Recently, my cousin told me that a young girl apparition haunts her niece, frightening her. My cousin asked me how to handle the situation.  As I thought about it, I realized there’s no pat answer. It all depends on your unique circumstance and how it affects you.

Before you decide what to do about a haunting, consider these questions.

How long has the spirit been in your home?

 

 

  • Have you lived in the residence for a while or just moved in? Has the entity been in your home longer than you have? If so, the spirit may be a former resident who still feels connected to their old abode.
  • Are you renovating? Energies tend to get stirred up when a home they are attached to is being altered.
  • Are stress and emotion dominating your life right now?  Do teenagers live in your house? Poltergeists tend to be attracted to these types of energy.
  • Have you or someone in your household summoned spirits through an Ouija Board or something else? You may have unknowingly brought something into your home.
  • Do you live in a multi-family unit (i.e., apartment or condo)? Someone else could’ve initially attracted the energy to the building.

How does the spirit make you feel?

Are you:

  • Scared because you fear the unknown? You can’t blame it for your discomfort.
  • Sensing negativity, malevolence from the entity? If so, you’ll need to get rid of it.
  • Fine or neutral about the energy, but don’t want it startling you? Consider setting rules for the spirit to adhere to.
  • Experiencing a familiarity about it? Perhaps it’s a loved one visiting you.

One way to determine a spirit’s motive is its reaction to your fear. Does it disappear when you scream or startle? If it does, it’s probably because it has no desire to distress you.

What does the spirit want?

Once, I told a shadow person to leave. Now, I wonder why it repeatedly had visited me. Freaked out by the unknown, I hadn’t cared if the specter was there to share something with me, needed my help or just wanted to hang around.  I regret I couldn’t calm myself enough to open up and find out.

Read about the options you can take to coexist or rid your home of a spirit, in next week’s post, “You’ve considered the spirit’s presence in your home: now what?”