- Seventeen-year-old Jolene K, a passionate
student of the paranormal and the occult, had begun experimenting with
the Ouija board. She thought she had the knowledge to contact spirit entities
through the board, but unfortunately she had neglected to assume a prayerful
attitude to guard against malignant influences.
-
- Her parents, Darwin and Aileen, called
me to their home after a Friday night slumber party encounter with an ouija
board had left their daughters, Jolene and twelve-year-old Joy, and three
of Jolene's friends in hysterics.
-
- According to Jolene, it had all begun
three nights before on Tuesday evening after she had achieved what she
believed to be a successful contact with a benevolent spirit through the
Ouija board. The teenager said that she was in the process of putting the
board away she became aware of a dark presence following her.
-
- "At first it seemed something like
a dark cloud," she said. "Or maybe even some kind of dark cloth,
like a billowing cloak of some kind."
-
- After she prepared for bed and said her
prayers, she fell into a deep sleep.
-
- "But when I awakened sometime before
morning, I had an awful feeling," she said. "It felt like something
icky was in the room with me."
-
- Jolene got up, turned on all the lights
in her bedroom, and went to the bathroom. "The lights made things
better," she recalled, "so I just left them on until it was time
for me to get up and go to school."
-
- But even during the day at high school,
she felt peculiar. "Really weird and nasty thoughts kept popping into
my mind," she said. "Stupid thoughts, ugly thoughts--and especially
sexual thoughts. I found myself fantasizing about guys--and girls. And
when I walked between classes with my boyfriend Jake, I was literally trembling
from the sexual feelings that I had for him."
-
- Later that night, as Jolene prepared
for bed, she washed her face, applied some cold cream on her face and was
in the process of her evening "zit check" in front of her bathroom
mirror when she found herself becoming completely fascinated with her features.
-
- "It was as if I was seeing myself
for the first time," she said. "Suddenly my nose, my cheekbones,
my lips, my chin, my long dark hair--all of me seemed so totally wonderful.
I was really beautiful. I wasn't just all right--I was terrific. And especially
my eyes. I found myself just staring into the reflection of my eyes in
the mirror."
-
- Jolene has no idea how long she stood
mesmerized by her own image in the mirror before she was aware of Joy standing
beside her and squealing in disgust: "Eeeew! You really love yourself,
don't you, Miss Movie Star? How creepy can you get? You were about to kiss
yourself in the mirror!"
-
- Jolene screamed at her sister, reminding
Joy how many times she had forbidden her from entering "Her Majesty's"
room without knocking first and gaining permission to do so.
-
- "But the little Munchkin was right,"
Jolene admitted. "It was creepy the way I was standing there just
staring at myself."
-
- It became even creepier and more disconcerting
when Jolene was brushing her teeth on Wednesday morning and saw a few moments
of a fleeting "motion picture" in the mirror.
-
- "It was like the mirror became a
kind of crystal ball," she said, "and I saw my boyfriend Jake
and his buddy Chuck getting in a bender-fender on the way to school that
morning. When Jake wasn't in his homeroom, I knew that I had seen true.
By third hour, everyone was talking about the accident. I had received
an accurate prevision of an actual future event."
-
- For the first time, Jolene decided to
share her uncomfortable experience with the shadowy form that followed
her back to her body after working the Ouija board. Melanie, Heather, and
Michaela were three close friends who were also fascinated by the supernatural.
All four of them were fans of the various vampire-slayers and witches on
television, and each of them had built up a small library of books on magic,
witchcraft, and the occult.
-
- "Melanie hoped one day to become
an initiated witch," Jolene said. "Heather experimented with
a lot of different areas of the paranormal, and Michaela wanted to study
to be a parapsychologist when she entered college."
-
- Jolene told them that not only had she
foreseen Jake's and Chuck's accident that morning, but ever since that
night she had been receiving other kinds of strange visions.
-
- "I could tell they really excited
when I told them about all the sexual fantasies that had come to me, but
they were most impressed with my ability to pick up impressions from some
of the jewelry and stuff they had. I told them where they had got certain
items or who had given it to them. Things I swear I didn't know before."
