SIX SIMPLE STEPS TO ACCESSING YOUR INNER VOICE
Throughout this book, I’ve mentioned that everyone has access to their inner voice, and to the divine guidance and wisdom that comes to us through that inner voice. But how do we actually get in touch with our inner voice? Are there some guidelines or tips that will help us recognize and learn from this divine resource? The answer is yes – that every single one of us – regardless of our religion, or even if we’re religious or not religious, can tap into this great support system. Our inner voice and this divine wisdom transcends religion. It’s there for all of us to access, and to use for guidance and direction.
Here are some simple guidelines that will enable you to recognize your inner voice and to connect with it in a meaningful, profound way:
1) Quiet your mind
If you want to access your inner voice, it’s important to clear out your mind and become as peaceful and relaxed as possible. Unclutter your thoughts, and open up your mind to receiving the messages and impressions that the powers that be want to share with us. Be open and receptive, and the messages will come.
2) Be humble, and take your ego down a few pegs
In our world today, in the era of reality TV, we’re often encouraged to be a star, to be the center of attention. Please realize that, yes, you are important and smart, and maybe even brilliant, but that you don’t have to take credit for every single thought that comes into your mind. Some of those thoughts or inspirations may actually be coming from divine guidance, from wise spirits or protective entities who are looking out for your best interest. So in order to be able to hear your inner voice clearly, it’s imperative that you keep your ego in check.
3) Trust your gut
Everybody has had gut feelings – strong thoughts or perceptions that come to us out of the blue, and that make a deep impression on us, regardless of what our rational mind is thinking. Pay attention to these gut feelings. Chances are that these thoughts and ideas are coming from our wise inner voice that’s trying to alert us to something important. It’s a good idea to heed these impressions and to take them seriously.
4) Ask for help
Do you think that God, the universe and the powers that be are too busy to care about our personal problems and to answer our questions or assist us in finding the right path going forward? You would be wrong. Remember these famous words, “Ask and you shall receive?” In the New Testament, in Matthew 7:7-8, Jesus says the following during the Sermon on the Mount: “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: For everyone who asketh receiveth; and he who seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.”
These loving entities want us to do well and to succeed, and they often respond directly to us when we ask for their help and guidance. I have had several experiences when, faced with a difficult dilemma or decision, I asked for help with the problem, and an answer or solution magically appeared. Either I was inspired to follow a new course of action that I hadn’t considered before, or I suddenly had a new idea that just “came into my mind.” Certainly, there are times when this doesn’t happen, perhaps because I’m still meant to struggle with the issue for various reasons, but many times, help does come. So don’t be afraid to ask for help, and listen to your inner voice for the answer.
5) Be open and believe that we are not alone in this world
Sometimes being able to access our inner voice is as simple as just realizing that we are loved and not alone. If we’re open to the concept that we all have access to divine guidance and wisdom, we’ve already taken a giant step towards being in touch with our higher self, the greater good, God, or whatever you choose to call it. In your heart of hearts, you may already realize this truth – you just have to have the confidence and courage to truly believe what you probably already know.
6) Become adept at “hearing” your inner voice
After you take the previous five steps to learning how to access your inner voice, you’ll begin to become more adept at actually recognizing and “hearing” your inner voice. At first, you may have difficulty distinguishing between your own thoughts and those inspirations that are divinely guided, but in time you will feel a distinct difference between the two ways of receiving information. One of the best ways to recognize this difference is to ask yourself if the “idea” or thought that you’re having seems to come out of nowhere, and represents a completely new or inspired way of looking at something. If the thought was coming from your brain, it will feel completely rational, because it was borne in your head. But divinely guided inspirations that we access through our inner voice have a fresh, clear and somewhat unusual quality, as if someone planted the thought in your head from another place.
Listen to these divinely guided thoughts. They are the basis of understanding the gift within us. We all have caring collaborators who want to use their divine wisdom to help us on our path in life. By listening to our inner voice, we can help both them, the collaborators, and us, achieve our shared goal.
