I have been away from this blog for a long time, far longer than i had intended. Each time i felt the pull to write about my experiences life had a funny way of throwing a hurdle full force at me in the name of life. Life glorious life…. its a messy bugger isn’t it?
But i am back, older definitely a whole lot wiser ( don’t fret i have used my messy time very well learning) and i am ready to open up again about the bizarre goings on that have surrounded my life since i was 11 year’s old. So i will warm up this blog gently and start with a curious tale of something so profoundly strange i am still not too sure Who or what i fully experienced to this day.
Let’s jump back in time to when i was 18. This was before we had moved to Sussex and then moved back to lincolnshire again (moving house was the theme of our teen lives) we moved for a brief time to a small bungalow on the outskirts of the village where the ominous number 74 was based. This was the bungalow where the ball vanished in my previous account. I was going through a particularly difficult time with my mental health and in all honesty i was at a horrendously painful tipping point. I was dealing with persistent and invasive suicidal thoughts and self harm episodes and i am ashamed to say it but i had reached a point where i saw no other way out.
One evening after crying myself to sleep i had finally managed to fall asleep when a couple of hours in i was woken up by someone gently kissing my forehead. They had cold lips i remember that detail distinctly and at first i thought my mother had crept into the bedroom to check on me and had leant over to kiss me goodnight. I opened my eyes to ask her what she was doing and was surprised to find myself all alone in my bedroom. Even though it was dark i could still see no one else was in the room and was utterly confused as to what i had just experienced. I didn’t feel alarmed as such just startled and a strange feeling of peace came over me.
I don’t know what it was about that encounter but i just knew it deep in my bones that i was going to be ok in that moment and to this day i am thankful for whatever force, person or spiritual entity soothed my soul that tear filled night. Although i had serious relapses with my mental health over the next few years i always pulled through and i have often thought about who it was that came to me. Was it a family member passed on, some wandering spirit who sensed my pain or maybe an angel trying to lighten the heavy emotional load i was carrying at that difficult point in my life.
I do not know and i am not sure if i ever will, but i like to think that they are somewhere nearby keeping a close eye on me.
In this post i am going to be looking into the different types of water elemental’s and their roles throughout history. I will also dig up some eyewitness testimony that may show us that there is possibly more to these fables and myths than meets the eye. Water covers an estimated 71% of the earth so it is no surprise that there are some fascinating accounts of otherworldly beings inhabiting these watery worlds. Written about extensively in myths and folklore we have all become accustomed to images of a few of these such as mermaids, Kelpie and or the Russalka from the Slavonic peoples of central and eastern Europe. So we start with one we are all familiar with from the ancient days of seafaring to being a modern day fashion trend;
Mermaid; When mentally conjuring up a image of the stereotypical mermaid or merman we may be inclined to picture a half human half fish being with long flowing locks and enviable beauty but this has not always been how they have been described. Throughout history seafarers have warned about the deadly powers of the merpeople and their deadly tendencies. These tales stem from the ancient mythological beings of the sea with their deadly tempers and vengeful ways ( think Posiedon) they were regarded with much respect out of fear of accidentally conjuring a dangerous storm which would drag sailors down to the murky depths and drown them. Such maliciousness is echoed in the sirens of Greek mythology pictured as half woman half bird and sometimes even closer to mermaids, they would lure sailors to the shallows with their beautiful hypnotic sea song and the ships would be dashed upon the rocks, sailors would even plug their ears with wax when passing one of these fabled islands of the sirens to avoid being lured by their music. It was from the middle ages on wards that they really concreted themselves and gained a place in the western worlds mythology, and it was said by sailors that if you were to accidentally reel one in you should let it go immediately that “such a cruel tempest will arise, and such a horrid lamentation of that sort of men comes with it, and of some other monsters joining them, that you would think the sky should fall.”
There is a fascinating tale from Cornwall about the mermaid of Zennor and her image is still carved into a old wooden chair at St Senara’s Church which is dated to 1400-1500. This is an excerpt from wikipedia.
Long ago, a beautiful and richly dressed woman occasionally attended services at St. Senara’s Church in Zennor, and sometimes at Morvah. The parishioners were enchanted by her beauty and her voice, for her singing was sweeter than all the rest. She appeared infrequently for scores of years, but never seemed to age, and nobody knew whence she came, although they watched her from the summit of Tregarthen Hill. After many years, the mysterious woman became interested in a young man named Mathey Trewella,[i] “the best singer in the parish.” One day he followed her home, and disappeared; neither was ever seen again in Zennor Church.
The villagers wondered what had become of the two, until one Sunday a ship cast anchor about a mile from Pendour Cove. Soon after, a mermaid appeared, and asked that the anchor be raised, as one of its flukes was resting on her door, and she was unable to reach her children.[ii] The sailors obliged, and quickly set sail, believing the mermaid to be an ill omen. But when the villagers heard of this, they concluded that the mermaid was the same lady who had long visited their church, and that she had enticed Mathey Trewella to come and live with her.[iii][1]
The parishioners at St. Senara’s commemorated the story by having one end of a bench carved in the shape of a mermaid. A shorter account of the legend was related to Bottrell on a subsequent visit to Cornwall. The mermaid had come to church every Sunday to hear the choir sing, and her own voice was so sweet that she enticed Mathey Trewella, son of the churchwarden, to come away with her; neither was seen again on dry land. The famed “mermaid chair” was the same bench on which the mermaid had sat and sung, opposite Trewella in the singing loft.[2]
The mermaid chair.
There are some modern day accounts of people seeing mermaids near the sea shore and here is an intriguing one and is notable as this mermaid was supposedly witness by many local people.
In 2009, mermaid fever swept through the Israeli town of Kiryat Yam as a mermaid was making appearances at dusk, often performing tricks for locals and tourists alike. People in the town were claiming to see a being that was part young woman and part fish. The first local to have seen the mermaid claims that she was sunbathing, and as he and his friends approached her, she bounded from the sand and disappeared into the waves. They were all shocked to discover that the sunbathing woman had no legs, but a tail instead.
This one sighting was not an isolated event; as word spread about the mermaid, hundreds of people came forward claiming they had seen the Kiryat Yam mermaid. The Kiryat Yam mermaid has become so popular, that the town council has offered a one million dollar reward for any evidence that this mysterious creature exists. So far, only passing glances have been noted, and no one is a million dollars richer.
Water Nix; These elemental’s are common in German folklore and were mentioned in a tale by the Brothers Grimm some say these elemental’s are similar in appearance to the mermaids and mermen of western mythology but rather than singing unwary sailor’s to their doom they play instruments like a pipe or violin some say they can shape shift into animal forms. In other accounts i have read that they are often said to rise with the mists off the lakes and rivers and it is here you will see their small wispy humanoid forms dancing across the surface. It is said that if you see these they are an ominous warning of danger ahead for sailors and travellers alike who have to traverse near these sometimes formidable bodies of water. There are some really interesting geographical versions of the Nix amongst the Scandinavian and Balkan countries which are listed on Wikipedia here is a link if you want to check it out for yourself. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neck_(water_spirit)
Kelpie; The kelpie of Scotland have long held a place in the annals of fearsome creatures among the indigenous and rightly so if the tales are to be believed. They are shape shifters that most frequently appear in the form of a horse. Acording to local lore it is wise to keep away from them because if a human climbs onto the backs of one of these creatures they will be dragged down into the lake and drowned. However if a human gains control of its bridle it can be put to work in the fields. They say the kelpie has the strength of ten horses but does not like to be enslaved so it will try every trick in the book to escape. It is primarily a Celtic legend but it has equally terrifying counterparts, Icelandic ninnir, the Australian Bunyip and the Scandinavian Backahast are also similar in nature.
Some say these tall tales are nothing more than scary stories to keep children away from the shorelines and potential danger. Some genuinely believe they have seen or sensed such creatures, yet other believe there is a link between this entity and the mystery that is the Loch Ness.
The blue men of Minch; This is a peculiar tale from folklore i came across whilst researching this topic and thought it would make an interesting end note for this post.
Here is an excerpt from the Scotsman.com ;
The strait between the Island of Lewis and the Shiant Isles was known in the 19th century as ‘the stream of the Blue Men’ because it was said to be inhabited by a strange group of creatures.
The Blue Men of the Minch, also known as Storm Kelpies, are said to occasionally prey on sailors making the crossing.
Those who are unlucky enough to come across the Blue Men note the distinctive green beards and hair they have, as well as their exceptionally-strong physique.
Other historical recordings of the creatures say that they lived in underwater caves in a clan system, while generations of folklore say they can only be beaten by making sure the last word is achieved in a rhyming duel.
It is said many a captain has escaped disaster on the seas with the sharpness of his tongue, while those less fortunate are left to perish in the cold and raging waters common to the region.
While the Blue Men slept the weather would remain fine, but they could conjure storms when they wished.
However, innocent fishermen who have done nothing to enrage the Sea Kelpies will be allowed safe passage through the area.
This was just a select few of the creatures and elemental’s that allegedly live within our waters, a good portion of them serve as omens and it would make sense as the seas and dark murky lakes can be treacherous. Some seem to display a more gentle nature, but there are many more out there that i haven’t mentioned in this post. Out of all the elements i would say water seems to have the most of these mysterious creatures and beings. It is truly fascinating to look at accounts and the wide range of diversity and ponder… just what other secrets are hidden far below our surface.
A commemorative stamp with the image of the Blue Men of Minch depicted.
The first time i saw her i was dreaming, this is how she works you see. I don’t know what else to call her other than a dream walker and she is by far the most powerful and dangerous spirit/entity i have ever dealt with to date, and as this is an ongoing situation i am sure this will not be the only time i mention her.
I was in a pub i must have been the only person as i saw no one else. It had the low head grazing ceilings with the dark beams and the walls were painted a pleasant pink/red. It looked like a fairly modern day pub with large windows that looked out onto a quiet country lane surrounded by hedgerows. The room in which i was standing was being used as storage for bits of furniture, there were several chests of drawers and an antique writing bureau along with some old fashioned arm chairs with tatty threadbare arms. I was suddenly aware of another presence in the room circling me, like a wolf bearing down on a wounded deer. I spun on the spot trying to get a glimpse of what was stalking me and i became disorientated like my my senses were being thrown around in the eye of a hurricane. I dropped to the floor and panicking i shuffled backwards towards a shabby white piece of furniture so my back was against something solid. I always feel vulnerable if i sense a presence and my back is exposed to a space behind me. With my heart beating in my ears and my knees drawn up to my chest i waited trying to calm the fear that had risen within my chest to fever pitch levels. I saw no one coming at me from the front and i felt the acute sense of danger retreating much to my relief. I was bringing my breathing back under control when came a noise from above me, a death rattle slow and drawn out, i slowly raised my head to look up and a form was looming over the top of the chest of drawers i was leaning against.