-
- Then Michaela, the budding parapsychologist,
removed the deck of miniature Zener cards that she always carried in her
purse. The deck consists of five each of five symbols--the square, the
cross, the wavy lines, the circle, and the star--and is used to test ESP.
-
- "The girls were like totally amazed
when I first got twenty out of twenty-five right, then twenty-two and twenty-three
out of twenty-five," Jolene said. "Before when Michaela had tested
me, I had never got too much above chance, five, six, or seven correct."
-
- The consensus of Jolene's confidantes
was that an entity from the Other Side had been summoned by her experiments
with the Ouija board and was granting her increased psychic powers, such
as an ability to receive glimpses of the future.
-
- "I could tell that they were all
kind of jealous of me, you know," Jolene said.
-
- When Jolene looked into the mirror that
night, she was startled to see a face behind her own, just to the left
of her shoulder.
-
- "The image really frightened me,"
she said. "It looked a lot like me, but its eyes had dark rings around
them. Its hair was stringy, and its complexion had a kind of greenish tint
to it. And when it smiled at me, it seemed more like an evil leer."
-
- Jolene dropped to her knees and began
to utter a prayer for protection and a supplication that she be surrounded
by a shield of Light.
-
- "After I had completed my prayers
for protection and the banishment of evil, the mirror was once again clear,"
Jolene said. "I hoped that I had sent the thing back where it belonged
and far away from me."
- Things might have been resolved and the
entity discouraged by Jolene's fervent prayers if the next day over lunch
in the cafeteria Heather hadn't suggested that the four of them conduct
a seance with the Ouija board to see if they could learn the identity of
the entity was who had been following Jolene.
-
- "I tried to warn them that this
thing looked really evil and that we should let it go back to the Other
Side," Jolene said. "But Heather kept insisting what a great
research project this could be, and she got Michaela all excited about
a big experiment, and pretty soon Melanie had come on board.
-
- "I really began to suspect that
Heather's motives were not strictly academic, you know. I think if truth
were told she was jealous when the entity appeared to have granted me these
big ESP powers, and she wondered if she might not be able to channel and
control such energy if we worked some more with the being."
-
- Against Jolene's objections, it was agreed
that Friday night would be Ouija board night at her house. It was Jolene's
turn to host a slumber party, anyway, so her parents wouldn't suspect that
anything unusual might be occurring under their roof.
-
- The K's had been given a clue, however.
Darwin told me that on Wednesday evening as he had come upstairs to go
to bed, he thought he saw Jolene in the hallway outside of her room.
-
- "I called to her and asked what
she was doing up at that late hour on a school night, but she didn't answer
me," he said. "As I approached her, she turned and entered her
bedroom. When I opened the door to see if anything were troubling her,
I was surprised to see her in bed, quite obviously fast asleep."
-
- And then Darwin received a couple of
other surprises.
-
- "It seemed that I caught a glimpse
of Jolene standing in the doorway of her bathroom," he recalled. "How
could this be, I wondered, because she is lying right there in her bed,
right in front of me. And then I thought I saw the glowing outline of another
person standing in the shadows off to the right of Jolene's bed. There
was a soft, hissing sound from the direction of the bathroom, and where
I thought I had seen Jolene, there was now only darkness."
-
- Darwin left his older daughter's room
convinced that his eyes had been deceived by patterns of light and shadow.
He had been working too hard, staying up too late, and suffering from sleep
deprivation--all of which had caused him to see things that weren't there.
-
- The trouble was, the "things"
really were there.
-
- The slumber party seance quickly became
a psychic disaster. Twelve-year-old Joy begged to be included, and Michaela
agreed, stating that a child's openness toward such matters could very
likely provide the circle with greater energy.
-
- At the stroke of midnight, they began
their attempts to contact the entity that had attached itself to Jolene
during her out-of-body projection. All the girls knew from watching various
television programs and reading certain books on the occult that midnight
was the "witching hour," the time when doorways to the unknown
opened a bit wider.
-
- At first the planchette under the girls'
fingertips moved smoothly from letter to letter on the Ouija board, blithely
spelling out a quaint tale of a young seamtress named Suzette who had been
killed by runaway horses in the streets of their city in the 1880s. Her
spirit had remained earthbound for many years, pining for her love, Raymond,
who remained devoted to her memory.
