Several years ago, I was terrified of Spirit Guides, ghosts, negative beings – any spirit, really.
I spent many a night frozen with fear unable to summon the courage to get out of bed and simply turn on the light because I sensed something in the room, trying to get my attention or communicate with me. Sometimes my heart would beat so fast and all I would hear was the muffled sound of blood pumping really hard around my body as I lay there terrified!
Maybe you’ve had similar experiences. Sometimes those experiences can be real psychic experiences and sometimes our adrenaline and fear kicks in and we begin to imagine things that aren’t there.
For me, fear was the biggest stumbling block on the path of psychic development. Communicating with the spiritual side seemed scary – and I really didn’t want to see scary things.
Spirits Aren’t Spooky
I later learned that communicating with spirit doesn’t have to be frightening. I know because I communicate with spirit all the time. Now it’s not scary – not even a little bit. And this is NOT because I’ve become less of a wimp, it’s because I’ve learned four perspectives/lessons that make communicating with spirits easier. When you know these four things, you can make your experience less frightening:
1. Develop Your Claircognizance, not Your Clairvoyance
Clairvoyance is the ability to see spirits. It’s one of the more well-known psychic gifts. There’s nothing wrong with it, but if you’re easily frightened, it’s probably not the best gift to develop intensively.
To reduce a fear of the spirit world, sensitize yourself to your claircognizance. Claircognizance is when you have psychic information just popping into your brain – which is not scary at all. It is very subtle and is often that subtle judgement or assumption about an outcome, that comes into your brain just before you have a thought. To develop claircognizance, try automatic writing (I don’t think anyone can be too scared for automatic writing.) Automatic writing is my favourite method for communicating with spirit. I have an article for beginners here which teaches you how to do it.
Clairsentience is another non-scary way to communicate with spirit. It is all about gut feelings – and no one can be scared of their own gut feelings. Here’s an article I wrote about sensitizing yourself to clairsentience.
As for clairvoyance, it doesn’t HAVE to be that scary either.
I don’t see dead people walking around my neighbourhood – I never have (I don’t see spirits with my bare eyes at all.) When I see deceased spirits, I see them in my mind’s eye. Seeing a spirit in your mind’s eye is not as scary as seeing a dead person walking around.
Now for the second way you can reduce fear when interacting with spirits:
2. Increase Your Level of Control and Sovereignty
You can quickly become more in control of HOW and WHEN you receive information.
Don’t want to see spirits? – Tell your Spirit Guides and Higher self. Let them know you are not comfortable getting messages through clairvoyance.
Don’t want to be surprised by spirits? – Tell your guides you will tune into them once a week but you don’t want surprise input without you asking for it.
Even when you do see spirits in your mind’s eye, you are in control – you can make the spirit clearer, or less vivid. You can tune it out. You can tell it to go away. You can turn your mind’s eye off and completely ignore it (there may be times when you do need to do this). You can tell your Spirit Guides not to allow spirits to come through to you when you’re not consciously asking for it. You are essentially in control of your mind’s eye and you can turn off visions. It’s the same with clairaudience (which is the ability to hear spirits.)
When it’s Time to Turn off Psychic Abilities
If you have clairaudient experiences or see visions that you cannot control, then you really need to know that it is possible to turn it off, and you have to want to. You might like to read this article to find out how to do that: How to Switch off Psychic Abilities.
Telling Spirits to Get Lost
Being in control also applies to your space and your home. Do you sense something in your space when it shouldn’t be? Tell it to leave. You can because you’re in control of your energy and your space. Nothing should enter your energy field without your permission. It’s the same with your space. If you are renting or own your space, then intruding energies shouldn’t enter it without permission. The only time they can enter your space and your energy is when you forget you’re in charge and get too scared to boot them out, or when you haven’t consciously set parameters around this.
You can make prayers and rituals to make it really clear to the unseen world that you are the sovereign of your space and energy.
Here’s one way of doing this:
1. Light a white candle
2. Call on your Higher self and Spirit Guides
3. Visualize putting a bubble around yourself
4. Repeat the affirmation:
“Nothing can enter my space without my permission.”
Say it ten times, as a command.
If you say this over and over to yourself, it builds up your sense of power. Say it with an attitude and even anger if you feel like an earthbound spirit is intruding on your space. Anger is one step better than feeling helpless. It helps to raise your vibration if you’re in a space of fear.
