Dear Julia:

I often have hunches or feelings about little stuff that usually prove "psychic." I'll be doing something and have a feeling that something is going to go wrong with it, and it almost always happens. For example, yesterday I was driving to a family gathering with my husband when I had a bad feeling about taking the highway. As it is definitely the most direct route, however, I didn't say anything. We ended up stuck in a traffic jam for an hour and a half! I was so frustrated with myself! It would almost be better if I DIDN'T have the intuition, then I wouldn't be kicking myself later. This sort of thing happens a lot. Was my feeling psychic? If so, what do I do with these intuitions? Am I getting them for a good reason? If I had told my husband not to take the highway, he would have thought I was nuts, and then, of course, we'd never have known what would have happened if we hadn't changed our course.

- Lori

Dear Lori:

Thanks for a great question! I chose it because I've been dealing with the same sort of thing. I know as a professional medium/ clairvoyant that I'm supposed to be beyond all this, but we all lose our edge once in a while.

In the past few weeks, I've experienced one small psychic frustration after another. Of course, the problem wasn't the psychic perception - it was the fact that I didn't do anything with it. For example, I didn't speak up when I "knew" that the schedule was going to change, because I was afraid I'd hurt my stepdaughters' feelings if I suggested (before they did) that they stay with their mom one night. I turned down invitations and hustled home to be ready for their arrival, all the while knowing it was all going to be for nothing. Sure enough, they called and told me they wouldn't be coming over after all. Aargh!

Another time, my son needed a certain paper signed and filled out on a specific day, and I knew he and his father would forget. I reminded them and reminded them in the days leading up to it, but on that morning, despite my intuition, I didn't call early because I didn't want to seem like a nag. Of course they forgot about it. Aargh! That same day I hid the house key in our designated spot for my stepdaughter, so she could get in when she got home from school. All the kids know that if you get home and the door is locked, you should look for the key. As I was leaving, I had a feeling that she would forget to look for it, and presume that I had locked her out. Nevertheless, I hid the key and left, and of course, got a call from a concerned neighbor that she was "locked out." Aargh!

These are just some of the ways that we can get intuitions about little things, ignore them, and end up really frustrated. Why do we do this to ourselves over and over again?

First, we are often just distracted. We're so busy rushing here and there that we shrug our intuitions off because we don't want to take the time to stop and really listen, or we want to do things the quick, easy way. (We don't like what our intuitions are telling us.) In your situation, it seemed on the surface like taking the highway would be the fastest, easiest way. You didn't want to have to take the side roads. As it turned out, this would have been faster, but you didn't "know" that. (Or did you?)

Second, we lack confidence in our intuitions. The only way to gain confidence, of course, is to test them out by acting on them. The more we do this, the more validation we'll receive, and the more confident we'll become. Initially, however, we feel "crazy" acting on our psychic impressions.

Finally, our egos trip us up. We're too shy or embarrassed to say anything, or we're afraid of being ôwrong.ö When you didn't suggest that you and your husband take a different route, you were afraid he would think you're nuts for wanting to change your course based on a premonition. When I didn't find some way to suggest that the girls spend the night at their mom's, I was afraid of hurting their feelings. When I didn't call my ex-husband to remind him again about the paper, I was afraid of irritating him or looking like a nag.

When we don't act on our psychic feelings because we're afraid of how others will feel about it, we are the ones who pay the emotional price. It is SO frustrating to have something "bad" happen when we could have prevented it. Of course, others suffer too - by having to sit in traffic, not having their papers, and thinking they're locked out, to name a few examples.

Premonitions are our inner beings trying to help us. We're given this information so we can either avoid problems or prepare for the inevitable. We can continue to kick ourselves and say "I wish I had" every time these things happen for the rest of our lives, or we can honor our intuitions by acting on them.

To act on them, we have to slow down and listen, and then risk looking a little kooky by acting on what we hear. The kooky issue seems to be what tripped you up the most. It's hardest for me, too. If you're tired of being frustrated, however, you have to rearrange your priorities.

Picture a stereotypical psychic aunt. Let's call her Aunt Marie. Everyone thinks she's a bit wacky, but she's wonderful too. She's happy, fun and "out there" about who she is. She talks about how she can feel grandma and grandpa (who died years ago) at family gatherings. She thinks the newest babies are reincarnations of other family members who passed on. She's into energy healing or crystals, or she just has ôfeelingsö about things, and she's amazingly candid about sharing this information with the rest of the world.

She says she's psychic, but some are not convinced, because they don't see all the confirmation she's getting, and a lot of the time she isn't getting any, anyway. She doesn't need it. If she gets a bad feeling about taking the highway, for example, she goes a different way, and no one ever knows what would have happened if she hadn't changed her route.

Now picture another aunt. Let's call her Aunt Lori. :) Aunt Lori is psychic too, but she's not out there about it. She has yet to even label herself "psychic," but she has a lot of experiences that fit the bill. She's also not as cheerful as Aunt Marie, because Aunt Lori is frustrated a lot of the time. (It's because she won't act on her intuitions!) When she gets a bad feeling about taking the highway, she bites her lip, says not a word, and then ends up kicking herself for days. No wonder she's not chipper like Aunt Marie (I can relate!) Now, everyone does think Aunt Lori is SANE, of course, and more down to earth than Aunt Marie, but it doesn't mean that they LOVE her more.

My point is that you have to choose what's most important to you. If you're willing to give up all the benefits of living by your intuition to look "normal" to other people, you'll have to live with all the frustration of predicting "problems," and then watching them happen. Instead, I suggest you worry less about others thinking you're wacky, and begin to ACT on your intuitions. I know all of this is easier said than done. I hope I don't sound preachy, because I'm no one to lecture you, as my confession above reveals.

It's not easy being psychic in this world, but when we don't get the lesson, Spirit will keep sending it to us until we do. My own rash of frustrating experiences did get my attention, and made me realize that I don't have to be frustrated, that my intuition is TRYING to show me the easy way, and not just about the big official questions I ask Spirit all the time, but also about the little stuff. I plan on getting back on that easy path by acting on my intuitions more, whether other folks think I'm weird or not. I'd rather be a happy, eccentric "aunt" than a sensible but grouchy one anyway.

-Julia