EDGAR CAYCE:
America’s Greatest Psychic
By Daniel Acuff Ph.D.
By the time of his death in 1945, Edgar Cayce was perhaps best known for his ability to go into a kind of trance state and correctly identify an illness of someone unknown to him, along with a precise and effective treatment plan. His diagnoses revealed detailed facts about the inner workings of the body, facts that had not yet been discovered by the medical community of the time.
His abilities emerged even in his childhood. He could sleep on a textbook and wake up with a photographic memory of its contents. As his abilities developed further he could operate from a superconscious state. He could access human evolution, traveling back in time to reveal the personal experiences of humans before recorded history.
But perhaps more importantly, Cayce explained how he was able to do this. His insights into the distinctions of the conscious, unconscious and superconscious mind or soul clarify his abilities and the key dynamics of human existence. The conscious mind is familiar to each of us in that it is the thinking, experiencing mind at work in our everyday waking state. Most of us, although we may have heard of the unconscious, and subconscious mind described early on by Freud, we have limited access to their workings.
In Cayce’s view the unconscious mind is merely a passageway from the conscious to the subconscious state, such as when we are falling asleep. Dreaming, then, occurs in the subconscious state and its content is more symbolic and filled with imagery.
Of critical importance is that the subconscious mind is linked directly with and indistinguishable from the soul. This mind/soul is infinite in its access to all that is knowable; it is linked then, directly to God. Think of it as a hologram. Each part of a hologram, say of a toy airplane, contains the entirety of the airplane. In Cayce’s view, God is the One Mind and each of us – individual conscious minds/personalities—is a total mirror image of God.
“From this state of infinite knowing, Cayce claimed he was doing nothing special, but something we could do ourselves. Although astonishing beyond belief, he indicated that all knowledge, that’s right, all, is within. You and I already have within ourselves every bit of knowledge that has ever been known, as well as the seeds of all that will ever be known. It is all within, inside our own mind.”1
The other critical and logical inference that can be taken to heart from the realization that this type of superconscious, all-knowing mind exists is that it exists in everyone, therefore it explains clearly how each of us is linked together. We all are connected at this soul level. How else do we explain how a mother immediately “knew it” when her son was killed in an accident on the other side of the globe? Or a more mundane example, those times when we have a premonition that someone is about to call and the phone rings? How to access this deepest part of ourselves, that is the question.
As mentioned, our dreams can reveal input from the subconscious such as via insights into problems we may be struggling with or premonitions. But many of us have meaningful dream experiences; few of us can say we are at will able to access the level of the subconscious or soul.
Many spiritual traditions employ meditation as a way of temporarily shutting off the blathering of the conscious mind and opening the door to the subconscious. But how many of us have the discipline to take on meditation as a practice? I don’t know about you, but I’ve tried and failed at most meditative attempts to the point when I have concluded to myself that “I’m just not good at meditating”. But at the same time I believe it would be worth the effort if I really dedicated myself to it.
Short of achieving at will access to the subconscious, Cayce offers a few very practical avenues to impacting the subconscious from our conscious state. Most importantly is attitude. He gives the example of a boss who assigns an impossibly hard project to an employee, one that invites frustration and failure.
An employee with a negative attitude might blame the boss, curse his luck and resign himself to failure. With a positive attitude, an employee might see the project as a challenge and opportunity to learn and grow, even if he fails. He may think positive of his boss for entrusting him with such a challenge.
Cayce points also to the physical effects of “thinking positive”. The cells of our bodies respond immediately to positive vibes and negative ones. Research has shown that even the act of smiling has a positive impact on oneself and others at the cellular level…and perhaps at the level of soul. Smile and the whole world smiles with you.
Our minds then are the creators of our lives on a moment by moment basis. The author of Edgar Cayce on Mysteries of the Mind, Henry Reed gives the example of a case of multiple personality. One personality, Jack, had asthma, while when he was William, he did not. William got migraines but jack didn’t. Each had quite different preferences in food and drink. Clearly they were of “two minds”, each one creating a unique and different life.
Cayce also suggests that we take seriously the power of positive suggestion and affirmation. The author gives the example of a mother who had a disease and her baby in utero contracted it. She had to give birth ten weeks early. The baby weighed only two ounces. For days the baby struggled to survive a multiplicity of other problems including needing a transfusion. Her mother believed in the positive power of affirmations and continuously spoke positive messages to her baby, even played recorded messages while the baby was sleeping. Most would think that a baby could not hear or register such words/feelings. But what about at the super-conscious/soul level? Looks like that’s how this worked. The result: a happy healthy baby by the age of three.
So what do we make of all this when we go to bed tonight or wake up tomorrow? What could we change in our lives to better access our souls?
1Reed, Henry, Edgar Cayce on Mysteries of the Mind, A.R.E., 1989, Page 4.
Bio: Dr. Acuff’s Ph.D. is in Philosophy, Sociology and Education. He has been a seminar and communication workshop leader in front of more than 3,000 participants. He is author of fifteen books including three philosophical/spiritual works of fiction: God Lied – What’s Really Going on Here, The Mysteries of Quan, and Golf and the Zen Master. Dr. Acuff will be leading a personal enhancement workshop in November. For info and to register: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..
