The search for insight on healer

Don't call him 'guru'.

Geoffrey Mogridge - life-path counsellor, clairvoyant, soul path reader and auric cleanser - will readily admit to sexual relationships with paying clients.

But the man who gets a glint in his eye over junk mail, smokes during numerology readings and greets me with a cheery "need the loo?" really gets his hackles up over the 'G' word.

He is, he insists, just a normal guy who has made mistakes.

A female colleague and I visited Mr Mogridge for separate appointments last week, hoping for some insight into his work. We used our real names and details, and paid for the therapy.

The only signs at the grandly-advertised "Master's Resonance Centre" were two soggy blue-washed flyers, printed off a computer and stuck on the garage and front door.

Mr Mogridge was dressed all in white and arranged himself at a flimsy table covered in sun-and-moon fabric - jumping up occasionally to smoke, go to the toilet or make himself a cup of tea.

A collage of postcards - prophets, saints, angels - was stuck to the wall behind him. Between us sat a 'peace candle' (labelled) and a peace lily. Bottles of oils were arranged in a row.

Mr Mogridge asked for my full name and birth date when I made the appointment a week earlier, but had yet to finish my chart.

When he completed my numerology predictions, he told me I should "welcome" every sexual "experience" over the next five years before my soulmate turned up. He said I should make the most of my youth: the years between 17 and 24 had been the best of his life, and I should enjoy mine. He asked if I felt ashamed about "giving myself" to men; when I said no, he nodded and said it was wonderful to see a young woman so sure of herself.

Later he began talking about his partner and how her breast augmentation meant she was unable to feel that instant "turn-on" that he remembered from his youth.

Mr Mogridge told me I was "all about touch". A man had to touch me once, even in friendship, and I would fall for him.

I had $80 cash on me - more than enough, I thought, to cover the $75 advertised price. But Mr Mogridge told me he was giving me a discount because he had so enjoyed our 90 minutes together. As I left, he told me his partner's full name and the address of her dress shop where he said the clothes would suit me. He gave me a great big grin and told me to ask her for a 15 per cent discount.

He told my colleague that she too was a free-spirited "nymph". He encouraged her to be a "female tart" and to make the most of her single status for two years until she met her long-term partner.

He offered to "crack her back" - she consented, but said she felt uncomfortable when he started to massage her shoulders afterwards. At that, Mr Mogridge stopped and sat down. Her session lasted two hours and cost $75.