Q.  What exactly is possession and is it a common thing?

A.  Full Definition of POSSESSION according to MiriamWebster.com
1: a : the act of having or taking into control
    b : control or occupancy of property without regard to ownership
    c : ownership
    d : control of the ball or puck; also : an instance of having such control

    (as in football) <scored on their first two possessions>
2: something owned, occupied, or controlled : property
3: a : domination by something (as an evil spirit, a passion, or an idea)
    b : a psychological state in which an individual's normal personality is       replaced by another

usually your name. They'll ask you just a few questions, usually boring ones that don't mean anything such as the weather or very impersonal small talk just to make that connection. While the person is talking to me about nothing important (how they like the coffee they just bought, how their drive to our meeting went, etc.), I start to see their life as a circle with lines going out from it in different directions. The lines have different thicknesses to them (this is just how I see it). The thicker the line, the more 'set in stone'. These are generally those things in their life that are already decided: the job they're currently working. The house they're living in right now. The people that they're associated with like their kids or their spouse. Those things have already happened. They're a part of that persons life already. A reading is following those lines out until they get to where the person hasn't been yet. These are decisions that are waiting to be made.

When I was a kid, there were these books you could get in the school library called "Choose Your Own Adventure". Basically it was this looooong story and you'd read a few pages and then it would say "If you want Jessica to go down the dark path, turn to page 63. If you want Jessica to go inside the deserted house, turn to page 14". You'd then choose how you wanted the story to go, and you'd go on, making new choices every few pages about how the story line would continue. There were potentially hundreds of ways the story could progress and end up based on what one chose at every opportunity. That's how I see our lives: Someone wrote the book. They knew all the ways that the story could end, we just have to choose which one we want to read (live). That's sort of how life works. I believe that we actually write our own book before we come here, and then part of the deal is that we don't get to remember why we wrote the book or what the book is about!  That's part of the learning experiencing of life on earth. So some things are going to happen. Like I was destined to be my parent's child. That was 'set in stone'. Then there are other things that may happen based upon a choice that person is going to make. Doing readings is pulling those lines and seeing where they branch out. Those branches would be the parts in the book where you're asked to pick a page. In life, it's about a fork in the road, having to make a decision. In practical terms, say there's a person that you like, but you're not sure they like you. There are things you could do to make them notice you and force the issue to find out what they think of you. You could possibly get to know them by putting yourself in their path.  Or not.  You could choose to never say anything, and then they'll find someone else, fall in love, have 16 kids, and move to Bangladesh.  Either way, you've made a choice. In a reading, I can only tell you the likelihood of the different outcomes of putting yourself in their path, how that might turn out. Or not, following that 'line' until it ends or becomes more lines with more decisions. This is what a reading is. 

Most often, a person comes for a reading to hear from someone else, who knows nothing about them, that the choices they're going to make are correct or for the best. They usually already know the answer; they just want validation that it's the right one. Or that they've thought of everything they can before making the decision. 

A reading also usually involves the dead. There are generally unresolved issues between two people when one passes. In a reading, usually I touch on the past (something that has already happened to the person so they know that I'm not a fraud and so that I know that I'm connecting with the right person), something happening right now (generally this is where the dead come in), and something they can verify is going to happen in the near future (also where the dead come in, usually for help in figuring out what's best for the person, just like you'd ask them for their advice if they were living and you could talk to them yourself). Sometimes it's about finding those missing pieces that were left when the person died and you couldn't ask them those questions anymore. It can be an amazingly healing experience. 

Q. What ARE the things most people call "hauntings" and why are they here? 

A. First off, there are ALL kinds of different types of entities. I’ve been doing this work actively for almost 15 years now, and I can’t tell you how many different types of beings I’ve met, and know that there are tons more out there that I haven’t encountered yet. Some are people who, for whatever reason, got ‘stuck’ here when they died. Those are what most people see when they think they’ve seen a ghost. There are things ranging from just regular dead people who need help moving on, to pure evil that will take a physical/ethereal form and can actually kill people or drive them insane. That’s their whole purpose for being: To kill or ruin life. That’s why people who play around with things like Ouija boards or have séances and things like that most times end up bringing a whole world of hurt into their homes. They're basically opening a door and having a house party for everything that’s out there when you do this stuff. And, if you’re intuitive, things will just find you anyway (explain more later).  No sense making it even easier for them.

