Psychometry can work for you

Everyone has the inherent ability to utilize some psychic ability. Intuition, for instance, is a familiar sixth sense (Extra Sensory Perception). This ESP presents itself in many studies: dream analysis, psychic readings, palmistry, psychometry, and so forth. This little essay centers on psychometry, something that I have used for more than seventy years—mostly successfully.

From Wikipedia: “Psychometry (from Greek: ψυχή, psukhē, "spirit, soul"; + μέτρον, metron, "measure"), also known as token-object reading or psychoscopy, is a form of extra-sensory perception characterized by the claimed ability to make relevant associations from an object of unknown history by making physical contact with that object. Psychics assert that an object may have an energy field that transfers knowledge regarding that object's history.

“Psychometry is commonly offered at psychic fairs as a type of psychic reading…Although a subject of controversy, psychics who use psychometry have been used by law enforcement as psychic detectives "as a last resort [and] as an investigative tool with caution" for providing clues not directly admissible in the court of law such as a criminal's character, or the location of dead bodies. Many police departments around the world have released official statements saying that they do not regard psychics as credible or useful on cases.

Early on, my father showed me how to dowse for water. He had me hold a cherry branch with both fists gripping it tightly and pointed upward, with the pointed end of the branch held out in front of me. (I thought that he must be over-working!) “Don’t let the end of the branch point downward,” he said. And then I walked back and forth quite near the house that we were building, seeking an ideal spot to dig a well for water. Within fifty feet of the house, the end of that cherry branch bent downward! I was gripping it so hard that the bark peeled away from it! Dad then asked me:

“How many feet to we have to dig for water?”

“Seventy-three feet.”

“How much water will it produce?”

“Forty gallons per minute; it’s over an underground stream.”

A week later, the Durham Drilling Company came and drilled for the well, and then dropped the pipeline—71 feet! And the well produced 45 gallons per minute.

Over the years, I have dowsed for several wells—every single one of them coming in with water. Dowsing is really a cousin of psychometry, using different tools to arrive at the answers. Some psychics use other media in their work. I have been rather adept at dowsing, using rods, crystal balls, and what have you for getting answers.

At other times, I have the client write a question on a “billet”—a sheet of paper folded over, with only a code to identify the person. Or, I have held an object owned by the subject of the investigation, and have been able to either give information about the past or the current statue of the subject—say, for someone who has disappeared. This, of course, is true psychometry. In my book, “Worth the Room”, I discuss many of these cases, cases which involved my working with police forces around the country, the FBI, and Interpol. In most cases, we have been successful. There have been a very few where I have missed. And this weighed on me greatly because they involved people who had been murdered.

“There is nothing hid that shall not be revealed, and there is nothing lost that shall not be found,” paraphrases a verse from the Holy Bible. I truly believe that man can know exactly what God, as Divine Mind, knows. However, one must keep oneself ready to serve and be well-prepared when the calls come in. Keeping oneself spiritually “fit” is an important daily activity, or so methinks.

It doesn’t really matter what one’s religion might be. The important thing is to stay close to God, the closer the better in order to realize one’s fullest potential.

Your Dreams Count

Welcome to a study that could easily improve your life. What makes Your Dreams Count truly unique is that it is a handbook to supplement whatever dreamers’ dictionaries you may now be using. This book found its genesis when I was a freshman in college. The dream dictionaries of the time did not always fulfill a need for an interpretation of my dreams. With my early background in spiritual metaphysics, I yearned for definitions that would present the meanings of dreams at the physical, mental and spiritual levels. Somehow, I seemed to miss the connection between the definitions given in the dictionaries and the manifestations of the dreams in my real life.

For instance, when I dream of a bird, does this image come to me at the physical, mental or spiritual level? At the physical level I see a bird in flight; at the mental level I sense a new idea approaching; at the spiritual level I soar above mere earthly things into the ethereal. The same might be said of clouds, stars, boats, horses, and all of the other symbols one finds in a dreamer’s dictionary. There are extensive possibilities for accurate dream analysis.

The languages of Tarot, Numerology, Chinese and Western Astrology add to the dreamer’s vocabulary. Patiently, I put together charts and tables to help me with the work of interpreting my dreams. One would be surprised at how many definitions there are for a single motif or symbol! It took many years to evolve a comprehensive dream language to go with the dream journals.

