Jonathan Cainer's Zodiac Forecasts

Instinct and Institutions
your feedback
We received an overwhelming response to Jonathan's Thought for the Day 22nd March 2000.
A big thank you to everyone who wrote and shared their thoughts.
Here are just some of them.

Jonathan's Thought for the Day During the recent full moon, I have been thinking long and hard about instinct; what is it? And why do some people experience it more than others? It occurs to me that, just as certain great artists and musicians live on the edge of what some people call insanity, there may be natural psychics who get into a similar state. What if, languishing in the asylums or institutions of this world are some of the most gifted people on this planet? They are, presumably,there because they cannot cope with the intensity of the visions they are seeing, the voices they are hearing or the impulses they are feeling. I strongly suspect that some alcoholics or people with heavy drug habits have arrived at their state of dependency for much the same reason.They simply can't find any other way to limit their level of natural sensitivity. If you have any constructive thoughts on this topic, please drop me a line.

Christina says to stay on track an element of control is essential:
"If you want my thoughts about the people with special vision, many things are possible, but the mind in that realm as in others can only be beneficial and productive if there is a sense of control and a sense of assimilation that does not supersede the individual. Only then are we on track."
Donna knows first hand of both the blessing and the curse of being sensitive.
"I feel compelled to respond to your thoughts for the day as my full-moon musings were of the very same sort.
It was only yesterday that I was sharing some of them with a very dear friend. I have been on both sides of the institution gate . My friend made the comment to me that it must have been horrible to have been there with so many very sick people. I told her in only a few respects, but that the most incredible people I have ever met, I have met in psychiatric hospitals. I was also telling some of the "full moon"antics that would go on. The energy then was something else again!
I know first hand that what you have written to be true for many, many people. There are such fuzzy margins between insanity and enlightenment. The voices and the vision - a blessing and a curse. There must be a better way than to lock away these precious treasures."
Bill in Kentucky is a sensitive and can detect the different phases of the moon. Just how, he doesn�t know. 'It�s an unknown driver,' is his comment. And he concludes:
"About alcohol or drugs... to each their own, I drink occasionally. Conditioning is the key, how to interpret what is happening in my sensitivity range and cooling it down as necessary. I can definitely recognize those who are also sensitive, and cool this down by relation of what is happening to them."
'Balance is the key' to both mental and physical illness, writes Santana:
"I think that mental illness is like physical illness. It often happens because the immune or defensive system isn't up to par. And it�s equally unhealthy, though, when these systems overfunction. Balance is the key.
Over-sensitivity to the environment results in overreactions to it (like allergies). Over-sensitivity to the psychic or emotional environment results in overreactions also. When one becomes physically ill it's important to recognize it as soon as possible to actively begin some form of healing process. I think this is true of mental illness as well. When things get too raw it's best to find a way to begin healing. I think going to bed for a couple of days works well in both cases and if you don't think it's getting better call for help. (Or at least call a friend for sympathy to start with - that can heal a lot). but once it's reached the point where you have to be hospitalized it's serious.
To say that people with mental illness see or experience things that others of us don't is true but so do people who have cancer. Either way it's painful. Over exposure is over exposure. So wear your sunscreen, and if it's raining out, wear your goloshes. Just remember to take them off when the sun comes out or you'll end up with a nasty foot rash."
Holly in California has more of a 'quandary' than a 'comment':
"I feel that I fit into the natural psychic category and have painstakingly numbed my senses with bakery foods and mindless television. There are so many things that I'd love to say, but the words are lost in my self-imposed Piscean haze. It's a crazy place to live.
I can no longer unearth the burial ground of my own intuitive thinking. I'm too numbed out. Sure, I can take the edge off the volume, the brightness off the lights, and close the door on the screaming world, but I can no longer find my own self behind that closed door. So I must agree that the intensity of living can be mind boggling.
Everyone is overwhelmed. We just don't know what to do about it."
Nirav in the States believe we are all susceptible to the 'natural guidance from the universe':
"A mind that is clogged with fear, restlessness, ego and evil intentions is not very receptive to this guidance. A person whose mind is like a clear channel, has an unobstructed flow of this divine energy. This energy has the form of joy and ecstasy (after all, the prime purpose of whatever we do in life is finding joy). When a mind is very receptive but not capable of sustaining this boundless joy or ecstasy, it may lead to insanity.
On the flip side is a mind that is rigid and closed, wholly submerged in material consciousness. The middle path is the most desirable whereby the mind slowly develops to tune to the inner voice and divine guidance, for that is how a person can know the true purpose of his being on the planet and can fulfil it."
