Your Mom Claims to be Psychic… How Do You Respond?

OT: can it get better? Let’s hope so…http://www.onenewsnow.com/Culture/Default.aspx?id=518466

Don’t think that claims of phychic-ness are a direct link to Chritianity… however interestingly enough my mom claims to have the gift of “discernment” which renders her able to make ambitous claims about other people charachter. i.e. spotting a fraud or whatever – some of it’s good judgement, but sometimes it’s a tad mystical/not logical how she derives the “facts”.

I would just ask her to prove it.

My mom doesn’t say she has “powers”, but still sometimes claims things that are not rationnally tenable.

What I have found is that when a person reaches this point, trying to rationalize her into admitting that it’s just an impression or an irrational point of view is just a loss of energy, as this person won’t be convinced by rational arguments.

So my answer is clearly a path of least effort, but it’s, as another commenter said, saying “whatever you say, mom”. If you can’t change the person, then trying to do so is just a loss of energy for you, and will on the long run make your relations worse.

Then, regarding mental illness: can’t we say that everyone has a mental illness, that would justify some personality trait? If it doesn’t harm anyone, trying to “cure” the illness might just do more harm than good.

In addition, regarding more particularly the fact of predicting the future, there is an interesting psychological phenomenon that makes that we tend to integrate informations about a phenomenon, that we learned after the phenomenon occurred, as if we knew them before. This is what makes us so good at “predicting the past”, and might give a retroactive illusion of being able to tell the future. If it’s this, then it’s just humane 😉

I think it should be a cause for concern only if it gets dangerous. “I burnt myself because the voices told me to” sorts. Other than that- “Whatever you say” seems the best reaction. I have had “psychic” or other cousins, but now it seems they were just deluded.

My mother thinks that her family has an ‘ability’ to unconsciously manipulate cards and dice rolls. My grandfather believes in ESP and extraterrestrials and dowsing and such.

If they’re crazy, it’s mildly so, and since it doesn’t much affect their day-to-day I don’t see why it’s anything to worry about.

I am not sure how different saying “hey guys…my mom thinks she is psychic, what should I do?”…is any different from “hey guys, my son says he’s an atheist, what should I do?”

One is a lack of belief in gods. The other is the belief in something that is falsifiable, and is a fantasy that is not real.

We cannot prove there are no gods (nor do we need to, the burden of proof is on those who make the claim). Psychic powers can be and have been debunked.

So I think that’s a pretty big difference. The claim of psychic powers goes beyond something ‘spiritual’.

Still, I agree that, sadly, it really isn’t his business to “do” anything about it, unless the is harming herself or others. Or if she brings it up in conversations, in which case she’s opening the door for a critical discussion of her super duper powers.

When a person tells me that they see ghosts or can be psychic at times and they actually want to discuss it. (Sometimes these things are not open for discussion with people for whatever reason). When a person tells me these things I usually at least get them to admit that there’s a chance that they are wrong and tell them that it’s very important to be a skeptic when dealing with unprovable things.

I know it’s tempting to offer all sorts of advice in this situation, but I would urge caution, and would advise only this: don’t act on advice from anyone who doesn’t personally know your mother.

It’s a delicate situation, and her reaction to any questioning of her belief will depend on her mental state and on the relationship between parent and child. Poorly judged action could be disastrous for all concerned.

I would guess that if you quiz her closely enough (if you can stomach it) you will find she won’t claim to “predict the future” in the stressful Dead-Zone-by-Stephen-King sense. She won’t claim to be able to predict the answers to such questions as “What will be the closing stock price of Caterpillar Corp. on Dec. 1st of this year?” or “On what date will Dick Cheney die?”

Instead, she will claim to be able to discern things like “If you start dating that girl from work, it will end badly within a year” or “Your friend’s law career is going to be really successful.” That’s not seeing the future, that’s just plain old wisdom based on experience.

On the other hand, if she does make very specific claims, she is probably losing it. Make her short-sell her Caterpillar stock (just in case!) and get her primary care doctor to refer her to a mental health professional.

My mom, her sisters, and my grandma have all claimed my entire life that they are psychic. They also all claim to have seen ghosts; my grandmother pretty much thinks she’s the kid from “The Sixth Sense.” Every time someone in our family dies, they all go visit her apparently. Funny thing…every story they tell about their powers happens to be when they’re asleep. And no matter how many times I imply that what they experienced were dreams, they dismiss ME as the lunatic. Oh well. Anytime they bring these stories up to me, I just shrug it off, and say “Well alright then.” Really not much else you can do unless you want an argument, or at least that’s what I’ve experienced.

