Interview with Lorraine Holloway-White Author of "A Sceptical Medium" and more!

Welcome Lorraine, I always like to begin with some personal notes:



Where were you born and raised?


I was born in Seaton Barracks in Plymouth - UK as my father was in the army at the time. At three months old we all moved to Germany for three years.


Where are you currently living?


The English Riviera, Torquay - UK. So called due to it's much milder climate than the rest of the UK. Everyone has snow at present and as usual we haven't got a flake


Are you in a relationship and do you have children?


I am married and have one son, Philip from a previous marriage.

Let’s discuss your book, “A Sceptical Medium” the title itself is unusual, can you share with us where the title evolved from?


It is taken from my blog of the same name. In fact, the book is a compilation of blog posts and was only done due to so many people asking if they could buy my other books. It is a 'get to know me book' and has smaples of my other books in it too. What I call my main two books are with my agents who are trying to secure a publishing deal for me. In the meantime, a Sceptical Medium was born.


The title came about as I am so sceptical about most so-called mediums today who seem to be in it for fame and money more than anything else. So many today aren't even natural mediums and are just very clever at generalising and making it sound good. I always try to warn people about them and how to tell who may be a naturally gifted medium and who may not. Several people called me a sceptical medium and I thought that fitted me quite well so I re-named my blog and the rest is history as they say.


When did you first become aware that you had the gift of mediumship?


At around the age of 28. I was on the telephone to someone and could smell her bacon cooking. She told me that getting smells down a telephone wasn't normal. It made me look back at other things I could do and query them. After questioning several friends about whether they could do these things too, they all looked at me as though I was mad. I realised I might be able to do things others couldn't and it all stemmed from me mentioning about her bacon cooking.


Did it frighten you at first?


No, not at all. I found it amusing at first and then puzzling more than anything. Why me? What was I meant to do with it? That sort of thing. Could I do more than just 'smell things'.


Did you share the information with family or friends?


Not as such. I questioned some of my friends as to whether they could do some of the things I could and then learnt to keep quiet about it for many years. I know I get it from my mother and grandmother as they too were able to 'know' things although they didn't use it as I do now. My mother still uses her 'gifts' without realising she is at times. Her judgement is always spot on with people.


What was their reaction to it?


Friends thought I was most peculiar and the majority of them still think I'm quite strange all these years later as they haven't bothered asking me anything or getting to know that side of me - they aren't interested. I have changed my circle of friends as so many were, and are, rather scathing of anything they can't understand and close their minds to it. Besides, most have seen the Sally Morgan's and Derek Acorah's of the world and liken me to that. That couldn't be further from the truth and if they took the time to listen or ask, they'd realise that.


Did you attempt to deny to yourself what was occurring?


Yes. I questioned and sought for answers anywhere I could. I still do. In fact, no one should ever take these gifts for granted and they should always be very wary about where it all comes from. There are low energies and high energies. I only work with pure and good high energies. Too many work with the low ones and that is where most of the problems come from and the ego.


When did you fully accept the gift?


At the age of 50. It took until then for me to search and try to see what was real and what wasn't. I tried spiritualist groups and found them to be most peculiar in their teachings and they actually held back my development due to the way they taught things that I felt were wrong. I now know them to be wrong as my first book, A Guide's Guide To Mediumship and healing is an instructional book inspired by the spirit world (channelled for want of a better word) and tells what is wrong and what needs to be changed. It confirms all I felt about it. My aim is to see those changes put into practice as there are many good people in these places who don't realise what they teach is wrong.


Please explain for the benefit of my readers what you perceive to be the difference between the Soul and the Spirit of an individual?


The spirit is what gives a person their personality. Their energy field if you like. It is what we recognise people by. When we die, that goes with us for a brief time only and then is shed like an old worn coat. It isn't needed any more. For those who believe in re-incarnation, we come back with a different personality or spirit each time. It is this spirit or energy that is used when giving messages about those who have died. It is this others will recognise about them.


The soul goes with us from lifetime to lifetime and grows with us. A new soul is always easy to tell as it is within someone who is usually selfish, self centred, lacking in any sort of compassion and all manner of other negative things. The older the soul, the more compassionate and caring they are. The soul grows and develops with us and lessons learned in each lifetime make the soul grow. Someone with an old soul (one that has lived through many lifetimes and bodies) will usually put others first and help anyone they can throughout their lives. A young soul usually has an easy life, which is why we tend to ask why it is that so many bad or selfish people sail through life with everything going well for them. Those who are kind and caring usually have hard lives with all manner of things they have to suffer.