It was a woman slight and pale with ash blonde hair piled up on the top of her head, it so fair it was almost white, prominent cheekbones and large piercing light grey eyes. She was striking and beautiful…..except for her mouth. It stretched unnaturally wide into a black gaping chasm with torn flesh around the edges, from deep within that hole the awful noise came again as she reached down and swooped for me. I stomach dropped like a stone and a wave of nausea hit me, i could not do anything but scream. I was frozen in fear and my nerves were on fire they wanted to react, shake me, make me jump up just anything to get me away from her but they were strangely paralysed at the same time. I woke up screaming, not a loud scream but a half scream half whimper and i quickly sat myself up and in a cold sweat placed one of my trembling hands against my thudding heart. My door creaked open and i jumped.
“Amz…are you Ok?” It was Lil she was staying with me at the time in the house where i am currently living and my sleepy attempt at screaming had woken her up.
“Yeah…i just had a fucked up dream.” I replied trying to steady my shaky breath. She went back to bed and i sat there in the darkness for a few minutes thinking it was just that before i lay back down and fell into a light sleep. I didn’t give it much thought after that, i do sometimes suffer with nightmares that are truly horrifying so that’s what i chalked it up to. I didn’t see her again for about a year and a half until early one morning around 6am i had been having a normal dream about mundane things when it changed into something else. I saw me lying in my bed from a vantage point in the corner of my room and there was a haggard old crone hovering a couple of feet directly above me. She was in a face down lying position with what looked like an old fashioned nightdress, she had matted dirty grey and brown hair and i did not get a look at her face as it was obscured. My sleep state had changed and i became acutely aware that although i was now in a light state of sleep i could open my eyes and wake up if i wanted, but it didn’t make sense i shouldn’t have been having a dream as vivid as this in this phase of sleep. I thought about opening my eyes, but decided against it as i felt something was amiss, i knew that a presence was nearby. I rolled over and tried to get myself back off to sleep properly for another hour or so. Again i put this occurrence down to being just a dream even though i was positive i felt a spirit within the vicinity, though she looked different this time as so much time had passed i never linked the two events.
This is how i saw her the first time.
Roughly four days later something similar happened again, i had been dreaming about being out shopping for clothes when it was interrupted and i switched to that light state of slumber, i was on my front with my face half buried in the pillow when through my closed eyelids i saw the early morning light start to black out like a shadow had crept up behind me. I felt the hairs rise on the back of my neck, she was here again mere inched behind my head boring a hole into me with her eyes. I knew for certain that this was not a dream, whoever this was was a real spirit manipulating my sleeping state. I could have opened my eyes and got up but fear kept me rooted in place and i scrunched my eyes closed a little tighter and waited to fall back asleep again. When i woke up a short while later she was gone it was just me and my Cat Otis in the silence of the bedroom.
A week went by before she waltzed into my dreams again this time it was a bit different i was dreaming about some sort of commotion in the block of flats where i live and people were arguing and scuffling out in the communal hallway. It was night time and the air felt electric with trouble i came out trying to calm several of the guys down before a full blown fight erupted with me at the centre and after getting cracked in the mouth accidentally i joined in taking my fury out on one of the random men. Next thing i remember seeing is police in full blown riot gear charging up the stairs behind us and they separated us and dragged us down out into the street one by one. While they were struggling to haul one of the men into a police van three of us were still cuffed and sat on the floor. One of the men said something and i threw myself at him ready to go for round two, i was unusually angry even for a dream. The police ran over and tried to break us up when in the ensuing chaos i was aware of someone creeping around the edge of the tight formation of heaving bodies and flying fists. Through the gaps i glimpsed her again and i could feel a scream burning in my throat, haggard in appearance with her hair in her face, back crooked and her gnarled hands hanging loose at her sides. She was moving towards us deliberately slow, she wanted me to know she was there and that she was coming for me. I tried to get on of the officers attentions to tell him when she lunged through the group and bit down deep into the flesh on my forearm. When she pulled away she vanished and i looked down and saw a septic wound oozing with pus and crawling with maggots, it was excruciatingly painful and i bolted up in bed torn from sleep violently by the pain and clutching at my arm, using my phones torch i looked to check myself thinking i would see teeth marks. It was a bit red but it wasn’t a bite. I now highly suspect that she had pinched me hard and made it look like she had bitten me in my dream. That fleshy section on the side of my arm was tender for a few days.
A couple of nights later i had been in a deep sleep when i awoke abruptly. My covers were off me and although i could not see anyone i was aware that something was looming over the side of my bed studying me. As i sleep naked i was immediately self conscious about being uncovered and slowly reached for my quilt and dragged it across me. Now this was not her, it was a rogue shadow man that had somehow wandered into my space which i had never had happen before. I actually caught the entity on film the next day, and that same morning i received news that someone close to our family had been found dead. Looking back i find the timing of this other entities appearance strange. Had she led it to me? had he sniffed her out and knew she had been looking for a sensitive that he could also feed off of? was it aware of a death close by? I am not entirely sure.
Then everything became still, i had no more activity for several weeks and i remember telling one of my closest friends that my home had fallen eerily silent. Simong was MIA, the witch had disappeared and i had no random stragglers popping in and out. I knew something was amiss, i just couldn’t put my finger on what it was. Then My beautiful cat Otis died suddenly one night i was distraught and even though i had managed to get him to a vets at 1:30 in the morning she was not able to save him, he was just shy of 4 and she suspected that he had a mass on his lung that had ruptured out of the blue. I was absolutely heartbroken as he was my baby and in hindsight i knew the silence was because my guides and my regular spirit companions knew what was coming. My teacher told me that they can view us from a birds eye perspective like we are on a road. They can see just behind and just in front so they usually have some sort of fore knowledge about what is approaching, and that is why a lot of people will notice and uptick in activity just before a significant life event. The fact that the witch had come in just before i was about to go through such heart ache made things too dangerous. With my emotions all over the place it would give her plenty of negative energy to use as literal nightmare fuel embedding her deeper into my space and energy field, so in the end my guides shut me down completely as a last resort safety measure that lasted three and a half years in total.
It was surreal and strange i was not used to the spiritual silence so i almost felt lonely in an odd kind of way but it was also nice to not have to worry about who was going to next come through my door potentially causing havoc. I thought she had gone for good, i hoped she had gone for good… i thought that with no negative emotions to feed her she would either starve or move on elsewhere to someone else. I was wrong….. she was just dormant for a while, always watching and waiting in the background, the bitch even mocked me when she came back.
As usual my normal dream sequence morphed into something much darker one night, my room was dark and it was as if i had opened my eyes and i could see my quilt hovering a few feet above me in the air, i could make out the surroundings of my room through the gap between me and it, murky shapes of my furniture came into view in the dark. Then i noticed someone was moving around my bed, i could see their form pacing back and forth and the realisation of who it was hit me in the gut like a cannon ball. I was unable to move and all i could do was lay there powerless and watch the torso of someone retracing their steps around the lower half of my bed over and over again, then the form bent down and slid underneath the hovering bed cover and started to crawl up my bed over my body closer towards me, she was on top of me her face a few inches from mine with her matted hair dangling between us.
“You…thought i ….was ….gone..” She drawled in a sarcastic tone. I think at this point i was holding my breath and i had stopped blinking, for a few seconds i ceased functioning all together in pure terror at who i was face to face with. Then she shot back out and vanished and my covers dropped. I have never woken up so fast in my life, i jumped up my hands reached for my quilt to try and surround myself with something of comfort. Where the hell is it? It was not on my bed, i quickly glanced down the left side of my bed, no luck then i checked the right side which was next to the window. My whole quilt was stuffed down on the floor between the bed and the wall and i quickly snatched it up needing something for protection. It sounds stupid but knowing that i had been lay there completely naked with her in the room made me feel completely defenceless and my quilt was the only barrier between me and the dead at night. I know that what i was seeing in the room, within these visuals she was manipulating was what was actually happening and i am glad that i have not opened my eyes and looked directly at her in a waking state, i know that is what she wants.
The next night after work i refused to stay at home and i went to my mums instead and it would be a few months before she would return. This time in the dead of night i dreamt that the first version of the witch i had seen, the fair blond one luckily without the horrible gaping mouth this time was stood next to my bed and she had one of her hands around my throat choking me, i woke up gasping for breath clutching at my neck trying to remove the invisible fingers which rapidly faded away. It was about this time i started to realise that she had more power over me when i slept and the more i thought about her the more i connected on a spiritual level. I know that the two opposing versions of herself that she had shown me were her at two different stages of her life, the young striking, respected healer woman within the community and then the vengeful angry old crone who had been shunned and pushed out as the christian religion took hold in the region. I knew that she had been exceptionally gifted in life but towards the end of it people were suspicious of her and her folk magic and people who had once been her neighbours and friends and had sought her help and advice turned on her, pushing her from the familiarity of home, until she was nothing more than a ghost to be avoided on the edge of society. What i do not know is how she found me and what her deal is. I mean she clearly despises me but i cannot fathom why.
And this brings me to the events of the last couple of weeks which have become worryingly sinister. About two weeks ago i again was asleep and in this dream i felt myself being slowly lifted into the air by my throat, as i felt the life being squeezed out of me i saw her form clearly before me. She was her younger self her pale blonde hair was loose and it hung down her back, she was strikingly beautiful but there was a coldness set deep into her features, she did not only look at me like she hated me but she also looked annoyed this time as we hovered suspended in the air above my bed, she held me with one hand like i was weightless. Then i woke up and inhaled deeply to get some air into my lungs, i felt as if i had emerged from a deep dive under water desperate for oxygen, something was different about this time. There seemed to be a disconnect i knew she wasn’t actually in my room but she was working from outside the boundary. Simong was keeping her at bay somehow and an old friend who had recently passed told me some months ago that she was lurking out there on the periphery, so i know she is being pushed out but ……
she
is
pissed!
I am expecting some sort of huge push back from her over this and it has already started. In the last few days i have found a sharp wooden cocktail stick in my toddlers bottle which i know was not there when i filled it an hour earlier with juice and there is no way my little on can get hold of any as they are kept in the top drawer with my cutlery, and yesterday i had gotten up to get a drink while on a video call and returned to my seat and spotted something metal glinting in the light. I was a bobble headed pin used in sewing, it was exactly where i had been sat a minute before and thankfully i spotted it. Strangely it was similar to one of mine in my sewing tin but when i checked the round pack they are securely held in, they were all accounted for. So tomorrow i am going to be doing an exceptionally hardcore barrier erecting to keep her and any other negatives out. Although i am still trying to understand the mechanics of how she is getting things within my home if she herself is not able to.