Now let’s talk about the third way to make the spirit world less frightening…
3. Communicate with Spirit More Often
One way to make communicating with the spirit world less frightening is to do it more often. There comes a point when talking to spirit is a bit like picking up the phone, and it becomes a bit mundane!
In the beginning, I used to get really creeped out because when I tuned into my Spirit Guides, I used to feel tingling on the sides of my head. Now that has become a commonplace occurrence – it happens a lot when I do readings but I barely notice it now.
You may be creeped out the first time you communicate with spirit, but you definitely won’t be creeped out once you’ve done it 20 times!
4. Don’t Watch Scary Films about Ghosts
One final tip: If you don’t want scary spirit experiences, I advise not watching scary films about ghosts and evil spirits! Those are designed to evoke fear to give you a thrill and they have nothing to do with the reality of communicating with the spiritual realm. They’re definitely not helpful for reducing fear of the spirit world if you are the type who is easily frightened in that regard (like I was.)
Still have a serious fear of spirits? – Check out this article: How to Overcome a Fear of the Spirit World.
Anna,
Can you explain what you mean by saying your mind’s eye? Thanks.
Hi Anna,
I just wanted to make sure I understood it right because thats exactly what I’ve been experiencing since January (and has scared me a lot!). I mean, I am not clairvoyant but suddenly (after doing a level of Karuna Reiki) I started to see images/shapes when closing my eyes just before falling asleep. I see them just in front of my third eye… So thanks again, your article was really enlightening of what I have been experiencing…
Oh ive had lots of scary experiences. Right from an early age. The one predominant one I had that shut down my abilities for a few years, was in my bedroom I felt this noise around my walls, usually at night, like fingernails scratching, but it wooshed around the room. I thought perhaps it was a rat in my roof but it wasn’t coming from the ceiling, but it was a scurrying sound. Finally I got some *ghostbusters* in and they were creeped out, but managed to clear the energy. I had been given a necklace from tradeaid of a fertility goddess. they linked the energy to the necklace, saying it had been cursed by a witch doctor. they saw a hand coming through a portalway in my wall, a bloodied hand. after they cleared the energy the room completely changed feel and the noise never came back. They said the necklace was clear now but i wasn’t keeping it, I threw it in the sea.
That scared the shit out of me and so I never dabbled again lol
Another thing I want to say on this topic is that people who have been abused in some way, especially in their childhood, can find it hard to tell spirits to go away and believe it will happen because they said so. Because they weren’t able to do it as a child etc. Having to work through being able to protect oneself can be important here.
Hi Sylvia,
Your mind’s eye is what you see when you close your eyes. It’s like a movie screen in your head. Try visualizing a big red balloon in your mind – that image will appear in your mind’s eye. At first, it can be difficult to access the mind’s eye, but the more you use it, the easier it becomes.
Does that make sense?
Thanks Anna! This is very helpful!
It is interesting to me that you talk of spirit guides as helpful happy beings floating about ready to give you a helping hand. There are a lot of tortured souls out there with very angry spirit guides whose main purpose is to create havoc and pain and punishment on the human race. Yes, they have the agreement with the being to be there and probably unconscious to it. IF you ever look at a violent person in society and look at there true self, it is not them committing the act, it is a spirit guide of theirs.
Yes there is great healing beings out there also, who do help us as a whole and individually to evolve as human beings as much as we ask of them. But a whole side of a coin is not being addressed.
Forest – I don’t believe that anyone’s Spirit Guides can make them do anything, without their collaboration – much less a violent act.
If someone is living in great fear and feels victimized by their own Spirit Guides, then I would suggest not to develop psychically. It’s not a solid foundation to build on.
Hi Kate – Interesting story you wrote. That is a good point you made about people who have been abused as children. I guess how you interact with the spirit world will be similar to how you are with people..if you let people walk all over you, you’re probably not going to exert much control over your energetic space either.
Thanks so much this helped me alot. When i was little and taking a bath or usinng the restroom i used to feel tingling all over my body. i was so scared that i hurried up and got the heck out of there and hid under my covers. now i understand.
I have been looking for this type of information for a while now. I have been having trouble controlling the communication I get – both from living people and from spirit. I don’t normally consider myself scared of spirit, but I realized that what I was really scared of was loosing the communication ability because I dismissed it for a while and things got “quiet”. Now I feel more confident in being able to reconnect, and to use the information more productively.
THANKS!