Kristina agrees that drugs and alcohol work as coping mechanisms:
"I guess the point is that drugs and alcohol in some way or another make it much easier to deal mentally and emotionally with intuitions and sensitivities that are still in large part not completely accepted by western cultures. They are not necessarily used to lessen the sensitivities themselves, but maybe more to lessen the impact of the outside world's reactions and the reactions we have been conditioned to feel ourselves.
The promotion of acceptance and openness is the key. We need to learn to be open to integrating all aspects of life into our view of what is real... not just those things that we can see, touch, taste, feel, and smell. We need to be open to accepting the possibilities without always having the answers."
Diana, a Leo, is attuned to the psychic world and really benefitted from having sympathetic parents:
"I have long believed that those who are mentally unstable or have addictive tendencies may be naturally more attuned to psychic energies. They are usually not aware of this fact and have no knowledge or information about it to help them become stabilized and deal with this ability and use it constructively.
I have been fortunate enough to have parents that have been aware of and interested in the psychic world since I was a child. I have always been exposed to it and know that I can control it. Unfortunately, many have to suffer with all the incoming energy because they don't know how to control it. It would be interesting to work with these people and see exactly how in tune they are to the outside influences."
The inability to express feelings can also push people closer to the proverbial 'edge', writes Philippa:
"To your observation about heightened sensitivity or awareness as being at least a partial cause to these conditions, I would add that an inability to articulate or somehow express personal (life) experience or perceptions can nudge those intensely aware humans further over the edge.
Happily (for us) or not, a number of them come back. Think of Vincent Van Gogh's Sunflowers, Aldous Huxley's Tunnels and David Crosby's Compass (American Dream CD). Am I being overly simplistic here or merely obscure?"
Evelyn has pondered the subject much of her life and has come to the same conclusion:
"I believe there are many people who have so much "cosmic energy" and "gut" instincts that they have not learned to properly use them. Therefore, you find humans who have no outlets for their energies in this western thinking world. I have thought many times about this issue within myself but have also witnessed it in others. I don't know the answers - however, I do see patterns of dependencies on drugs, alcohol, etc. in the most sensitive and spiritual people."
Without a guide, Mala considers it often very difficult to deal with the gift of sensitivity:
"One escape is drugs, alcoholism but only when there is no light and all the hopes seem to be dimmed. As a logical derivation,it seems to me that all the gifted persons are highly sensitive but not all the sensitive persons may be gifted yet. Although they sure have a potential for it, they may not yet be fit to handle it."
Ariel writes of a 'broken heart':
"I am a 22 year old alcoholic and drug addicted woman. The first time I got drunk intentionally I was 10, and the first time I ever did methamphetamines I knew that I would do whatever I had to do to stay high as much as I possibly could. I've been through in-patient treatment three times in the last three years and I finally have five months sober (tomorrow) which is the most I've ever had.I was thrilled to read your paragraph today on sensitivity because you basically said what my mom has told me my whole life - except I thought she was just making it up because she loved me! So thank you. And I agree with you.
Almost all of the many alcoholics I know suffer from some sort of sensitivity, or hypersensitivity. The people I got sober with tell me that alcoholism is a three part disease affecting the mind, the spirit and the body. The idea is that once we straighten out the spiritual malady (learn humility and learn to step outside of ourselves) then the other things fall into place. But the way it FEELS to become dependent on escaping reality, before anyone explains any of it, is like a broken heart."
From Tours in France, Elisa writes of the serious problem affecting a female family member, who has been diagnosed paranoid schizophrenic, and is trapped in a patriarchal marriage:
"I was recently talking to a woman friend of mine about this tragedy, and she said something that really thwunked me between the eyes. It was this:
Most of the women who populate lunatic asylums could be de-diagnosed tomorrow, if we could allow ourselves to realize that the proper name for their condition is not insanity, but rage.
The trouble with that, of course, is that it indicts something - the patriarchal establishment that robs women of our power, creativity and genius. So much more convenient to classify us as poor irrational sick people who have lost hold of 'reality'."
Being unable to tune into the 'voice inside' is the root of the problem for many, writes Cynthia.
"One of the hardest things for people to do today, is to listen to the voice inside them which tries to offer them guidance in what may be the proper direction for their personal growth. So much of the time those things which may be best for us, spiritually or emotionally, require going against what we have been socially or parentally indoctrinated to believe is the ONLY acceptable course of action."