So yeah there you have it a pissed off dream walking witch who can switch your sleep paralysis off. Highly unusual and incredibly dangerous, big question is why me?
I will keep you updated on any further developments as i know she is not likely going anywhere anytime soon.
This will be a short one but i had to include it as it is one of the more significant encounters i have experienced and my sister witnessed him too, i have included the image of the man that i drew years ago. The activity didn’t just stay in England, on one of our trips to Spain activity flared up in my grandmothers apartment she had there. It was the last time me and Lil holidayed there which was about 11 years ago now and after a couple of days we had noticed the usual paranormal activity albeit on a smaller scale. Creepy vibes and the sound of things moving across the worktops in the kitchen kind of stuff, i remember being half surprised that he had come that far to haunt me.. i mean that is some dedication but by this point i was so used to it i just tried to shrug it off.
About a week into our holiday with my stepdad and grandmother, me and Lil travelled with them to Gibraltar for a day out. Nan’s apartment was on the Costa Del Sol so the drive to the border wasn’t too long, it was a beautiful day and we had explored the caves in the iconic rock, visited ancient but still functioning glass blowing workshops and had a fancy lunch out on the cobble stoned streets. We were finishing our day at a small shopping mall and after buying some hand made jewellery we headed back out into the bright sunlight outside. It was situated on a plaza and to the right of us was a long cobbled street that gradually climbed a hill until it disappeared, it was lined on both sides with three storied antiquated buildings alongside more modern perfume and clothes shops.
Me and Lil were a few metres ahead of Nan and Dad and we were talking about what bars we were going to visit that night and trying to formulate a plan for sneaking some alcohol to Lil who was technically underage. I mean Nan would let her have a couple but where is the fun in that, i couldn’t be drunk on my own and i wanted us both to have a good time. The next sentence dissolved in my mouth before it could come out as i sensed someone staring at me with the intensity of a thousand suns. I quickly turned in the direction the soul piercing tingles were coming from, it was like a magnetic force pulling me face towards it and up that narrow stony street, approximately a quarter of a mile away some man was watching me. He looked as if he had been from running from one side of the street to the other and had stopped dead in his tracks. His body was lurching with his heaving breath and his gaze was fixed on my face.
I can not fully explain the mechanics behind this next part…… It was as if i zoomed in on his face. I could see his scraggly white grey hair framing his face, his mouth hung open and his teeth were parted a little, they were bared and he looked predatory. His cheeks were sunken in and he looked gaunt and malnourished. I could see every line on his face, his skin was leathery and olive…. every fine crease around his eyes came into focus, then the dark hollow circles, then i noticed it, his eyes were completely white. No iris’s. No pupils, just ice white. We stared into each other and i felt like he saw something more. Something deeper within me, personal things close to my heart, a piece of my soul… my deepest insecurities and fears. I do not know what exactly, but i knew he took more from me that day.
The tall spirit i saw in Gibraltar.
I was so focused on the tiny details of his face that it took me a second to gauge the size of him. He was stood head and shoulders above everybody else in that packed street. I mean disproportionately taller than everyone else. Yet no one glanced at this ominous looking figure, throngs of people just walked straight by like a river of people around a boulder in a stream. That was when i twigged that they couldn’t see him. He was solid and he was wearing an old faded green anorak style jacket that hung limply off of his broad but skeletal frame. It was flapping open and i think he was wearing something navy blue underneath. I could see a portion of his trousers and they were a grey blue loose material. The colour of everything about him from his skin to the clothes he wore was like a washed out filter had been placed over him, slightly dull and faded.
I do not know how but i dragged my gaze from his and turned to Lil who was also silent and looking in the same direction.
“Can you see him?” I asked and she turned and told me yes. We both returned our focus to the spot but he had vanished. Not even three seconds had passed and he had disappeared and the only direction he could have come was straight up or down the hill. Unless he had gone into one of the shops, but somehow i doubt it. He stood out like a sore thumb and yet it seemed we were the only two people that acknowledged him. That is the most solid spirit i have ever seen to this day, and i am still at a loss as to how i saw so much detail from such a distance. I later showed the drawing of him to my spiritual teacher and she thought it was possible that he had been a drowning victim because of his all white eyes. But who knows.
As an amusing side note after drawing that image i stuck it on the fridge to freak my mum out, for the first few days she didn’t seem too bothered, then one morning whilst making us both a coffee she snapped at me.
The floorboards felt loose under my feet and a cool draft was creeping in through the windows. The building work had been left in haste leaving us with not much more than a shell of an old rickety barn, i was actually furious and told mum she needed to square up with the landlord and get the place sorted out. He had promised to have it finished a few weeks before we came back but he was not the kind of guy who followed through with promises. It felt empty and sad and although we were looking around the bare bones of the place i still could not imagine this feeling like home even with all of our furniture inside. It even came with free bats and squirrels in the roof. Bonus.
The building mum had rented stood beside a massive lofty vicarage with several floors and looking up at the windows of that grand place it seemed forlorn and despairing. Directly on the other side of that stood the village church and the graveyard and i had no doubt that some of the more ancient graves likely stretched beneath our properties, the headstones and markers lost to time. At the front the two homes shared a large driveway and our garden was bare with a stretch of gravel a pitiful amount of grass and a patch of trees at the back. Beyond that there were muddy fields that seemed to stretch for miles. It definitely felt like a lonely place and our time here was one of the worst periods of our lives, for reasons that i will not divulge here for Lil’s sake, but i am not exaggerating when i say we ended up being the nightmare neighbours you see on them channel 5 tv programs or as i often joke we were the Jeremy Kyle family.
Lil was barely here at this house as she had her own stuff to deal with and i regret that i couldn’t have kept her with me more, she was safe with me her big sister even if i was a fucking pathetic mess at the time. I spiralled into a seemingly endless pit of mental health issues, suicide attempts, serious drug use and criminal activity and very nearly went to jail because of this and i truly thought i was going to die in this house. Forgive me for this depressing post but i feel like it is important to relay some of this to you as this wasn’t just hell in the paranormal sense, it was hell all round. And a lot of weird revelations would come from our time here. So buckle in.. it is going it get bumpy.
Our neighbours who had also just moved into the recently renovated vicarage were northern, Leeds or Bradford i forget now where they were from. The parents seemed friendly enough although it was obvious the mother had a temper. They had two kids and both were around my age although i didn’t have a lot to do with the daughter our family became friendly with her son who i shall call by the nickname we in the village gave him G man. I already knew some of the folk in the village as i had grown up with some of them so we weren’t completely alien but G man was. The strong accent made him stand out and he carried a man bag for fuck sake, he also thought he was a shit hot rapper and he wasn’t half bad at free styling i will give him that. They also had an angry looking ginger Persian cat who needed grooming as he had a long dread lock of fur hanging from his back end so we all called him two tails.
Not long after moving in Mum got involved with a new guy who is still a massive part of our lives today. He lived in a town about eleven miles away so she would go and spend the weekend there leaving me in charge of the animals and the house and was relaxed enough to let me have free reign of the place. Which i did, i would regularly have friends over for chavvy soirees and we would sit around drinking lambrini, cheap spirits and smoking weed and this became the new normal. I was always more of a tomboy as a child so i was perfectly comfortable being with just the lads. The activity started like a trickle effect at first, the feeling of being watched, cupboard doors slamming in the kitchen and the sound of something moving around in my room at night, so much so that i felt more comfortable taking one of the animals to bed with me so i felt less alone.
One of my friends is also a gifted clairvoyant having a similar backstory to me, she grew up in an old hotel and ended up training with a medium. Kay came over one night to try and get a vibe for who it was who was clearly following us around, she told me that he was attached to me and he seemed very pissed off at me for some reason. We heard some footsteps on the floor above coming from my mums room which was empty so we headed up the stairs and with trepidation headed for the bedroom. Kay was ahead of us and as soon as she drew level with a small closet the door popped open and a stack of bedding and folded curtains spilled out onto the floor. I jumped and i swear my heart skipped a beat, the pure timing of it was not a coincidence. We stuffed everything back in and opened the heavy bedroom door and walked into a sharp chill, she knew he Simong was in here waiting for us but she couldn’t get any more information from him as he had essentially blocked her. It was something he would do often to sensitives trying to glean some info from him and it made me question whether he was truly a human spirit. I was sceptical about his origins for a couple of years.
On one of these weekends my dear friend Alec and his mate Cal stayed over, after a night of playing monopoly, watching films and eating junk food we decided to settle in for the night. I had two beds in my room, my double one and my sisters single bed and as she wasn’t at home we all decided to stay in there together, i now wonder whether it was because they used to get spooked by the night time noises. Cal was in bed with me and Alec was in the single and we lay there in the darkness wittering on about conspiracy theories, I decided i wanted a drink and as i was headed out of the door to pop downstairs Alec asked me to fetch him one as well. I left the lights off as i went down and after getting our drinks i bum bumped the heavy bedroom door to open it and made my way around to my side of the bed in the darkness clutching our glasses filled with orange juice. I walked straight into Alec and splashed juice all down my front. Why the fuck is he just standing there in the dark.
“Alec what the fuck… get out of my way…” I hear sniggering in the corner of the room.
“We are over here.” Cal replied.
“Don’t piss about Alec, move!” Then i hear Alec’s voice from the corner of the room and that familiar sensation of dread hit me, rising from my chest and threatening to wrap itself around my throat.
“I am over here you twat.. whats wrong with you.” My stomach dropped and i quickly backed up two steps. Cal being nearest the light switch flicked it on, a look of concern on his face, sure enough him and Alec were crouched in the corner. I had just walked into the solid bulky body of someone and now i was scared. I could see nothing in front of me but i knew damn well that i had felt it even going as far as to think it was Alec as he was stockier than Cal.
“What are you doing over there?” I asked annoyed as i bravely moved around the spot where i was blocked and put the drinks down on my bedside table.
“We put a spiky hairbrush on your side of the bed, thinking you would sit on it….. but obviously not. What was that all about?” Alec said as he strode over and pulled back my section of quilt revealing the brush, honestly to this day they are still the biggest kids i know. I dried my hands off on my dressing gown.
“I thought you were over here… something was blocking my way.” I told them and handed Alec his glass.
“Are you sure it wasn’t the bed?” Cal asked me grinning trying to make a joke out of it thinking i was scaring myself.
