As Naomi Watts claims she was given 'permission' by Diana to play her... Why do so many intelligent women think they're psychic?



'Suddenly I began to feel out-of-touch with the whole business of, well, getting in touch with the dear departed'

There has been a surge of interest in people looking to communicate with dead loved-ones

It seems that, to many people, seeing a psychic is now a natural part of the self-help movement

My wife had just brought a dish of food to the table and I was opening another bottle of red wine when one of our dinner guests, Emma, began holding court.

The rest of us duly fell silent as she made a gesture with her right hand as if tuning in to something intangible hovering in the dimmed light of our kitchen.

Emma is dating a friend of ours and I had never met her before. So I was most intrigued when, out of the blue, she made a pronouncement about my father and mother.

Naomi Watts who is playing Princess Diana, has said of her part in the movie: 'I found myself constantly asking for her permission to carry on. It felt I was spending a lot of time with her. There was one particular moment when I felt her permission was granted'

She didn’t know that they had died, in 1989 and 2004 respectively, but clearly believed she was able to contact them in some way.

She said: ‘Your mother was a very important person in your life. She had a powerful influence over you, which you did not realise at the time. Your father tended to take a back seat and let things steer their own course.’

Of course, these were pretty bland comments that could have applied to anyone. But it seemed impolite to argue with someone I had only just met.

What did surprise me, though, was that none of the other five people seated at the dinner table seemed at all fazed by Emma’s impromptu communication with life beyond the grave.



The much-anticipated film Diana: Hollywood actress Naomi Watts said she admitted her claim that she got permission from Diana beyond the grave may seem bizarre

After everyone had left and my wife and I were stacking the dishwasher, we discussed Emma’s ‘talent’, and my wife said this was a growing trend and that she had a friend who is a practising psychic in South-West London.

Coincidentally, the next morning I read in the Mail that the novelist Santa Montefiore — wife of historian Simon Sebag Montefiore — has just dedicated her latest book to two friends who have been in touch with her from the ‘other side’.

A few hours later, I was chatting to Georgia Coleridge, a psychic and healer who is married to Nicholas Coleridge, chairman of the Conde Nast magazine empire, and suddenly I began to feel out-of-touch with the whole business of, well, getting in touch with the dear departed.

Everywhere I turned, it seemed, I couldn’t escape from highly intelligent women who are convinced by what I must admit I regarded as rather unbelievable.

The latest example (following Madonna, who has consulted the psychic Susan King) is the Hollywood actress Naomi Watts, who said this weekend that she is convinced that Princess Diana gave her ‘permission’ from beyond the grave to play her in a new film about her love life.

Ms Watts said she admitted her claim may seem bizarre, but explained: ‘I found myself constantly asking for her permission to carry on. It felt I was spending a lot of time with her. There was one particular moment when I felt her permission was granted.’

For a cynic like me, it’s tempting to think that these privileged, rich women have enjoyed so many of the delights of this world that they are keen to explore the mysteries of the next one, or a past one.

But what they are experiencing does seem to be a growing trend.



Organisations such as the British Astrological And Psychic Society (founded in 1976 by the TV stargazer Russell Grant) say there has been a surge of interest in people looking to communicate with dead loved-ones who might give them a wider view of life in the here and now

Organisations such as the British Astrological And Psychic Society (founded in 1976 by the TV stargazer Russell Grant) say there has been a surge of interest in people looking to communicate with dead loved-ones who might give them a wider view of life in the here and now.

Georgia Coleridge says: ‘Thirty years ago, people thought yoga was odd, but they don’t any more. It’s the same with healing and receiving advice from those who are no longer here.

‘It’s become more normal to discuss these things. We are all psychic to some degree. It’s like cooking. Some people are natural cooks and hardly have to think about it, while others find it hard and so tend not to practise it very much.’

Georgia practises what she describes as ‘past life healing, ancestor clearing and spirit release’.