She is no nuttier than my mom who believes the same thing. Mostly that when some family member dies or gets badly hurt she knows in advance. She was raised LDS but has morphed into a wierd mix of eastern and western beliefs (she believes in the power of crystals whatever the hell that means). Smart well read lady too with a college degree. Zero math and science background though. Fortunatly she does not push it on us and takes it well when we tease her.

We (her kids) think she is certifiable but it is pretty harmless crazyness.

You can try what we do which is tease her about it in a friendly way – after a while she may give up talking to you about it which is about all you can expect to accomplish. Your not going to change her mind.

Allytude is on the money. Confronting beliefs, even from the irrational/insane vein, usually results in the entrenchment of the person in defense of those beliefs to the point where their mind will fabricate further observations. Best to leave them alone unless their delusions involve harming others (the libertarian in me can’t fathom stopping people from hurting themselves).

Case in point, my mother’s dad died about a decade ago and to this day she is convinced she ‘saw’ and ‘felt’ his spirit leave his body when she was in his hospital room. I remain convinced things would have been better had I let her just believe that until she could rationally process the reality-v-perception on her own.

They should check out: Full Facts Book Of Cold Reading by Ian Rowland. He instructs how to put the kibosh on alleged psychics. It’s also descriptive for use of basic psychological trickery that can be used/is used in everyday situations.

I have met several people who claimed to have powers of some sort or another. In my experience, this so-called powers often appear in stressful situations. Your Mom probably is very distressed about something.
Just talk to her and try to figure out what triggers these episodes. You will find the connection if you are patient and non-confrontational. I dont think it is positive to leave a person thinking weird stuff. They do not think weird stuff because they want it, they think weird stuff because no one bothers to help them out of the mess. Think about it… when you think about something that doesn´t affect you, you don´t go out and try to talk to people about it. You talk about something either because it is a good thing or a bad thing for you; either it brings you pain or it brings you pleasure. If it brings you pleasure (like a joke) you want to share it with other people in order to make them feel as good as you do. If it brings you pain (worries, problems) you talk to other people hoping to feel better. Your mother described her “premonitions” as being a curse, so it is safe to assume it is an issue that brings her pain. Talking to her to try and help her out of this pain, is the humane thing to do, to say the least.

Ah, I love good old paganism and superstition covered with a thin veneer of Christianity!

Today’s religion is tomorrow’s paganism.

Was she able to predict his atheism?

Good question. I’m the one with the sooth-saying mother referenced in Hemant’s post.

Her exact words to me when I told her I was an atheist were, “I knew it. They ruined you! All that education and science. You’re ruined.”

Interesting to hear a teacher rale against education.

If you ask her, she would say, “yes, I did see it coming.”

Okay, first of all it probably isn’t a sign of mental illness. There are plenty of ways for natural phenomena to be perceived as supernatural manifestations of psychic abilities.

Imagine, if you will, someone with the cognitive abilities of Sherlock Holmes but without his rigour in implementing the scientific method. This person may very well consider themselves psychic.

“Psychic” abilities do not necessarily have to be *magic*, because “psychic” abilities do not necessarily have to be psychic abilities. It could be intuition, pheromones, microexpressions, “vibes,” or an understanding of cause and effect.

Our minds are extremely powerful simulation engines and we work hard to establish patterns and ways for our mind to model information in a useful way. Of all the input our brains get from our observations, we only really pay attention to a very small portion of it — what we consider important or relevant at the time. Different people may see different things. Different people may see the same thing, but model and/or articulate it differently.

Personally, I’ve had many experiences that could be considered “psychic” … predicting a “paradigm shifting terrorist attack against the US within 6 months” in March of 2001 was one of them. It wasn’t magic. It wasn’t purely scientific either, but there’s plenty of room for grey.

As for this reader and his mom… challenging her is not the answer at all and that would merely be a sign of immaturity. Instead of saying, “no you can’t see the future, that’s crazy,” ask, “How does that work, exactly?” Get her to explain what she means by it. Armed with that information, you can try to figure out what she really was experiencing in a way that fits in with your subjective understanding of the world. Odds are that there is a reasonable explanation for it, if not a rational one. And so what if her metaphor for it has a supernatural connotation to it?

Anyway, I’d also consider yourself lucky if coming out as an atheist to your mother resulted in a conversation about spirituality and an honest conversation about her own non-doctrinal beliefs.

