Seeing Visions with Ouija, Seances, and Scrying

TL;DR

Seer powers and abilities can often be used to see your future in regards to love and spirituality, but that’s not all they are used for. How to communicate with the dead by holding a séance, scrying on black mirrors, and how to use the Ouija board as more than just a device to help you find lost items are also ways to use spiritual gifts. Learn about Ouija boards, black mirror scrying, and séance rituals with Mysticsense today.

“I want to do more with understanding my spiritual gifts besides just using a love vision board!” Good for you! Learning to do simple magic for manifesting is just one way you can use your psychic gifts. The “darker” arts like communication with the dead and using the ancient art if scrying- what a mysterious sounding word- are things not everybody takes the time to learn about. Are written séance instructions all you need to call up the dead on your own, and how is that done? Can Ouija boards conjure spirits that give specific answers like the movies say they can and is that dangerous? What is scrying and how do you do that? Join us to read about the mystical practices of seances, Ouija boards, and scrying today!

What is a Séance?

“ Then Saul said to his servants, “Seek out for me a woman who is a medium, that I may go to her and inquire of her.” And his servants said to him, “Behold, there is a medium at En-dor.” “ 1 Samuel 28:7

A séance is when people gather to communicate with the dead, usually with the help of a psychic medium, or somebody who can speak with and hear messages from spirits. This is often done formally at an event or at a shop, and sometimes one family comes to speak with one deceased loved one, but at times mediums have groups of the public who have never met one another before who will gather and the medium takes turns calling each participant’s deceased loved one so they can speak with them or receive messages. Movies, and old photos from the Victorian era show elaborate meeting rooms with richly dressed mediums, some of whom became quite wealthy and famous from being doing seances. The Fox Sisters were an example.

These sisters were named Leah, Margaretta, or Maggie, and Catherine, or Kate. When Maggie was 14 and Kate was 11, they claimed they were able to communicate with the dead, and their eldest sister, Leah believed them. It was said their house was haunted, and there were mysterious sounds of knocking or rapping and what sounded like furniture moving when nobody was moving any furniture. One night, Kate told people that she challenged what she perceived as a spirit to repeat knocking sounds she made- and she said it did! The girls told the neighbors and said they worked out a system with their spirit they called “Mr. Splitfoot” where combinations of how many knocks or raps the spirit made indicated a yes or no answer or an alphabet letter.

News spread like wildfire, and within two years, the girls were paid for public demonstrations. By 1857, various investigators declared the girls’ frauds, one stating the girls made the rapping noises they claimed the spirits did by cracking their toe joints. In 1887, another investigator stated they were sitting near the sisters when they called for spirits to make the rapping noises, and the investigator reported they felt them tapping their feet on the floor. By 1888, Maggie publicly said that their method was fake, and showed how they did it. She attempted to recant the confession, but their credibility was gone by then.

However, the author KNOWS mediumship is real because she has witnessed it. The author was estranged from a family member before their death. While this family member was alive, they often asked other people to tell the author “I want her to know I love her very much.” Years after the family member passed away, the author was on staff to read Tarot at a psychic studio around Halloween where a séance was taking place. The author speaks to her own dead loved ones and had no interest in having a psychic medium do so for her. However, the medium approached and informed the author that said family member “Wants you to know they love you very much.” Nobody at the séance knew anything about the author’s family member let alone the exact words they had used many times. Mediums exist and are very helpful for mediating communications between the dead and the living.

How to Conduct a Séance

While some would assume special séance chants or trances are a must to conduct a séance, all you need is to have the natural ability to receive messages from the dead. You need not adhere to any specific structure or techniques, just go with your own abilities. However, there are some things to keep in mind when communicating with the dead.

Be Respectful

The dead are the same beings they were when they were living, they just don’t have physical bodies anymore. They still deserve and expect to be respected. Do not “COMMAND” a spirit to appear or make itself known through signs or noises. It is not a servant, existing to appease the living, but somebody who is open to continuing to speak with the people they love even once they die. The same respect in communication with the living should be observed when speaking with the dead.

Be Direct

No cryptic, fancy talk is necessary to contact the dead. Simply say their name and ask them if you can communicate with them. Ask what you want to ask and tell them what you want them to know. It’s that easy.

