according to my own well-conceived intentions" [...]

Understanding the cosmic laws of manifestaion is like having the keys to the universe.

[...] people are becoming completely enamored of technological innovations in order to escape the mounting pressure [...]

[...] they are immersing themselves in an electronic bubble that manages their frequencies.

Beginning in 2007, the third and final phase will be initiated with a profound new leap in intensity.

Your life and your reality can be preidictable in terms of the energies that influence you and your times, and equally unpredictable in terms of how you will respond to them.

An inherently stron psychic connection exists in all families because of the commonality of infomration and familiarity that is carried in the blood. your cells are always communicating your state of mind to your genetic family in all avenues of time.

Events and experiences that are the results of fear-based beliefs and encoded as such in the DNA are especially important to heal, because unless the meaning and purpose of an experience is understood, as the saying goes, history will repeat itself.

Healing times are always about reconnecting fragmented parts with the greater whole by rejuvenating the spirit through accepting greater responsiblity for eing a co-creator of existence.

[...] if deceit is involved, or no love is present, the hangover from sex can be psychically, emotinally, mentally, and physically debilitating.

The ninth chakra offers your consciousness great mobility; its symbol is the moon flower because its function is to connect you with all that transpires between the atmosphere of Earth and the moon, including the powerful magnetic energies that connect the two spheres.

Do not rush to analyze [] symbols by insisting on an immediate answer.

Projections of worry have a very powerful and insistent frequency that transmits a message with an expectation of problems arising.

We suggest that you invest in your self, for on the web of existence, we are all one.

Animals can always read your vibration, and if you are intent on empowering your life, they will often gift you by making special melodies of sound to balance your chakras and tune up your body.

Beliefs are usually about power: your power to create.

[...] when you change your thinking, you will inevitably change your life.

The more aware you are of the programs you run inside your biological computer, the easier it will be to create what you want.

[...] through an array of synchronistic events, you cross the path of opportunity that connects you to what you are focused on, which is deeply tied to your beliefs about your self-worth.

There are no accidents; your cells impel you to turn down one street versus another--to meet an old friend or avoid an unpleasant encounter--so whatever crosses your path is part of your creation.

[...] you often live your life on one avenue of existence, all the while missing out on a myriad of untold opportunities because accepting limiting beliefs is like wearing a straightjacket all of your life.

Happiness and peace of mind are the hallmarks of real empowerment, and they are present when you are in balance with your values and intuition.

Neediness is based on a desire to have someone other than yourself mold your destiny.

[...] your beliefs are an integral part of your personal energy field; in actuality, they are a form of magic. Magic is the ability to conjure something into form, and beliefs do the same [...]

In order to empower yourself and consciously utilize the force of vital cosmic energy, you must recognize your fears as your regular contribution to the current state of global emotional pollution.

[...] over the next few years the very nature of intelligence, which is often based on solely logical interpretations of reality, will be reconsidered.

How often do you use sarcasm?

[...] the meaning you assign to an event determines the outcome you experience.

People often want to know what will happen in the years ahead and the answer is, It depends on what you believe.

Proceed with confidence, common sense, and courage, utilizing your own unique style and grace. Trust yourself to create harmonious resolutions, and remain calm wit all that unfolds, affirming that everything will work out just fine.

[...] how you feel is a result of what you believe.

[...] learning how to manage energy in the material world is one of the main reasons you are here.

Healing is dealing, and dealing is feeling, and feeling is healing.

The message, or core purpose, of your body's condition is based on a friendly, cooperative relationship between your mind, your feelings, and your cells.

You must be practical with respect to the laws of physical reality.

On some level of consciousness, you are always responding to the effects of lunar and planetary cycles; how you interpret these influences can have a profound impact on your sexual experiences.

No one owes you an orgasm if you have been unable to discover for yourself your body's own orgasmic pleasure.

Women in general currently have the greater tendency to switch their attention from one reality to another and most women do so, often without realizing it.

At the onset of womanhood, the appearance of the first blood creates a psychic-spiritual vortex of energy, a personal power entrained to the lunar cycles.

Men need to understand that their personal power resides in activating and embracing their feelings, a side of themselves they have not duly considered.

The sperm that genetically best suits the requirements of the non-physical being desiring birth through the union will then resonate with the song and match the egg's vibration.

Good sex is good business for all.

In the journey of consciousness, how you earn a living is much less important than how you manage energy.

You are stronger than you think, and with this in mind, you must allow the multiverse to gift you with something even greater than you can imagine.

To leave the endless, boring loop of repetition on the road of disempowerment, you must make a choice, and then creatively imagine your own exit.

Symbols are the interface between the field of existence and consciousness.