I’ve have only 1 really scary experience. I was only like 10 so it was really scary to me and I am 14 now. Well in the middle of the night I woke up and saw something. I started to wake up more and become more aware to my surroundings when I saw that it was a spirit. I was staring at it in complete terror with half my face under the covers. It was an old man,glasses,mustache,hair, and I saw that he was wearing a buttoned down shirt and i kinda saw the pants. His lower legs were a little more white and blurry. But he did look really real, clear, and detailed. he wasn’t paying attention to me, just staring at the walls. He then disappeared and reappeared next to my bed and then did the same thing again and reappeared in the middle of my room again. It was very early in the morning with a couple more hours left and I told myself i can’t just lie here all night staring at this spirit in terror. God only knows what will happen. So I decided on the count of 3 I would sprint out of my room into my mom and dads room. I started to count to 3 slowly and then right when I said 3 I jumped out of bed and ran sooo fast but i did notice as I ran past him I saw him turn his head really fast and he watched me run out of the room. While I was in my bed I was also pinching myself, closing my eyes, shaking my head with my head under the covers and he was still there. Not my imagination. When I went into my parents room I just went to sleep there and don’t know where he went after that. I never saw this spirit ever again and this is the only ghostly experience I’ve had. I think I lost my sixth sense a little bit and i wish to regain it cuz now that i am older i have a great interest to communicate with spirits but I do want to have control and i don’t really like seeing them. thats what scares me. And please reply telling me why you think he never came back and why maybe he showed his self to me? Also do you think he showed himself or I was just able to see him. is there a difference? I do wish to know who he was and why he came but the only way to do that is to somehow communicate with him which i think i am too scared to do. Well, Thanks for this article!
I’m terrified of spirits, and I watch Paranormal State and Psychic Kids episodes over and over to try to better realize that spirits will not harm me. I am 14, between the ages where the brain starts “rewiring” itself (12 and 21 I think) which I learned in National Geographic. It says that the brain picks up more and more information, and you can “readjust” things if you practice. I’m becoming more of a psychic and I’m always thinking “I’m a psychic” and I think it’s helping a bit.
I saw a shadow person dash by a light in my garage, at 11pm when I was cleaning up a craft I did earlier, and he left a shadow on the opposite wall. I WAS TERRIFIED BUT SO EXCITED! It was amazing. I’ve looked up shadow people and I’ve read more about spirits. I now have realized that they’re basically humans-just no physical body. They are as curious and afraid as we are of THEM. They may hide because they’re hurt, scared, might not even know they’re dead, or might even not know how to get to the “other side”. I tried to contact him once, and he was gently pushing one of the punching bags on the stand, and it was rocking back and forth. That’s all I got from him, because I was nervous and had only been there for 5 minutes. Another experience I had was after a friend died in 5th grade, I heard my name whispered in my ear in the middle of class. The last experience I’ll share is this: I was in a cathedral with my father, he was somewhere at the altar, fixing something. We were alone in the church. I was just about to walk up the stairs to the choir loft, when a spirit man, in kahki pants and a blue dress shirt walked up the stairs, and faded away before me. I’m going to try to contact by automatic writing with my other sort of psychic friend soon! Thanks for your advice about spirits on this site!
Hi Anna,
The one i remember is when i was 9 my sister was looking at the window and begged me to look so i did. I seen a woman that look just like my mother. Same coat my mom have and hair color and eye color. i ask my mom if she had a twin but my mom said no. when she look outside their was no one foot prints but her own. even since than i seen or hear spirits talking to me or about me. some scary me at times.
thank you for you info it helped out alot.
i’m 23, and have no one to talk to about being a psychic i thought i was going crazy for the past 5 years now. reading what you put about not being afraid and such has really helped. thanks im saving certain things to look at later
Hi Anna, nice article. I enjoyed reading it as I do many of your articles.
One thing I learned early on in my own spiritual development was to simply NOT push myself beyond my own comfort zone while learning new subjects. If something “creeped” me out, then I would simply leave it out of my spiritual studies/practice at that time. I found that as my study and practice base strengthened, I could approach that same “creepy” subject again years, or months later and be all ready for it. One example here is communication with spirit guides…for me,many years ago, just the thought of this kind of communication turned me completely off. However, within just a few short years of continued spiritual growth, guess what I was doing?!?! Yup! Communicating with my own spirit guides! Never say never, right? 🙂
Also, over the years, I’ve learned that sometimes I just need a break from all my spiritual studies, and practice. I need to get completely away from them, take a “vacation”, and concentrate on other things in life. This vacation is usually a few days, or maybe a couple of weeks long. I found I needed these breaks more when I was a newbie first starting into my studies. I think this was because my being was acclimatizing(?) itself to new experiences. I find, now, that I rarely need them. But anyway, there’s nothing wrong with taking a break from spiritual studies, and one will usually find they have a fresher mind that is eager to get back to work when one returns.
