HOW TO EXPLAIN MEDIUMS

A medium is a person who seems to connect with something ‘other’. In its most popular interpretation, we are dealing with Spiritualism, and the ability of the medium to contact the afterlife, usually through a ‘spirit guide’.
They often get bad press nowadays, thought of as frauds. Typically they indulge in ‘cold reading’, where they can either lead the person on to disclose more than they think, or they intuit information from what a person says.

But cold reading can be seen in two ways.

It can be intentional or non-intentional. In other words, it is quite possible for a medium to indulge in the practice without realizing exactly what they are doing. So whilst some are obviously fraudulent, an identical mechanism can equally be behind a medium who genuinely doesn’t know how they are accessing the information.
The same can be said for other areas of mediumship. The ‘spirit guide’ can so obviously be seen as fraudulent. Yet, we know of ‘multiple personality’, where the mind can fragment into various characters. It is therefore quite possible for spirit guides to be fragmented personalities, without the obvious consent of the medium.

Do mediums contact the ‘other’?

Well, I suppose we have to decide what the ‘other’ is. And one obvious means of explanation is that they contact something ‘other’ than themselves. Indeed, they often talk of a ‘voice’ inside their heads.
One possible explanation for this comes from the ‘split-brain’ concept. We know that we have a left and right brain, the former dealing with rationality, the latter with inspiration, emotion, artistry. And it has been suggested often that the one can seem to interact with the other as if a voice.

There seem to be ‘mechanisms’ the medium can use.

But these still tell us little about whether they really contact the ‘other’. We DO know that a medium seems to go into a trance, which is seen as a descent into the inner mind. If we bring into the discussion such concepts as Jung’s ‘collective unconscious’, then we can argue the deeper we go into the mind, the more communal it becomes, thus connecting with ‘other’.
We can also learn a great deal by looking at mediumship throughout history. Contact with ‘other’ is first identified in the tribal shaman. Christian mystics seem to have a similar ability. Spiritualism eventually appeared, contacting the dead. And the modern expression of mediumship comes in the Channeller, who seems to contact discarnate entities.

This suggests the ‘other’ changes over time.

But is there a connection? I think there is. For in each case the medium seems to connect with the contemporary cultural expression of our dreams and desires. Contacting nature, God, the dead, or higher spiritual or extraterrestrial masters ape our ideas of our spirituality at any one time in history.
I suggest, therefore, that the ‘other’ could well be our culture – itself a form of entity above the individual, and the guiding process to who we are. The medium could well be in touch with the spark of zeitgeist that is us. But what process is behind this ability?
Studies of many mediums show that they suffered adversity at some point in their lives. This is also true with the average Christian mystic. As for the shaman, some argue they are similar to borderline schizophrenics. And people who suffer such adversity often cut themselves off psychologically from the physical world and descend into the deep mind. And is it not when we are in the deeper mind that we dream of ‘other’?
Of course, I could be wrong, and mediums do exactly what it says on the tin.

© Anthony North, October 2008