“No it was not the bed, it was big like a person. Just turn the light off i am tired.” I snapped at him and quickly jumped under the covers and sidled up to Cal, they stayed pretty quiet after that. I lay there with that feeling of certainty forming in my gut, it was Simong. I was sure of it but he had never done anything like that before, was it because the guys were round? A couple of weeks later we had another get together and for once my sister was home that weekend. We had been drinking quite heavily and playing stupid games and Alec, Cal and another two guys were going to sleep over in the living room. The had made up beds on the two sofa’s and a mattress on the floor was for a couple of them to top and tail.
I was pretty drunk and in the early hours after Lil had already collapsed in bed i headed up, being sure to lock the front double doors and the back door. I remember doing it vividly and drawing the floor length curtains so no one could see in then i sloped off upstairs and dragged myself into bed. I woke early about 6:30am thirsty as hell. My head was pounding and as i sat myself up on the edge of the bed it felt like the world lurched. Lil was still fast asleep and gently snoring so i threw my dressing gown on and headed down the stairs. As i was descending i could hear the guys still awake and talking quietly so i stuck my head in the living room door causing them to jump. The four of them were sitting crammed on the single mattress on the floor with three quilts wrapped tightly around the huddled group. Something was up, they looked scared.
“Morning. Why are you still awake?” I croaked with one raised eyebrow. They didn’t answer immediately and they looked at one another.
“Were you awake in the night? Like …. coming up and down the stairs?” Lewis another of the guys asked. I was still half asleep at this point and my brain was slowly operating in that post alcohol fog.
“No me and Lil have been asleep. Why?” I was just starting to register that something had clearly been going down in the night to freak them out when Cal asked me..
“Seriously? Your not messing with us? because we have heard someone thundering up and down the stairs. We didn’t dare look.” I blanched at his statement and my thoughts flashed back to the dark nights at 74 when i would hear the same thing.
“Of course not…” I trailed off there was a light wind brushing against my bare legs and spun around to see the curtains over the front door lightly billowing. I yanked one back and one of the double doors was wide open with the lock mechanism stuck out. The guys were getting off the mattress one by one and Lewis came up behind me.
“Why did you unlock the door?” I asked angry at them before panic set in.
“Oh shit the dogs.” Lewis was following me helping me search as i called their names. Not in the kitchen. Not in the hallway. All the while he was insisting no one had opened the front door. I headed out of the kitchen and into the conservatory and found both dogs curled up in a chair looking troubled, i breathed a sigh of relief knowing that if they had escaped they could have run miles before anyone noticed. Then i saw it. The back door was flung wide open as well and upon closer inspection the lock was also stuck out in the locked position too. Why they hadn’t taken their chance to escape confused me as they were sat mere feet from the door, Our smaller dog Woody was quite the Houdini and it was not like him to stay put if he didn’t have to.
Quickly slamming it shut i turned to him with a face like thunder and asked him to promise me that they hadn’t been fucking around with the doors in the night. He said they hadn’t. One by one the lads trickled into the kitchen looking tired and seeing my nervous expression they all started talking at once, like a tsunami of words that i was struggling to focus on. They were saying how someone was running and stomping on the stairs and how could we both have slept through it. Apparently the dogs had been growling at nothing and were spooked the whole night, when they were in the kitchen getting drinks and snacks things had been moving around. Alec pointed to a large plastic clothes basket that was slung onto the floor in one corner of the kitchen.
“We left that on the table, every time someone came back in here something big had moved. We shut ourselves in the living room because it was freaking us out.” They were telling the truth, i could see it on their faces they looked just as shook up as i was feeling. When Lil woke up an hour or so later they relayed all that had happened to her. I will never forget the way she looked at me with concern on her face.
“Simong’s back then.” she held my gaze and i know damn well what was going through her head at that minute. Thank fuck it’s not me living here with it.
Luckily on most weekends when mum was gone i had a couple of friends stay with me. But there was the odd one where i would be on my own and i hated it with a passion. This was one of the most unsecured houses we had ever lived in. The back door was flimsy as hell and one good shove it could come open, one of the window frames in the conservatory could literally be lifted up and you could step right through. Alec once broke in one night because his mum locked him out of his house when he was drunk, mum found him passed out on the sofa, snuggled up with one of our quilts and pillows and a plate with toast crusts on it and babestation playing on the telly in the background. It was comical but it showed how easy it was for someone to get in.
I would never venture into the conservatory once the sun had gone down. I always felt like there was something out there in the back yard watching me and the dogs proved it one weekend. I was on my own and they were stood side by side staring out of one the windows, they were focused on the end of the garden where the trees were. They were grumbling in a low tone and then they would break out into full blown growls baring their teeth, they would not listen to me calling them away. I had to pull them into the kitchen by their collars and shut that door and the curtains that covered the glass. That was the worst one for me, i knew something was out there and i was petrified not knowing if it was a spirit or some messed up person planning to break in. I chose to sleep downstairs on the sofa over them couple of days with a knife and kept both of the dogs close by. I figured if someone came in at least i would have half a chance of hearing them as opposed to sleeping upstairs behind the solid doors and not hearing anything. I wanted a fighting chance.
Weird activity surrounded that house, mum on a few of occasions had taken the dogs on their leads down the drive to have wee’s before setting in for the night and she saw a car with a couple of men sat in it just watching the two buildings. As soon as they saw mum they sped off into the night. It turned out our neighbours were not as nice as they seemed and we found out when our house and theirs was raided by dozens of police at the crack of dawn one morning. They thought we knew the family previously and amazingly we hadn’t noticed that they had cleared off in the dead of night a couple of days before this raid. It turned out the father was a criminal involved in a nasty home raid robbery which saw two elderly people hurt and they had moved to the sleepy little village to put some distance between them and the crime scene. We were stunned as he had seemed the most pleasant out of the whole family. So i suspect the car mum saw had been a couple of plain clothes officers watching the place. But as for who or what was creeping around the end of the garden, i do not know….. I don’t think i want to know.
Before long we left the quiet house as i came to call it and we ended up journeying down south to be closer to family. We moved to a town called Midhurst in West Sussex and it was a far cry from the flat lands of East Anglia, with rolling hills, crumbling castles and a beautiful forest practically on our doorstep. It was like stepping into another world. It was lovely to be close to our ageing family as we had spent most of our lives living hundreds of miles away from them and although mum struggled financially as we were in a more affluent and expensive part of the country, we tried to make the best of it and find our feet. Though me and my sister were still annoyed at having to share a room. Me and Lil made friends with a group of teenage girls who lived in the town and we would doss down the estate with them. I thoroughly enjoyed taking the dogs on long scenic walks through the forest which was breath taking, on top of the wooded ridge you would look down upon a large sandy clearing with a large turquoise blue lake nestled within. It really was a special place.
On one of these cold windy winter nights a few weeks after we moved in we took a stroll through the busy town exploring and seeing what our new place had to offer, our estate was at the top of a hill and the whole town descended down it. We found quirky pub restaurants in ancient buildings, fancy jewellery boutiques, the windows filled with expensive shiny trinkets and charity shops which were a bargain hunters dream as the wealthy citizens of that area happily parted with designer handbags, old wooden carved furniture and antique books and i ended up finding one of my most prized possessions in one of these shops. It was a 1919 limited edition Midsummer nights dream with beautiful colour plates and it still has the original Foyles Charing cross book stores sticker on the inner cover.
After descending the hill and having a good nosy around i pleaded with Lil if we could go and have a look at the ruins of Cowdray castle. I do not know what the fuck i expected to see in the pitch black darkness but Lil reluctantly agreed and we aimed for the long walkway that led down to the ancient site.
In the warmer months they would hold day events and fairs for the local area and tourists and i was hoping that when the weather picked up we could go with mum for a day out as i love historical places and i am fascinated by their often tumultuous past, plus this place is said to be cursed which is more than enough of an excuse for me to want to check it out. When reaching the beginning of the lengthy path we stood there getting lightly spattered by rain drops trying to make out an outline of the left over remnants. We couldn’t see anything, the path was partially lit at the end we were stood but a few yards further ahead it disappeared into the inky black shadows, the lights of Midhurst did not reach the ghost of this place and i was disappointed that we weren’t able to see more. I looked at her with that mischievous look on my face that she has gotten all to used to seeing over the years.
“Shall we go down there?” I asked her and she rolled her eyes.
“It pitch black Amy we won’t be able to see anything….plus it is creepy as fuck. Look at it.”
“Yeah that is kind of the point, what else have we got to do?” I have no idea how i got her to agree to it but boredom leads people to do questionable things, so i linked my arm through hers and pulled her a bit closer for moral support and mainly because it was a truly black place and if we needed to run for fear of some madman lurching out of the darkness then i knew she was there right beside me. We made it about a third of the way before slowing down and chickening out, the darkness of the place was a bit too much and we both agreed it was stupid idea as we would not see anything anyway. We decided to head back towards the inviting lights of civilisation and in that moment as we turned something caught our attention. A faint melodic tune travelled on the wind from the location of the castle, it was old music the sort you hear in a medieval based historical drama as the camera slowly pans to the courts musicians playing solemnly in the corner entertaining well to do guests as they stuff their faces with greasy turkey legs. It sounded a lot like a flute or a similar sounding pipe like instrument and the strumming of a lute. It was soft and gentle and we both halted and turned to each other and pulled a face.
“Did you hear that?” I asked
“Yes… but it can’t be coming from there they don’t look like they have anything going on tonight.” Lil turned back in the direction of the castle. She was right, if there had been an event going on down there the place would have been lit up and we would have seen it, on a shitty cold night like that one in a roofless building any organisers would have been unlikely to hold an event in that kind of weather. But we both heard it distinctly and deciding enough was enough we headed back home not sure what to make of it.
Up until this point things hadn’t been creepy at home and i was hoping that the activity might have stayed in Lincolnshire but a few months later i would be proven that this was not the case.
Mum and Lil had gone to bed and as i couldn’t sleep i had stayed up in the tiny kitchen with a large square board propped up on the kitchen side. I had my earphones in listening to some RnB and was painting a fantasy scene of a water nymph emerging from a natural pool. Right beside me was the fridge freezer with bits of paper and bills dotted all over it with magnets. I was concentrating on my art channelling my inner Rembrandt when one of the letters level with my head jerked outward from the fridge door getting my attention. I pulled my earphones out and stared at it for a few seconds wondering if i was imagining as i was starting to get tired. Just as i turned to get back to painting it happened again but more violently this time and the sound of the paper rustling made me jump back. I was surprised that the letter was still on the fridge considering it had just been yanked with some force and being brave i took a deep breath and a step towards it and placed my hand firmly on the paper.
