Offer to work with someone privately - should i do it?

[Sentient]

I'm advice seeking again.

So, I have this opportunity to work privately with an intuitive on my own development. The curriculum is meant to include some info about universal laws, dream work, energy work, psychic development, etc.

The woman is incredibly sweet. Seriously, she's like 5lbs of love crammed into a 3lb bag. How it all fits I have no idea. She's also very skilled. And she was also instructed by her guides to work with me.

...yet here I have this problem that I still am lacking the personal experience that I feel truly comfortable with this. I've had a few classes with her and she tells me stuff like time doesn't exist and I think "okay, sure I've heard that a bunch but have no basis for judging whether it's true or not." Then she says it only came into existence when people started measuring it and then my brain goes all kittywompus (love that word) and gets up in arms. Excuse me? Of course things exist independent of measurement. I'm 170 lbs whether I'm standing on a scale or not.

The point being that within an hour around her this scenario plays out at least 4 times. I can't shake the feeling I'm supposed to be doing this, but I also wonder how productive it can be if I keep blocking myself like this. I'd love to do the whole live it from the inside thing and just give her the benefit of the doubt for 30 days and see where it takes me, but eeeehhhh..like 10% of me still feels like the whole paranormal thing is sincere, partially right, but often incorrect or misguided.

Even my analytical side recognizes that there are only 3 possibilities. A) She's misrepresenting herself b) She's sincere, but either incorrect or not as good as she thinks she is c) She's sincere, very good, and the problem is entirely with me. From judging her character, I know that A is absolutely and completely out of the question which leaves just B and C. But how do I tell

In case you can't already tell, I'm highly analytical and rarely - except for when I worked in finance - did I ever meet anyone more so than me. It sincerely bugs me that I keep being told that I'm putting myself in a box with my logic and that I need to be more open minded. I'm not open minded? I quit my job! I did polyphasic sleep! I spend time trying to induce out of body experiences! My gf and I left my city and moved and even chose our new home partially based on proximity to her (fortunately we 100% love it here anyway)! I relentlessly explore my world first hand and it feels like a cop out when my logic gets blamed. But then if I say that, well, that's just me being too logical again. Circular arugments!

My financial situation is more or less fine, but it's not an insignificant sum we're talking about. She has lots of clients, is constantly busy, and correspondingly not that cheap. So, financially I *definitely* would feel the effect of working with her. It's at least to the point where I suspended the work already for financial reasons (go global financial meltdown and evaporation of my net worth).

Perhaps were it free I would experiment (hey, look at my bookshelf, I obviously already do experiment with this stuff).

Blah, I am hoping that someone much further along than me reads this, has a good laugh, and feels up to the challenge of helping me see what I'm missing. If nothing, I suppose the journaling is cathartic.

Any and all advice is welcome and sincerely appreciated.

[Anna Conlan]

Hi Sentient,

I think your rational mind is in conflict with your intuitive mind because it wants to understand everything...?

When I was being taught spiritual healing, although my intuitive mind was comfortable with it, my rational mind thought that my teacher was crazy and it took a long, long time to bring it round to the idea that spiritual healing was real and worked. What made me accept it in the end was when I do readings, 99 times out of 100, I find the information that makes total sense to the client and some of it is super specific. My rational mind has had to accept that this is real only because of that.

So I guess what I'm saying is that it's OK for the rational mind to protest. It's going to do that anyway. (mine certainly did and I consider myself really open-minded). But we are taught to let the rational mind criticize and weigh everything up, aren't we, so it's natural that you have some doubts.

The only time this becomes a problem is when the rational mind closes off to possibilities and experiences.

So my view is...what do you have to lose from doing this? Money? Will you feel foolish if it turns out the woman is not a real psychic? Do those things matter to you more than the possibility of having this experience? I guess you have to weigh that up.

And if this isn't 100% right for you, I'm sure there will be many more opportunities in the future.

[fellowtraveler]

Originally Posted by Sentient

I'm advice seeking again.

So, I have this opportunity to work privately with an intuitive on my own development. The curriculum is meant to include some info about universal laws, dream work, energy work, psychic development, etc.

The woman is incredibly sweet. Seriously, she's like 5lbs of love crammed into a 3lb bag. How it all fits I have no idea. She's also very skilled. And she was also instructed by her guides to work with me.

...yet here I have this problem that I still am lacking the personal experience that I feel truly comfortable with this. I've had a few classes with her and she tells me stuff like time doesn't exist and I think "okay, sure I've heard that a bunch but have no basis for judging whether it's true or not." Then she says it only came into existence when people started measuring it and then my brain goes all kittywompus (love that word) and gets up in arms. Excuse me? Of course things exist independent of measurement. I'm 170 lbs whether I'm standing on a scale or not.

The point being that within an hour around her this scenario plays out at least 4 times. I can't shake the feeling I'm supposed to be doing this, but I also wonder how productive it can be if I keep blocking myself like this. I'd love to do the whole live it from the inside thing and just give her the benefit of the doubt for 30 days and see where it takes me, but eeeehhhh..like 10% of me still feels like the whole paranormal thing is sincere, partially right, but often incorrect or misguided.

