The paranormal term clairvoyance originated in the French language. And can be broken down as, in French, ‘clair’ meaning clear, ‘voyance’ meaning vision and ‘voyant ‘ being a visionary. Therefore being a clairvoyant is one who has clear vision. This is, however, a literal translation and not really accurate or very helpful.
One thing that further complicates the definition is the fact that the term ‘clairvoyant’ has been used over the years to refer to different things. ‘Clairvoyant’ has gradually been used as a term that applies to an individual that displays various ranges of psychic or paranormal abilities. The definition that accurately sums up what a clairvoyant is a person that is able to know specific thins about a person, location, event, or object with a means other than the five physical sense. In summary, clairvoyance refers to the use of ESP or extra-sensory perception.
Usually clairvoyance involves an individual who has the knowledge of a situation that happens at the moment, but at a distance, out of the range of that individuals physical senses. Cases of individuals (clairvoyants) have been documented with these individuals knowing of situations that have happened in the past or in the future. Some consider clairvoyance to be a form of prophecy or of precognition.
The means a clairvoyant individual learns this ability varies and can generally be broken down to one of six categories. The first form or category is ‘remote viewing’ and perhaps is the most associated with clairvoyance. A clairvoyant views a location, event, person or object hidden from them through remote viewing. And occasionally takes the form of visual hallucination and at other times the clairvoyant views things with their ‘minds eye.’
Clairaudience is another means by which the clairvoyant may receive information. As the name suggests, in this case this is in the form of sound which they and no one else can hear. Some clairvoyants may even hear the voices of people who are dead; these cases are more properly termed mediumship.
The third form or type is called clairsentience. With clairsentience an individual gains their knowledge with feeling and touch. This may include the feeling an object that are not present. This is more of a feeling or ‘vibe’ that a clairvoyant gets from events, locations or people that are out of the clairvoyants visual view.
The fourth form of clairvoyance is clairalience. In this, the clairvoyant is able learn about remote events or locations through their sense of smell. As an example, they may smell the wildflowers and grass of a peaceful meadow, then the smell of gunpowder and blood. Nobody else is able to smell these different things and there appears to no source for the different scents.
Clairgustance is the fifth form or type of clairvoyance. In this form an individual can taste the different flavors, despite the fact there is no apparent sauce and since they have not eaten anything. They are able to describe the flavor that they are tasting even though they are a distance from any source.
Claircognizance refers to a clairvoyant ‘just knowing’ something without any explanation for their having received this knowledge. There is no sensory analogue to claircognizance, making it a difficult phenomenon to explain.
Clairvoyance is known around the world and is something which figures into every one of the world?s cultures. It is also something which makes up a part of many major religions.
In Buddhism for example, clairvoyance is considered of the six special senses humans are capable of at advanced levels of meditation. In this case, it refers to being able to feel vibrations put out by other people.
Among Catholics, clairvoyance is often considered miraculous. Over 500 hundred years ago, Saint Claire, a disciple of Saint Francis, had a vision in which she witnessed the death of Saint Francis, even though she was miles away at the time. Interestingly, the Catholic Church made Saint Claire the patron saint of television. ‘Television’ translates to ’seeing over a distance.’
There are plenty of people that are skeptical of clairvoyance. It is human nature for people to deny that something exists just because they don’t understand it. Take for example the scientists that not so long ago denied the existence of electricity or magnetism.
No matter what the skeptics are saying, nobody has ever been able to completely disprove that clairvoyance is possible. In fact, there is plenty of evidence that shows that there are many genuine clairvoyants among us. In general, parapsychologists, scientists, and the public is starting to become more open minded and seem more ready to accept the fact that clairvoyance is very real.
Even though we don’t know how this all works, there is absolutely no reason to ignore that the phenomenon exists. There are some people that think all humans had the ability to be clairvoyant in the distant past, but somehow lost their abilities. These same people think that is possible for people regain these talents if they were to make some effort to develop the powers.