“Stop it… now.” I told whichever spirit it was in my best don’t screw with me voice, having been terrorised for years i wanted to stand my ground and be strong and show that i would not be pushed out of the room. I slowly took my shaking hand off of it and as soon as there was a space of a few inches between it and the paper it happened again, it was pulled up in a sharp jerking motion which unnerved me to my core. The kitchen was so small, i was not comfortable sharing such an intimate space with whatever this was and with panic rising in my chest i literally downed tools, dropping my paintbrushes on the side and leaving the light on i fled into the bedroom. Lil was fast asleep in her bed and i was sleeping on just a mattress along side her bed, we didn’t have enough room on the trailer for another bed base so i was making do until i could get a new one. Seeing my quilt was all turned around as i had been too lazy to make my bed up that morning i quickly darted over to the other side of the room and switched on our table lamp. It was one of them ones with the dimmer switch and not wanting to wake my sister i turned it on as low as i could but with enough light i could see to straighten my covers out. As i was rearranging my quilt the lamp started to flicker, so lightly at first that i did not notice straight away but then it became more noticeable and was rapidly flipping between low light and complete darkness. I fixed my eyes on it knowing that whatever had been in the kitchen with me had now followed into the bedroom and i frantically started whispering Lil’s name trying to wake her up.
On the fourth attempt which was no longer a whisper but more of a shout she opened her eyes and lay there silent and motionless for a few seconds, i just assumed it was because she had been startled awake and was wondering what was going on but she told me afterwards that she felt like a heavy pressure was holding her down and she wasn’t able to move or make a sound until it lifted. Finally sitting up and without a word she looked at the lamp watching it behave erratically.
“Why is it doing that?” She asked me in a low voice bringing her knees up to her chest, she could feel the change in the air too.
“I don’t know, weird shit started happening in the kitchen and i turned it on to make my bed and it randomly started doing it.” I told her, by this point the low light was getting brighter and it would stay like that for a couple of seconds before switching back to pitch black and vice versa. I should add here that we had never seen it do this before but after this event that lamp would act almost as a warning beacon when paranormal activity was going to occur and it would begin a strange sequence of flashing and flickering alerting us to any presences within our space. I perched next to her on the bed not quite sure what to do about the situation and my heart was hammering in my chest, whatever this was it did not feel friendly. We sat there for a minute watching it flash on the brightest setting, so bright it hurt to directly look at and then back to pitch black before Lil suggested we should try asking it questions to see if it responded.
We started off with Do you belong here? It then flashed bright.
Did you follow us? It stayed black.
Are you a male? It stayed black.
Are you a female? It flashed.
Are you a negative spirit? It flashed.
Do you want to harm us? It flashed.
Who do you want to hurt… Lil? It flashed.
Me? It flashed.
Have you been here a long time? It stayed black. It started to flash erratically again and the atmosphere in the room became unbearably heavy. That feeling of dread was accompanied by a darker presence in the room and we could feel it studying us. Lil had started freaking out and i was only just keeping my fear from showing when i bolted of of the bed and switched it off at the wall. Dashing back to bed i jumped under the covers and assumed my usual cocoon pose wrapping the quilt tight around me being sure to tuck my feet in. Lil feeling vulnerable asked me if she could get in my bed with me and i agreed knowing we would both feel safer together. It was comical thinking back to it now, wrapped tightly in her quilt she rolled off the side of her bed and landed on my mattress with a thud, with my mattress against the wall and her bed on the other side it was a squeeze but we lay there side by side, eyes wide like quilted sausage rolls. Neither of us could sleep and when mum woke up around 6 am to let the dogs out for a wee on the balcony from our room she seemed was surprised to see us both awake.
Feeling a little braver with mum up and about we got up and had a coffee and told her about what happened, although she was sceptical at first i could see she was irritated at the realisation that things might not be normal in this house either and i always wondered whether she blamed me for that.
We tried to demonstrate what the lamp was doing but neither of us could twist the dimmer switch as quickly as it had been doing it on it’s own.
That was the one screwed up night we had i that house, the ominous feeling of another presence would come and go at random and the occasional thing would move but nothing as scary as that event. It is strange how a feeling, a sense or emotion can make you feel as though you are being threatened without a visual apparition to back it up but it is an unmistakable vibe that washes over you when something has bad intentions towards you. You can almost smell danger in the air, it is primal, something deep within us that stretches beyond logic and rationale.
Again we stayed here for a short time and after six months we all struggled to get on our feet financially so mum moved us back to where we came from, we moved into an annex joined onto a vicarage one village over. Although i am sure you can imagine being in an old setting like this things were not going to be quiet on the paranormal front. I am glad we moved back i have always enjoyed the friendly nature of country folk and being able to have a chat with a complete stranger during a bus journey or waiting in line at the bank. I have often thought about the phantom music we both heard and can still hear it plainly in my memories. Maybe it was an echo from the past spilling out into our world. Maybe other people have heard it too.
Poltergeist. The word comes from the German language Polter (Noisy) Geist (Ghost) and is often used to describe a volatile spirit that is not at rest and stuck on our plane of existence causing it to act out violently in retribution. This type of haunting also has the greatest ability to effect the living. There are many notable cases of terrifying haunting’s that display serious poltergeist activity. Given our modern day obsession with all things technical it is not surprising that there are some compelling videos of this type of paranormal activity caught in real time.
Although a portion of these types of haunting’s are caused by separate entities that are acting of their own volition there are also a portion of cases where it is essentially the victim haunting themselves. Now in case you haven’t heard of this and you are wondering what i am talking about we will look into this troubling phenomena and the circumstances that can lead to this type of telekinetic haunting.
It is safe to say that poltergeist phenomena will appear at random in the victims life with no discernible reason as to how and why. Commonly when teenagers are going through puberty the resulting flood of hormones can result in mental insecurity or instability and that can be a triggering event for this kind of haunting. Other times it can be someone older who starts to undergo an extremely stressful period of their life. Whether it be grief, breakdown in relationships or fear and worry whilst caring for a frail member of their family. The energy we throw out during these tumultuous periods can draw spirits or entities into our space as we are giving them enough negative energy to feed off of creating the perfect storm for paranormal activity. A tense atmosphere at home can also enable them to embed themselves deep into our day to day lives and before you know it you are stumbling through a full blown nightmare of aggressive activity directed at one or all within the household.
It has been acknowledged that in a significant number of poltergeist cases activity will move with the victims to a new home, often becoming worse immediately preceding the move and when they are settling into the new house. One thing we know is they do not take well to change and can be affronted with such a monumental shift, especially feeding off of the inevitable stress that comes along side moving. It is because in these cases the spirit is not attached to the property but to a person instead.
On the other side of the coin this activity can be triggered by people that have dormant abilities that were suppressed in childhood. Again it will usually travel on the back of stress or some other horrible experience they had recently endured but in this case it might not be a separate spirit so to speak. Their sleeping gifts can be awakened and start to leak out manifesting in a form of telekinesis that can move objects from one place to another, create an oppressive atmosphere within the home or in the worst case scenario this telekinetic ability can manifest with so much force and potency that they inadvertently create a shadow version of themselves consisting of their fears, abilities and emotions that can go on to terrorise themselves and in heartbreaking circumstances the ones they love and hold dear. On becoming aware of this revelation the accompanying guilt can cause further issues as they resent themselves for unwittingly being the source of pain and suffering for others and this needs to be dealt with carefully.
These shadow entities can take on many forms and some truly horrifying apparitions, possibly connected to the persons deepest and most primal fears. It can be easy for them to believe this is a spirit of its own as these visual forms can be convincing and seem to act of their own accord. Some mediums and sensitives believe that all poltergeist cases are the result of the persons own mind and others believe they are a mixed bag of the two so it makes it incredibly hard to give them some kind of statistic. In my experience i would say 70/30 as i think it is more rare for a shadow self to manifest with this much force but that is purely speculative on my part.
Fortunately there are a few things we can do to help us recognise what kind of poltergeist you are dealing with.
Given the circumstances it is hard to remain calm in the face of volatile activity but it is important to show the entity that you are not only in control of yourself but also the situation at hand, you have to take a firm stance but not in an aggressive or confronting manner. Admittedly it is a fine line to walk when you are exasperated and desperate for some kind of end to the issue. In helping to determine what exactly you are dealing with it is useful to keep a journal and write down any paranormal occurrences that happen. Take note of who is in the house at the time, what the atmosphere in the home is e.g arguments that day, stress etc. Record the type of activity that occurs and who it is directed at if at anyone at all, usually it will be focused on the person who is the root cause of the haunting. It is a useful way to determine whether the activity is being unconsciously generated by a particular person as you will start to see patterns emerge over time.
If it seems like one person within the house is inadvertently responsible then fortunately there are things you can do to help the situation. Starting meditation can be a great way to focus and neutralise chaotic energy and by setting aside a few days in the week to do this can be a good start in calming the atmosphere and help quiet that persons mind. Counselling and talking therapy’s can be useful in getting to the underlying root cause of someones mental state if you believe that a mental health imbalance is the triggering effect. Taking time to decompress after a stressful day can be equally beneficial, go for a walk in nature, swimming or spend an hour or two getting into a good novel as this gives you a release from things that are weighing heavy upon your shoulders.
If this still doesn’t help then it may be wise to consult a reputable professional spiritual medium who can tell you whether dormant abilities are stirring and manifesting in this manner and they will be able to advise you on what action to take. It might be enrolling in psychic circle classes with other sensitives or they may offer you some one on one time to help explore and develop their innate abilities which can help get the manifestations under control. Having somewhere to focus this ability can dramatically decrease the activity in the home.
On the other hand if you struggle to see any correlation between the activity and people in the home and you suspect that this is a separate entity that has entered your life akin to a tornado tearing through a neighbourhood, this can be more tricky, and only by seeking help from a psychic medium or a clairvoyant will you be able to confirm what type of poltergeist you are dealing with.
This is an excerpt from the book Is Your House Haunted written by Debi Chesnut that might explain why i take this view;
Poltergeists don’t typically communicate or even attempt to communicate with the living, don’t show any particular attachment to the location they are haunting, and are often the most difficult type of ghost to get rid of because it is almost impossible to determine what they want, if anything.
As i said above taking a firm stance is important because the main driving factor of a noisy ghost is boredom or to create fear thereby giving them more negative energy to work with, it is a vicious circle which is far easier said than done. But by attempting to assert dominance at home it will show it that you are not going to take this kind of activity lying down. You can take control when activity starts by telling them out loud that this is your home and their behaviour is not acceptable and you want them to leave. You are claiming your home as your own and by handling it in a calm manner you are not empowering them but you are empowering yourself. You can try to erect spiritual boundaries around the home or try a more heavy handed cleansing in an attempt to drive the spirit out. I have written about some powerful techniques for achieving this although i must add this isn’t a given that it will work as these entities are persistent and stubborn. I will leave the link to that post at the bottom of this article. Asking for help from professionals is probably the safest way to go about it as they may be able to glean some information from the unquiet spirit and give you something to work with.