Qualia Soup has some excellent videos on YouTube about dealing with superstitious people. Pretty sure we can only do one link so here’s the channel page, but watch “It could be a coincidence” and “Arguing with Ghosts.”

http://www.youtube.com/user/QualiaSoup

My mom also claims mild psychic powers. She is an atheist and follows no organized religion, but she tends to be a little more “spiritual” than the rest of the family. She claims to have premonitions about things happening, though this is almost always after the fact. I tried to tell her about confirmation bias and how her premonitions are not as accurate as she thinks they are, but I’m not sure she totally gets it.

Her beliefs are mostly harmless; she doesn’t actively do anything about her psychic premonitions, doesn’t use them to make major decisions about how to run her life or anyone else’s. Really all it’s good for is some amusement and interesting stories, so in the end I figure there’s no harm in letting her think what she wants.

Ruby Leigh: I would say I have a mild version of that. Certain people I meet I just don’t feel right about. I can’t speak for your mom, but in my case I think it’s just instinct. ‘Course, I keep my thoughts to myself until there’s more evidence, and, as it usually translates into how well the animals I work with will work with those people, it’s generally pretty plain to everyone else at that point.

I have lots of Pagan friends who think they have one magical ability or another. Psychic abilities, reiki, telekinesis, controlling the weather, etc. I generally just use the smile-and-nod approach when we’re in group settings. For private conversations, I just state that I don’t believe in these powers and don’t wish to hear about them or discuss them.

My mom thinks that she can see/sense demons. A few weeks ago she took me aside and very seriously told me how she had recently sensed an “overwhelming evil presence” and then cast it into a flock of black birds by evoking the name of Jesus.

I find that sort of belief very distressing. It’s one thing to believe in Jesus sitting up in Heaven and waiting to give us hugs when we die (or cast us into hell, alternatively), but it’s another thing entirely to believe that the world is filled with evil spirits that you can see and have the power to manipulate. It suggests such a dramatic amount of irrationality and disconnection from reality…it makes me feel really overwhelmingly sad.

Its hard to talk to the irrational. Even more so if they are a family member. Sigh.

Whether or not you call it mental illness, it sounds like it’s negatively affecting her life. (She calls it a curse and a significant source of stress.) I’d do some research on cold reading techniques and all the peculiarities of memory, and then ask her if she’d feel better knowing her experiences weren’t really psychic. If she would, you can feel better about explaining the common misunderstandings and objectively testing her claims. Just remember to approach the situation as a shared quest for truth based on agreed-upon premises, not as you setting out to debunk the idea.

Of course it might just result in emails pestering you about Jesus and psychic powers too.

I think it’s unlikely to be mental illness, though it’s not impossible (e.g. the correlation between mental patients and religion). But it’s more likely that she’s just drunk far too much of the Kool Aid, watches Oprah and Dr Phil, and is probably quite a serious idealist and just wants the world to be more than it is. Like “Fate” — for many it can’t possibly be a good relationship simply because you’re compatible and get on well, instead it has to be ordained by the stars or gods.

As with religion, you’re unlikely to be able to rationalise and reason her back to reality, especially if she’s proselytising you, as her beliefs have no basis in either. Simply providing a refutation of something she sends you probably isn’t going to work and will create pigeonholes and communication blocks.

Perhaps the better response would be to provide a reference explaining which logical fallacy she’s fallen for (Argument from Authority, Argumentum ad Populum, False Dichotomy, etc). By teaching her critical thinking and logic skills, you may be able to help her think her way out of the fog.

lol @ Nick

Also, (sorry to chime in again) I used to be a practising wiccan as well – until I actually read about science.
I used to think my spells were doing something, when I see now that it was coincidence.

I feel pretty stupid about it now, but it just goes to show when someone is educated they can realise how wrong they were.

Well I remember one spell to make my landlord give me back the bond he owed me. Which he did. Which was obviously a coincidence.

I don’t know what you’re trying to infer with the emphasis you’ve given. But it seems with your comment to Jason that you believe in magic or something like it.

My mom claims the same thing. I don’t immediately discard the idea because I’m an atheist. Whether she’s psychic or not, I don’t know.

Although I do know that, after my sister’s boyfriend’s (now husband’s) mother died, my mom claimed that she told her where certain items were hidden in the house, how she was treated at her home, etc.

I often find her talking to someone in the kitchen, when she thinks I’m not there.

She could be crazy – she’s had a traumatic life, lesser women would not still be a live – or not. I can’t really say.