PRAJNA AVALON
Prajna Avalon grew up in Brazil among a community of healers, psychics and mediums who were part of a “healing community” where she and her family lived. As a young girl, she gradually developed her healing and psychic abilities with the help and encouragement of her father, who was also a very gifted medium. After Prajna graduated from high school, she worked for a couple of years, saved her money, and moved to the United States when she was twenty. Prajna studied English in Boston, and she was eventually hired as a medical interpreter at a local hospital, where she translated medical terms, and used her healing abilities to do research on the effects of energy healing and surgery.
Prajna loves the healing work she does, and she feels deeply grateful for her psychic abilities. She believes that our purpose in life is to grow and to heal here on Earth, so that we can ultimately be more enlightened, fulfill our destiny, and raise the vibration of the world to its highest, best level. During my reading with Prajna, I felt the effects of her healing energy because, while she was very accurate, her comments were also very inspirational, supportive and affirming.
Growing up in Brazil, Prajna Avalon always knew that she was gifted with psychic abilities. “I’ve known it all my life. I was really lucky, because I was born and grew up in a community of healers and mediums and so all of that was very normal to me,” she says. “There wasn’t a memory where I said, ‘Oh my God, I know I’m psychic, or I know I’m a medium.’ I never had a spiritual awakening moment that changed my life. Everything was very normal and very familiar from the beginning.”
In fact, Prajna has detailed memories of her existence in spirit before she was born. “I had memories of planning this lifetime, and what my work was going to be here,” says Prajna. “I even had memories of the specific beings that are part of my soul group. These memories have been strong guiding forces for me in this life.”
Prajna received support and encouragement about her psychic abilities from her father, who was also a psychic medium. “He always encouraged me with all of my abilities. I think he saw it in me since I was very young.”
As she was growing up, Prajna noticed that the other psychics seemed to be surprised at the high level of her intuitive gifts, compared with their own abilities. “The healers, mediums and psychics within the healing community, including my own teachers, were surprised at the level of my psychic and mediumship abilities. And as I got a little bit older, I noticed that I had surpassed even my father’s abilities.”
Psychic experiences were routine in Prajna’s life. When she was about eight, she had an experience that even amazed her father. “One day, my father was working in the garage and I was drawing with chalk on the sidewalk. He told me that my 83-year-old grandmother was very sick and that no one, none of the doctors, were able to determine the cause of her illness. And he told me that they were going to take her to the hospital to try to figure out why she was sick,” remembers Prajna.
“Suddenly, out of nowhere, I said ‘She has labyrinthitis.’ And my father just looked at me with a surprised look, as he often would, since things like that often came out of my mouth, and he said, ‘What does she have?’ And I said, ‘Labyrinthitis.’ And he said, ‘How do you know that?’ And I just kind of shrugged my shoulders, and I went back to drawing on the sidewalk.
“A few weeks later, he came to me and gave me a hug, and he said, ‘Well, we waited for two weeks, but the doctors still didn’t know why your grandmother was sick, so we asked them if she could have labryinthitis, and they looked into it, and that’s what your grandmother has, that’s what’s making her sick.’ None of us had ever heard of labryinthitis – I now know that it’s an inflammation of the inner ear, which causes extreme dizziness,” says Prajna.
“But when my dad told me about my grandmother being sick, I just heard that word and it just came out of my mouth. That’s usually how things work for me. The thought will come, or the vision will come, and I instantly know the answer. This has happened to me many, many times, and it’s been proven to be right, so I don’t question it anymore. But this was my first memory of using my medical intuition.”
Although Prajna grew up in a community of psychics, she attended a traditional grade school. “I’ve always loved school and loved learning,” says Prajna. “But I was very bored in school, because I found it too easy, and I wasn’t challenged. I missed being around others who had a deeper connection with the spirit world, and who understood the teachings that I felt within myself. But nobody outside of the healing community knew that I had these abilities, and I kept them to myself.”