The spirit is the surface person we see, the soul is the inner core of the being which can often be hidden from those we don't want to see the 'real' us. Very complicated to explain in such a short space, but I hope I have helped you understand a little of what I mean?


You believe in God, does that conflict in any way with your beliefs in the afterlife, or does the belief walk hand in hand with your religious convictions?


That is what worried me most when I realised I had these gifts as I believed them all to go against God. The years I took to come to terms with it all. I now realise, the gifts, if they are natural and only ever result in good, are of God. The ones that are forced and 'taught' by man are the ones we should steer well clear of. If God means you to help with healing or bringing comfort then that is fine if done with humility and with giving Him credit.


What goes against God and His teachings are those who profit by charging huge sums of money for healing, by thinking you can 'learn' to be a healer or a medium. You can't learn. It is there from birth or it isn't. It may not develop naturally or become obvious until one is older, but it will always happen naturally as it did with me and all other natural mediums I know. If you have to learn to do it and get certificates, you shouldn't be doing it and it is this that goes against God as these people will be working with the very low energies that shouldn't be messed with.


By the very nature of your gift you have encountered a level of hostility from a few people, can you tell us about that, and also why you believe some people become hostile?


People are usually scared by what they can't understand. I am no different which is why I tested as much as I could to see where my gifts came from. There are also people who have no belief in anything but the here and now and they find it difficult to comprehend anything - not just what I do.


The hostile people are very sad. They think it is their duty to be rude, insulting and often very threatening to people who believe in anything they don’t. Luckily these types are few and far between. The ones who have been nasty to me cannot be reasoned with or talked to. They have a mental block and want to see everything in black and white. The fact I warn people against the frauds is besides the point, they tell others that I am a fraud and as a witch (which I'm not) need to have my house burnt down as that is what happens to witches.


These people are fanatics and can never be reasoned with. I walk away and ignore them as that is the only way to handle them. At first I tried to answer any questions they might have, but soon realised they didn't want answers, they wanted a fight. I don't get involved with that now.


Do people listen to what you say with an open mind, or are they unwilling to explore the possibility that you are correct in your beliefs?


The fanatics I described above will never listen, but they aren't really sceptics, they are just angry with the world. I find the majority of sceptics to be open minded and reasonable people willing to listen to what I have to say. Most have been very intrigued and stangely, it is the sceptics who have enjoyed reading A Sceptical Medium as most agrees with their viewpoints!


Can you assist my readers in understanding the definitions of being a guide.


Another one difficult to answer briefly, but I'll try. The word guide is wrong although most use it. I was told in my book, A Guide's Guide that Spirit Guide's are not of this world and have been created to help guide us through life and steer us in the right direction. What you might call your conscience talking is usually your guide trying to stop you doing something that's wrong.


A spirit helper, is usually someone who has been of this world and is there to give help with healing and messages during mediumship. It isn't always that way, but more often than not it is. Only those who are of the very highest levels as mediums, will have spirit helpers who were never of this world, but even they will have a mix of the two. We have many with us through life and most come and go while others will be with us throughout our working life. One thing is for sure, they don't have really fancy way out names. The mediums who give a fancy name to what they call their guide is probably someone you shouldn't bother going to.


Is there a difference between being a spiritual guide and channeling?


Yes. They are totally different ways of working and the channeling is always from those of pure spirit and who were never of our world. If the medium is a natural medium of a high level, the spirit will be of a very high level and the words given will always be to benefit the world as a whole. The words will be gentle and put in a way that is very obviously different from the person receiving it. On my blog, if channeling happens and in my book, you can tell when it is me talking and when I have been 'taken over' so to speak. The language and manner is very different whereas when I give a message to someone through my spirit helper, it sounds just like me talking - because it is me.


Reincarnation is a large part of your belief system, share with us your thoughts on that, and does the spirit reincarnate or the soul, or both?


Only the soul is re-incarnated within the new body. As I explained earlier, each time we come back in a new body, we have a new spirit, which is our personality and the energy that is unique to that particular body. I was never sure about re-incarnation until writing my first book. When they talked of it, I was as fascinated as everyone else to read about it and see what they had to say. I look forward to that book being published as it answers so many of the questions I am asked each day.


Your book is available on Lulu. I have included the link further down. How have you found the self publishing experience?