Peace!
Hi Anna,
Very informative and interesting site you have. I do have something to tell you and I hope you can give me some advice.
I know I have always had an intuitive mind and always very open to spirits. I never paid much attention in the past. But lately, since my very close grandmother passed away, I have been calling to her to give me a sign that she hears me asking for her advice and to help me through bad times and that I miss her and my grandfather dearly. She did.
I was sleeping so soundly (very unusual for me)when at around 3:45am, I just opened my eyes and stared right at the top of the tv set which holds 3 different lights(I sleep on the couch). First light plugs in the wall, it’s a bright white light. The second is run by batteries and is a rope blue butterfly light. The third is a battery run toy bear that changes different colours (this is the bear I gave my grandmother for her to look at, she had alzimeirs and I looked after her for many years, everyday). They all went off exactly at the same time. Then turned back on, then all off again. I was scared but then I realized it must be my nana letting me know she hears me.Then I actually had thoughts in my head of her talking to me and telling me to do a few things for her.
My question to you is, What the heck was this? Can I really communicate with spirits? Are they actually hearing me?
Thanks so much Anna and sorry for such a long reply.
My aunt & uncle passed away both were found wed morning by my cousin. They both have been dead for two days..they passed away sun found on wed. But there spirit is coming to me ..I’ve seen spirit’s before never scared me but some reason this one scares me to death why….something does not feel right….
Hi Anna, I have recently started following your blog and seriously I find this more informative than data available over the web.Really appreciate it. I am following the exercises tha you have suggested to explore the scope and vision of mind eye.Today, after 5 consecutive years of practice, I saw some letters and numbers(clear though),…just wanted to find out, does this make any sense..
recently i have moved back in the home i grew up in. my dad passed over in jan 1998.at times i think i see movement slight shadow.how do i connect with that movement.i am 61 and no-nonsense person.how do i find out if its real or not.
I’ve seen shadows out of the corner of my eye since i was little, but always dismissed it.I believe this is due to the fact my family is a medical family and work with the elderly/dying. My mom loves fortune tellers, me not a big fan, but she’s been to a few and each one asked/told her she has a daughter who can “see.” Still i dismissed this until a recent encounter where my mind is blown and I’m scarred.
So I am taking out the trash like I do every night and the light flashes on. I would normally dismiss the shadow i saw due to the light flashing next to me(motion detecting lights), but this was a very different figure then i see usually. It was on the railing of my patio deck and i could see it wearing a dress and it seemed female. I took a step towards it and it turned around and it smiled that joker smile(from Batman)and looked down to the ground(a 20 ft drop). And when I blinked it was gone.
It was clearly not human but that did not stop me from rushing to see if anything fell below. Of course nothing, but i got the feeling that thing committed suicide by jumping. But all this took place in seconds, but i felt a lot of things. Fear(my usual “OMG i saw something that’s not real” fear), fear for the “person”, sadness, shock, bittersweet-ness. I’m confused and scared and to get over the fear wish to socialize more with things around me(school) what can i do without looking silly?
Hi Anna
I have had lots of scary incidents happen to me
The first one was when I was really little, I used to live in a flat that was really haunted. Everyone either see something or felt something…. It would move toys around and fog up indoors. We left here when I was 12.
When we moved to our new home every time I tried to go to sleep, I started getting sensations that I was spinning, and felt I was being pulled down, I knew that if I hit the bottom, something bad would happen, so I would get out of bed and walk around until I was so dog tired, it wouldn’t happen. I started going to spiritulist group in my 20’s and the leader told me that the spinning sensation (which i was still getting) was a spirit trying to speak through me (this really freaked me out), she also said that I was very suseptable to the spirits. I went to number of meetings and saw a number of things.
I also had a incident where I had someone talking to me, it was my husbands father whom I had never met. It was really strange because although I could hear talking, it was like in my head. My husband kept asking me question for him to answer and every answer I gave was correct (I knew it would be, because he was telling me).
Since all of this, I have lost both my parents and a brother and sister, I have never been able to contact them, although I would dearly love too.
