I Had My Aura Read, and It Seriously Changed My Life

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I once took a quiz that told me my aura was green. This was a major buzzkill, considering green is my second least favorite color, but I didn't give it much thought after that.

You might be thinking that auras are something Gwyneth Paltrow crafted while coming up with energy stickers and jade vagina eggs, but I found out that's not exactly true.

I've had psychic readings before, but an aura reading? Never. I don't care about reality TV, but when a friend mentioned she heard of an aura reader named Michaela Firester or "Mystic Michaela" on Kaitlyn Bristowe's (of Bachelor/Bachelorette fame) podcast, Off The Vine, I was immediately intrigued.

Michaela gained fame in 2017 because of a "feeling" she had about Real Housewives of Orange County star Meghan King Edmonds. Michaela reportedly reached out to King Edmonds via Facebook to schedule a reading which ended with Michaela predicting the birth of the reality star's daughter and twin boys.  (Related: Everything You Need to Know About Energy Work—and Why You Should Try It)

What was it: If there's anything that sells me, it's a prediction. I wondered what Michaela could see if she read my aura. Will I get that book deal? Will I finally get that mansion with pool and outdoor firepit? Will spiders stop eating my beloved plant Yukiko?

What even is an aura?

The history of auras goes back to the mid-1800s when a man named Charles Webster Leadbeater, a member of the Theosophical Society, claimed that all humans have an aura surrounding them that evolves depending on their spiritual development. While the concept of aura readings didn't gain much steam until the 1980s and 90s, aura readers are still not entirely common for the average person interested in getting theirs read.

Like enneagrams or astrology, auras can supposedly help you understand yourself and the people around you a little better.

And no an aura is not just gas or a hallucination. An aura is a colored energy field that surrounds a person that can encompass a few shades, according to Michaela. Auras can shift if you're not feeling well or going through a difficult situation, she explains. In those cases, auras can become dull.

So, what is an aura reading then?

Reading auras are a way of "sorting through our programming and trauma to get to the actual authenticity we were born with," says Michaela. One important thing that makes Michaela's reading unique, though, is that she calls herself both a psychic and aura reader. Used in tandem, her abilities can supposedly give you a larger more detailed picture of what's going on in your life, compared to just an aura reading alone.

Through her aura readings, Michaela says she can provide "spiritual life guidance" and help clients make conscious changes to their energy so "your path can align to you."

In other words, she lets you know what facets of your behavior are holding you back so you can make the changes and hopefully achieve the life you want. If you're feeling confused or unhappy about work, love, or family life, for example, Michaela can take a look at your aura to see why and how you can fix that.

Sounds almost too good not to at least try it, right? I thought, if Michaela can give me guidance as well as predictions, I might as well cancel therapy entirely right now.

Getting My Aura Read

I had to find out for myself if Michaela was the real deal. I had set up a phone appointment since we don't live in the same state. The good news is that Michaela assured me this would affect her ability to read me. She can see auras in photos, she says, so all she required were a few pics of myself and anyone I want to know about. The most important picture is a selfie taken right before the reading, she told me. When it came time for my reading, I sent her a photo of myself trying on lipstick, a picture of myself and a family member, a photo with friends, and a mirror selfie taken a few minutes before the reading.

Here, are just a few things  I learned after getting my aura read:

1. Your aura can reveal your deepest issues.

"Your purple is bright, signifying creativity and intuition among other things, but you wear an inauthentic red," Michaela told me. "It's a tool to help you be tougher and show other people you don't care what they think. You have blue in your aura as well. You're an empath, but you tuck it away. In that last picture, your blue was just hanging out all over the place."

I giggled as I thought of the blue part of my aura just oozing out all over the place. But what about that "inauthentic" red?

"That fake red you wear is from the survival instincts you've created from the way you were raised," she continued. She asked for a photo of my parents because as she put it, "how they raised me still very much affects you today."

Gulp. I stopped giggling. My father is bipolar and my mother was…difficult. But I hardly expected Michaela to pick up on my dysfunctional childhood based on a picture of me trying on lipstick at Nordstrom. (Related: I Got an Intuitive Massage and Learned What Being Balanced Actually Feels Like)

"Growing up, you didn't want to show any weakness to your mom," she continued. "You hid your blue to protect yourself," said Michaela. "You associate being vulnerable with being a victim."

Over the past year, I've been bingeing on the books and talks of Brene Brown, the famed vulnerability researcher, Ted Talk star, NYT bestselling author, and Oprah fave, working on becoming more open and letting down my walls. The fact that Michaela just mentioned it went to the very heart of the matter; why I had the walls up in the first place. Lightbulb!

I had many tarot readings before, but none of them had gone this deep or linked my past to my current life in such a clear linear way. Previously when I asked psychics for advice, I got the general "you're fine, that's just life" sort of advice. But Michaela went deeper into the childhood issues that were motivating me.

2. Auras can show the dynamic between two people. 

First, some context: After dealing with a series of hurtful comments and false information a family member had fed me, I knew I could no longer trust her and ended our relationship. Nonetheless, I struggled to understand why she behaved as she did. Without telling her anything about what happened, Michaela took one look at her picture and immediately knew.

"She feels like she's allowed to say whatever she thinks, hurtful things, without any filters," said Michaela. "She's just like whatever, that's what friends do."

"Yes!" I shouted. Michaela had this person's number for sure. It was like Michaela had gone deep diving into her brain and read her mind. (Related: All the Benefits of Meditation You Should Know About)

What Michaela went onto explain is that this person resents me for living on my own terms. Michaela's comments were eerily accurate. I had been replaying the events between me and this person over and over again wondering if there was something I could have said or done differently, but hearing Michaela's take on it left me feeling at ease, knowing there wasn't much I could have done.

3. Auras can show life lessons.

"There's a man from your past that's showing up," Michaela started again. I had a feeling I knew who it was, so I dug up a photo from Facebook and texted it to her.

"He's also needy and sensitive but hates himself for it," she says. "The minute he felt himself needing you, he disappeared. The thing is, you've been tucking your vulnerability away for so long," continued Michaela. "And he reflected how you treated yourself. The Universe stuck a mirror in your face so you could see yourself and learn the lessons."

At this point, my mind was exploding. I have always hated feeling sensitive, weak, needy, or soft. When I made a mistake or didn't live up to my own standards, I'd beat myself up and raise my walls even higher. This guy wasn't much different. When he was younger, he hid behind a wall of drugs and alcohol and had been in and out of jail to mask the pain of his broken home.

Hearing all of this from Michaela helped me see that dating him allowed me to see my own shortcomings and break down my own barriers. And more importantly, it helped me see the things I needed to change in my own life.

4. And, yes, Michaela says she can see my future.

Michaela also told me I'd be moving, that I'd write a book, I would never go back to a nine-to-five job, that someone significant with the letter "J" and a red aura would enter my life, and if someone pressured me to do something work-wise I didn't want to do, I didn't have to.

Interestingly enough, the latter already came to fruition as someone pressured me to work on a project that I simply had no interest in. As I pondered over the request, Michaela's words rang in my ears, and I passed. In the past, I might have had anxiety over this, but now I felt like my passing on it is going to open the door for better-suited work. (Related: I Finally Got a Natal Chart Reading and Now Everything Makes Sense)

Michaela says that while she was born with her abilities, she also teaches people how to read auras. "Even if you don't see colors, you can learn to feel their vibes."