Brilliant for the purpose it was intended. Remember, this isn't what I call one of my 'real' books, this is one put together as a compilation so some of the posts might sound a bit repetitive in parts due to the fact they were done over a period of time and not written as a book. That said, the stories stand apart from each other and the sample chapters from my two other books have been of interest to people.


Lulu do a top quality book and it has meant that people all over the world have been able to buy it easily. It is getting my name known and the message I want to get over whilst waiting for the other books to be published. The marketing and promoting is difficult, but once people have read it, they recommend to others. I'm glad to say, all who have read it that have come back to me, have said they loved it and it has taught them lots in an easy way to understand.


There are some cases where I wouldn't recommend self publishing as a first step, but it has done me proud and I hope it continues to do so.


Have you found that your gifts have isolated you in any way, either from friends or from people you know?


That is an excellent question. Since developing fully (through the spirit world and not man) I have found I have cut so many people out of my life through choice. There again, there are quite a few who have been very resentful of my gifts and are now very scathing about my writing and public speaking. I don't let this bother me.


People will come and go through our lives as we change. Sometimes it is their choice, sometimes it is ours. If we are very lucky, there will be a couple who go with us the whole way. It is very few of us who still know and mix with the same people today who we mixed with 20 years ago. Some of us move on in life and some stand still. I'm one of those who always moves along learning more and more as I go. I feel sad when some people resent what I am doing, but human nature is a strange thing. What I find worse, are those who don't ask me anything and assume I am one of the Sally Morgan, Derek Acorah brigade.


You have been the driving force behind Authors On Show, when did the idea surface for you about creating a site to showcase new Authors?


When my agents told me to get known I was useless at promoting myself and ended up promoting others instead as I've always liked trying to help others. It was also the idea that we would all support and promote each other. In other words, I would promote them on a site set up for that purpose and in return they would promote me and the author site. Sadly, although that was the idea it didn't really work that way and I still have to promote myself. I found it much easier to become known through the back door if you like, but nowadays, I am better at putting myself and my work forwards too and feel no embarrassment about doing it. After all, if you don't show yourself how are people meant to know about you?


The site is very popular, and growing daily. That must be pleasing, what plans have you for the future development of AOS?


I love Authors on Show and many of the writers we have on there. I want to keep promoting authors, but in the months doing it have learnt a lot about who we have showcased. Some are very pro-active and others have been so lazy it beggars belief. It has been a real eye opener for us I can tell you. We now see what agents and publishers see and we aren't surprised why so many authors are rejected even if they have brilliant books.


We are becoming more selective now and trying to find some new faces as well as the familiar ones many of us know. I would like the site to become more informative for our writers and am slowly going to be steering it that way over a period of time. It has amazed me how many don't read submission guidelines properly or think they just don't need to do it as everyone else does.


A lot of authors without agents seem to think nothing of signing a publishing contract without having it looked at professionally. They don't seem to realise the importance of having it done. I would love to see that changed and am having an article about that very subject on the site soon by a professional in that field. Hopefully, we will be having more articles written by professional in the coming year too. I now feel ready to move onto that stage.


More agents and publishers are looking at us each month now too and I am dying for some of our authors to get a deal or be signed with an agent from having appeared on our site. I admit to having been acting as advisor to some and also acting as a literary agent for others already. I have to really believe in you to do that though.


Where do the Authors that you feature come from?


To start with, most were from Authonomy and Slush Pile Reader. Places where I was an active member. Now we are getting better known, we are being approached by more authors from elsewhere and even agents have approached and asked us to promote their authors. We hope to be expanding on this much more in future months.


Do you have a selection process? Please share with my readers how they go about contacting you to be showcased on the site.


Nicole is the one who now handles all the submissions as she is far stricter than I am. I'm getting better though as saying no. We have submission guidelines on our FAQ's page, but it is amazing how many don't bother reading them properly. They skim and do what they like. Those people are now deleted immediately with no explanation given.


A MS must be near to completion and in a good state of editing to be able to go on site. We have people sending a note saying.


"Here's my book (they put link to click on) do what you want with it."


That is their idea of a submission. It is horrendous what we see. We get PDF files sent to us that I can do nothing with and all sorts of things. These are the writers we are not surprised don't hear back from agents when submitting.


Anyone who wants to submit for any category, just need to read the FAQ's properly.