The more adept you are at recognizing patterns within the symbols of 3-D reality, the faster you learn to reestablish contact with your higher self, thus opening and activating the codes for new levels of life-enhancing, sustainable probabilities.

You actually select probable versions of reality as easily as you choose food from the grocery shelves.

Language is based upon telepathic agreements where inherent meaning is assigned to sound symbols; [...]

Writing is a form of magic that was once readily accepted and developed as a method for affecting reality.

Never underestimate your own personal power to change the world, for as you emerge from denial, your probably choices dramatically increase. Remember to always ask yourself: Why did I create this? What my lessons, the gifts of opportunity, and what can I learn from them?

To have an impact on your country and community that establishes world peace now, join with a group of like-minded individuals each month at the new moon, the traditional time for planting and seeding reality.

An integrated, well-balanced mind vibrates at a frequency that is immune to negative influences.

Any spiritual awakening is challenging because a reinterpretation of reality is always involved.

"[...] I know that I will receive the impulses, the signs and signals and guidance that I require to always be in the right place at the right time, for my highest good and that of all those around me. All this I know, and for this I am grateful."

Within the game the greatest victory and ultimate achievement is to feel the power of love within all creations by transcending fear without annihilating its purpose.

Beliefs are the invisible building blocks, the conditions around which you agree to interact with reality.

From: Path of Empowerment: Pleiadian Wisdom For a World in Chaos by Barbara Marciniak, Inner Ocean Publishing, 2004

Channeling in the media

Maybe this has been going on for a while but I didn't notice until recently that the mainstream media are using the word channeling a lot these days. I don't remember it being that way before. I have seen it used online as well as in magazine articles, in sources and contexts that are definitely not spiritual in nature.

The way I have seen it used, somebody might be channeling another living person, or you might be channeling a feeling associated with a particular time and place, or a characteristic of another person. You can channel Mel Gibson, or Hitler, or 19th century England, or your mom's tidiness. I find the use of the word channeling very interesting. Even though the media aren't talking about channeling people who have died or beings from other dimensions but are using channeling merely as a current buzzword, it makes me think that the whole world is subconsciously waking up to the concept of channeling spirit.

Vera's Spring Newsletter

Happy Spring, everybody!

I haven’t written in a while, so no wonder I have a lot to talk about.

TAXI SCHOOL
One thing I’m excited about right now is that I just finished taxi school and am about to become a licensed San Francisco taxicab driver. Can you believe it? I was just as surprised about this as you are. But it turns out that going to taxi school is what I needed to be doing right now; it became crystal clear to me after a friend of a friend saw me for a Tarot reading and told me that he used to drive a taxi, just for fun. I am planning on doing it for fun as well, one day a week. Once I know which day that is I will let you all know, and if you ever need a taxi that day, you can call me and my taxicab! Hopefully it will be one with NICE COLORS. I’m trying to get hired at a taxi company whose cars have nice colors. Thanks, Tyson!

PSYCHIC GOODIES
I have added some new psychic goodies on my website. After Valentine’s Day was over I was bummed that people couldn’t send Psychic Valentines anymore, so I created some new similar psychic gift certificates: Generic anytime Psychic Wishes and Psychic Birthday Wishes. Last week there was also a Psychic St Patrick’s Wish, and I am planning on making a Mother’s Day one soon. If there is a psychic gift certificate YOU would like to see, let me know and I’ll see what I can do.

PAINTING
Thanks to my friend Tracy I started a new hobby: Painting! I already made four paintings, and I’m very proud. Check them out.

THE CITY
I seem to be doing a lot of things that pay homage to San Francisco. I made a painting of the New York Street Café in the Mission and am planning to paint more San Francisco urban scenes. I have also been taking pictures all over the city and submitting them to the Guess Where SF group on Flickr like crazy. I can’t stop doing that! Plus, I am going to be a San Francisco taxi driver to get to know the city even better and to share my love for the city with others. Once I start driving a taxi, I plan on posting all my routes online somewhere as well. I don’t know why I love mentioning and recognizing intersections so much, but I definitely do.

SESSIONS
From now until the end of April I am offering psychic counseling sessions and Tarot readings at special spring prices. Psychic counseling sessions are part psychic reading and part counseling session. Please come prepared with a specific topic you would like to talk about. I prefer my sessions to be a dialog rather than a “Tell me what you see” monolog. The more energy you put into the session yourself, the more you will get out of it. So it’s good to spend some time before the session thinking about what is up for you right now and what you are hoping to get out of it.

I do the Tarot readings with the Osho Zen Tarot. Osho wrote the book on one of my favorite subjects, Intuition. The Osho Zen Tarot focuses on the present rather than the future, which I like. I do a five card spread regarding one specific topic you would like to know more about.

