Seership has always been a basic part of Western magic, but what is it, and why should we learn this ancient art in today’s world? A seer is simply one who sees, but with an inner vision that is much clearer than the average person’s in today’s world. Where most people see only the trees, the seer sees the forest. Seership enables one to stand on the mountain and look down from above. Most of the time, our everyday consciousness is consumed with the minutiae of details in our particular corner of the woods. The view from the mountain enables us to see the big picture, to grasp the pattern, to sense the whole, to find meaning in what often seems like disconnected and random events.

A seer sees with the eyes of the heart. To see in this expanded way is to be more fully conscious on all levels of what is going on in one’s own life and the worlds without and within. It requires a willingness to go beyond appearances, to trust our intuition, and open to the natural ability to see that lies within each one of us. In fact, it might be said that we cannot afford not to be a seer in these unpredictable modern times!

Nowadays, we call seers psychics. This word comes from psyche, the Greek word for the soul, and so literally means ‘of the soul.’ This offers us a good clue as to what seership or psychic awareness really is. It’s the viewpoint of the soul, the essential core lying within each of us. Opening up to psychic awareness helps us become aware that each of us is more than our limited local self, locked into the laws of the space-time continuum. The soul within each one of us is who we truly are, an inextinguishable spark of the Divine Fire that we may know as God, the Tao or All-that Is. As Wordsworth wrote,

The soul that rises with us, our life’s star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting, and cometh from afar.

The soul is beyond space and time, has lived before this lifetime and will live many more after this one, each time shrugging on a new body and personality like a fresh set of clothes. If you are new to this concept, it may seem strange and unnatural, but in fact it mirrors many of the organic processes in nature. The plant growing in the woods, for example, is not in essence the stem, leaves and flower that we see. It’s the bulb or rhizome, hidden underground, which sends up new shoots every spring. When it has finished flowering and fruiting, it dies away, but the underground bulb has grown bigger and stronger. The soul, too, goes through successive seasons of incarnations in order to grow and evolve. If the original plan for the lifetime is lived to the full, the soul has learned its lessons and gained in depth of experience and understanding, we inch a little closer along the great arc of involution and evolution that will eventually take us back to the Source. Because the soul is beyond space and time, it can understand the bigger picture. As we walk along the road of life, our normal perceptions show us a limited view behind and in front. Sometimes the road leads uphill and we can look around and get more of a sense of how it winds away in both directions. The soul, however, can see the road not as a straight line, but as a wide arc curving its way from the Source and eventually returning Home again.