For the first seven years I did demonstrations, I cried before I went up, and I cried afterwards — all because of one little word. No. A few of those in a row and my whole sense of myself would collapse. Today a "no" is one of my favourite things to receive, because I've finally learned the truth about it:

A no is never a no. It must mean something.

What does a "no" actually mean?

It doesn't mean you're wrong. It means a piece of information arrived, but your mind translated it imperfectly on the way through. So you don't throw it away — you go back and ask: why did my mind make this out of what they were trying to tell me?

Let me give you a real example. I once gave a sitter "sunflowers." She said, "No, my mum didn't like sunflowers." Years ago I'd have crumbled. Instead I asked spirit what the sunflower was for — and it turned out her mother had worked at a kindergarten whose symbol was a sunflower. The information was perfect. My interpretation was the only thing that needed adjusting.

Isn't that just making it fit afterwards?

The line is finer than people admit, so let me draw it clearly. "Making it fit" is when you ignore the no, scramble for any meaning at all, and force it — she said sunflower, so she must be spiritual, no? then maybe… — until you've talked yourself into a corner. Decoding is different. You trust the symbol was given for a reason, you calmly ask what it points to, then you offer it back and let the sitter confirm. One is cheating. The other is how you actually learn the language.

How do I get better at reading the nos?

Every no teaches you nuance you cannot get any other way. When I started, a pressure on the head meant one thing to me — a stroke. But for every "no" I received, I learned more: that same sensation can be tinnitus, a tumour, a haemorrhage, a fall, a blow. The nos are how one vague feeling slowly became a whole vocabulary. They are not failures. They are your teachers. This is also why I have no time for the fear of getting it wrong — perfectionism is what quietly retires good mediums, not lack of talent.

What should I do in the moment I get a no?

Don't pile on. When I'm given three or four nos, my instinct is not to throw more and more evidence at the wall — that's panic, and the audience can feel it. I stop and work out why the first pieces didn't land. Maybe I have the right person but the wrong relationship; maybe it's a mother-in-law, not a mother; maybe I'm just a little ahead of myself. I got "mother" for a reason, so I stay with it and find the reason — I don't abandon it.

And remember why this happens at all: spirit has to push their message through you — through your fear, your assumptions, your life experience, your beautifully complicated human mind. Of course it arrives a little bent. The no isn't the door closing. It's the clue that tells you how to read.

So the next time someone says no, don't let it shrink you. Get curious. Go back. Ask why your mind made a sunflower of it. That one change — from crumbling to curious — will do more for your mediumship than any amount of trying to be perfect.