-
- Just as the five girls were growing teary-eyed
over the sad tale of a young woman deprived of life and love by a cruel
accident, the board suddenly began to spell out lewd descriptions of Suzette's
and Raymond's sexual techniques. At once repulsed and fascinated, the girls
were soon learning how the spirit of Suzette had continued to make love
to Raymond from beyond the grave--and how they, too, could receive passionate
lovers from the Other Side.
-
- Heather moved away from the board and
began to make strange noises as she dropped to the floor and started to
twitch spasmodically. When Jolene and Michaela knelt beside her to see
what was wrong, Heather sat up with a leering smile and greeted them with
a string of obscenities. Later, the other four girls would all swear that
Heather's face was changed, altered into the features of a profane stranger.
-
- Heather put her arms around little Joy
and tried to kiss her. Jolene stepped in and pulled her away from her sister.
Melanie screamed that she could see the image of a horrible, ugly woman
superimposed over Heather's face and body. Michaela gasped that she, too,
could see the wretched hag.
-
- "Begone, evil demon!" Melanie
shouted, holding one of her occult charms at arm's length before her. "Begone
and leave us alone!"
-
- Heather snarled and reached out for Melanie,
seizing her by the throat, seemingly intent upon strangling her.
-
- When Darwin and Aileen finally pushed
open the door to their daughter's bedroom to see what was going on in there,
Joy, Jolene, and Michaela were screaming hysterically and trying to pull
Heather off Melanie.
-
- Dawin immediately interpreted the scene
as a bunch of teenagers' squabble over hairstyles, boys, rock stars, or
lord-knows-what, so he insisted on driving Heather, Melanie, and Michaela
home at once. It was when the always well-mannered and polite Heather spat
in his face and swore at him in a hoarse, croaking voice that he knew that
something was very wrong.
-
- Once again--sadly a bit late in the course
of events--Jolene suggested that they all join hands and pray for Heather
to return to them as she was. As Jolene began the prayer, Heather fell
to her knees and began to make growling and hissing sounds. Joy screamed
in horror, and Aileen carried her out of the bedroom.
-
- A few minutes after the prayer was concluded,
Heather blinked her wide hazel eyes at her friends and Darwin, who stood
ringed around her. She appeared to have no memory of the bizarre performance
that had brought the slumber party experiment to a screeching halt.
-
- Darwin changed his mind about taking
Heather, Melanie, and Michaela home at two o'clock in the morning. Later,
he admitted to me that he was embarrassed about the incident and worried
about what the parents of the girls would say if they were awakened in
the middle of the night to be informed that unsupervised activities at
the K household had driven the girls into hysterics.
-
- When the girls arose the next morning
about ten o'clock and had some breakfast, everything seemed back to normal.
But after her friends had gone home, the K's had a lengthy discussion with
Jolene and decided to call me for advice in acquiring some preventionary
measures against a repetition of such an event. Little Joy had slept between
her parents until morning, crying, shuddering, and lapsing into nightmares
that caused her to wake up screaming. Neither Darwin nor Aileen were eager
to endure a repeat performance of a teenage activity that would traumatize
their twelve-year-old and transform Jolene's normally courteous friends
into crude, shrieking wackos.
-
- When I arrived at the K's home on Sunday
evening, I was informed that Joy was at a friend's house so we could all
speak frankly about the frightening occurrence on Friday evening. After
only a few minutes of conversation in the K's' living room, I soon determined
that neither Darwin nor Aileen were aware of their daughter's experiments
with the Ouija board.
-
- As Jolene began to feel more comfortable
with me and with her parents' disapproving, but supportive, attitude toward
her adventures in the occult, she told of the dark entity that had apparently
attached itself to her after one of her Ouija board sessions.
-
- "Such an entity is what I have come
to call a spirit parasite," I said. "They may once have been
humans and wish once more to occupy a physical body or they may be regarded
as the classic demons, who wish to invade and control a fleshly vehicle
to experience human passions and emotions. Generally, these parasites of
the soul cannot achieve power over humans unless they are somehow invited
into the person's private space--or unless they are attracted to a human
aura by that person's negativity or vulnerability. Unless you have made
your prayer for protection and alerted your spirit guide, you are extremely
vulnerable during a conscious out-of-body projection."
