Things I Don’t Tell People

Being psychic, there are things I hide from people. Or rather, they try and fail to hide something from me. People think that their thoughts are private and that they don’t show anything on their face. They are wrong. The other night my wife and I had dinner with a Doctor and his wife. When she found out I was a handyman, she was disappointed. It only showed for an instant and then it was gone. She was quite practiced at being gracious. I doubt most people would have even noticed, but with me, she may as well have sent up a signal flare.

I felt it first, and then saw it. I’m familiar with that look. I’ve gotten it sometimes when I’ve told people I’m psychic. People think they’re being nice, but they don’t fully understand what psychic really means.

I never call people on this stuff. First, they would habitually deny it, out of politeness if nothing else, and second, why would I want to stir up trouble? Let them believe they are hiding their true feelings from me. What can it hurt?

I learned a long time ago that I often know what people are feeling better than they do and if I tell them, they are usually so blind to their own mood that arguing with them is pointless.

I don’t tell people how much they are hurting themselves with their little lies; how it all adds up over time to produce a cancerous cocktail of inner pain so squashed down it will never come up. I don’t much like most of the people I meet because of this. I don’t despise them, hate them. I am under no illusion that I am better than them, it’s just that most people, most of the time talk about stuff that not even they care that much about. Most of the emotion that comes through is fear stuck in a loop.

I see no point in telling people that they have done such a good job guarding themselves that there is nothing left but an empty shell motoring around. In fact, that is how most people look to me. When I wander around the supermarket or walk through Costco, I see people of all ages and ethnicities living their lives hiding behind a shell that is the face that they show the world. I don’t look too closely because this subjects me to their pain, which is so intense that I don’t know how they bear it.

What I see around me are people with their emotions bound and gagged, allowing themselves only a tiny sliver of the emotional world that they are capable of. When I was in my late twenties and early thirties I made the classic mistake of trying to help people in this situation. I know better now; there are too many of them and only one of me. I am there for people, but only if they come to me first; they must first demonstrate the presence to see me as someone capable of helping before I lend a hand. If I don’t do it this way, all my effort will be a waste.

So I let people have their little secrets; I let them lie to themselves and believe that their thoughts and feelings are in a little bubble which only they can see and feel. If I were to expose to them what I see, it would only add to their set of worries and Heaven knows, people have enough of those already.