I hope this article has been helpful in some way and i want to thank @Politiolog for asking me to write this piece.
I have a long held fascination with elemental and nature spirits, though many past cultures around the globe have touched upon these beings in some way it is the Norse and Celtic mythologies that are the richest with a wondrous myriad of these creatures but i will dig into all the cultures and mythological creatures from around the globe for these elemental posts. Forest’s are my favourite places in the world so I thought this would be a good place to start delving into the mystical lore of otherworldly spirits that inhabit these scenic habitats. So lets start with the phrase i am sure many of you are familiar with, panic in the wood’s.
Pan; Pan comes from the ancient Greeks and is the God of the wild, shepherds and flocks, nature, and rustic music. He has the hindquarters, legs and horns of a a goat very much the same as a faun or satyr. Pan is commonly associated with sex and fertility and the season of spring and the word panic ultimately derives from the gods name. There is a strange phenomena which ties into the very name of this spirit and his links to the forest. Have you ever been on a scenic and peaceful walk through the woods when out of the blue you get an uneasy and overwhelming sensation that you are not alone leading to an overwhelming panic that you need to get the hell out of there? Many people have experienced this odd feeling come over them, even if they safe in the knowledge that they are alone and not in the vicinity of dangerous wild animals that could cause this. Some people report a strange buzzing sound like a swarm of insects that are near and yet far at the same time when they struck down by this debilitating yet unexplained response to an unseen threat. Other people get a claustrophobic feeling and imagine the surrounding tree’s are closing in on them. This is where the panic in the wood’s phrase comes from and i know that i have experienced it myself. I used to walk my dog through a beautiful scenic forest in West Sussex but there was one section i would not venture into, strangely enough i would never see no other ramblers or dog walkers in that part either and it was near this section of barren tree’s i first experienced this feeling. Within a couple of uncomfortable minutes i had turned around and left vowing to never return to that part of the forest again, even the dog seemed uneasy and followed closely behind. Have you ever felt like this when taking a hike? Here is an interesting post i found on reddit by a user’s experiece with this phenomena;
I experienced panic in the woods as you defined it as a child while staying in a cabin in the high Sierras. I was about nine years old playing with my sister, two other boys, and our pack of family dogs near a huge lake deep in the woods. One second we were playing the next second I was floodedwith the overwhelming feeling that I was being watched and that I needed to run to safety. I remember being filled with dread and all of my senses were on high alert. My skin was prickly and I couldn’t breath. I could have ran back to the cabin, or down to the waters edge , but for some reason I couldn’t turn around and chose to flee to the curve of the lake, about a block away. I knew I had to run and my sister and I took off for the curve of the lake. I ran for my life that morning and I have no idea why or what evoked those feelings or why I chose to run where I did.
Satyr’s and Fauns; Called Satyr’s in Greek and Fauns in roman mythology. They are the lazy pleasure loving followers of Pan. Some say they are brothers of Nymphs others say they are the sons of nymphs and goats, which explains why they are part human. Usually seen in Baroque art and commonly depicted frolicking with semi clad groups of youthful people drunk on wine and having a merry old time. The figure has long been associated with promiscuous acts and with it’s appearance being half man half goat, it may have been instrumental in the commonly associated depiction of the devil from the middle ages onward’s. But have they been seen in real life? Do these depictions of half men half goat beings have roots in reality. In researching to see if i could find any accounts of run ins with such creatures i came across this account on the unexplained mysteries.com forum although it is a lengthy read it had some peculiar details which piqued my interest.
So I was recently on a horseback camping trip with a good friend of mine. It was a 2 night trip in northern SK.
We had planned this way back around christmas, we’d assumed the snow would be completely gone, but our trail was really damn cold/slushy. So the original 3 nights was cut to 2. We saddled up our horses and headed out. The first tip off that this trip wouldn’t be fun was our horses. My trusty old white gelding was off his rocker. He’d never been aggressive, ever. But he was wailing and bucking and biting the moment we got onto the trail. My friends horse, who was usually the energetic one, stayed completely silent and hung his head the whole way to the first stop.
When the sun started setting we found a patch of trees to make a pen around. We use this electrified cord that connects to a battery. Then when I unsaddled my boy and put him in the enclosure, he calmed down and grazed along side his buddy. While I tended the horses my friend set up the tent, and noticed that my bed roll was gone, along with my hat. This made no sense, as I had tied them tomy saddle just a few minutes ago. So I looked around and couldn’t find them near us. Then I went back to my saddle and noticed that the leather cord that tied the items down had been crudely sawed in half. I thought ithad snapped along the trail, and that I was going crazy and didn’t put my hat there. I walked up from the small valley we were in and looked around. I found my hat about 80 feet from where we had followed the trail in. I had thought it maybe flew away when I was riding…until I picked it up. It STANK. Really, really badly. It smelled like a mix of burnt hair and rotten milk. I held it far away from me and went back to the camp. When I got there, my friend said that he left to chop wood, came back, and the boots he left outside of the tent were moved and stank too. With the same smell. By this point we assumed a skunk was around. But it did not smell like skunk, my friend pointed out.Indeed, it was waaayy more putrid. It was so bad we resorted to piling snow on the items just to block the stink. My friend began getting scared wondering if an infected wolf was out there. I laughed because I knew this area well, and no wolves live around the area(too many farmers with shotguns). Besides that, no animal but something like a skunk would so thoroughly stink up the place. I thought it may had been a small animal that was sick marking it’s territory. I’ve seen coyotes do similar things. But coyotes would never come that close to humans/foreign objects. But we dismissed it as harmless and went to bed.
The next morning we saddled up the horses and noticed that my friend’s mare was covered in leaves. But they stuck to her skin with what looked like tree sap. She got really angry when we peeled them off, even trying to bite me, as if she was protecting them. We looked around and couldn’t find any sap leaking, and my horse was still clean. This was the point when my friend brought up woodland creatures/spirits and how they’re known to do this. I really don’t like to believe in such things, but the way that his horse had protected the leaves and was licking at the sap made me wonder. It’d be nice if it was a good omen, because my stinky hat certainly was not. My poor friend had to wear those boots,too. Ick. But we rode on and set up another camp the next night.
We settled in without anything unusual, the horses were calm, the wind had settled, and the stench had almost gone from our stuff. But then I went to the bathroom at about 3am, and before I turned behind a tree I smelled the same smell as before. I was nervous now, because whatever was making that smell had followed us. I was really scared that it may have been a cougar that wandered too far south because of the long winter. I went back and grabbed the small hunting rifle we brought, and told my friend were I was going. Because damn it, if I gotta pee, I’m gonna! I went around a tree and finished my business, then got back up and looked around, gun on hip. A shadow moved slowly behind a tree about 40-60 feet away. I hummed lowly, hoping to hear it move/breath so I could figure out what it was. The thing perfectly echoed my melody, but it had a gutteral sound to it. Okay,definitely not a cougar. But my heart began to pound as I realized nothing could do that but a person. I yelled a “who’s there” and then the rot smell came back. So strong that I began to heave. My friend was calling out from the cabin for me. I kept my eyes on the tree the thing stood behind and called out again, covering my nose. The leaves crunched and it hummed again. I was beginning to cry and back up towards the tent. The horses were letting out really low,rumbling nickers. Which made me more uncomfortable because horses only do that when they’re happy. And I certainly wasn’t. My friend ran to my side just in time for me to keel over an vomit. He also was on the verge of sickness, but he pointed the flash light around and yelled out into the trees. The thing ran, the leaves crunched behind it. And I kid you not, what I saw looked like a man, but with an animal’s head. It was so dark, so I might be wrong, but dear god, I know what I think I saw.
It was about the height of a man, it’s legs looked all broken and it’s limbs were skinny. And it was hairy, especially on its head.
Needless to say we got the hell outta dodge after that.
Guys, what the hell did I see? My friend insisted that it’s something supernatural, but he also did not see it,so I might have seen nothing. I have literally no way to explain. But I’m pretty damn sure that I saw exactly what I described. If you have theories, please share. I haven’t slept well the past few days.
Either A. I saw what I saw because of my own fear, or B. Forest nymphs are in Canada.
The poster seems sincere in his recollection of the event and he displays a healthy amount of scepticism about the whole ordeal, even going as far as to question his own reality.
Russian Leshy; In Slavic folklore there are a type of forest spirit called Leshy/Leshies and they are often described as lively and mischievous. They hibernate during the winter to reappear in the spring time and this is when people report encounters with them. They will let out whistles and loud echoing cries to confuse travellers and hunter often leading them in circles in the woods. To break this spell it is said that humans must take off their clothes and replace them back to front , and swap their shoes onto the wrong feet. They are described as having wild green hair entangled with leaves and vines, green beards and vivid green eyes. Their blood is reputed to be blue giving their skin a icy blue hue.
Finnish forest spirits; The Finnish forest spirits are friendly unless annoyed or mistreated by humans. They will lead lost travellers to safety and help hunters find game. The hunter must let some of the blood run onto the ground as a gift to the spirit. Here is an excerpt from the site https://theculturetrip.com/europe/finland/articles/11-mythical-creatures-lurking-in-finlands-lakes-and-forests/ with a bit more information i found regarding the male and female forest elemental’s. It is an interesting read and describes all manner of nature deities from Finland.
Tapio and Mielikki
Tapio and his wife Mielikki are the god and goddess of the forest, who hunters and farmers pray to in hopes of finding lots of game and protecting their livestock. Together they created many of Finland’s wild creatures, including the bear. Tapio is depicted as having a mossy beard and a hat made of twigs, while his wife is described as an incredibly beautiful woman, although she can be haggard and terrifying when she isn’t appeased. They live in a wooden castle deep in the forest where they watch over their wild animals.