            The Holy Bible was and still is a favorite resource and mainstay for research into dreams. I like especially the Book of Revelations and the chapters having to do with the Breastplate of David, Solomon’s Temple, and the dreams of Daniel and his three friends. As a matter of fact, most of my dream analysis work finds some roots in Scripture. There is more. I use Cruden’s Complete Concordance of the Bible as my constant reference. It, together with a dictionary and thesaurus are at my elbow as I write and study day by day.

            Reading Hobbes, Freud, Jung and other philosophers and psychoanalysts helped me to understand the philosophy of dreams. I embrace their teachings in my dream analysis work inclusively, but not exclusively. My major degree is in Education, not Psychology, but I find this to be no drawback to this work with dream analysis. My work in family counseling, in teaching a dream class for more than twenty-five years and as a guest on radio and television stations in several cities expanded my ability to decipher the codes in which dreams often appear to the dreamer.

Along the way I became a Freemason, taking all 32 degrees and joining the Scottish Rite and York Rite bodies of that organization. Needless to say, there are infinite symbols in these studies, as there are in the Knights of Columbus, Daughters of the Nile, Eastern Star and other such organizations.  Even the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts fill youngsters’ minds with symbolism. Fraternities and Sororities are the same. You see, there are symbols and motifs all around us. We need but embrace them in our dream language.  Symbols are found almost everywhere we look.

This eclectic approach to embracing several bodies of symbolic teachings widens the playing field for effective dream analysis. Dream dictionaries are still viable sources of information. However, this handbook permits you to expand upon those definitions to make your dreams more meaningful to you, to make your dreams really count in your daily life.

Paying attention to dreams has been a fruitful habit, recalling and recording them day by day. A constant flow of dreams was recorded in dependable steno pads, and presented an opportunity to go over past dreams, and to track the timing between my dreams and their manifestations in my daily life.

            For many years, I taught Your Dreams Count classes, using the fifteen major chapters of this book as the syllabus for our work. Our class members kept dream journals, and learned to share even the most intimate dreams with their companions in the classroom. The students and I would go over the material in each chapter carefully, year after year, until it became the finished product that you hold in your hands. You and your friends may wish to form a dream class using this handbook as a steady guide.

            The chapters are arranged logically. In the first four chapters (Part I), I lay the foundation for dream analysis by discussing the definition of dreams; understanding man’s three-fold personhood: physical, mental and spiritual; determining one’s life purpose; and considering three vital triads that apply to daily life. The next section of four chapters (Part II)) discusses important practices and belief systems to expand one’s dream language. These are: Western Astrology, Eastern Astrology, Numerology, and Tarot.  The final section (Part III) describes in detail the terminology of certain common, and not so common, objects that appear in dreams, giving a more perfect definition to them. The answers to your questions about last night’s dream, for example, will become clear as day. In fact, each definition clarifies meanings for the dreamer, making dreams count more and more in daily life.

You will sense the inherent symmetry of what is presented. As a handbook, I’ve tried to keep it interesting for you; I want you to enjoy yourself. Also included in this volume are many examples of dreams and the solutions to them as they were worked out by the dreamer(s) and myself. In these cases, I simply use the word “Dream:” followed by the dream as it was reported; the dreams are in Italics.

            The benefit that Your Dreams Count holds for you becomes apparent as you learn to recall and record your dreams and then begin to decipher your dreams at three levels: physical, mental and spiritual. For instance, there are four major areas of your life that may benefit from your dreams. These areas are, briefly, health, wealth, work and love. Often, when stumped by a problem relating to my job I would have the issue clarified in a dream. This happened more times than I can recount. Why? It was because I paid attention to my dreams, and then acted on them. Needless, to say, there were events in my life that could have been avoided had I but listened, really listened to what my dreams were telling me.

It is true that dreams alone are not going to make your life better; they are not the only avenue of help in solving dilemmas. We go to bankers for help with our finances, lawyers with legal problems, doctors with health problems. At the same time, one’s dreams may be of great assistance with these things. In addition, we each must take responsibility for diet and exercise, and laying aside harmful substances. The practical things in life must be heeded.

            This work has been more than fifty years in the making, combining my dream journals, notations on scraps of paper, syllabi for classes, workshops, and from what my students have taught me along the way. I am a compulsive reader and learner, and this has proved to be a boon in this study.