Even my analytical side recognizes that there are only 3 possibilities. A) She's misrepresenting herself b) She's sincere, but either incorrect or not as good as she thinks she is c) She's sincere, very good, and the problem is entirely with me. From judging her character, I know that A is absolutely and completely out of the question which leaves just B and C. But how do I tell

In case you can't already tell, I'm highly analytical and rarely - except for when I worked in finance - did I ever meet anyone more so than me. It sincerely bugs me that I keep being told that I'm putting myself in a box with my logic and that I need to be more open minded. I'm not open minded? I quit my job! I did polyphasic sleep! I spend time trying to induce out of body experiences! My gf and I left my city and moved and even chose our new home partially based on proximity to her (fortunately we 100% love it here anyway)! I relentlessly explore my world first hand and it feels like a cop out when my logic gets blamed. But then if I say that, well, that's just me being too logical again. Circular arugments!

My financial situation is more or less fine, but it's not an insignificant sum we're talking about. She has lots of clients, is constantly busy, and correspondingly not that cheap. So, financially I *definitely* would feel the effect of working with her. It's at least to the point where I suspended the work already for financial reasons (go global financial meltdown and evaporation of my net worth).

Perhaps were it free I would experiment (hey, look at my bookshelf, I obviously already do experiment with this stuff).

Blah, I am hoping that someone much further along than me reads this, has a good laugh, and feels up to the challenge of helping me see what I'm missing. If nothing, I suppose the journaling is cathartic.

Any and all advice is welcome and sincerely appreciated.

I'd set it up so you pay as you go and can bail out if it goes nowhere. If you don't try it you'll always wonder.

If she won't do that or says it won't work unless you totally commit...would sound fishy to me.

[Sentient]

Thank both of you so much for taking the time to read and give your opinion. Anna, I think your post nails a lot of what is going on in my head. What you wrote is very helpful and I thank you for it. Traveler, that's very sound advice and thanks for looking out for me.

It's already set up as a pay as you go. Part of me just wonders how long it would take me to make a determination. If you met her, you would know she is definitely genuine in every way. The woman has the biggest heart I know. One of her friends owns a tiny indian restaurant here in town. The owner's only waiter up and quit on her with 0 notice recently. So, despite the fact that my mentor barely has any free time, last week she spent it waiting tables for free because she wanted to help out her shorthanded and exhausted friend. This hardly surprises me. I wasn't kidding when I said 5lbs of love in the 3lb bag. For the other part, while she is expensive, she constantly runs over time and never charges for it. I've booked 1 hour of energy work with her in the past and ended up talking for 2 hours afterwards because she kept wanting to tell me things before I went.

I thought about it a bit more and I believe part of the reason I have so much more resistance than I typically would is because of secondary gain. I enjoy the badge and title of being rational and I derive some value out of that. Part of me really doesn't want to let go, and indeed go the opposite direction. I think I'm projecting the scenario where a few thousand dollars into it I decide to stop working with her. At that point I get to become "the guy who poured his money towards the crazy psychi lady." I remember reading about the church of scientology bleeding a bunch of people dry, and while of course I know this is completely different, I would shudder at trying to explain that to any of my rational friends.

Also, besides my girlfriend to be wife, I don't think anyone else is on board with this. It's sort of tough when a major component of your life becomes off limits for conversation because all you hear when you bring it up is ....hey, umm, Sentient, do you really think you have your head on straight on this one?

Essentially, I think a big reason I'm holding back is self image - both how I relate to myself, and then how others will judge me.

Pretty weak reasons when I put them in writing.

I'm starting to think that I need a 30 day trial on this one, and just need to be willing to "gamble it up" from the perspective of my rational mind. Then, I need to get over worrying about how my other friendships will react.

[fellowtraveler]

Originally Posted by Sentient

... Then, I need to get over worrying about how my other friendships will react.

Bingo. A friend's a friend even when they think you're a weirdo.

[nikki]

I wish I had this opportunity! My opinion is you can't do things by halves. Either go for it whole heartedly or really stop and take stock of the situation. I get this vibe off you that even if you give this up you are going to keep running into the same situations and opportunities because it what you really want in your heart of hearts.

By the way, she's right - time doesn't exist. It's merely space demonstrated in a way that we can comprehend so that we can sit here and ponder our own existence

[nikki]

I would highly recommend getting a copy of The Prophets Way by Thom Hartmann if you haven't read it already. He went through a very similar experience.

[Sentient]

Originally Posted by nikki

I would highly recommend getting a copy of The Prophets Way by Thom Hartmann if you haven't read it already. He went through a very similar experience.

Thanks Nikki... I'll pick up a copy!

Thank you for the advice everyone. I'll let you know what I end up doing. As for now, I think I'm going to take a few weeks to let things stabilize in my life. That should give me a good idea of what my bills are and how much of a strain this really would be (I just moved here after all). After that, if I have the resources to commit, I'll do it without looking back rather than the 50/50 secondary gain bs I was working with

Hope everyone has a wonderful day!

[nikki]

Definitely keep us posted, I for one would be really interested to see what you end up doing either way

Peace

x

[Mato Kinze]

You're not ready yet. Don't waste your money.