She doesn’t see spirits — but says she ‘feels’ them. For example, if she walks into a house where there’s a ‘bad atmosphere’, or where a couple have been rowing, she quickly develops a stomach ache.

Georgina Coleridge, a psychic and healer, pictured. She practises what she describes as 'past life healing, ancestor clearing and spirit release'. She doesn't see spirits - but says she 'feels' them

‘I’ve been like this since the age of 18, but it was only after studying at the College of Psychic Studies in London that I began the work,’ says Georgia. ‘Most ghosts are completely normal and unfrightening. They are just in the wrong place. I ask them to go away, or I get someone from the spirit world to take them away.’

Amaryllis Fraser, a former Vogue model, is another posh psychic. She is the great-great-grand-daughter of Sir Arthur Balfour (Tory Prime Minister in the early 1900s), whose younger brother, Gerald, founded the Society For Psychical Research.

Her speciality is clearing negative energy from houses.

She became aware of her psychic powers after suffering a car accident when she was 19. Now aged 37, with two small children, her work is taken so seriously that she’s on the books of various property developers keen to rid their sites of nasty spirits.

Estate agents take her advice when a house won’t sell and they fear that there is something particularly off-putting to potential buyers about the atmosphere of the building.

Amaryllis says: ‘Judges, barristers, hedge fund managers and chief executives of major corporations all come to see me. I can clear blocks and help them get in touch with their spirit guides.’

Amaryllis calls herself a ‘sensitive’, and her clients include the X-Files actress Gillian Anderson, the Angel of the North sculptor Antony Gormley and the property tycoon Anton Bilton. She once ‘cleared’ the business premises of Gina Shoes.

Jeremy Lloyd, the creator of TV’s Are You Being Served? and Allo, Allo! has said that he ‘wouldn’t buy a house without Amaryllis going round it first’.

Another person offering such services is Nicky Huntingford, a former dress designer who lives in Barnes, South-West London, with her husband Richard, the former chief executive of the music group Chrysalis plc. She charges £70 for a one-hour appointment and gives clients a CD of the session to take home with them.

She jokes about the public image of psychics and mediums and says: ‘I don’t wear a turban and walk around in sandals, eating lentils!’

But she is deadly serious about her work. ‘It is not the occult and there is nothing dark about it. In fact, it is becoming more and more mainstream.’

Author, Santa Montefiore, pictured, wife of historian Simon Sebag Montefiore, dedicated a book to two friends who have been in touch with her from the 'other side'

Nicky first became interested in the subject after she was introduced to a medium in 1988 when her mother died suddenly.

‘We weren’t able to say goodbye and I wanted to know that she was okay,’ she recalls. ‘The medium awakened things in me, and it helped me a great deal. It was as if I had discovered this new language inside me but had not yet found the country that spoke it.’

Nicky’s clients include professionals who are faced with big day-to-day decisions.

‘I know nothing about them when they come to me. In fact, the less I know about them the better.’

A typical client she described to me was a businessman who was troubled over making a knife-edge decision about a possible deal. ‘I was able to give him the assurance he needed to make that decision.

‘I don’t tell people what to do, but I can give them the options and help them tune in to a deeper part of themselves.’

I wonder what happens if she foresees something bad happening — for example, someone being run over by a bus on the way back from work.

‘I would never say something like that but would certainly point out to them that some dangers might be ahead.

‘I see my role also as helping people to become more psychic themselves. We all have this power to greater and lesser degrees, but we don’t use it.’

Natalia O’Sullivan has been a psychic for 30 years. She and her husband Terry run an organisation called Soul Rescuers, whose clients include actors Orlando Bloom and Trevor Eve.

‘When I started out, there might have been one shelf devoted to psychic healing in a bookshop, but today there is a whole section,’ says Natalia.

Talking about the possibility of ghosts, she says that when people die they ‘have a lot of wisdom to share with people on earth’.