11 Signs You Are Clairsentient (Plus 7 Ways to Strengthen Your Psychic Abilities)

You’re going about your normal day– when all of a sudden your heart starts pounding. 

Something eventful is about to happen… You just know it! 

Your hair immediately stands on end, and you feel tingly all over. 

And although this happens often, you still feel overwhelmed by the visceral force of your intuition. 

Then, it happens. Your gut feeling was correct once again.

Clearly you are highly intuitive– But do you also have psychic powers? 

If you frequently have emotional or sensory premonitions that turn out to be true, you are probably clairsentient. 

What is Clairsentience?

Clairsentience is the psychic ability to clearly feel the emotions and energies that surround you, and to gain knowledge or insight from those feelings. 

If you are clairsentient, it means the native tongue of your intuition is emotion. 

You feel– therefore you know. 

Clairsentience differs from other psychic abilities, like clairvoyance and clairaudience, because clairsentience goes beyond the 5 senses and into the realm of emotional intuition. It can be described as psychic knowing through feeling. 

Because clairsentience is more subtle than the other psychic abilities, many clairsentients don’t realize they have special powers, or end up doubting their psychic knowledge. 

On the other hand, sometimes clairsentients find their powerful emotional responses overwhelming or draining. 

In both cases, it is critical to learn how to identify the signs of clairsentience and strengthen your clairsentient abilities so you remain in control of your psychic power.

As an intuitive and clairsentient, I often feel events approaching before they happen. I also instantly know when people are hurt or upset, even if they try to hide their true feelings. 

This used to be a burden, causing me to turn to drugs and alcohol to numb the constant, intense waves of feeling I experienced. 

Only with practice did I learn how to make my clairsentience work for me, which included establishing internal energetic boundaries and mastering the art of intuiting on command. 

If developing YOUR clairsentience intrigues you– read on! 

11 Common Signs You Might Be Clairsentient

1. You Are a “Highly Sensitive Person”

Have you noticed that you have strong emotional reactions to being in a large group of people?

Or do you feel overwhelmed or stressed whenever you go to a new place– even if it is supposed to be a fun trip?

Do minor changes in tone when you’re texting your friend or partner send you into a panic thinking they are mad at you or hiding something? 

Extreme emotional sensitivity might be a sign that you are clairsentient. 

While highly sensitive clairsentients often struggle with the side effects of their gift, with practice, it’s possible to develop this trait so it becomes your greatest strength. 

2. You Feel The Energy of Places, Buildings, and Rooms

Have you ever walked into a new place and something just felt… off? 

Do you ever get really anxious before entering a building for the first time? 

Or can you feel the presence of somebody who used to occupy a space– but is no longer there?

These are all signs that your clairsentience is causing you to viscerally experience locational energy.

Sudden feelings of anxiety, fear, or overwhelming joy are all common for clairsentient people upon entering a space. 

Unexplained physical reactions, such as feeling faint, dizzy, or sick, are also possible if the energy is strong enough– or if you have extreme clairsentience.

Again, the key to harnessing your psychic abilities is learning to control your clairsentience– using it only when you want to, while maintaining your internal energetic boundaries when your clairsentience does not serve you. 

3. Stories, Art, and Performances Bring You To Tears

Do you find yourself dabbing your eyes at every concert, movie, or play? How about cheesy television commercials and billboards? 

Clairsentience makes you especially sensitive to the feelings any piece of art is trying to convey. Sometimes the artists’ emotions, even when not explicitly depicted, can be felt.

While this can make art more enjoyable and powerful, it can also become overwhelming. Skilled clairsentients are able to be emotionally immersed in artwork without jeopardizing their own stable emotional baseline.

4. You Can Tell When Somebody is Upset (Even if They Are Hiding It)

Can you pick up on even the subtlest energy changes when interacting with another person? 

From momentary flashes of anger to unexplained sadness or fear– clairsentients are viscerally aware of other people’s emotions, even when masterfully hidden or repressed. 