Don’t Waste their Time

Communication with the dead should not be part of spooky fun or games for when you are bored or want to try something new. The dead have moved on to a new part of life and taking the time to stay connected with their friends and family who are still living may be important to them, but it is not for amusement, but to maintain their relationships. Movies might show people having a rip-roaring fun time being scared by ghosts, but in real life, your deceased grandmother watching over you is the least scary or thrilling thing there is. It is a blessing, and when you call your loved one to speak with it should be for something important.

How to Communicate with Deceased People Without Seances

There are many different ways of how to communicate with a deceased loved one other than through seances. Mediums psychic readings can be had through most psychic organizations, not just Mysticsense, and in person psychic appointments with mediums who help show you how to communicate with dead loved ones can be arranged at most local shops. However, how to fulfill your wish to speak to the dead can be done by creating your own personal altar at home.

Building Your Ancestor Altar

Yours can be as simple or as elaborate as you like. Ancestor altars are most powerful when made gradually over time, although successful communication can happen the first time you use your new ancestor altar. Get photos of your loved one as well as any items that either belonged to them that you have, or gifts they gave to you. These items put a tangible object that is directly connected to them and represents them onto the altar. These things are really all that is necessary unless you would like to add more.

You can add candles that you light anytime you go to the altar to communicate, as well as incenses and food and drink offerings to them can be added as well. Some people buy something called ancestor money to burn as gifts for the dead, and other people put a plant they water and tend to as a representation of life and their “family tree” on the altar. If you like, place symbols of your faith on the altar, and skulls representing death itself are also often used for ancestor altars. Fresh flowers can be placed on the altar as gifts for the dead.

The altar is used as a sacred place where you go to speak with your deceased loved ones and ask them to speak to you. There are really no hard and fast rules, unless you belong to a religious tradition that has ascribed techniques for creating and using the ancestor altar, so build yours to your own personal taste. Put things on there that make you feel close to your deceased loved ones as well as things your loved ones would have liked and will appreciate. For some people, black coffee, chocolate, and tobacco are gifts given to their dead, and to others, things like charitable works in their name are the gifts given. You will decide for yourself what you feel is best, and the longer you have your altar and use it, the more it will change and evolve.

What is a Ouija Board?

“A friend comes over with a Ouija board.It spells out: Bourbon…

Just because you’re dead doesn’t mean you can’thave fun.”-Kelli Russell Agodon, Hourglass Museum

Plenty of horror flicks start out with bored teens or young adults giggling over a Ouija board they want to have fun with. Often, a character makes a blanket request like “If any spirit is here, make yourself known!” Of course, this is what causes all the scary things to happen to the people who thought the session with the Ouija board was for laughs. Movies aside, the true history of the Ouija board will surprise you.

Believe it or not, the Ouija board was a board game produced and patented in the 1890’s by Elijah Bond, and by the 1920’s these were quite popular. Prior to this, similar things called “talking boards” were used and were popular during enthusiasm for spiritual and occult topics by the Victorians. Even Aleister Crowley, famous Thelemite occultist writer wrote abut the talking boards. He urged a student to practice using the board to communicate with an angel. By WWI, an American occultist named Pearl Curran popularized the Ouija board as an important tool to use in communication with the dead.

The technique is to place your hands on a dial, called a planchette, and the belief is that the spirit will influence you to love the planchette. Numbers, letters, and words like “yes” and “no” are on the board, and it is believed the spirit can spell out words one letter at a time this way. This is no different than belief that spirits can influence people to use what is referred to as automatic writing. That happens by the medium relaxing or going into trance, and they psychically listening to what the spirit is guiding them to write. Some mediums say the spirit takes control, using the mediums hand, and others say they receive messages from the spirit, and they write the messages themselves. Automatic writing has been around since at least 1100 AD in China!

Back to the present, a new Ouija Board can be purchased online from Hasbro, who now manufactures them here: Ouija Game | Hasbro Games

What are the Dangers of the Ouija Board?

Another feature shown in pop culture films is that the Ouija board drums up “evil spirits” that maim or kill, and these boards are flat out malevolent things that should be avoided. Is this true?

