Nashauna Drummond, Lifestyle Coordinator

Psychic, hypnotherapist, past- life regression specialist and author and artist, Debbie Smoker wears many hats. - Ricardo Makyn/Staff Photographer

Debbie Smoker stops mid-sentence. "They say it's OK to tell you." She's confirming that two of her spiritual guides, 'Old Woman' and 'Tide', have given her the go-ahead to tell me their names.

Smoker is from Wisconsin in the United States of America and is currently in Jamaica promoting her latest novel, Coconut Woman, distributed by Novelty Trading Company. Of course, she's more than just an author. She's a psychic, hypnotherapist, tarot card reader, specialist in past-life regressions and a stained-glass artist as well.

Smoker told Flair she was born to a family of psychics. However, at school where she was taught by nuns, it was forbidden to even speak of such things. "Then I went home and there was my family, and they were not bad people," she recalls. "I was taught (at school) that I was unworthy and the more I suffered (physically) the higher would be my place in heaven. So I went home at nights and tried to hurt myself. Then they told me that there is a God who loves me unconditionally and I had free will, but had to do this and that. That's not free will. Between age 20-21, I started asking, if God loved me unconditionally, He would accept me the way I am?"

Smoker's view on Christianity? "I look at Jesus Christ historically, as a man who came on Earth and did great things, saying I did it, so can you. I think He was fun! Why give us humour and joy if we were not to enjoy it?"

Everyone's psychic

Smoker notes that everyone has psychic abilities, it's just that not everyone's developed. "You may think you don't have it because you were raised to develop the five senses. The sixth sense is your gut feeling, your intuition, looking with your third eye to see beyond the physical dimension," she explained. She says psychics get a bad rap because the power is often abused. "I have a brother who says I love you, even though you're cuckoo," she said laughing loudly.

Spiritual guides

"I believe, before we came to this planet, we knew we were coming. We have these spiritual guides who are always with us. We choose the body, the family we came to. We choose how we are going to go. We just don't remember consciously."

Smoker explained that picking the winning numbers for the lottery is a matter of ethics. "With the lottery numbers, I don't even try to tune into that. I tune in to things that can be beneficial. When someone says they want to win the lottery, what I'm hearing is, I want to be happy and more financially stable. But the lottery causes a lot of chaos, life gets disrupted. Be clear as to what you really want."

Past-life regression

Smoker believes that we have had many lives before our current one. "I was once married, my husband was an alcoholic and very abusive." Didn't she see it coming? "I knew marrying him was a challenge, but I felt I could change him." She had corresponded with her husband for a year before they actually met. "I was sitting in front of my dresser, journaling one day and when I looked up I saw him in the mirror. I had never seen him before, so I wrote and asked him to send me a picture and it was him. I could just feel that I had a past-life connection with him."

She revealed that in that marriage she lost 'sense of herself' and became suicidal. "I went into the kitchen and got the knife. One of my brothers who was psychic lived six blocks away. He felt it and stopped me and got me through the night. I had a past-life regression done, and that helped me heal. I went into a past life where we were living in Venice, he was very much in love with me and I was the abuser. In the next life, it was the days of the pioneers and he was my son."

She notes that going through those experiences gave her insight into what was happening and helped her to move on.

Hypnosis

Debbie Smoker during a tarot reading. - Ricardo Makyn/Staff Photographer

Smoker explains that the benefits of hypnosis are to get past life experiences to provide answers to things we are facing. To get help with emotional problems, fears and phobias.

"When you are hypnotised, you are never going to do things you wouldn't normally. The subconscious knows things that the conscious doesn't."

Past lives in Jamaica

Smoker has written three books that are set in Jamaica. She has been coming to the island for over 30 years, the first time when she was about 19 years old. "I really opened up here, all the vibrations." She explained that her books are based on past lives she had in Jamaica.

Books

The main character in her novel Turn on Your Magic Eye, Paul Bacchus, came to her in dream. In Joy of Jamaica, she teaches people how to find their own power. Her latest novel, Coconut Woman, is based on her backpacking experience across the island in 1990.

"I think Jamaicans are so spiritual and I wanted to get their stories. I just enjoy writing. I let the stories come to me. I have to be in a very quite place, because I go into such a deep state and if I'm interrupted, the thought is lost."

Smoker is currently writing a screenplay for her next novel, Mystically Mesmerised, which she wants to be filmed independently in Jamaica.

Smoker will be signing copies of her latest novel at Bookland on Knutsford Boulevard on Thursday between noon and 2:00 p.m.