Energy fluctuations can even be felt over a long distance, if you already have some sort of a connection to the other person– even an indirect connection. 

As a clairsentient, I used to acutely feel the tides of the world’s tragedies and triumphs on a daily basis. Only when I learned how to consciously tap into my power while maintaining a safe emotional distance, did I begin to thrive in my psychic abilities. 

5. You’re Extremely Intuitive

Strong intuition is the most common sign of clairsentience. 

Do you frequently get a gut feeling that tells you something isn’t quite right in a given situation? 

For example, perhaps you are driving down the highway– and suddenly you feel an intense fear or anxiety. You know you need to exit, even though you are nowhere near your destination. Later, you find out there was a huge crash ahead and you would have been involved if you didn’t turn off the road when you did.

Many people in this world are intuitive, but clairsentients are special because their intuitive powers are closely intertwined with powerful emotional responses and energetic sensations. Rather than ‘just knowing things,’ clairsentients feel what they know first and foremost. 

6. The News is Emotionally Overwhelming

Are you dramatically impacted by negative or tragic news stories? 

While the news is designed to provoke, clairsentients have unusually powerful emotional responses to stories of hardship, conflict, and tragedy. 

As a clairsentient, over the last few years it has been extremely challenging to stay informed by the news– while not becoming consumed by the negative emotions and energies of the people being reported on. 

Intentionally consuming small doses of the news from trusted sources has proven essential. 

I also frequently unplug from the endless news cycle– and focus on reestablishing a healthy perspective via immersion in nature, returning to my body (yoga), and enjoying family life.

7. Crowds and Parties Drain You

Parties have always left me utterly drained– and it’s no surprise.

Large crowds and parties don’t just represent a chaotic mix of the emotions and energies of all the attendees– but the saturation of a wide range of emotional experience actually has an amplifying effect. 

If you are a clairsentient at a large event, you are in for a highly stimulating, and often overwhelming, experience. 

For instance, your friend crying and distraught alone in a room with you is a very different experience than your friend crying and distraught at a large event with you. In the latter situation, her emotions are amplified, distorted, and refracted by the emotional experiences of other people at the event. 

Clairsentients must always make time for rest and recovery after attending a large party or event. 

Even the most skilled clairsentients can struggle to maintain their emotional and energetic boundaries when exposed to a large crowd of people for an extended period of time. 

8. Your Memories Always Feel Extremely Vivid and Real

Are you able to recall memories with astonishing vividness and detail? 

Almost like watching a movie in your mind? 

Perhaps remembering an embarrassing memory still makes your cheeks burn in humiliation, even if the event was decades ago. 

Or remembering a sweet moment with a loved one or close friend makes your chest feel warm and tingly and joyful. 

While the experience of negative memories is often stronger for most clairsentients, it’s possible to create internal emotional boundaries and maintain an energetic distance from the vivid remembered experience. 

Similarly, you can train yourself to relive pleasant memories over and over again– and sometimes they even feel better than they did the first time around, if your clairsentience is more highly developed. 

This is why the best artists and storytellers are often clairsentients– rendering the emotional experience of a vision that other people can feel comes easily to those who enjoy clairsentience. 

9. You’re An Empath

All clairsentients are empaths– which makes perfect sense. 

Empaths (and clairsentients) feel the emotions and energies of the beings and objects around them. Both empaths and clairsentients can feel overwhelmed by these sensations– but with practice and discipline, empathy can be honed into a powerful tool for growth and connection. 

Clairsentients differ from non-clairsentient empaths with their accompanying psychic powers. While a non-psychic empath might viscerally feel another person’s sadness, a clairsentient empath will immediately know why that person is sad. 

10. You Always Have A Gut Feeling About People– For Better or Worse

Have you ever had a sudden bad feeling about a new person– even when everyone else seems to like them? And no matter what everybody says, you just know they can’t be trusted? 

This used to happen to me all the time when I was a bartender in Oakland. And every single time it happened to– my gut feeling eventually proved to be true. 