Herne the hunter; Here in the UK we have our own fascinating version of a forest spirit although this one by all appearances is more human, and i have read some highly interesting alleged sightings of this spirit. Near the site of a fallen oak that once stood in the ancient forest land of Windsor, the unwary have caught site of a terrifying figure as he rides atop a monstrous black horse and closely followed by a pack of baying hounds. People who have witnessed this apparition say that stags antlers grow from his head like a resplendent crown. Some say Herne the hunter is a Celtic god of the underworld and others believe he was once a human possibly a king of a now forgotten Celtic tribe that ruled these lands. The most common theory is that he hung himself from the long gone oak although i have come across something in my research which i believe ties into this legend. In digging into some dusty old books nestled within my bookshelf i came across this tale from a few miles up the road from me;
In the Peterborough Chronicle, there is an account of the Wild Hunt’s appearance at night, beginning with the appointment of a disastrous abbot for the monastery, Henry d’Angely, in 1127:
Many men both saw and heard a great number of huntsmen hunting. The huntsmen were black, huge, and hideous, and rode on black horses and on black he-goats, and their hounds were jet black, with eyes like saucers, and horrible. This was seen in the very deer park of the town of Peterborough, and in all the woods that stretch from that same town to Stamford, and in the night the monks heard them sounding and winding their horns.[22]
Reliable witnesses were said to have given the number of huntsmen as twenty or thirty, and it is said, in effect, that this went on for nine weeks, ending at Easter.[22]Orderic Vitalis (1075–c. 1142), an English monk cloistered at St Evroul-en-Ouche, in Normandy, reported a similar cavalcade seen in January 1091, which he said were “Herlechin’s troop” (familia Herlechini; cf. Harlequin).[23]
The Bokwus; In Native american folklore they tell stories of a more sinister kind of entity, the Bokwus, the dangerous spirit of the spruce forests. People who walk alone through the forest at night can sense their presence watching them and may see his war painted face through the leaves of the tree’s. They are said to lurk near the rivers that flow through the forest and if they so desire they will drown fishermen and travellers so they can steal their souls.
The green man; Probably the most enigmatic and easily recognisable on this list it may come as a surprise that this forest god is the most mysterious with his origins lost to time and no one can be sure of how ancient he is but he is certainly pre christian and possibly pagan, yet there are carvings of his leafy head in many christian churches. He is the life force of the planet kingdom and his iconic image is found all over Europe and also in parts of Asia. He sometimes goes by other names, The Old Man of the Woods, Jack-in-the-Green or The Leaf King. He dies in winter to be reborn again in the spring and his effigy is still used in many European Mayday processions.
I am sure i have missed many off this list but these are the most notable i can find and i hope you have enjoyed this entry. I will continue to look into the different spirits based upon the elements and i will make another post soon. And as always if you have experienced anything strange in the woods then let me know in the comments.
So next time you take a walk in the woods, be warned…. you may feel eyes on you.
After leaving 74 we ended up moving into a small two bedroom pokey little bungalow on the outskirts of the village, me and my sister were completely confused as it was a considerable downsize and we would have to go back to sharing a bedroom which as you can imagine did not go down well. Lil was in her early teens and i was eighteen so we were at odds at the best of times but throw into that mix the little sod stealing my clothes and make up continuously all hell would break loose on a weekly basis. This house would prove to be one of the less active places we lived in and nothing happened for the first few weeks after moving. I was still struggling horribly with my mental health and had stopped going and meeting with friends for a while, i didn’t want to drag people down with my low moods but isolating myself did not help at all. There was a lot of tension at home and we were all under each others feet given the tiny space we had to share so my only viable option for escape and quiet time were in the garden or cooped up in my bedroom.
One early evening i had done just that, shutting myself away i had been doing some artwork and after growing tired of that our naughty dog Louis roused himself from his sleep on my bed and started nose prodding at me to play. I sat on my bed which was against the wall and was throwing a bright pink ball up in the air for him to catch before wrestling it off of him, nipped fingers and all and repeating it again. It was about the size of a tennis ball, it was his favourite and he had a thing for bright pink toys which has always made me question whether dogs are really colourblind. You could line up identical balls in a range of colours and time and time again he would choose the luminous pink one. After a few minutes of doing this i threw it in the air, Lou by my side was poised and watching like a hawk waiting for it to descend low enough he could jump up and retrieve it in his mouth when inexplicably it poof..vanished a few feet above us.
I would have thought i was going stark raving mad if it hadn’t been for the dog sat beside me looking up still patiently waiting for it to come down. After a few seconds he looked at my hands thinking i had somehow tricked him and had it hidden but i opened them to show him they were empty. I was confused but tried to rationalise it any way i could, it may have landed on top of the wardrobe next to my bed or fallen between the two so i jumped up to fetch a chair from the dining room a mere eight foot away and came back. Louis by this point being impatient and wanting his favourite ball back had started pulling up my quilt and pillows with his paws and though i was certain in my heart it had not gone on top of the wardrobe i climbed up on wobbly legs and had a look. My initial thoughts were confirmed it was no where to be seen and knowing that the wardrobe was pushed up against the wall there was no way it was rolling behind it. I scanned the small gap between the two pieces of furniture and it was not there either.
Louis in this time had grown bored of the mysterious shenanigans and cleared off into the living room to entertain himself with something else. I was climbing down from the chair when i saw him through the open door running back towards my room with something in his mouth….. I shit you not it was the pink ball. I stood there hands on my hips and a frown etched deep into my brow wondering what level of fuckery all this had just risen to all the while the dog is back on my bed mauling his ball like a hyena at a carcass ready to go again. I wish i could tell you that i have an explanation but i don’t. Was it a glitch in the matrix kind of event? Was it that elusive moment when a spirit moves an object to another place within the home and i just happened to witness it in real time? I will let you guess in the comment section because i am stumped.
A few weeks later i was at a real low point emotionally and mentally, i was living in my pyjamas eating nothing more than mash potato and gravy, copious amounts of cheese and cake! I hadn’t shaved my legs in several weeks or washed my hair in four days. It was not a high point in my life and sadly would go on for a couple of years. I remember crawling into bed one night my sister on the other side of the room was sound asleep already and i lay there awake staring at the ceiling with a thousand and one thoughts racing through my head, swirling in a tornado of nonsense, pain and pessimism. I will be honest i was thinking incredibly dark thoughts. I do not want this blog to be a self pity party and i don’t want people to leave my page thinking Jesus she is a Debbie downer but my thoughts had turned to ending it all. Judge away… it is what it is and i am in a good place now but it was hard. I felt like i had been tossed out to sea and was drowning in my own sadness. At some point my eyes grew heavy and i started to nod off and the feelings, disturbing thoughts and memories grew quiet for a few minutes.
Then i felt a hand stroke my hair and cold lips softly kiss my forehead, my eyes shot open as i wondered what in the hell my sister was doing creepily kissing me in the night and scanned the room….she was fast asleep. At first i was alarmed at the intrusion but a deep sense of calm washed over me and i knew in that moment someone recognised how i was feeling and tried to comfort me. I know many will think it quite possibly was a dream and yes it could have been, but i also know some people will have awoken from something in the darkness knowing that what they had just experienced was not a dream at all. Your gut registers something different like after a match has burned out and you can still smell that distinctive sulphur scent. Even if it had been purely a dream it brought with it a feeling of peace and that everything would be OK after the storm had passed. I do not know who had kissed me but i thank them for that one simple action that gave me a bit of light in a long dark night.
The next significant event that occurred in this house was not experienced by me but by my sister and my mum. Lil had awoken one night in the early hours to use the bathroom and left the door open while she did her business, still half asleep she looked up to see a small girl with dark hair and old fashioned clothes stood in the darkened living room staring at her, she said she was as solid as you or i and after a few seconds she simply vanished. Mentioning it to mum the next morning they agreed they had figured out where she had come from. We are a simple family and a good day out for us is going to a car boot sale and finding bargains. Mum used to go most weekends during the warm months with her then boyfriend Colin to the large car boots around the county we lived in. One day ( roughly a week before this happened) she came home with a white wicker chair and they thought that this particular apparition was somehow attached to this piece of furniture. I have other thoughts about that but i will get into that at the end. Several nights later mum had woken up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom and she explained to us the next day how she switched on the light and made her way down the hallway she brushed away from her eyes what she described as thick spiders webs, she said that she wafted this stringy like vapour out of her face several times before reaching the bathroom and becoming a bit more alert. It was only then she thought that maybe it was not random webs dangling in her face as she had initially thought as she had to tried to wipe whatever it was from her vision the whole length of the hall. On returning to her room she scoured the hallway ceiling looking for the offending dangling strings of web but couldn’t find any. Putting the two events together they were convinced it had been the same spirit trying to get their attention in different ways.
I have no doubt that both of them experienced something strange over that three day period but i now believe that the spirit was not attached to the chair but had followed us from number 74. When i first went for a reading with who would turn out to be my teacher she had mentioned about a couple of spirits who had attached themselves to me and had followed us to our new house, one was Simong and the other was a little girl. Now me and Lil knew that there were children in the house, she had heard their voices and i had felt the little waist height fingers prodding me in the ribs. Even thought the previous house had been ominous and heavy with sinister vibes it also had it’s bursts of childlike energy that anyone who has experience with child spirits will understand where i am coming from. So that is my theory on the little girl and she is still with me to this day. Strangely enough as i write this out now there is some knocking sounds coming from the cupboard doors behind me…
Spirit guides are an integral part of developing your abilities, and forging a strong and workable relationship with them can take time. For many at first when trying to visualise their guides through meditation the results are a little disappointing. I remember mine being a blurry outline with vague fuzzy features but that is a natural part of strengthening your bond with them and it takes time to be able to tune in properly as you are dealing with an energy that is much different than your own. At the end i will leave a meditation our teacher taught us and with practice it becomes an valuable tool in creating a safe space for you and them. Here i will explain a little more about spirit guides to clear up any misconceptions and maybe give you a bit of a clearer picture of what to expect when you start your journey on the spiritual path.
Sometimes you will get a temporary guide when you first start visualising that may only last your first few meditations until you have your own appointed to you. I had a little crooked old lady cloaked in a shawl, she gave off the most calming and gentle nature and seemed incredibly sweet. Strangely enough when i did this mediation with my sister she described the same lady even though i hadn’t told her about my temporary guide which i found curious to say the least. It was my teacher who suspected that she was not a permanent fixture in my safe space and sure enough within three sessions i had a new guide come in and my oh my… she is feisty! Her name is Isabella but she insists on being called Bella and likes to appear in different brightly coloured skirt’s. The very first thing she ever said to me was “Don’t fuck up.” I remember being quite taken aback by this as i was not expecting that kind of language to come from a spirit guide but what the hell i rolled with it and she had been my main guide ever since. Everyone has a main guide that will be placed beside them and over time you will build your own workable communication and validation techniques which are unique to them and are akin to a calling card or a key so you know that you are receiving information from the correct person.
In my experience you end up with numerous guides for all different aspects of spirit work, although i can’t say i speak for everyone. I have known clairvoyants and mediums to have just one guide and i think it all comes down to what you personally need from them, but if i am being honest that is just guess work from me as i only know who mine are and what my teacher taught me. I have many guides that sit in a circle around me and Bella is by my side within the circle. Even though i started with only two i found over time and after so many years the spaces around the circle would be filled in with new faces and people and eerrm how do i put this….. things… It’s complicated and i will get to that a bit later on but currently i have eighteen different guides. Yes you read that correctly and there are still a few spaces left in my circle. They cover all manner of things mostly spiritual but there are some that seem to be here to aid me in the more normal aspects of day to day life. I will list all mine and what their role is in guiding me. One of my strengths is getting a clear name for a spirit which some struggle with and i will admit that some of these are unusual but these are the names i have been given so i must respect them.