Q. Where do entities (that aren't spirits of the dead) come from? 

A. I’m not sure about all of them; there are so many. Some entities are created by people’s bad emotions that sort of congeal and begin to take 

Q.  You talk about visualizing protecting oneself.  How is this done?

A.  When protecting yourself psychically, the most effective way to do this is to imagine yourself inside something that you can see out of but which nothing can see in such a glass box with tinted glass. You are inside this box when actively protecting, and you can see everything outside of this box, but no one can see in.  You are invisible. You can let things in or out, but nothing gets in unless it has your permission. That includes the emotions of others (if you're an empath, this is vital), the dead, entities you might not know are there, bad intentions of others, etc. It's a completely psychically sterile environment. You can imagine this protection to be anything that works for you. The only trick is that you must believe it works absolutely.  If you don't have absolute belief that it works, it won't.  It's that simple.  You can imagine it to be anything that works for you.  When working with children, I use the analogy of Harry Potter's Invisibility Cloak: When he was wearing it, Harry could move through the world completely unseen and safe. Again, any imagery works as long as it works for you and you believe it will work. Just remember that it takes quite a lot of energy to protect yourself if it's something you're not used to doing. Do it often, and it will become second nature. If you're gifted, this is very important.  No one should be allowed inside your bubble but you and those who are there to help you. BUT, it's possible to create a second bubble outside of your own to encompass those you love. Sometimes they need help, healing, love...but your bubble should be consider inviolate.  Everyone has their own bubbles.  We should help them learn to keep their own bubble healthy, not share ours with them.

There are other things you can do to keep yourself safe. First, make sure that you don't stick around areas where you feel uncomfortable. That lizard-brain feeling that you're being watched is generally a warning sign that (duh!) You're being watched! smile emoticon As soon as you feel it, throw up your barriers and leave. ENVISION that you are leaving ALONE. It's also important to keep your personal living space 'clean'. Smudge it at least once a month. If you're feeling 'off' or not quite yourself, all the more reason to do it more often. DO NOT put things you notice off with the excuse that it's "all in my head". It probably isn't. A healthy dose of skepticism is vital. Denial is not. Denial can be dangerous.  Practice regular protection of your own psyche. This is something that is just as important as insulin to a diabetic or thyroid replacement for someone who is hypothyroid. If you feel that you've picked something up and you're not having luck shaking it yourself, call someone.  If you can sense it, I can sense it through you. In a reading, I can see what you've seen (and sometimes the things you can't see in the places you've been!).  Watch your pets. They're an excellent barometer of metaphysical activity in your home. They see and feel what you might not have noticed yet. If your pets start behaving differently, call someone/me. Pets can be just as bothered (or more so than humans!) by negative entities that we pick up.

Q.  What are 'Shadow People'?

A.  No one knows what they are, really. Yes, I've seen them. I remember seeing them as a child and they scared me. A LOT. I used to be most afraid that my collection of stuffed animals would talk to me at night, and it was the Shadow People who I knew would be the ones behind it. I hid them in my closet and mostly slept with the blankets pulled over my head. 

As an adult, I still don't know what they are. They tend to be pretty common in negative places and are almost always present with hauntings in which the living are being physically affected, touched, pushed, scratched, etc.  These, too, are typically easy to get rid of.  But fear is what keeps them going and keeps them strong and able to affect their physical surroundings. And they ARE dangerous.

on a literal form of their own. Some have been around forever and ever. Some are pieces of a person’s personality that have broken off due to some horrible traumatic event and stayed behind when the person moved on.  They may or may not be working on getting that piece back from wherever they went…I’m not sure how important it is once they’re gone from here for good. But that generally happens when some really horrible event takes place in a person’s life (like abuse) that scars them psychologically and a part of them that just can’t deal with it sort of breaks off (very much like a "split personality"). But there are SO many types of entities out there I couldn’t begin to list them all.

Sometimes though, houses or buildings will keep replaying an event that happened there over and over and over again in a loop. Like an old house that used to be used as a hospital during wartime with the nurse that keeps going up and down the stairs, over and over and over again. That isn’t something that can think or interact; it’s just like a picture. This is sort of what I like to do when I go to an antique store. By literally picking up objects, I and ‘see’ what they were used for or who used them. (I especially like irons.  I get to see what the women saw when they were ironing every time I pick one up.) But those loop things really don’t go away. You can do things to make it stop, sort of like burning incense to make a smell go away, but they're not technically a 'haunting'... they're just a replay after replay of something that happened...like a worn path in carpet. 

