It is true that every one of us has psychic powers, extrasensory abilities that can extend our experience and insight to the world we live in. We depend upon these abilities even without realising it, using intuition to make decisions, making 'lucky' guesses, especially in areas that we are skilled in or enjoy. But for most of the time, we remain unaware of this potentially explosive ability that we have at our fingertips!

As much as it is true that we all have these abilities, just like any gift or facility, these talents can lie dormant until they are developed through practice and exercise.

Before we delve into the development of these gifts, it is important to understand that there are many types of psychic ability and they come under four headings.

• Clairvoyance, the ability to psychically see clearly;
• Clairsentience, the ability to psychically feel or sense clearly;
• Clairaudience, the ability to psychically hear clearly; and
• Claircognisance, the ability to psychically know clearly.

Each of these categories covers a range of gifts and abilities the likes of which vary from person to person. Clairvoyance, for example, can include vivid dreams, visions, seeing auras around people as you look at them, or closing your eyes and seeing auras and much more. Furthermore, each person has all of these gifts, but to varying degrees. So one individual may have wonderful clairvoyance, good clairaudience, but minimal Clairsentience and claircognisance. Another may be extremely strong in Claircognisance but have little of any of the others.

As you develop your psychic gifts you will discover your strengths and weaknesses. It's important to develop all of the psychic gifts as all of them have the potential to expand and grow. Also, you may find with a little work, what was once considered your weakest gift can become an extraordinarily strong talent.

Developing your natural gifts is actually quite easy and much of their maturation comes from your intention to progress and the effort you put in to them rather than the exercises themselves. It is important to remove all over exerted effort or force. Imagine that the work you are doing is being fueled by a river of energy flowing through you rather than being forced or pushed by you. With each exercise you perform, focus on the activity itself rather than worrying about getting a good outcome, just enjoy the exercise for it's own sake.

Prior to starting the psychic development exercises, it is first important to understand how to protect yourself. Protection is important in any area of life, for example, you would not send a child off to walk to school on her own without first teaching her the skills involved in crossing the road safely. Likewise, in developing your psychic ability, you are stepping in to a new area of life, and it is important to do this work safely. These protection techniques will help you to do that.

Why Protect

Here on Earth, we have healthy and unhealthy people. Violence, hatred, bigotry of all kinds abound. To some degree we have all learnt to create boundaries for ourselves that protect us from the worst of this focus and behaviour. As you develop your psychic gifts, you are opening the ability to tune in to people and energies in ways that you previously have not been able to. It is therefore important, to learn how to protect yourself at these new levels as well. These exercises are simple to use, and are powerful. The important thing to remember is to focus on the river of energy running through you that is being used to build this protection, rather than relying on your own energy and your own mind.

The Mirrorball

The first exercise is a visualisation. It is as powerful as it is simple. Simply visualise a giant, sparkling, spinning mirrorball completely surrounding you. Each time a negative thought, focus, or being of any kind comes your way, they are repelled by the blinding light that they are faced with. This is a great exercise to do if you spend a lot of time around negative or needy people.

Archangel Michael

The second exercise involves Archangel Michael. This powerful angel is the protector and defender. He will never cause harm and he will always protect and keep you safe. For this exercise all you need to do is call Archangel Michael to you. You can do this out loud or in your mind. Say "Archangel Michael, please come to me now! Wrap your powerful wings of protection around me until I am completely shielded by you. Protect me from all negative or dangerous energy, Now!" Make sure you are clear and strong, not derogatory or rude.

These tools are two of many techniques that help to keep you protected and strong as you journey into your psychic gifts. As you develop your psychic gifts, you will come across many other methods of self protection and I thoroughly encourage you to explore and implement new tools if you feel guided to.

During this article we have discussed important clarifications regarding individual psychic ability, you have learnt about the four different categories of psychic talent and important tools in protection to be used during psychic development. In the next article you will learn a number of wonderful exercises to develop your own psychic talents and more important tools to keep you centred and strong as you develop your gifts.