Bella; My main guide who i go to for clarity or confirmation in general work with spirit, she is a beautiful gypsy woman of Mediterranean descent from the late 1700’s.
Malkiel; Is my main angel guide and appears in a shaft of pale blue light. If i need guidance from higher level energies it will be him i go to.
Caruche; Another angel guide with a more soft feminine aura and i see her as a human like form, again i would ask her for guidance when dealing with an issue like i would Malkiel.
Saul; Saul is who helps me with my tarot card readings, he has guided me in this area since i first picked up a deck and has been brilliant in helping me to understand certain layouts and meanings. Saul sadly was a victim of the concentration camps and at first i struggled with his energy as it was quite chaotic and aloof but over time we have built a relationship and he is one of my main guides to go to aside from Bella.
Corteous; Always carries a hawk on his left arm and he is my spirit messenger, usually spirit messengers will carry something symbolic to signify their role as it is a very important role. He is a roman from the later period of the roman empire.
Nemari; Is a lovely Egyptian lady, very young bless her and she helps me with spirit art and transferring things i see onto paper.
Rolda; Is my newest guide and she is a water elemental and utterly fascinating in how she presents herself, she has water vines protruding from her arms and legs and gills, webbed hands and feet. I believe she is here to help me build my connection to elemental spirits as this is an area i have always felt connected too.
Jeruc; Reminds me of the Moroccan Berber men and helps me in controlling and respecting my finances. (I tend to be hopelessly reckless with money.)
Ambrose; A British gentleman from what i presume is the dark ages and although i am still figuring out his role in relation to me i believe it may be Psychometry (The reading of objects and one of my key strengths.)
Annubr; Now this guy is formidable to look at and again i think he is from the British Isles descended from the Celtic era, he is shirtless and wears a ram’s skull over his face so i have never seen what he actually looks like. Annubr is silent he never speaks to me and i don’t think there is any need for him to do so, he is here to aid me in any trance work i may attempt, i have done some scrying on a few occasions and i believe this practice falls under this.
Margret Heckleton; I have tried to research this name as i get the impression that she was a prominent female healer or Dr during Elizabethan times which would have been something exceedingly rare in them days. The way she gave me her full name she sounded full of pride with almost a touch of Don’t you know who i am? I am in no way a healer so for a long time i struggled to understand her role for me. I have on several occasions been horribly ill and i have felt the presence of her hands floating over my body as she worked her spiritual healing abilities on me. She is the only one of my guides i have encountered who has stepped out of the meditation space and into our plane of existence to assist. I can not thank her enough.
Mary Lana; An american lady from the 1870’s who helps me in keeping my home in order as i am a notorious clutter bug who has far too many books and art supplies that do not always get put away.
No cone; Now i am not sure if i have his name correct but that is the closest i have got. He is a Native Indian guide who has an unsurprisingly strong affinity with animals and he has helped me to understand the role of animal spirits and animal guides and the messages they may impart.
Diek/Derrin Parker; Now bear with me i told you things may get weird. Derrin first showed up and would only show himself in side profile which i found odd to say the least. He is a white man with long red hair from the southern counties of the UK roughly circa 1800’s. He wears a rag of cloth round his head much like a pirate and i have always got strong maritime vibes from him…..erm.. them. After several meditations he finally turned so his opposite side was showing well boy oh boy was i in for a surprise it was a large muscular bald headed black man! It was like they had been sliced straight down the middle and glued together. Now i can not tell you what that’s all about as i have no idea and although both were linked in life and had ties to the ocean i am still trying to figure out their roles and the meaning of their bizarre appearance.
The tree; Again a strange one that i first saw many years ago in a dream and i currently have an extremely long ongoing writing project involving this entity. Many years later it randomly popped into my circle. It has blackish bark with no leaves and strange glowing symbols that look like they are carved into its surface. I have pondered over this one as my dream was clearly symbolic of something which i will get into another time.
Jenny Mcreed; A lovely Scottish nurse who was a recent passing in the 1980’s and much like Margret is involved in the healing aspect of things. Jenny helps me in self healing with specific herbal concoctions and remedies, and i find her guidance in working with herbs, flowers and seeds invaluable.
Lady Alton; Another recent guide who came in just before Rolda she is a slight and wispy almost ethereal in her appearance with very pale skin and hair, she lived the 11th century and was a lady of standing although i sense her life was not a happy one. I think she felt very trapped behind the fortress walls and i think it was through this desperation she found her ability as a remote viewer. This is the area where she guides me.
Even though it may look like an abundance of spiritual gifts, many tie into one another but need singularly working on in their own right. Psychometry ties into remote viewing as can trance work. There are still a couple of guides i am working in trying to figure out their meanings or lessons for me as you can see and it isn’t always a quick process. I still have a few spaces in my circle so who knows who may turn up next.
Some sensitives will experience a high pitched whistling or frequency that can indicate a new guide coming into your circle other will get a vibration tone. Sometimes they will appear during your meditation or while you are in your circle communicating with a certain guide that is how i most frequently find out if there is a new edition to my circle. Occasionally i sense a new presence which will gravitate towards one of the empty spaces other times i will see them on the outskirts of the circle. I have heard of people hearing a certain phrase or word they will use to indicate a new person is coming in. With practice you will learn and develop your own method for recognising a new spirit coming into to guide you.
They can also leave your circle, i am quite lucky that i have only ever had one leave but it was obvious that she wasn’t meant to be there for long and when she moved on Annubr took her space. Another key thing you will have to do is learn validation techniques for each and every guide as proof that it is them that has come through and not some impostor ( yes they exist) when you are first introduced to them you ask them for something to validate their presence that only the both of you will recognise. It can be a saying, an image, a sensation or a scent…. it could be anything that is akin to a key unlocking communication with you and is a good practice to get into as it keeps you safe and your circle pure from any negative or mischievous spirits. For Caruche ours is the phrase liquorice moon, or for Saul it is a far more poignant reminder of his heartbreaking past, i get the stinging sensation of being tattooed on the inside of my wrist. For Jenny she shows me a chamomile flower and for Jeruc it is an image of an old set of weighing scales. With A lot of higher level angel guides a lot of people will have the sensation of heat somewhere on their bodies that seems to be the only consistency i have found with spirit work.
There is no hard and fast rules for how they will manifest visually, our teacher told us about a previous class where one of her students bizarrely had a talking two dimensional red triangle as a spirit guide which is perplexing to say the least. The same goes for when they choose to appear for you sometimes it will be as a latent gift which is dormant starts awakening for the first time but you will soon develop signals or signs when a new one is moving into position. I know of a couple of mediums and they have the same circular set up that i have but theirs are family members and ancestors, others will notice a recurring theme with their guides, my teacher curiously pointed out one day that all my human guides were relatively young and it is true none of mine seem to be over the age of forty five. You can also give them gifts to say thank you and i will visually manifest a crystal or fresh herbs to give to a given member of my circle and likewise you can ask for one too. Pay close attention to the images, colours, symbols and words they use as they all hold a deeper meaning within the spiritual plane.
There are some things that you should be wary of though like if a spirit manifesting as a guide constantly places themselves square in front of you then they are not a true guide and someone or something pretending to be so. If that happens you can ask for other guides or a higher power to remove them as they do not belong in your circle nor in your protected place. If a new spirit guide comes in and starts telling you what to do and influencing your thoughts by directing your actions then again they are not true in nature and you must ask for them to be dealt with accordingly. Although rare as your circle is a place bound by rules to which they must abide it does sometimes happen. It is considered wise to be polite and respectful towards them and i am in the habit of saying goodnight to mine when i am settling down for the night, it is my own way of thanking them and showing that i appreciate their guidance. I will leave you with the meditation that i was taught many years ago which is brilliant for setting up your own safe place and circle for spirit guides to come through and communicate and over time you will notice more additions to your secure place. Let me know in the comments about your own spirit guides and your experiences with them.
I want you to imagine that you are standing in a meadow on a warm brightly lit day, your feet are bare upon the grass, the breeze brushing against your skin. I want you to take a deep breath in and breathe in the light and then breathe out the dark. Do this three times in total and pay attention to the scents and flowers you smell. Straight ahead you can see a dense forest and you begin walking towards it see the butterflies and bees in the tall grass amongst the flowers and hear the birds singing all around you. As you get closer to the forest you can see an entrance and you take a deep breath and step through into another world. Seeing a faint path in the dirt you start to follow it as you hear the branches creaking above your head. The leaves rustle and the daylight breaks through the canopy above in golden shafts of light. Pay close attention to the wildlife you see and hear as you continue to travel through the forest on this path, you are making this your unique place. Soon you see the tree trunk’s starting to thin out and up ahead you can see a small locked gate with someone stood beside it waiting for you. At first they will not be clear but as you get closer try and visualise their features and the colours of the clothes they are wearing, even if they are not completely sharp now they will be in time. This is your gate keeper and is the protector of your spiritual space beyond. When you finally reach them yousay hello and thank them for being there and you will notice a key on a bit of string hung around their neck. You ask them if you can have it and they take it off and put it around your own neck, then the gate unlocks and you are free to pass through. You continue on your path but your surroundings are starting to look different now, the forest has disappeared behind you and you are now walking through a garden. I want you to visualise this garden however it pleases you as this is again unique to you. When you reach the end of your path you find a large grassy open clearing and there is a bench waiting for you. Look at the details of the bench is it a particular colour? is it smooth wood or raw branches? Sit down and wait for your guide to meet you there, they may take a few seconds or a few minutes. They might appear right besideyou suddenly or you may see them walking towards you from a distance. Again try and pay attention to what they look like and what they are wearing, they may have a scent or give off an aura. When they are sat beside you thank them for being there and ask them their name and ask them if they have a message for you. If you struggle to get their name immediately don’t worry it will come in time. Ask them to give you their own personal validation sign so that you have a unique calling card for this person and they will give it to you before communication in future. When they havedeparted any messages they see fit and they leave from your circle, begin your walk back on the path through the garden. Give your key back to the gate keeper and follow the path back through the forest and back into the meadow where you started. When you are ready open your eyes. Take your time to jot down any impressions, words or images you received during your meditation. You can also voice record this and play it while your meditate so you can follow your path more easily until it is memorised.
The spirit in my shadow 