Clairsentients can sense the hidden emotions and intentions of new people, which makes them extremely accurate judges of character.

Unfortunately, this gift can be a curse when others gaslight you or criticize you for being too “negative” or “paranoid.”

The unfortunate reality is this– there are many wounded people in this world. It is essential to avoid those who would lash out and harm you if you want to thrive in this world. 

Developing your clairsentience will allow you to become an even better judge of character, and give you confidence to trust your own intuition and psychic knowledge– even when others doubt your perspective. 

11. You Can Feel the Presence of Beings Who Are Not Here

There are spirits all around us. 

Clairsentients are able to detect the subtle energies of spirits and entities who aren’t visible or physically present– including people who have passed away and distant loved ones. 

Clairsentients can also quickly develop an emotional connection to invisible and distant beings, and often receive insights into each being’s backstory and motivations. 

Skilled clairsentients are able to focus this power intentionally, so they don’t become overwhelmed with the many energies and stories of the spirit world. 

7 Ways to Strengthen Your Clairsentience

I’ve always disliked the phrase, “You either have it, or you don’t.” How many people gave up on their dreams or calling because they weren’t instant virtuosos, thinking they simply didn’t “have it?” 

Like any skill, clairsentience can be practiced, strengthened, and refined. 

Psychic power is a spectrum, not a binary. We are all somewhere on that spectrum, connected to the universe in varying degrees by our natural intuition. 

To strengthen and develop your clairsentience, you must first focus on clearing and harmonizing your internal emotional landscape. As you gain self-awareness and emotional balance, you can start practicing psychic readings on other beings, objects, and places. 

1. Meditate Daily

Meditation is the single most important thing you can do to develop your psychic abilities. 

The goal of meditation is to practice clearing your mind. When your mind is still and calm, the subtle wavelengths of external emotions and energies are much easier to detect and decipher. 

I use visualizations to help me stay focused during meditation. My favorite is the blue sky visualization. Here’s how it works: 

• Sit down in a comfortable, quiet location with the intention to meditate. 
• Close your eyes and imagine you are looking up at a vast blue sky. 
• As thoughts and feelings arise (and they always do), imagine each of those thoughts is just a cloud passing through the sky– and let it go. 
• Maintain a detached view of the entire sky, continuing to avoid focusing on any of the clouds.

As a beginner, I wanted to focus on each thought, following it to its logical conclusion. But as I continued to practice meditation, it got easier and easier to let clouds pass by,  maintaining a relaxed perspective on the sky as a whole

2. Create An Environment That Relaxes and Inspires You

Clutter, disorganization, and chaos negatively impact clairsentients much the way large crowds and events do. 

Taking the time to clean, organize, and decorate your space makes it much easier to slip into a receptive, intuitive state. 

Here’s how to create an environment that supports psychic work:

• Start with basic decluttering and cleaning– wash the dishes, put laundry away, and clear and wipe down surfaces. 
• Then, adorn your space with meaningful objects that inspire your intuitive side– add crystals, candles, books, artwork, plants, and anything else that resonates. 
• Add music and aromas to further enhance the environment– play calming instrumental music, incorporate fresh flowers and herbs, burn incense, or heat up essential oils. 

3. Create Your Own Psychic Rituals

Creating your own psychic rituals helps prime your mind to receive energetic and emotional information from the world around you. (Much like designing an inspiring and relaxing space.)

There is a vast range of spiritual practices out there that can be used to enhance your psychic abilities. It’s important to design a ritual that resonates with you, which will require some experimentation and soul-searching. 

Here are some spiritual practices you can incorporate into your psychic ritual: 

• Grounding exercises
• Breath work
• Meditation
• Prayer
• Visualization
• Crystal work
• Aromatherapy
• Food and water ceremonies
• Movement, yoga, tai chi, etc.
• Intention setting

4. Practice Reading the Energy of Other People

Chances are, you are already very good at picking up on other people’s energy and emotions naturally. 

But in order to strengthen and refine your psychic abilities, you need to practice intentionally. 

