the wise medium

"He has changed people's lives, banished the fear of death, and brought grieving parents the solace of their dead children's presence ... It is impossible not to be moved."
- Newsweek

"Van Praagh could have used this text to prove that his gifts as a medium are authentic - the story about the deceased teenager who led his parents to his murderer is impressive (the result was a murder conviction) - but instead, Van Praagh offers spiritual and psychological comfort to those grappling with the loss of a loved one. He also helps readers develop their own means of talking to heaven. Even those who aren't aching for contact with the deceased will find Van Praagh's down-to-earth discussions of karma, the afterlife, and spiritual guides fascinating."
- Amazon.com

"This is a wonderful and uplifting book, and I highly recommend it. If you have ever ... grieved the loss of a loved one, James Van Praagh's spiritual stories and lessons will heal your heart. He is without a doubt one of the most gifted mediums on the planet at this time. This inspiring book is a must read."
- Brian L. Weiss, author of Many Lives, Many Masters

"... the groundbreaking book ... that changed people's lives, that gave them hope, that answered their most profound questions about life ... A nationally recognized medium offers a compelling and inspirational message ... providing readers with the means for recognizing and dealing with the harrowing pain of grief in a healthy manner."
- Ingram

His very natural, easy-going style would lead you to believe that James Van Praagh is chatting with a friend on the telephone, not communicating messages from the grave. Van Praagh is a survival evidence medium, meaning that he is able to bridge the gap between two planes of existence, that of the living and that of the dead, by providing evidential proof of life after death via detailed messages.

"I'm clairsentient," he explains, "which simply means clear feeling. I feel the emotions and personalities of the deceased. I am also clairvoyant," he adds, clarifying that, "the first is feeling, the second is seeing, very much like Whoopi Goldberg in Ghost."

The true essence of the messages are the feelings behind the words. Van Praagh is an expert on this subject, since he has been in touch with those feelings most of his adult life. "The spirits communicate by their emotions. No words exist in the English language, or any other for that matter, which can describe the intense sensations."

Personality traits come in as well. If a person was talkative while alive, he will come through with plenty to say. Van Praagh also relays physical traits and death conditions as evidence. "If I convey recognizable evidence along with even a fraction of the loving energy behind the message, I consider the reading successful."

Van Praagh's message of hope has touched a great many more people due to his television appearances on such shows as Oprah, Larry King Live, Maury Povich, 20/20, and 48 Hours. His popularity began during his appearances on the NBC talk show The Other Side. The show concentrated on paranormal issues, and Van Praagh became the favorite guest and resident expert on the subject of life after death.

Even Howard Rosenberg, the Los Angeles Times distinguished television critic, dubbed Van Praagh "spectacular".

about james van praagh

Van Praagh was born in Bayside, New York, and is the youngest of four children. An average child, he remembers having a tremendous fascination with death. He was raised Catholic and served as an altar boy, entering the seminary at the age of fourteen. It was there that his interest in Catholicism ended and his sense of spirituality began. There are no schools or training that could prepare Van Praagh for his unusual vocation. Indeed, his ability to communicate with the dead arose out of his ... well ... life.

This belief was affirmed by an astonishing encounter that he had when he was only eight years old. The young boy was praying for God to reveal Himself to him, when an open hand appeared through the ceiling of Van Praagh's room emitting radiant beams of light. Incredibly, he recounts, "I wasn't scared. It was actually very peaceful."

Graduating from public high school, he continued to pursue his studies and later graduated from San Francisco State University with a degree in Broadcasting and Communications. You could say that he ended up working in Communications, just in a different capacity. After graduation, he moved to Los Angeles where he became involved in metaphysics and psychic phenomena. At 24, the promise of that outstretched palm so many years before was fulfilled.

realizing the gift

During his early days in Los Angeles, Van Praagh was invited to attend a session with a medium, although he didn't even know at that time what a medium was. Given that, he was understandably dubious when the medium informed Van Praagh that he would be doing the same work within two years. "My first reaction was, I have enough trouble dealing with the living; why do I want to talk to the dead?"

As Van Praagh's sensitivity increased, he began doing psychic readings for friends. During these readings, he began receiving detailed messages from the beyond. Though at first this seemed bizarre, the more he learned, the more he could not deny the fact that he had the gift to reach beyond the familiar plane of existence we call life.

Today, Van Praagh is recognized as one of the foremost mediums in the world.

Naturally, there remain skeptics about what his abilities. Van Praagh, however, is the first to say that he welcomes healthy skepticism, declaring, in fact, that he is a skeptic himself. "I believe that I am doing this, but I don't believe that just anyone can do this. All mediums are psychics, but not all psychics are mediums."

A psychic senses energy around the living people or objects. A medium not only senses energy, but is able to interface between the slower vibrations of the physical world and the much faster ones of the spirit world. Though Van Praagh is quick to point out that his gift does not provide insights into the future, he is able to provide detailed evidential proof that a loved one survived death. Surviving death may seem to be the supreme oxymoron, but he has a firm belief that we are all spirit beings, and that there is far more to our life than our life span.

Ultimately, Van Praagh feels extremely fortunate to be a conduit of comfort, healing, and most importantly, love. "As a medium, I have never experienced anything but love and compassion and healing in my work," he avows. "It is the love bond between people which allows me to make the connection between the living and the dead."

sharing the understanding

To assist others in spiritual awareness and fulfillment, Van Praagh has produced two meditation tapes - Tuning Into: Intuition / Abundance and Tuning Into: Healing / Forgiveness. In his instructional video Devleop Your Psychic Self, Van Praagh shares his personal techniques to develop your own innate abilities. His unique paranormal experiences during the past fifteen years have been recorded in his best-selling books Talking To Heaven, Reaching To Heaven, and Healing Grief, all published by Dutton Books.

A television mini-series is being produced based on his first book Talking To Heaven. This CBS special will star actor Ted Danson and is scheduled to air in February 2002. In the Entertainment Tonight interview on May 23, 2001, Van Praagh shared his thoughts about the mini-series, "I think that people are ready for it, and I think there's a major audience out there ... My belief is that CBS will see how powerful this is ... and I think that [the mini-series] will really open the door to many more productions about spirituality."

Van Praagh is also in production for a new television talk show, Beyond With James Van Praagh. "The books and television shows are another way to share my gift and the message that our personalities do indeed survive death. My greatest satisfaction in doing this work is witnessing an instantaneous change in people," shares Van Praagh about his work. "When someone is alone and overwhelmed by grief, life seems over. But, when someone is able to make contact with a loved one by utilizing the information in my books, grief and loneliness disappear and proper closure can take place."