The spring price for psychic counseling sessions and Tarot readings is $40 for one hour. Their regular price is $55-80 sliding scale.

HOOPING
My good friend and hooping accomplice Philo and I recently went to Los Angeles to be filmed and interviewed for an upcoming movie about hooping. If all goes well, we’ll be movie stars later this year!

VERABUG.COM
After hiding my personal blog in a subdirectory for almost four years, I finally gave it its own domain: verabug.com. Blogging has been one of my favorite things to do for a long time, and I am finally ready to have the whole world see what I write on there. I’m not going to hide ANY part of myself any longer; it’s all right there on verabug.com: Childhood drama, insecurities, boastfulness, and self-absorption. They are all part of me, and there they are.

These are the things I’m excited about this spring. What are YOU excited about? Let me know because I would love to hear from you.

And finally, here is an awesome quote I saw on a bumper sticker the other day: Let the beauty YOU LOVE be what you do. Have a great Spring 2006!

Bliss,
Vera.

What do you want to know?

I was at Borders today and The Complete Idiot's Guide to Psychic Awareness caught my eye. And in Chapter 2 titled What Can a Psychic Tell You?, I found my favorite paragraph of the month:

What Is It You Want to Know?

Most readings address relationships, careers, spirituality, family, health, and life-lesson issues. I find that the more specific my clients' questions are, the more helpful I can be. When I first began giving readings, I wasn't sure how specific I wanted my clients to be about what they wanted to know, mainly because I wanted to believe that, as a psychic I should just know everything. I soon discoverd, however, that I was spending a lot of time in the reading telling people things they already knew, like "You have a husband and two children--a boy and a girl" or "You hate your job as a sales manager". I could amuse and amaze people, but--apart from providing simple entertainment insights didn't really help to guide or inform my clients.

This is something that has been on my mind a lot lately. Like the author, I often feel that I am not allowed to ask the client any questions because I am supposed to be psychic and shouldn't need any help or direction. And clients love to ask very general questions like "Tell me about my life" to see how much I can tell without them giving me any information. But it's true that the reading is much more effective if the client comes with a specific and detailed topic in mind. That way I don't waste ten minutes on getting information the client already knows.

When the client comes prepared with specific questions, there is an energetic advantage as well. First, the client is putting energy of his or her own into the reading, even before the reading starts. The more energy you put in, the more you get out of it. Secondly, by talking about their question, the client creates energy during the reading. I can then pick up on that energy much more quickly and easily than if I had to go looking for that energy by myself.

I am glad I am not the only one who thinks so. For a while I was afraid that I was cheating by asking my clients what they would like to know.

Notes from Family of Light

Last summer I read Family of Light by Barbara Marciniak, and these are the parts I highlighted in that book:

[...] You create your own reality." At this point this is a very deep and important concept to grasp, for it is truly one of the greatest continuing laws of existence.

The vast majority of people in your world have signed up for a struggle. By this we mean that they believe what they are told.

You are taught what to think, and you pay a good amount of money for this experience.

In retrospect it can be seen that it was only the Western world, a product of the Roman Empire and Christianity and a certain mode of thinking, who did not understand that the world was round.

Without psychic abilities secrets can be kept.

Your power ends where your fear begins.

Speak, manifest, and live, dear friends, your true selves.

How you get to the place of knowledge is to know yourself; what you do with your knowledge is yet to be seen.

Pay attention to all of the creatures of Earth: insects, birds, and creepy crawlies that walk and tumble on four legs, for they create a vibration that can help you bridge the gap to intuitive living, which is the way they live.

Even though you know the effects of vibration and frequencies, sometimes you forget and slip into bouts of depression or bad moods [...]

It is time to change your schedule and let your body's callings be the guide.

Everyone claims membership and kinship to Family of Light.

Synchronicity describes a meaningful unfolding of events that are experienced without apparent order, a so-called divine intervention.

Your body is the easiest way for spirit to talk to you when you will not listen.

You select your food based on how good it tastes and not on its vibration.

Areas you formerly found boring will become fascinating because you now understand the information and will wonder how you could have missed it earlier.

No dues, club memberships, certificates of approval, or graduation diplomas are required. You simply live, creating a vibration and a standard of living that astounds those around you.

Your health and your work are one and the same.

A healer can sense the messages in your field and suggest the necessary changes before the energy turns to ailments in the physical body.

Sometimes you overfocus on "how" something will happen rather than putting attention on "what" you want to occur.

If the headline on a newspaper read, "Comet Here To Shift Consciousness," the statement itself would shift consciousness. You are so programmable that whatever you see in print you believe [...]

Your personal name is part of your frequency [...]

The presumptions you apply to the unknown territory determine what you will experience.

She alone could produce blood without wounds [...]