Piscean Irene tells of her experience as a nurse:
"Twenty years ago I nursed 'senile geriatrics', and realised that where a lot of carers had difficulty communicating with these people, I almost invariably had no difficulty understanding their needs and emotional states. I believe many of these people are sensitive and gifted and wise, but are not accepted as 'normal' by society�s standards. I also have had a long association with people of marginalised and isolated sub-cultures, and have noticed a common theme. Most are empaths who cannot stand the pain and so hide behind a 'heavy' front, or the veil of psychoactive drugs. Or they are angry at life, society and the universe. Many have suffered childhood abuse, and many of our youth routinely contemplate suicide. I think this is because many sensitive and aware individuals are arriving on our planet in these times of stupendous change."
Doris from Pennsylvannia has a cautionary tale with a positive outcome for parents with gifted children.
"Our son is extremely intelligent and creative, so much so that his teachers in school informed us that "when he shows up to class, he teaches the class." His math teacher in the ninth grade of school said that our son had more natural mathematical intelligence than he (the teacher) and that there was nothing that he could teach our son.
At the age of ten, our son became troubled and serious. At the age of 13 he started using drugs to escape his boredom and energy. Fortunately for us, we were able to place him in a residential drug rehab for 13 months at the age of 16. They taught him how to focus his energy and assume responsibility for his actions and his life.
During the 13 months of his residential treatment, we visited when he had earned the privilege to have visitors. My observation of the other residents was that I had never seen so many creative intelligent people in one place in my life.
Our son is now almost 33 years old. He turned his life around during his residential drug rehab, and is a functioning, intelligent, creative adult. Had his drug problem not occurred while he was still in our charge, I cannot imagine what his life would have been. Thank God that it happened while we could still do something about it."
Sunny in Canada thinks the medical profession, both traditional and alternative, need to re-examine the way the approach substance abuse.
"While programs like AA deserve to be applauded for their work and goals, the medical profession, both traditional and alternative, need to move closer with the spiritual world and seek the reason why so many turn to substance abuse. Jon is correct in his thinking that these people have a hard time in limiting their natural sensitivity. But what the hell do you expect when we live in a society where boys are told not to cry and girls are made to feel like day old bread if they are not married by their mid-twenties? What happens to the highly artistic child that is pushed to play sports when they would rather play with a paint set? What happens to the natural athlete who is pushed to become a business executive or attorney when they would rather be a high school P E teacher.
Drink, drank, drunk.. pot, coke, crack... don''t laugh too loudly, don't show an abundance of happiness, work at a job you hate and that is going to kill your soul and maybe give you a heart attack, stay in a sick marriage become an emotional cripple and quietly go insane..."
When you 'know', you 'know' is how Janet from the UK defines 'instinct':
"Instinct is a new perspective, a sudden realization, an instant knowledge or a deeper understanding or even deja-vu. You just 'know'.
The troubles begin when an individual wants to share that knowledge or to respond or react to it, but can�t find the way, the right words, the right canvas, the right lyrics - the right audience."
From down under, Seva tells how she had to resort to alcohol to dumb down her psychic gift and how later she was able to escape her insidious habit:
"Many years ago I also was psychic and unfortunately I couldn't cope with it. I drank a lot of alcohol to numb the influx of information. I have since given up drinking and have learnt to control my psychic ability. How?
I simply asked for guidance. I asked my helpers (guides) to take it away from me and so it was no more. I still sometimes have visions but generally it is nothing I can't cope with. So I make a deliberate choice when I am with people not to read them as I also feel this is a form of trespassing on their psyches, unless they come to me for guidance and then I only use Tarot as it also limits me."
Pinar in Istanbul, Turkey, offers his view 'what may be the real cause why some sane but extraordinary people may be staying in lunatic asylums':
"I guess the answer must be as the results of their acts, whatever the cause. The ones whose acts trespass into harming themselves or others are most probably locked in asylums. But what I am really trying to say is, if sensing more than other people leads to nervous breakdown so that these people become tempted to kill themselves or others, these are a pathological cases. But there are at lots of people with extrasensory perception, and more still who are a genius of some kind, and millions, if not billions, who have dependable instincts, who do not go to the lunatic asylum."
There is much to life than meets the eye, writes Karen in the UK:
"In response to your comments on instinct and insanity, society determines who is insane and unfortunately society has yet to wake up to the fact that there is more to this world than what our recognised five senses can perceive: will power to name but one. As you have said we are coming out of an era that tries to explain everything through science. We are recognising that not everything can or should be explained."
