"A hair, perhaps, divides the true and the false," says the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam.

The same may, at first blush, be said about the difference between the psychic and the psychological worlds. The distinction between the two cannot easily be made, but such distinction may depend on the condemnation or acceptance of an individual by society.

For some, the failure to make the distinction has led to unfortunate and traumatic results.

When the American psychic and clairvoyant, Edgar Cayce, was a child, he had "invisible" playmates that he alone could see. When he talked about them to his parents, his visions were considered to be nothing more than the product of an overactive imagination.

The same fate befell another well-known psychic and sensitive, named Eileen Garrett. In her book called Adventures in the Supernormal, Miss Garrett related her story.

"When I was a child, far from being alone, I had my secret companions, two girls and a boy. I called them The Children. I saw them first when I was four years old. We communicated freely, but without words.

"When I told my aunt about The Children in the early days of their coming, she ridiculed the idea of my playmates, whom she had neither heard of nor seen. 'What are their names? Where do they come from? Where do they live?' she asked. When I admitted I did not know, she replied sharply, 'I thought so!'"

Secretive

"There came a time when I did not want to talk about 'The Children' to anyone, but became cautious and secretive."

Both Edgar Cayce and Eileen Garrett were lucky, in the sense that, all they received from the adult world for their psychic perceptions were skepticism and, perhaps, occasional ridicule.

A friend of mine from Iloilo, whom I shall call Rogelio, was not so fortunate.

Because of his insistence that he could see and talk to an invisible female being, he was considered to be insane and was placed under psychiatric treatment for months.

When I met Rogelio in Makati years ago, he was reluctant to tell me his story because I might react the same way as the others had in the past.

Rogelio is now director of a management consulting firm engaged in personnel recruitment and training. When he learned that I was seriously interested in the fields of psychic phenomena, mysticism and related subjects, he developed confidence in me, and started telling me the unusual story of how we met his invisible friend.

NEXT WEEK: Understanding the Psychic Child (Part Two)

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