As a result, Prajna often felt isolated and alone, and that she was different and didn’t fit in. But she was very independent and actually enjoyed spending time alone. “I had fun exploring my psychic abilities in day to day life, and would often experiment with them to see how far my abilities could go,” she explains.
Sometimes, Prajna used her psychic abilities to help her in the classroom. “I was really shy as a kid, so when I was in class and I had a question about something, but I didn’t want to raise my hand and be the center of attention, I would look at another student and think into their head, ‘Could you please ask this question,’ and two seconds later, the person would raise their hand, and ask the question I wanted answered. That always worked for me, and it was nice to play with energy and consciousness in different ways.”
Prajna also used her psychic abilities when playing childhood games. “I grew up playing outside, and we used to play hide and seek a lot,” recalls Prajna. “I used to play a lot with my father. He was very fast and agile, so I could never find him. One day I realized that, because I could connect with other people’s minds, I was able to find their hiding places more easily. So the next time my dad and I played hide and seek, I connected to his mind and I could see where he was hiding right away. Every time! He couldn’t believe it!
“But the funniest part is that after I told him what I was doing, he tried to do the same thing with me,” Prajna continues. “Except that I knew he was doing that, so I would still connect with his mind first. I would think of places I didn’t intend to go and send him all over looking for me in different spots. It drove him crazy!”
When Prajna was about ten years old, her father abruptly left home. “That was a huge loss for me, because my father was my main source of support and development. In a way, he was the only person who truly understood who I was. I felt very alone.”
In her early teens, Prajna’s intuitive gift began to grow rapidly. “My abilities started increasing a lot – to the point where it became overwhelming to me. I was having very strong premonitions all of the time. I would see spirits a lot, I would do astral travels, my things would disappear from one place and show up in another. My mom asked the psychics and mediums from the healing center to help me, but they weren’t sure what to do. So I actually asked my guides to please shut down my abilities for awhile. And they did. My psychic abilities didn’t shut down completely, but they decreased significantly, which was a huge relief, and my life became more manageable.”
During Prajna’s teenage years, some of her friends found out about her psychic and healing abilities, and they would ask her for help. “When I was fourteen or fifteen, my friends would ask me to put my hands on them when they were sick. If they had a headache, I would put my hands on their forehead, and their headache would go away. Even my friends’ parents would ask me to come to their homes and do readings for them. It was a lot of responsibility for a young person to handle, doing readings about major life decisions for an adult.”
Prajna graduated from high school when she was eighteen, and because her family was very poor, she didn’t have the financial resources to go to college. So she took a job as a salesperson at a telemarketing company and began to save money to move to the United States. “When I was about thirteen years old, I started feeling that I was meant to move to the U.S.,” Prajna says. “I had no idea why I was coming, or how long I was going to stay, and I didn’t even speak English. But the guidance, the intuition, was so strong that I knew I had to move to America.”
When Prajna was twenty, she moved to Boston and dedicated herself to studying English for a year. “I really studied a lot, so after one year, my English was very good,” says Prajna. “I was always interested in using my medical intuition, and I was able to get a job as a medical interpreter at a local hospital, where I worked for almost ten years. My main job was to interpret medical language to patients who were Portuguese or Spanish, but I eventually did healing work.”
In addition to working at the hospital, Prajna took courses at the Barbara Brennan School of Healing. “I completed the four year professional program and the two year advanced studies program and teacher training,” she explains. “It was an extraordinary program, and it allowed me to start working as a healer in the United States.”
Prajna always knew that she was meant to be a healer. “It felt very natural to me. My guides always told me three things: that I would be a teacher, that I was a healer, and that I would write a book. So those three things I knew. They told me not to ever lose sight of that. So I knew that I had a purpose, and that I was going to fulfill that purpose.”
As part of her graduating project for the Barbara Brennan School, Prajna developed a research project at the hospital where she worked which looked at the effects of energy healing in patients who were undergoing surgery. “My research project was approved by the hospital almost immediately, and I began doing healing work with patients pre-op, inside the operating room and post surgery. I worked with a control group and a healing group, to compare specific results.
