Receiving communication from the other side is a gift, in my opinion, however you must be the one who decides when that communication takes place.  Being too open is like leaving your front door unlocked and ajar; the deceased are going to push their energy at you whenever they see you can get a message to a living loved one. 

When I first started my work as a medium, I was open all the time.  Once I was chatting with the check out girl at a clothing store and her deceased grandmother started going on about how her granddaughter was going to give birth to a girl and name it after her.   At dinner one night with a couple, I saw the woman’s deceased father standing behind her and he had a lot to say about his death and his children.  Back then I blurted out everything as it came to me.  But one day I got information for a woman who didn’t want to hear from her deceased abusive husband.  I realized that not everyone is open to this sort of communication, so I stopped doing “drive by” readings.

The way I stopped receiving unwanted communication when I wasn’t working was thanks to my conduit guide Bob.  Bob is the guide who acts like a bouncer.  The only way a spirit can communicate with me now is if Bob lets him through.  On some occasions a strong and powerful spirit will get my attention when I’m not working, but it’s usually pretty important or urgent or Bob wouldn’t have let them through. 

If you don’t have a conduit guide, and I highly suggest you have one if you are a medium, then you’ll need to work on tuning out the constant influx of information.  You’ve got to turn off the psychic radio when you’re not working or wanting the information.  You can do this by pulling your chakras in tighter.  One of the reasons you’re getting so much information all the time is probably because your chakras are open too wide.  Your energy is brushing up against people’s auras and you’re getting an instant download about that person’s life.  Keeping your chakras open that wide can have unwanted side effects, as you can inadvertently take on the negative emotions of another person.

Also, stop using your psychic radio like a police scanner.  Most people new to psychic abilities scan every channel all the time.  They do this unconsciously.  This is one reason why negative and lower vibrational beings can bug you; you’re tuned in to their channel.  You’re allowing your “radio dial” to be pulled to a lower channel just because something is being broadcast.  Learn to be discerning. 

Learn to tune in only when asked or when the situation is urgent or important.  Get with a conduit guide who will agree to filter out the riff raff so you get communication when you want with who you want.  Pull in your chakras so you’re not empathically detecting every little issue with people you pass on the street.

If you do receive communication you feel is really important, you’ll have to learn to be very sensitive to how you pass on the information.  Some people think mediums work for the Devil, so if you blurt out your information, instead of being grateful you may get someone making the sign of the cross at you. If I’m with someone who knows I’m a medium, I will usually say, “Oh I seem to be in contact with someone who would really like to pass on a message to you.  Would you like to hear it?”  I’ve actually had people politely decline, but most of the time they are eager to hear the information.  If I’m with someone who does not know me and does not know I’m a medium, I usually keep my mouth shut, plus these situations don’t come up so much now that I have Bob standing guard.

Psychic work can be energetically draining, and mediumship more so.  You’ve got to guard your own energy.  To the other side, you’re walking around with a little light above your head that conveys, “I’m on and I can hear you.”  The deceased will flock to you if you you’re not careful so that you will pass on messages to their living loved ones.  You must be the one who decides what information gets through.  If you don’t control the information and when it comes through, it can overwhelm  you and cause you to become very unbalanced.   When this happens a lot of psychics try to turn off their abilities.  Instead I simply recommend becoming the commander in chief of your ability.  Take responsibility for the gift, and learn how to use it properly.

Answer:  When I was a teenager a lot of scary beings used to visit me.  I was able to take control of the situation and open up a can of astral whoop ass on them, but I don’t recommend that approach for most people.

In my twenties I shut down my psychic abilities as best I could so I could get away from that life.  That worked pretty well for a while.  When I met Steve, though, he encouraged me to reopen that part of myself and continue exploring.  I found that when I opened up to the psychic realm as an adult, it wasn’t scary anymore.  This was due in large part to the fact that my vibration had changed.  I was no longer susceptible to fear.  I was vibrating a lot closer to love, so those darker entities just didn’t bother me.  We were not on the same channel anymore.

But like you, I was always afraid that ghosts or spirits would try to get my attention by appearing in my bedroom at night, in the dark, and scare me.  I could easily see having a heart attack if that happened!  When I started to see I had an ability that could help others, though, I knew I had to somehow get over my fear.

That’s when the tv show, Ghost Whisperer, came to my rescue.  In this show the main character, Melinda Gordon, is a medium who regularly sees and talks to spirits.  When they appear to her, they almost always startle her, but she is never afraid of them.  That’s when I realized that being startled is different than being afraid.  I decided that if I had to, I could live with being startled.  So I made a deal with my guides, telling them I would open myself back up to these psychic abilities I’d had practically my whole life, as long as they knew I didn’t want to see dead people in my room in the middle of the night.  And I told them if seeing the spirits in my room at night was the only way to help them, I would learn to deal with it.

As it turns out, I needn’t have worried.  I have a conduit guide named Bob that prevents spirits from presenting to me unless I’m working.  Only three times in the last three years have I had a spirit present to me when I wasn’t officially working.  All three came in very gently with me though, and all three came at night.  When you think about it, why would they want to scare me?  If I’m scared, I’m not going to be able to help them.

I did do a reading once where a spirit appeared to me in my White Room (the mental construct I go to when I do readings) and she nearly gave me a heart attack.  She had shot herself in the face and showed me the whole image.  And she was standing right over me.  It took me a moment to collect myself and I was quite startled.  She wasn’t trying to frighten me, she was just in an intense situation and probably didn’t know that I would react so strongly to her grisly visage. 

So my advice is to get a clear connection with your guides and tell them what you are and are not willing to tolerate.  Also, make sure you vibrate at a reasonably high frequency normally.  If you’re depressed, angry, sad, ashamed, or guilty you might attract lower vibrational beings when you open yourself up.  And lastly, decide in advance that if a spirit does show up, you’ll only be startled and not afraid.  They aren’t there to hurt you.   They’re there to reach out for your help.  If you have this gift, think of all the good you can do with it.  Don’t let a little fear stop you.