At different points in my life when I’ve come to a crossroads, been embroiled in a taxing situation, or felt uncertain about my next steps, I’ve sought out metaphysical readings for guidance. I’ve turned to Tarot card readers, astrologers, numerologists, and readers of the Akashic Records, a kind of cosmic library where all the information and wisdom pertaining to each soul that’s ever incarnated resides. I’ve had psychic readings, channeled readings, palm readings, crystal readings, and I’ve talked to mediums. There’s a drawer in my desk devoted to the countless metaphysical readings I’ve received over the decades, as I’ve often recorded and transcribed my sessions or at least taken copious notes. I’ve found metaphysical readings to be helpful when I’ve felt overwhelmed, afraid, and unsure.

Overwhelmed, afraid, and unsure is how many of us are feeling right now, as we face a time of collective uncertainty greater than many of us have ever experienced before. “Will life ever return to normal?” we wonder. “When? Will we go back to work? Lose our job? Find a new one? How will we continue to meet monthly expenses? Does that person in front of us in the check-out line have the virus? Does our neighbor? Will we catch it?”

With so many unknowns swirling around us, metaphysical readings can be a salve, helping to decrease our anxiety, broaden our perspectives, and offer us solutions we might not have considered.

The way they achieve these lofty goals is by “connecting us with our true spiritual selves,” says metaphysical counselor, Anita Raviele, who reads the Akashic records. “When we can connect with Spirit and a bigger picture, we can remain calm and come up with ideas that can get us through this. [Metaphysical readings] help us take a more positive attitude. That’s the only way we can move through it.”

“In these times, we want to know that we’re not alone,” adds healer and Akashic records reader Sherri Waggoner, “and that there’s hope, guidance, and direction–that there are things we can do.”

Tapping Into the Right Tools

Metaphysical readings, Sherri explains, tap into universal consciousness, which always knows the highest good for each and every person at any given time. “The information that comes through is specific to you,” Sherri says. “If you have anxiety, you might learn you’re not breathing as deeply as you could and that just doing breathwork could calm and level out your sympathetic and parasympathetic systems. It might come through that you’d benefit from meditation or starting a journal. The guides may say it would serve your highest good to do EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique) or that you just need to find a good book and have a bath. The readings give you tools in your toolbox to help you help yourself, knowing [those tools] will serve your highest good.”

In her Soul Path Astrology readings, metaphysical advisor Elise Manzo looks at areas of her clients’ lives that are awakening or in flux as well as the lessons the cosmos is helping them learn. “It may be that an area of your life needs your focus and attention while you’re in lockdown,” she says, adding that metaphysical readings pull us away from being externally focused on things out of our control and redirect us to our inner worlds and our lessons. “They allow us to stay in our own lane,” she says. “When we become more self-aware, we’re able to come into acceptance more easily.”

Psychic medium and intuitive coach Susan West says her readings help clients begin to think differently, enabling them to become comfortable with an undeniably uncomfortable situation like COVID-19. “Most people who are uncomfortable during this time are likely in their masculine energy more than their feminine energy,” Susan notes. “Masculine energy needs to know and to control. It’s attached to the outcome. People who are more in their feminine energy are feeling more relaxed right now.”

Susan’s guides read her clients’ energy and offer suggestions. “Spirit might ask them, ‘How often do you get up and dance?'” she says, “or It might ask them to cook or paint–everyday things they can add to their lives to become more relaxed and less fearful.”

“The readings can support you in a way that allows you to be able to go through this period in a more balanced manner,” Sherri agrees, “so you don’t get so thrown out of whack.”

How Readings Support Relationships

For those of us experiencing added strain in our primary relationships as we spend more time at home than ever before, metaphysical readings can also enable us to see our partners differently. “If you’re having trouble with a spouse,” Anita explains, “it could be related to another life where something happened. Maybe your spouse was betrayed by you or harmed by you. When a reading allows you to see [your relationship] from a new perspective, it pulls you out of the moment a little bit more so you can look at it in a different way.”

Sherri says her guides might paint the picture of the dynamics at play between a client and a significant other. “They might say,” she remarks, “‘Just sit back and realize that this has nothing to do with you. It has to do with so-and-so. This is a dynamic that’s coming up now to be dealt with and here’s a better way of approaching it.'”

As we become more in touch with our higher selves by way of metaphysical readings, according to Susan, we develop more patience in relationships. “If you can admit you’re impatient,” she says, “you’ll have more empathy and compassion for your loved ones who are uncomfortable, too. It starts with you.”

Metaphysics and the Media

In addition, metaphysical readings can help us manage the fear that can arise as we sift through the onslaught of information the media expels. “A metaphysical reading can help you to find your own wisdom and truth, rather than [fall prey to] the negative conditioning of the media, which can easily suck you in,” Elise says. “A reading can help you stay centered in yourself and in the present moment rather than in fear.”

Anita believes metaphysical readings can neutralize the effects of mass consciousness because of their ability to shift our perspectives. “They bring you out of that fear mode of worrying about the future or getting stuck in the past,” she says. “Really, that’s the only way to get through turbulent times like these—asking ourselves, ‘How am I feeling in this moment? And if I don’t feel great now, how can I make it better?'”

“Metaphysical readings aren’t negative and fear-driven,” says Sheri, “so they can help to offset our externals. We’re powerless over them, but we can take back the power within ourselves to make the changes we need to make as we’re coping in this pandemic.”

Even though none of us knows when life will return to some semblance of normalcy, metaphysical readings can not only help us manage our emotions in the here and now, but they can also help us forge ahead.

“I just did a reading yesterday,” Sherri says, “and this woman said to me, ‘I feel lighter. I’m not so nervous or on edge. This is what I can do for now to help strengthen me and when this is over, I feel like I have a plan for where I’m going to go.’ Just knowing that you’re connecting with Source is healing. We’re all raw right now. We’re all in this together. We don’t know what to do. It’s like we’re an open wound, but the readings can start the healing process.”

Originally published by Kripalu Center for Yoga & Health