Today:
Posted: Mar 26, 2008 in Things to do
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Click here to watch a video of Konrad at the psychic devolopment class
In a strip mall, behind a Blockbuster video.
Inside a small carpeted room, in the back of a New Age store selling crystal wands, herbal teas and mythical figurines.
This is where fates are revealed, where the psychic spirit is reached and destiny is divined.
A wall-mounted waterfall calmly bubbles as I and four women sit in the darkness. The tranquilizing voice of John Tolle, medium and class guide, takes us through guided meditation. He has us open our chakras, then our eyes.
Tolle -- who has studied clairvoyance and psychic energy, and was ordained through The Order of Melchizedek -- draws us around a card table in the middle of the room and explains that during our 90-minute psychic development class, we will use "psychic art" as a tool, in much the same way as one uses tarot cards or runes.
He hands me a sheet of paper. I fold it, hold it and rub it, imprinting a psychic trace of myself onto the sheet. He takes it back, then squirts a liberal amount of paint onto the paper, in whatever way comes to him, then folds the mess on itself, squishing it, and unfolds it once more.
This messy Rorschach is now to be interpreted by Tolle, taking into account the colors, shapes, feelings and all-important first impressions, all of which can help determine neuroses, traits and psychic state of mind.
In my paint-blot, there is a butterfly, a symbol of change.
The way the colors are spread suggests my energy is scattered -- that I wonder what I am doing and where I am going.
There is an emptiness in the center, something missing.
But I am passionate, and drive myself toward my goals.
And I am creative -- very much a communicator.
This is Tolle's interpretation, and it is close to accurate. But did he divine this from the paint on the paper, or from a few of the things I told him 30 minutes earlier, when we first met?
I told him I had just moved to Indianapolis.
I mentioned I had worked in New York and Florida before coming here.
I said I grew up in another country.
He knows I am a reporter.
With these facts at his disposal, could he not simply guess I am in a period of flux, that I have my career in mind, that I am somewhat unsettled in life, and that I am a communicative person?
Perhaps. But that does not make his interpretation false, ill-gotten or even uninformative.
A few minutes later, I acted as the medium for one of the women in the group. Having heard her commenting on psychic art throughout the class, it was hard to ignore what she had revealed.
But I looked at her imprint and noticed asymmetry in the pattern, and a pattern in the colors.
"Are you feeling a little imbalanced?" I asked.
"That's why I've come here," she replied. "To get it all in balance."
One interpretation. One revelation.
Tolle said psychic development classes are designed to help people open up to the spirit world. Maybe it had done just that for me. Maybe my interpretation was a lucky guess. Or maybe it was sufficiently vague.
"We're asking the spirit for a little bit of energy or clarification. All the information is coming through, psychically, but a lot of us don't trust it enough to just run with it," Tolle said. "Everybody has that ability -- to communicate with the other side." Or maybe just the other side of the card table.
Interested in attending?
To take part in a psychic development class with John Tolle for $10, contact New Age People at www.newagepeople.com or call (317) 228-9411.