Portals to Hell

Some believe that spirit boards, and all forms of divination open a portal to the Biblical Hell, allowing various demons or the devil himself to come in, possessing human beings in horrifying ways. Mysticsense cannot preach belief, or if you believe in the existence of the devil or demons, however, if you do, think of one thing. Do you believe that an inanimate game board that is made of wood or cardboard has the power to destroy human beings or that such a thing is necessary for malevolent beings to use to make it to earth? Furthermore, do you believe that if such a creature willed itself to come and possess or attack, that NOT using a board game to talk to them would prevent them from coming? All of this seems unlikely. Perhaps fear of a board game being demonic or evil in and of itself need not be a concern after all.

Furthermore, according to Christianity, which is the religion that adheres to belief in the devil, once you are baptized, the devil cannot “get you” or “possess you.” Perhaps a board game is not as powerful as your baptism and your will that your soul belongs to your god.

Calling Random Spirits

A real risk of using the Ouija board is to do, as some in films do and call “Any spirit that can hear”. You wouldn’t invent a phone number and dial it, placing demands that the random stranger who picks up the phone to answer every question you have and talk to you for as long as you want them to. So why place such rude demands on spirits? When using a Ouija board or any other form of divination to contact spirits, be specific about what spirits you are contacting just like you would when calling to speak with living people.

Angering Ghosts

Is there a risk you will anger spirits if you call them using a Ouija board? Only if you call them disrespectfully or if you say something to them that upsets them. You don’t need a Ouija board or divination to do that, and you can use the Ouija board respectfully, and not risk upsetting spirits you contact with it.

Is Ouija Just a Séance Board?

Perhaps a Ouija board is a form of séance tool if you think about it. How it differs, however, is some seances are conducted without a spirit board, but a spirit board can absolutely be the method you use to receive messages from the dead during a séance. Some mediums will use automatic writing to get messages from the dead, and others will simply listen. There is no one right way to speak with the dead, and spirit boards like the Ouija board are used as a tool for that by many.

What is Scrying?

“ Mirror to mirror, mirror to know, mirror to help the power flow.

Mirror absorb, reflect my gaze, show the truth within your glaze.

Show the future and the past, all that is hidden reveal at last.

Mirror, mirror, display for me, that which I desire to see.” Anonymous

Another mystical technique for getting answers is by scrying. Scrying entails looking or gazing into the surface of some type of object to receive visions. Various objects are used for this including but not limited to crystal balls, crystal gemstones, water, patterns in the sky or air, and even various types of mirrors. Perhaps the most famous method used for scrying is use of the scrying mirror, or “black mirror.”

How to Scry with Black Mirrors

A black mirror is created when a regular mirror’s back side is painted black. It takes on the look of a large shiny black onyx, however, some people don’t blacken their scrying mirror at all, but simply gaze into a regularly colored mirror in a darkened room. Multiple techniques are used, depending on individual beliefs or traditions.

One practice was for young single people to gaze into a mirror in a dark room on Halloween to see if they could see a vision of who their future spouse would be. However, it was believed that of they saw, instead, a skull in the mirror, it would portend they would die before having the chance to marry.

Some people believe the power of the full moon is good for divination, so they fill a bowl of water and try to catch the reflection of the moon when it is full in the bowl of water, then gazing in it to see what messages or visions they can. Others will simply leave a bowl of water outside under the full moon, and sometime in the next day, look into the water to see what messages they get. Still others see no need for the full moon to be reflected in the bowl of water but will ask the full moon to give them messages, and may even cover their head with a cloth for soke darkness, and gaze into the bowl of water that way to get messages.

Some people will cover their scrying mirrors when not using them, and others keep them out, uncovered, and look at them often, never knowing when they may get an important vision from their mirror. Some people will go into a relaxed trance state for scrying, and still others say they don’t need to. Experimenting with your scrying object will show you what the best techniques are, and your skills will improve with time.

How to Connect with My Higher Self by Scrying?

What wisdom can you seek to find by scrying? Any wisdom you like at all. Scrying is just another form of divination, and like tarot, pendulum, use of things like the I Ching, and even divining from omens, any question the powers that be allow can be answered in this way. Asking questions to reveal aspects of your higher self can absolutely be done through scrying.

Like with any form of mystical practice, holding seances, using the Ouija board or any other type of spirit board, or scrying can reveal unlimited answers and wisdom. Would you like to know more about your own spiritual gifts and how to develop them? A psychic reading with one of our advisors at Mysticsense can illuminate your hidden gifts and help get you on the road to developing them. Learn more about your own spiritual and psychic gifts through a personalized reading with us today!