The More You Know

The Business Of Being A Psychic

If you’re anything like me, your conception of a psychic’s day to day is probably based on Whoopi Goldberg in Ghost or, even worse, The Long Island Medium on TLC. But as insistent as pop culture is on depicting psychics and mediums as existing on a higher plane, removed from more petty earthly concerns, they still have to make a living!

We were curious about the business of being a psychic, and so we decided to sit down with Linda Lauren, who comes from several generations of psychics, including her mother, grandmother and great-grandmother. Although Lauren loves her work, it was somewhat inevitable that she would end up making a living this way. “I used to see bubbles coming out of people’s mouths when they talked,” she told us of her early experiences as a psychic. With those kinds of intrusions into her daily life, it would be pretty tough to do anything else.

Her big professional break came when, while working on file in attorney’s office, she began to pick up on details about the case, and began to describe the person in the file. After astonishing her bosses, she decided that her talents ought to be able to support her as she branched out on her own. Today, Lauren’s clients include many law firms and Wall Street companies, entities you might not associate with the world of psychics and mediums. But Lauren is emphatic that her practice is not about advising people one way or another — it’s about “guiding people to live productive lives so that they’re happy.” Her role is advisory, giving her clients additional information so that they can make the best possible decisions for themselves.

Lauren is also set apart by her scrupulous commitment to ethics. Although she is also a novelist (her book Hostage In Time was published in July 2011 and recently released), she is careful to keep all of her promotional commitments separate from her professional obligations. You won’t see her doing a reading during an interview, for example. As for some of her more high profile peers, like the Long Island Medium and other psychics who offer their services on television, Lauren is cognizant of her role as an advisor to her clients, rather than a star in her own right.

If she has a television show, she says, “The readings are not about me, they’re about you. The TV show is not about you, it’s about me – what’s wrong with that [picture]?”

[Photo via]

TAGS: linda lauren

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