Children and the Other Side

It's been said that children and the elderly are more likely to see departed loved ones and friends on the Other Side because they have one foot in our earthly world and one foot in the hereafter. The young have just stepped into the physical plane and the elderly will soon be leaving.

Young children can see the strangest things!

I remember when my youngest daughter was about five years old, I took her with me while visiting someone who lived across the street from a cemetery. As we climbed up the front steps, she turned, pointed to the graveyard across the street, and began giggling.

"Why are you laughing?" I asked. She pointed to the graveyard, again, which looked deserted to me, and said a man there was waving at her to say "Hi!" I stood there a moment, straining to see something that was beyond my abilities, then smiled down at her. She was quite convinced that a friendly man was greeting her. Who was I to disagree?

One book I read recently suggested a child may be demonstrating their psychic abilities with the following:

• Stating facts they have no way of knowing—describing a thing or event without a logical source for that information.
• Long conversations with imaginary friends—involved conversations with imaginary friends that only they can see. These may be spirit guides or grandparents. The child might mention talking to them, and being taught by them.
• Prophetic dreams—dreaming about things that are about to happen (precognitive dreams).
• Astral projection—flying in a “dream” around the house and reporting all activity going on there, when they should not know anything about it, as they’re supposed to be asleep. (Astral projection is sometimes referred to as out-of-body travel.)

The youngest participant in the upcoming book, Loitering at the Gate to Eternity: Memoirs of a Psychic Bystander, is currently eleven years old. He's quite psychic and his parents shared three stories about him. The first one took place when he was only four in a graveyard. Although he is the only child who shared his stories with me, I have no doubt from conversations I've had with other parents that psychic ability is not all that uncommon in young children. We just learn to rationalize away our paranormal experiences as we get older, usually with the help of skeptical adults.