a Modern Practitioner for Today's World

THE Uncommon Shaman

Q. Why are there hauntings? 

A. Assuming that the entity or haunting is a spirit, someone who was once human and died, then they’re just a ghost: someone who died and, for whatever reason, got stuck. We don’t know why people get stuck. I know that when someone dies they’re very much the same as they were when they were alive; they’re just dead. They mourn the loss of their life and, in most cases, move on to whatever learning they have next. They still make choices, exercise free will, interact with people around them, work with their own guides/angels who are there to meet them when they die, lots of

stuff. They're busy.  Then there are some people like my ex mother-in-law who made a pact with her husband before she died that she wouldn’t ‘leave without him’, and waited around for him to die (and would stick around my house spying on her son until I made her leave).  There are some who get stuck because they can’t face moving on to something new without the people they’ve left behind, so they stick around and ‘haunt’ places, or even sometimes things like jewelry which is why I suggest doing a thorough cleaning (not with soap and water, but a specific type of energy clearing I'm happy to share with you) if you inherit jewelry from someone or like to purchase used jewelry second hand. But I have no idea why some spirits get stuck. There seems to be as many answers to that question as there are reasons living people get stuck in certain behaviors. 

Q: What exactly is an intuitive reading or divination and how does it work? 

A:  A reading, a type of psychic divination, is when someone enlists the help of an intuitive specifically to find get answers from either their Guides or those whom they love who have crossed.  While I'm talking to them, I can make a connection to what's going on in their life, see the people who are connected to them, get a feel for what the person is feeling, and then focus on the things that they think are most important, which is usually the main reason they want a reading in the first place. This is why it's easiest to give readings to people I've never met. That way I know that the information I receive isn't something I might have heard already just because I know them.  A good intuitive will ask you not to tell them anything but

"Demonic possession" is a term everyone is familiar with. But when directly addressed, most of us turn the page, close the door, or put our fingers in our ears and mutter "lalalalalalalalala".  We've been conditioned to believe that even THINKING about such a thing makes us bad or puts us in danger...sadly, it's what we've been taught is the 'right thing to do' when this situation comes up even though it's literally keeping us from truth.  But how much do you really know about it? Is ignorance truly the smartest move? If you throw out anything you've seen in horror movies, anything you learned about it in a church setting, and anything you've read that scared you, what are you left with? 

How can you tell if someone is possessed? Would you recognize it?  Does one have to believe in possession to experience it?  I'd like to open a dialog about this because it is was a MAJOR factor in why I didn't pursue my gift until I was well into my 20s.  FEAR.  I've now had personal experience with this and was surprised to find that everything I had believed up to that time was based solely in fear and not fact. If we strive to live life without fear and, if you're searching for an understanding, this is a serious topic that needs to be addressed, no different than 'stranger danger' or firearm safety.

I think to answer this question in a way that truly makes sense, we have to understand what it is which will also address the "what type of entities try to possess".  Possession IS a thing.  Oddly, it's most often attempted by the dead. This takes a LOT of energy and practice on the part of that person to gain the ability to do this and it CAN happen. It's far more common (and I use that word loosely!) for a dead person to try to 'jump' the living. A person in this situation won't necessarily know that it's happened. It's usually 'diagnosed' by others who see a distinct change in them. And there are varying degrees to which the dead can jump the living.  Usually, from the inside, the living person feels very scattered. They would experience feelings that are NOT them (i.e., sadness when they're not sad, elation for no reason, but rarely fear which I found odd...) What does NOT happen when a living person has been jumped by a dead person: Their head does not spin around. They do not speak in a freaky voice.  Demonic possession, and I only call it that because it's what we have always called it, isn't the same thing. I've seen evidence of what we call 'demons', though I wouldn't necessarily associate them with our strongly held belief in a 'devil' per se; but they're DEFINITELY evil. This happens very rarely. My personal journey of understanding actually began with this phenomenon.  I really should type the whole story out some day as it's fascinating and terrifying. I could find NO ONE to help me at that time (early 1990s) and eventually ran from the situation which followed me for years until I took control of my abilities and faced it.   I now know that I caused it to go on for as long as it did because I was so scared of it.  Once I faced it and dealt with hit, I've not been bothered by it since and know that I never will.  In fact, it's come up in my practice on a few occasions and is always overcome.  

People in this situation tend to believe they're responsible for the feelings they feel; they're not. Again, this is a VERY unusual situation. I believe that experience happened to me for a reason: That one event alone caused me to have to throw out my formerly held beliefs and allowed me to learn first hand what I needed to learn to be effective in helping others in the same situation. Because at the time that this event happened I didn't believe in the things that I actually experienced, they completely and utterly changed my paradigm.  In the 20+ years I've been working with people in similar situations, I've only seen THIS type of thing, what is generally known as a true 'demonic' possession, once.  And it was taken care of in 10 minutes. The woman never had an issue with it again.  

As to WHY possession happens, it's pretty simple: Something not physically present wants to experience life and they want to find a body with which to do that. But it's not a comfortable thing, I don't think for either party, not just the living person. It also takes an INCREDIBLE amount of energy on the part of the entity that is doing the possessing.