             Please carefully note the “Supplemental Reading” section toward the end of the book. It contains names of authors and their works that provided acute knowledge and wisdom in my studies of this material. I haven’t read these authors in many years, and am not sure whether their books are still available. While I cite specific authors of material in the text of the book, I do not knowingly quote from anyone else. To all of these, my teachers of the past, I give grateful thanks. 

            From this dreamer to you, then, Your Dreams Count: A Layman’s Approach to Dream Analysis is dedicated to assist you with your dream analysis. Enjoy!

Sincerely yours,

Reverend Paul Lachlan Peck, M. Ed.

Transcendentalism

Recently, I was reading an article from The Courant, a journal sponsored by the Syracuse University Library Associates Of which I have been a member for years. The article that caught my attention was on a recent acquisition of the first essay ever written on Transcendentalism (Crocker and Ruggles, 1842). This reminded me of a paragraph that I wrote in my autobiography “Worth the Room”. The year that this paragraph refers to is about 1953 when I was a student at the University of Connecticut.

“My dreams began to take on great meaning, so I started a dream journal. Almost nightly for several months at a time I find myself sitting in a Massachusetts living room with Bronson Alcott and his daughter Louisa May Alcott, Ralph Waldo Emerson and his brother Charles, and Henry David Thoreau. I traveled from Philadelphia, or near it, and spent time as a visitor with these people. We discussed everything. Nearly always our talks centered on esoteric matters such as reincarna­tion and the Oversoul. I would spend several days at a time with these good folk and then return to my home in Philadelphia where I plied my trade as a writer, mainly poetry. My dreams of these times were so vivid. Years later, I learned that these people were known as Transcendental­ists, and that I profoundly identified with them.”

From The Courant announcement: “on a recent acquisition of the first essay ever written on Transcendentalism (Crocker and Ruggles, 1842), it was written by Charles Mayo Ellis [1818-1878] (it was preciously attributed to Ralph Waldo Emerson [1803-1882]). The definition of the term transcendentalism is attempted on page 11: ‘The belief we term Transcendentalism which maintains teat man has ideas, that come not through the five sense, or the powers of reasoning; but are either the result of direct  revelation from God, his immediate inspiration, or his immanent presence in the spiritual world. Strictly speaking, then, Transcendentalism is the recognition of this third attribute of humanity, and the inquiry must be into the history of this—the arguments that support it, its effect upon the world, on literature, philosophy, the arts, criticisms, religion, and on man in his political, social and moral relations.’”

From this study, then, the movement of Transcendental Meditation took root. From the Wikipedia we get a reasonable definition: The Transcendental Meditation technique is a simple, natural, effortless process practiced 15–20 minutes twice daily while sitting comfortably with eyes closed. It is unique among techniques of meditation, distinguished by its effortlessness, naturalness and profound effectiveness. The TM^® technique allows your mind to settle inward, beyond thought, to experience the silent reservoir of energy, creativity and intelligence found within everyone—a natural state of restful alertness. During the practice, your brain functions with significantly greater coherence and your body gains deep rest.

It was a no-brainer for me to take a course in TM many years ago. Getting into “my space” ultimately became the practice of reclining in an easy chair, and taking three deep breaths to this count: Inhale through the nostrils to the count of four; hold to the count of four, and exhale through the mouth to the count of four. At which point whatever information that I needed in my ministry, or psychic practice, would immediately come into view. By view, I mean to say thoughts, feelings, words, and/or at times actions.

This same practice may be used to relax the body and mind of all tension, removing pain from the body, getting to sleep easier at night, and improving human relationships. In other words TM may be used as an ameliorative or palliative for patients and clients.

(More on this subject later.)

© Reverend Paul Lachlan Peck 2010

Prayer

Although I wrote this a few years ago, it seems appropriate to share it with you here. Sure, feel free to copy and paste it, share it, and tell people about it. Let your own light shine!

What I Am That I Am (I) can give you

I can give you anything but sickness, sin, and death.
I can give you a land of beauty, harmony and wealth;
I can give you oceans that live and breathe with life
I can give you an earth that has been purged of strife.

I can give you a mind that is healthy, kind and pure
I can give you a heart that beats with beauty sure;
I can give you time to know and show My goodness
I can give you space to grow and glow in kindness.

I can give you enough of all that you'll ever need
I can give you gladness to share the blossom and seed;
I can give you gratitude to fill you to the overflow
I can give you strength to bear what winds may blow.

All of this is mine to give you, precious child of Love
So take it and become the steward of all beneath, above.

©Reverend Paul Lachlan Peck, April 22, 2007