Melanie also in the UK takes comfort from Jonathan�s point:
"It is such a wonderful feeling when someone expresses a feeling that you have felt but somehow never quite got it down in words or been able to properly explain what you think. I agree completely with your theory, [obviously this is not always the reason for the dependency,] but certain people just can't seem to cope with the fact that they are here. They can�t understand why they are here and why it hurts so much to be here."
Kevin in the States raises the radio station analogy:
"I remember seeing the movie, "Always" with Holly Hunter and Richard Dreyfuss. There is a scene in that movie where they stumble onto a homeless man. Dreyfuss is a ghost and starts saying things thinking no one can hear him. But this homeless man does.
Maybe people like this are like radio stations, picking up messages from out there and they sometimes seem so obscure that people think they are crazy although it makes sense to someone somewhere.
Many of my friends are sensitive individuals. Some use drugs to slow down or block some of the stuff that comes their way. Others suffer from depression, not knowing whether its their stuff or not. Some people take valium (legal drugs) to cut themselves off. When you speak with an alcoholic you often hear the story of how they were irreversibly hurt or disappointed with what came their way. I think its the visions, the energy of others and the past together which determines how people deal with instinct."
US poet LA Cool writes:
"Artists are the "canaries in the coalmine" of our society. The things we are annoyed about, but have learned to deal with tear them apart. While going through a particularly unpleasant divorce, I had become scraped raw and sensitive to everything. Being a writer and poet, I had an outlet for the emotional volcano, but I vividly recall wishing I could turn off all of the sensory input for a while. I gradually recovered from the divorce and grew a thicker skin, but I remember wondering about some of the good pieces of poetry I wrote during that time and the price I paid to be able to write them."
The 'politics of craziness' is an interesting perspective raised by Cordia
"As a mental health counsellor for many years, I have often seen and felt the dilemma of people outside the norm, especially in the area of sensitivity. "Crazy" is after all a political definition. I feel there are many gifted persons in our institutions who just can't cope with their insights and want more out of life.. Sensitivity is not a high value in today�s culture and it is difficult to survive if you haven't found a way to accept your feelings and set up good boundaries."
Forty-eight year old Texan, Mary, thinks that sensitive people not only frighten themselves but others with what they perceive, and she reckons it is a truly great shame:
"It causes me such sadness when I try to imagine all the good and wonderful things that never get a chance to occur simply because of fear. But, unfortunately, isn't that the way of the world? Except for the helpful side of fear which helps us protect ourselves, I wish we could annihilate the dark side of it altogether, or teach the world to recognize it for what it is and control it and encourage people to watch the example of the extraordinary people in the world, who buck the system of fear and live their lives fearLESSly."
Libran Nathalie, a sensitive from Melbourne, Australia, has a fairy god mother:
"Love what you said about instinct and sensitivity. I have six of my planets in the 12th house and my astrologer fairy god mother has watched my life closely, showing me how to keep my life practical and grounded. She saved me from a life of drugs and insanity through her commitment to have me win. How she made this difference was to make me aware of my sensitivity and gave me a choice where otherwise I had none. For example, she said you can take drugs and kill yourself or you can make a contribution to humanity. Which one is it going to be?"
Recovering alcoholic and psychic Jeffrie from Washington DC writes:
"The intuition I possess gives me the natural ability to read people deeply and instantly on an emotional level, for most of my adult life I have been able to experience what the people around me are both feeling and to some extent thinking. It has as you accurately guessed caused me a great deal of confusion and sometimes pain, imagine hearing the thoughts and feelings of everyone you are surrounded by at a party and you can begin to understand what I experience.
For me it operates like amplified empathy, In my case I do know how you feel!
As for my addiction I believe I was born with the genetic predisposition for alcoholism but I did use a combination of alcohol, marijuana, and nicotine to dull the connection. Until I was in my mid-twenties I thought everyone experienced what I did, It wasn't until I began experimenting with psilocybin mushrooms with my friends that we realized that I had a peculiar talent. They simply don't teach you about this stuff growing up in the inner city of Chicago. If I had grown up closer to my native American traditions perhaps I would have been taught how to manage this gift.
Today I do look at it as a gift, although for many years I thought being hypersensitive was a type of curse."
Aquarian Ritu knows the problems of experiencing too much and wonders how to cope:
"I consider myself to be an intuitive person and often I instinctively know what people are feeling and thinking.This is not always helpful as often I don't want to know all this information. It is especially difficult because others don't really understand you. What's the best way to get around such situations?"
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