For those who confuse you, recognize that their confusion is theirs and your clarity is yours.

Your creativity ends when you are in fear, and your power ends where your fear begins.

You are the agents of change, and the ability to change and transmute your lives is yours again and again to marvel over, as you proclaim how well events unfold when you embrace faith and learn your lessons in living.

[...] when you experience an uncomfortable area, realize it is time to reassess your beliefs and assumptions about reality, to see them in a completely new light.

You will learn to communicate with this satelitte to a greater degree when you understand that the moon has a story to tell [...]

Your real work is to expand your consciousness, allowing this energy of change to move through you, and when it changes your old ways of thinking, then the patterns of your life will stop repeating themselves and you will be open to new possibilities.

The real power lies in knowing the meaning of the song the birds sing [...]

If you have been running around in circles of late, looking for what you think is needed for the next phase, then stop for a moment, find a place to relax and lay to rest your quivering and quaking.

The more you rarefy your frequency, the more you will only attract specific energies.

Perhaps you will travel to the end of the world, and even though it is round, you will find a way to fall off and perish in some never-never land of nonsense because you could not make the leap from a flat-world to a round-world view.

Purposeful clear living allows those who understand the laws to be the makers of reality.

Your finest hour shall soon be upon you, and there will be an exquisite uniqueness to it.

Once you activate the eye in your brain, the pineal gland, by continuing to visualize the numeral eight or the sign of infinity across your eyes, meeting between your eyebrows, more of what is hidden will come forward.

We ask you to step into the mist, into a place of mystery where you can see nothing at all, yet you feel the spaciousness.

From: Family of Light: Pleaidian Tales and Lessons in Living by Barbara Marciniak, Bear & Company, 1998

Something GREAT is about to happen

Golden Bough Books in Shasta City has a little sign on its front door that says Something wonderful is about to happen. It inspired me to create a sign for my own front door. Mine says Something GREAT is about to happen.


It works wonders for how I feel. Every time I come home and every time I leave my home, I am reminded that something great is about to happen. It opens doors for all kinds of awesome things I can make happen. And it stretches my mind to imagine more possibilities of great things that could happen. Everybody should have a sign like this!

Robin's website

My friend Robin Clark, who taught the classes that made me psychic, just launched her own website: www.robinclark.org. Check it out!

Introducing: Psychic St Patrick's Wishes™

I know it's short notice but I have created Psychic St Patrick's Wishes™ that you can send to friends. As usual, a Psychic St Patrick's Wish™ is a gift certificate for psychic insight via email. Find out more.

My personal spiritual PMS theory

The day before you get your period, you might feel depressed. You might feel bad about yourself, insecure, even hopeless. You might cry.

Then, the next day, you start bleeding and you feel good again. We have all been there.

After shedding a lot of old tears yesterday, I started bleeding today, and finally I understood: I was letting go of negativity and emotional ballast. By pushing out the blood, my body was pushing out painful memories, fears, negative thoughts and beliefs, from where they were stored in my cells.

So why is Pre-Menstrual Sorrow necessary? In order to release negative emotions, we first have to be aware of them. I have been working with this concept for a while now, and it really works for me. If I am not aware that something is bothering me, it is going to continue to bother me surreptitiously.

For instance, I might get annoyed that my friend is always late for our dates, and it might ruin my mood for the rest of the day. If I'm not aware of how much my friend's tardiness is bothering me, my days will continue to be ruined by it. But one day I might realize and it and notice to myself "Hey, I'm really annoyed that she is always late. It makes me think that she doesn't respect and value my time." And then I can do something with that. I can either decide to let it go, or I can talk to my friend about it, or I can investigate more deeply why I get so upset at other people's tardiness, or... However I direct my new awareness, I probably won't get as upset when my friend is late in the future. At the very least I can stop it from ruining my mood for the rest of the day by reminding myself: "This always happens. She is late and my day is ruined. I don't like that." And I can then choose to let go of that negativity and have a good day anyway.

My theory is that PMS is your body's way of making you aware of what's been bothering you over the last month. PMS brings it all up and out, in your face, so that you can't deny that it's there. Your body does this so that the next day you can let it all go with the blood that exits your body. If you didn't know what was bothering you, it would stay right there in your body and it would undermine your sense of well-being in subtle ways, so subtle you don't even know it's happening. That's why you go through a day of increased, albeit painful, awareness of what's been gnawing at your heart. So you can let it flow and let it GO! Thank the universe for PMS.

Introducing: Psychic Wishes™

You can now send a Psychic Wish™ anytime! After the Psychic Valentine™ and the Psychic Birthday Wish™, I have finally created the generic anytime gift certificate for psychic advice. You can send them to anyone you like, anytime you like!