Why can other spirits come to me and not them???
Sorry for the long winded story :o)
Sue
Hi,
I’m 23 and always had a spiritual side. I recently wanted to start developing my psychic side but i have depression, i get my days but my meds help a lot and you say maybe its not such a good idea for someone like me, but if my meds help does that mean my vibration will still be low?
Thanks.
Kerri
I recently lost a good friend. He was 22 and he was epileptic which was actually the cause of his death. Last night I was lay in bed and I had the feeling I was being watched and saw smokey shaddow in my room which I thought nothing of. Later I heard footsteps and then again saw a smokey effect but this time was in the appearance of a body shape. I was that spooked out I hid under the covers and minutes later his favourite song started to play on my phone by itself and when I came out from under the covers, the song went off and the figure went away. Later I woke from my tv going on and when I shut my eyes I saw my friends face. My head started to get pins n needle like feeling. Is this him telling me that he’s there with me? And could the feeling on my head be his epilepsy and be a sign that it is him?
On the last day I saw my father alive, he spoke to a my friends mom who passed away many years ago. I thought he was hallucinating because he was on so much drugs. It was brief and because I was in so much shock that he was going to die, I didn’t really such much except “dad, are there angels in the room?” I saw a tear roll down his cheek and he said yes. We didn’t know her in this lifetime, she just appeared. I was so numb, I couldn’t process anything. He told me that she was singing happy birthday to me. I said it’s not my birthday. Fast forward a few years, my friend and I talked again, just because I was so curious to see if this could be true, but I proceeded with caution. We had some drinks and inhibition was lost for a few hours. he told me his last conversation with his mom. I fell fast asleep very drunk, and in the middle of my sleep I heard a womans voice, I woke up startled. his last conversation had two words and both words reversed is my chinese zodiac. Happy birthday was in fact her way of revealing their last conversation… mirroring my last conversation with my dad. More time went by, I didn’t want to tell him because I believe in God but I am A SKEPTIC when it comes to signs. But it wouldn’t go away. Signs became more frequent. I went to church, lit a candle and asked for a sign that it was her singing happy birthday. At the end of mass, the priest praised an alterboy, nodded to the organist and my mouth dropped when I heard the entire congregation sing happy birthday. There’s just no way! So I typed up everything and dropped it off at his door, I couldn’t face him. He was appreciative:) More time goes by, I lose touch with him again. So in the last few months I see all these signs again… Crazy coincidences, very strange and beautiful at the same time. I kept telling myself it’s nothing, but my gut feeling is somethings up. So I text him a lot! He responds that he has a girlfriend… naturally I’m furious and tell him off. But the signs continue… I received a text 3 x’s with his birthyear and mine combined; at work i see his name and 707 next to it (BTW this # is ALWAYS associated with him and her, if anyone knows what that # means please let me know) The song ROSE by Bette Medler is always on now… And she reveals the most about her daughter. He wants absolutely nothing to do with me, and I’m so exhausted by all this, that I just don’t understand what I’m supposed to do? And now I doubt absolutely everything. Why is she in my company? Is this just my imagination? Did I do something wrong?
I will start with my experiance first. Just last weekend, while visiting my dad, i remember walking into my room and thinking “oh my god why does it feel so dark in here?!” Later on i was back in there going to bed when i saw this little boy. He is terrifying. He followed my every move, crept into dreams, and just scared me. I remember feeling scared and angry and confused. I don’t want to leave my parents side because i think nothing can touch me if i’m with them.
Hello, I Am Trying To Get In Contact With My Grandpa. I Have A Little Fear But I Bet Once I See Him I Won’t Be Scared Anymore. Any Help On How I Can Get In Contact With Him Anna?
Great article and very helpful thank you! Do you have any recommendations of anybody that can help with teaching to understand and not be afraid in London,UK? It would be great to not be afraid and understand this more finally after years of fighting it. Thank you.
Hey, I am 16 and I have been able to communicate with the spirit world since I was an infant. I know that can appear rather hard to believe but I can remember my very first encounter. I have trouble controlling my psychic gift. I can see them, talk to them, since them, sometimes even feel them. It is most common for me to since their presence late at night. They can even communicate with me in my dreams. I have had really bad experiences. I have also had pleasant experiences. The reason I am telling you this is I want help personally. This gift is shunned by my family. They say it’s a sin to communicate with entities. Everyone I have personally consulted with has told me I am very strong. The only problem is how do I control it. How do I master it.