I'm afraid I don't have time these days to plough through the bad ones, so it is important they all read carefully. If you don't hear from us, chances are you were deleted for not doing it properly.


You are also collecting people’s experiences with the ‘paranormal’ for a future work. Please tell us a little about this and share with my readers where they can contact you or share with you their experiences.


This is something I have been dying to do for a long time. So many people ask me what certain psychic happenings mean they experienced even 30 years ago. In return for allowing me to put it in my book, I will give them an explanation of what happened and what it probably meant. Ghostly happenings speak for themselves, but there are so many other things that don’t. These explanations will also go in the book.


Most books of this kind show all the different little stories people send in, but I've never seen one where the medium explains what probably happened and what it could have meant. This is what I'd like to do.


Anyone interested can send their experiences to


paranormal@authorsonshow.com


Are you planning on hosting book talks on Mediumship?


I already do. I have done quite a few talks already and am doing another at the Royal Torbay Yacht Club on 8th December. I have also had talks with someone from the Society for Psychical Research in London and they have mentioned they would like me to talk there in February. The date has yet to be confirmed.


I don't charge for my talks, but if anyone would like me to do one that is out of my area, I do now have to ask they pay my expenses as I was getting well out of pocket. If anyone would like to book me, they can contact me initially at


lorraine@authorsonshow.com


How can you be contacted for a reading?


I am not overkeen on doing readings. I can do all manner of things with my mediumship, but readings is something I've never felt that happy about. I never do one to one's in person, but will do some online. They can see my blog (link below) to book one, but I want NO information from the person booking it and all I require is a photograph unless they want a card reading only.


What do you have in the works for 2011 both personally and professionally?


I have been to a talk recently where a medium attending the same talk told me I was to become well known in 2011 and would be busy travelling and that my books would sell and more were to be written. Two weeks later, I actually paid for a reading (something I never do) with someone who is very well known as being accurate and honest. He told me that 2010 had been me putting everything in place and that 2011 was when it would all come to fruition. He too mentioned about books and more to be written. He saw a contract being signed and said fame was coming to me and maybe quite soon. You are the first person I have told this to so we'll see if it happens.


Neither of the mediums knew me or had met me before and the one I paid for the reading, told me so much about other things in my life and many of the people who had died giving their names, that I have to hope he is right.


I applaud the stance you have taken about the ‘entertainment style demonstrations’ that are being carried out…I quote from your blog.


“Lorraine is fast becoming well known for her talks. Her aim is to change the way mediumship is practiced by many today. It is her wish to see the ‘entertainment’ style demonstrations that are done in large theatres and stadiums stopped as it compromises the standards of mediumship and brings it into ridicule due to the way much of it is done. Mediumship is meant to be a private matter and not for public ‘show’ and a money making exercise. What she has to say is often rather controversial, which is why sceptics as well as believers find her books and talks most interesting.”


This ‘entertainment factor’ is something that tends to bring genuine mediumship into disrepute. It appears to be an escalating “Business” . What do you believe can be done to discourage folks having their lives played with by these “Entertainers”?


I am hoping that I do get the fame talked of above as then my voice will be heard further afield. I am determined to talk to as many people as I can teaching them what is real mediumship and what isn't. Why they shouldn't be encouraging these other people to make so much money out of making it an entertainment industry.


My books, if they do get published this coming year, will spread the word around the world. I have no doubt it'll happen as the spirit world told me it would in the book they wrote with me.


I don't think we'll ever rid the world of this 'fortune telling' and entertainment style from happening, but at least maybe I can help stop it growing in the way it is now. I have no doubt I will make many enemies along the way, especially from those who are making millions out of it. It has to be done though as I don't want people looking at me in the way they do these money making machines. I am a compassionate person who wants to help people, not use them for my own ends as so many sadly do today. Wish me luck.


It has been a pleasure to have you join me here today, Lorraine.


Thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to tell people a little more about me and who I am.


Time to plug your sites


Here are the links:


Private blog, A Sceptical Medium http://askamedium.wordpress.com/



Private blog, Lorraine -The Blog http://bitly5z1ezq.blogspot.com/
 

To purchase “A Sceptical Medium” book Lulu.com
http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/a-sceptical-medium/13045308



Smashwords
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/27137



To read a fascinating interview with Lorraine by the Herald Express newspaper click the following link.


Herald Express link
http://www.thisissouthdevon.co.uk/news/able-spiritual-gift-keeps-giving-volumes/article-2718028-detail/article.html