-
- Jolene lowered her eyes and seemed to
be studying my comments. "I guess I just thought that angels and guides
were out there always looking after me."
-
- "They are," I agreed. "But
remember that there are always negative entities looking out for vulnerable
humans."
-
- I went on to say that humans are most
susceptible to spirit invasion when they are abusing alcohol or drugs and
have lowered their normal boundaries of self-control. Spirit parasites,
eager to experience the passions of the flesh, may enter the human vehicle
at that time and encourage the possessed human to indulgence in all sorts
of excesses of sex, gluttony, greed, and ego aggrandizement.
-
- "So many beginning students of metaphysics
make the mistake of assuming that their good intentions protect them when
they enter trance or deep meditative states," I continued. "These
individuals may find themselves particularly beset by spirit parasites
because they are seeking to follow the path of Light. They present a challenge
to negative entities. And when these beings from the darkside find a chink
in their armor--such as inadequate spiritual preparation--they are quick
to zero in on those students too impatient to take the time to pray or
to surround themselves with the Light of protection."
-
- Darwin wondered what it was that he had
seen in the hallway and in Jolene's room on Wednesday night.
-
- "Jolene told us how she felt as
though another being was somehow influencing her thoughts and causing her
to fantasize sexual images regarding her friends and classmates,"
I said. "Later, as she stared into the mirror, a kind of dual consciousness
enabled her to perceive the thoughts of the spirit parasite as it admired
the body in which it found itself. Still later, she saw the other face
in the mirror, the face that resembled her own, yet was also reflective
of the negative entity. It was that awful face that caused her to pray
for the creature to leave her."
-
- I went on to explain that Jolene's prayers
had probably been quite effective in discouraging the spirit parasite from
making long range plans about inhabiting the teenager's body. If Jolene
had continued to draw upon the Light, her spirit guardians would probably
have been able to banish the negative entity within just a few more days.
On Wednesday night, however, the spirit parasite was still able to draw
energy from Jolene, and it was able to externalize itself while she slept.
-
- "The other entity that you saw hovering
near Jolene's bed," I told Darwin, "the one that seemed to be
glowing, was quite likely her guardian angel or spirit guide. A spiritual
balance would probably been achieved very shortly if Jolene had been talked
into that séance with the Ouija board. The combined energies of
all those young women--especially young women open to communication with
the Other Side--brought the spirit parasite renewed strength. Thank heaven,
Jolene conducted that prayer circle and performed a kind of impromptu exorcism."
-
- Darwin and Aileen asked me if I believed
that the entity had left their home. I redirected the question to Jolene,
asking her if she still sensed the spiritual interloper around her.
-
- "I...I really don't think so,"
she answered after a moment of thought. "And I have been praying my
knees off ever since Friday night!"
-
- I shared the following prayer with Jolene
if she should ever be aware of the return of the spirit parasite: "Beloved
Angel Guide, charge me with your great strength. Charge me with your light
and your love. Charge my mental, physical, and spiritual selves with strength
and energy. Keep me ever sensitive to your guidance and your direction
and banish all evil and negativity from my presence."
-
- "And what about us?" Aileen
wanted to know. "What if we should sense that evil presence anywhere
in our home?"
-
- If any of them should still sense the
negative energy of a spirit parasite or any discordant entity, I advised
them to visualize their spirit guardian around them moving a soft, violet
heavenly light over their physical bodies. Then say inwardly to the spirit
guide: "Beloved spirit guide, angelic guardian, activate the God-spark
within me and assist me in calling upon the highest of energies. Permit
the heavenly Light to move around and through me. Keep this Holy Light
bright around and within me and with the power of the Father-Mother-Creator
Spirit banish all negative and chaotic energies from my presence."
-
- When I left the Kozisek's residence that
evening, I felt confident that a spiritual balance had been reinstated
both in their home and in their daughter's personal province of psychic
development. And I had Jolene's promise that she would not continue her
experiments in any facet of the paranormal until she had undergone a process
of disciplined study that would enable her more accurately to discern between
the various shadowy residents of the world of the supernatural.
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