(CNN) – When I agreed to do an interview and have a medium read by a psychic, the first thing I did was google myself to find out what this person could somehow “guess” about me.
You can find a lot about me on the Internet, for example that I have a 5-year-old daughter, the year I got married and that my parents have already passed away. When I signed up for my Zoom session with medium Christopher Allan, I was skeptical that he could tell me anything about my life that wasn't available on the internet. But a mutual friend had told me that I would be surprised by Allan's ability to learn things about me.
On our screens I saw that Allan is a young and handsome guy. Sitting in a room with a few guitars, he seemed unremarkable compared to some well-known mediums who read for people's arenas or base their practice on the celebrity world. I started our conversation by asking him more about his work and when he realized he was a medium.
A spiritual connection
“For as long as I can remember, I've always had the awareness, like an inner knowing, to realize that there was more to my identity than this physical version of me,” Allan told me. “I remember as a three-year-old looking at my mother and saying, 'I am me, but I'm more than I think.'”
Allan recalled that his sense of awareness and connection to a spiritual realm never felt unsettling or frightening, and that connecting with “spirits,” as he describes it, felt like an overwhelming feeling of love.
He said he was adopted and as a child he always told his mother that he felt “nostalgia.”
“I missed my friends and family back home, but I was homesick about where I was mentally before I came here,” she explains.
As he grew older, Allan said, he began to notice when seemingly healthy people would die, not long before they actually did. At first his parents doubted him, but that changed, especially for his father, when he began sharing his psychic abilities with other people.
“He became my greatest supporter and my greatest confidant,” he says of his father.
Nevertheless, Allan initially tried to distance himself from the attraction he felt for dead people.
“As a child, I just wanted to be a musician. I went to college to study music and write songs, so I tried hard to put that part of myself aside and focus on music,” he explains. “But when you say you're doing this and the neighborhood knows about it, it becomes something bigger. And once you have it, you can do something with it. And then I learned to accept it.”
A language of symbols
Sometimes Allan's head makes a lot of noise. For example, you might feel overwhelmed in airports or while walking through Manhattan. Allan says he has learned to control the volume of the news he perceives.
“It's like shopping in the supermarket and there's always music playing. And if you pay attention, you can hear the music, or it can be it.” [ruido de fondo]. “There’s a time and a place for everything,” he said.
Facts and information appear to him in the form of symbols, he explains.
“Spirit language is the language of symbols because they have no voice to project an actual sound like 'Hello, it's me,'” Allan explains. “So all I get is their energy, which my brain interprets in a way that I can relate to. When they interact with me, my brain sees things it wouldn’t normally see.”
As for the skeptics, Allan says he's also learned to control the volume.
“I think that everyone goes their own way and that everyone sticks to the person they should resonate with,” he says.
And there are many people who believe in it. Allan has sold out his shows in Las Vegas where he reads to audiences. He is preparing for an event on December 20th at the Midnight Theater in New York. Titled 'Brunched by an Angel', Allan will read to a small audience who will sample dim sum and Christmas cocktails.
“It seemed best to do this at Christmas,” he said, as people miss loved ones they have lost and want to stay in touch with them.
Allan's Brunched by an Angel event is produced by Shane Farley, who says the small gathering size offers a different experience than stadium shows.
“People come with their baggage, and through Christopher’s unique gifts, he connects them with the spirits of their loved ones,” Farley explains. “It’s like a magical portal to forgiveness and deep connections. Being part of this healing journey is truly powerful.”
“Take your cat with you”
In the middle of our interview, Allan made an urgent note. I asked him what he said. He had written: “Dad.”
“Your father died?” he asked me.
Marianne Garvey and her father Earl Garvey sit together at a family wedding. (Source: Marianne Garvey/CNN)
I told him four years ago, but I haven't given him any further information. Then Allan told me something that I don't understand how he could have known.
“He wants me to give the impression that there is some sort of neurological event or something going on with his eyes,” he said. “One eye was weaker than the other and he feels like you should see it almost like a scar, like that's what makes you unique. More power to your father for being the beautiful man he was, given this physical defect.”
I tell him that my father was born with ocular myasthenia gravis, a disease that causes the muscles in the eyes to deteriorate or weaken, and that as a child I always hoped that he would never be made fun of for his disease.
“His physique has never defined him and you shouldn’t focus on it anymore,” Allan said, adding, “And it looks like he’s back with your mother. So your mother died too, and that has something to do with this month.” “
My mother passed away on December 24, 2014.
She also highlighted what my wedding venue looked like and that my daughter is in daycare and is musically talented. I knew that my best friend's husband had died unexpectedly.
“Your father wanted to tell you he saw your daughter,” Allan said to me. “Your father wants to make sure you know the transition went smoothly. And you don't have to worry about him anymore. He has your cat with him.”
My 18 year old cat Meepers died two months after my father.
I'm glad my dad takes care of my cat. He's very nice considering how much he hated her when she was alive.
Unless Allan had access to my father's medical records, I'm not sure how he came up with the information he shared with me. I think some people are tuned to a higher frequency.
Maybe it's the holidays, or the fact that that Sunday would have been my dad's birthday, or maybe I just need some comfort and was open to it. All I can say is that I'm no longer a skeptic.
“Brunched by an Angel” opens at the Midnight Theater in New York on December 20th.