The results of the research project were overwhelmingly positive, impressing both Prajna and the medical team at the hospital. “The results showed a significant benefit to the patients who received energy healing,” says Prajna. “In fact, over 70% of patients who received healing treatment didn’t need any pain medication after surgery. And the healing group also reported a significant increase in their sense of well-being and calmness around the entire surgical experience.”
One case in particular stands out for Prajna. “They were going to do a lumpectomy on a woman who had breast cancer, and they asked me to do my healing work with her before the surgery. So she came to me and I worked with her for a half hour, preparing her energy field, working with the tumor, just working energetically to prepare her for surgery, so that she would have a very easy recovery and healing afterwards.”
After Prajna finished her healing session, the patient was sent for an ultrasound to identify the exact location of the lump prior to surgery. But, after three hours, the patient still hadn’t returned to the operating room. “The nurses called the radiology department to find out the reason for the delay. And the ultrasound technician reported that they had done numerous ultrasounds on the women, but that they could not find the lump. They had looked at her previous x-rays and confirmed the lump, but now, somehow, it was no longer there. So they cancelled the surgery and sent her home, because the lump disappeared. We all looked at each other in astonishment and celebration.”
From then on, after seeing repeated positive results with patients in the healing group, the hospital staff would often ask Prajna for help. “If they had a patient whose blood pressure was too high, or if the patient was very nervous before surgery, the nurses would page me and ask, ‘Could you come over and do some of your healing hands?’ And even if it wasn’t my shift, I would come and do the healing work, because the staff saw how much it worked.”
After Prajna completed her research project and graduated from the healing school, her life and work as a psychic healer began to accelerate. “Opportunities began to arise from many sources. I developed a thriving private practice, taught at the Barbara Brennan School, did interviews on Hay House Radio, started running my own healing groups, and I collaborated with other healers at different events. I was even invited to be a part of a worldwide peace vigil at the border of Syria. It was as if the universe was saying, ‘Okay, you’ve graduated from your regular life, you’re ready to be a healer, you need to surrender and let go, it’s time.’”
Over the years, Prajna has been able to help many people from all over the world, most of whom come to her for healing work, which she feels grateful to do. “So many times, after I finish a day of work, I am in such deep gratitude, and feel so honored to be able to be trusted with transmitting these healing energies, and to help people heal. In fact, very often, I’m brought to my knees in gratitude, with tears in my eyes, feeling so humbled, and so grateful for still being trusted with this sacred, sacred work.”
Prajna believes that one of the main reasons we experience life on Earth, with all of its ups and downs, is to heal and grow our souls. “The message that I feel is very important is that we are all here to heal – that’s why we’re on this planet,” explains Prajna. “Regardless of our life’s circumstances, regardless of what we’re going through, or how easy or hard our life is, the purpose of why we’re here is to heal. To be better. To be happier. To be healthier – within our soul and within ourselves.”
Prajna thinks that everyone has a purpose in life. “I believe that we all come to life with very specific purposes, and gifts – some people are gifted artists, some people are incredible doctors, and some are caring teachers. And some people are extremely gifted healers, and psychics and mediums. And gifted healers and psychics have a really big responsibility. We have to embrace ourselves, and embrace our abilities through the highest of its capacity, so we can help others raise themselves up to a higher vibration as well. By doing this, we can become a template for others to find the light that is already within themselves.”
Prajna continues, “If people can focus on being the best that we can truly be, if we can focus on the deep love within our hearts, or compassion, or happiness – the more we raise our vibrations like that, the more we help the vibrations of the world to rise. And the higher vibration always wins. The negative and lower vibration cannot compete with the higher. Higher frequencies will always be more powerful.
“So let’s forget about focusing on healing the negative. We’ve been doing that for too long. Let’s focus on raising our vibrations, and connect straight to the source of happiness and love and trust. And then darkness cannot help but dissipate, because the vibration will be so much higher here on Earth. This is the secret to healing our own personal wounds, and healing our beautiful planet.”