“Psychic” has served as blanket term for physical experiences that fall outside of a known scientific explanation.

Though throughout history people have been coming to terms with what doesn’t have a scientific explanation, and their efforts often took the form of the major cultural groups, philosophies, and even the major religions.

Thus while a segment of the world considers the idea of the “psychic”  to be outside of “normal,” this perspective is contrasted by an abundance of cultural history where being psychic is a completely natural thing, a sometimes spiritual thing, and for some evidence of more than what we can see with our eyes.

Thus the Cultural Context category will cover posts that place psychic experience in a cultural context.

Example:

Cultural Context: The Ring Finger

Bishops in a variety of Western churches are known to wear rings set with amethyst stones. It is noted among psychic healers that amethyst assists in the healing process, and that psychic energy often collects on the “ring finger,” thus wearing metal around the “ring finger” may be a tradition started to relieve pressure from energy gathering at this point on the hand.

Other reading:

As quoted from Wikipedia, there is a long history of the “ring finger” being associated with psychic energy:
(Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ring_finger )

According to László A. Magyar, the names of the ring finger in many languages reflect an ancient belief that it is a magical finger. It is named after magic or rings, or called nameless. ^[1]

1. The medical finger. Some cultures named it after its supposed magic power, especially the healing power. An example of the idea of its healing power is Bhaisajyaguru, the Medicine Buddha, who uses his right ring finger for medicine.
   • English: leech finger
   • Japanese: 薬指 kusuri-yubi (medicine finger)
   • Korean: 약지 yak-ji (medicine finger)
   • Latin: digitus medicinalis (medical finger)
2. The ring finger. Some cultures associated it to magic rings. This is particularly common in European languages.
   • Albanian: gishti i unazës (ring finger)
   • Arabic: البنصر
   • Armenian: մատանեմատ (ring finger)
   • Catalan: dit anular (ring finger)
   • Cornish: bys-bysow (ring finger)
   • Croatian: prstenjak (ring finger)
   • Czech: prsteníček (ring finger)
   • Danish: ringfinger (ring finger)
   • Dutch: ringvinger (ring finger)
   • English: ring finger
   • French: annulaire (ring finger)
   • Galician: dedo anular (ring finger)
   • German: Ringfinger (ring finger)
   • Hebrew:קמיצה (kemitzah)
   • Hungarian: gyűrűsujj (ring finger)
   • Icelandic: baugfingur (ring finger)
   • Irish: méar fáinne (ring finger)
   • Italian: dito anulare (ring finger)
   • Latin: digitus annularis (ring finger)
   • Latvian: zeltnesis (gold carrier)
   • Malay: jari manis (sweet finger)
   • Norwegian: ringfinger (ring finger)
   • Persian:’انگشت انگشتری’ (ring finger)
   • Polish: palec serdeczny (lit. cordial finger, etymology is from “heart” – in Polish “serce” which means “heart”, because it’s rather “finger of heart”) (ring finger)
   • Portuguese: dedo anelar (ring finger)
   • Romanian: degetul inelar (ring finger)
   • Slovak: prstenník (ring finger)
   • Slovenian: prstanec (ring finger)
   • Spanish: dedo anular (ring finger)
   • Swahili: cha pete (of the ring)
   • Swedish: ringfinger (ring finger)
   • Tamil: Mothira Viral (ring finger)
   • Turkish: Yüzük parmağı (ring finger)
   • Vietnamese: Ngón đeo nhẫn (ring finger)
3. The nameless finger. Many cultures avoided the true name of a powerful entity, and called it indirectly or called it nameless.
   • Bulgarian: безименен пръст (nameless finger)
   • Cantonese: 無名指 mo ming ji (nameless finger)
   • Finnish: nimetön (sormi) (nameless finger)
   • Gan: 冇名指 mau miang chi (nameless finger)
   • Georgian: ara titi (no finger/useless finger)
   • Japanese: 名無し指 nanashi-yubi (nameless finger)
   • Lithuanian: bevardis (nameless)
   • Mandarin: 無名指/无名指 wú míng zhǐ (nameless finger)
   • Persian: binàme (nameless)
   • Russian: безымянный палец (nameless finger)
   • Sanskrit: anámika (nameless)
   • Tatar: atsyz parmak (nameless finger)
   • Ukrainian: безіменний палець (nameless finger)
4. In other languages this finger takes its name from its place between the other fingers.
   • Latin: digitus medio proximus (the finger next to the middle)
   • Greek: παράμεσος paramesos (para = next to + mesos = in the middle: the finger next to the middle finger)
   • Serbian: domali prst (the finger next to the little)