Here’s how to practice reading people’s energy:

• Notice when you have a gut feeling about somebody’s emotional state. Try to define your premonition as clearly as you can, in as much detail as possible. 
• Ask the person about their emotional state, without leading or influencing them to respond a certain way– i.e. “How do you feel about that?” in a calm, even tone of voice. 
• Listen to the person carefully, trying to remain as neutral as possible while still encouraging them to reveal more and providing supportive energy. 
• Later, in your journal, record your original premonition and compare it to the revealed information. How accurate was your reading? What details do you struggle to read? 

Over time, review your notes to find hidden patterns and progress in your ability to read people’s emotions and energies. This practice will help you to identify your greatest psychic strengths, and call on them instantly when needed in the future. 

5. Practice Reading the Energy of a New Place

Reading the energy of a physical location is more difficult than reading a living person. It’s harder to get confirmation that your premonition was correct, and furthermore, the layered energy of many beings and narratives are often mixed together in a single location.

Nonetheless, spending time walking around ancient sites and abandoned buildings is a powerful way to develop your psychic abilities. 

Here’s how to practice reading locational energy: 

• Every time you go on an adventure to a new place, take a notebook with you to document the energy you pick up from that area. 
• Take your time walking all around the area. Pause whenever you feel an energetic or emotional shift, and try to soak up as much sensation as possible. 
• Change your vantage point to get a different view of the space. Observe from a distance, try an elevation change, or squat down low to the earth. Do you notice anything different? 
• Take photographs of the location and review them later. What did you miss during your in-person visit that is revealed by the photographs?
• If possible, look up the history of the place online after your reading. Check how accurate your premonitions were, and make note of the results in your journal. 

This practice will help you further strengthen your psychic abilities, improving your reading skills in a variety of settings and situations. 

6. Practice Reading the Energy of Objects

Much like reading the energy of people and places, you can intentionally practice reading the energy of objects in order to hone your psychic abilities. 

My favorite part about reading the energy of objects is being able to move the object around to different vantage points and environments in order to observe how the energies shift. 

Here’s how to practice reading the energy of physical objects: 

• Choose an object that you don’t know much about, like an old family heirloom or mysterious thrift shop find. 
• Use all five senses to observe the object. What feelings arise? How does your energy shift? Make note of your observations in your journal. 
• If possible, bring the object with you as you go about your day or week. At regular intervals, take time to observe the object in a new environment. Do you notice anything new or different? 
• Take photographs of the object and review them later. Did you initially miss anything that is revealed by the photographs?
• If possible, try asking family members or doing online research to get more information about the object. How accurate was your reading? Make note of the results in your journal. 

7. Make Predictions Often– and Check To See If They Come True

Practicing reading the energies of people, places, and objects will strengthen your ability to make accurate predictions about future events or other unknown information. 

Here’s how to continue your psychic practice by making predictions: 

• Every time feelings or premonitions arise about an event or situation– write your thoughts down. Try to be as detailed as possible, and write quickly without judgement. 
• Start by recording the overarching emotional vibe of your prediction– positive, negative, happy, sad, fearful, etc. 
• Then, write down any specific impressions you notice– visions of colors, details, sounds, people, places. 
• Finally, write down your best interpretation of the prediction. Why is this premonition significant? How will the event ripple out and impact the rest of the world? 

Are You Clairsentient? Here’s The Truth…

Are you tired of riding the relentless emotional rollercoaster of daily life? 

As a sensitive, intuitive person, you have an obligation to yourself to learn how to hone your abilities so they best serve you (rather than drain you). 

Psychic abilities like clairsentience are not unattainable gifts that only a select few have access to– nor are they merely phony, pseudoscientific scams. 

Being psychic simply means intentionally developing and using your natural intuition as a human being. 

In this way, we are all on the psychic spectrum. 

Anybody can strengthen their clairsentience (and other psychic abilities) with practice, dedication, and self-reflection. 

You just need to set the intention– and start taking action.