As my last couple of posts have suggested, I'm certainly open to the idea that discarnate entities – "spirits" – can harass, obsess, or actually possess living persons. But I think the idea has to be treated with caution. It can easily lead in the direction of paranoia. I found this to be a problem in Dr. Edith Fiore's 1987 book The Unquiet Dead: A Psychologist Treats Spirit Possession.
Fiore, who holds a Ph.D. in clinical psychology, became interested in addressing her patients' problems via hypnosis, which eventually led to past-life regressions and what she calls "depossessions" – the removal of harassing spirits. She distinguishes depossessions from exorcisms, which involve possession by a nonhuman demonic entity. In the cases she recounts, she believes that the possessing entity is a deceased human being who has become earthbound and attached himself to a living host. She takes pains to say that spirits are only a working hypothesis which she uses because it has proven therapeutically effective, and that she is not sure spirits actually exist. This occasional caveat, though, is undermined by the bulk of the book, especially the later chapters offering advice on personal protection against spirit possession.
Her accounts and partial transcripts of some of her sessions match up well with similar case histories presented in Carl Wickland's famous 1924 study Thirty Years Among the Dead, as well as more recent spirit release narratives. This continuity across many decades was, for me, the most interesting aspect of the book.
Here are a couple of examples. (In the quoted material, I've converted Fiore's narrative to the style of a transcript for easier reading.)
One of Fiore's patients, Peter, had a serious drinking problem that sometimes got him into barroom brawls. Though of upper-middle-class background, he frequented "the rougher sorts of establishments" favored by workingmen. A hypnosis session apparently summoned up a spirit who'd been a construction worker. Even when asked to leave, this spirit hung on, leading to this dialogue in a subsequent session:
Fiore: You're still here. What's your name?
Patient: Lou, I think.
Fiore: But why are you still here with Peter?
Patient: He lets me drink. He can be fun, and I can get him to go to my kind of places.
Fiore: What kind of places?
Patient: You know, a place that's got real men in it who know how to drink – not a bunch of stuffed shirts.
Further discussion reveals that his last memory of his previous life was an accident in which a Caterpillar tractor rolled over him.
Fiore: You were killed in that accident.
Patient: I was?
Fiore: What happened after that?
Patient: I saw a small boy playing in a backyard. He seemed pleasant enough and friendly. And I felt lonely – and lost. So I went towards him.
Fiore explained to the confused Lou that he had taken possession of Peter at that point. She persuaded him to leave. After this session, Peter no longer had problems with alcohol. For readers of Wickland, the parallels are unmistakable.
Another patient, Paolo, came to Fiore already believing in the spirit world and intrigued with the idea that he might be possessed. During the first hypnosis session, he started speaking in a different voice. "The voice," Fiore writes, "was booming and thick-tongued, as though he were drunk."
Patient: I'm not going anywhere!
Fiore: Who are you?
Patient: George. But don't tell Paolo, that asshole!
Fiore asked if he saw anyone around him whom he knew. George saw someone named Pete, whom he knew to be dead. Even so, he resisted the idea that he himself was deceased. He continued to speak in bombastic and crude terms, saying of Paolo's wife, "I can't stand that broad! All she does is nag poor Paolo, that jerk!" He said his efforts to keep Paolo from going home were often successful (Paolo had taken to spending some nights in a motel for reasons he couldn't explain). "If I never see her again, I'd be happy. But that shit goes home when he feels bad enough. I can't stop him all the time."
Once Paolo was out of his hypnotic trance, he said, "I know that guy! That's me when I've been drinking. But it's not me!" After sharing the tape recording of the session with his wife, he told Fiore: "Kathy says she's talked to that spirit a lot. When I've been drinking, she says she sees him coming out in me. Not really seeing, but the way I act. It's George!"
After much discussion, George was apparently persuaded to leave Paolo and go into the Light.
Fiore: All right. Here's somebody to help you leave.
Patient: I don't know him. (Frantic and crying.)
Fiore: Yes, you do.
Patient: Uncle Jim.
Fiore: What does he say to you?
Patient: He asked me to go. But I don't wanna go! (Crying.) They're all dead. How can I go with dead people? (Crying hard.)
Fiore: Listen to me! Listen to me!, Yourself!
Patient: Awwww … fuck it!
Fiore: Just calm yourself. Would you like me to explain to you everything that's happened?
Patient: Uh-huh.
At that point Fiore believed she was able to persuade the very reluctant George to go with his Uncle Jim, his mother, and his friend Pete – the "dead people" who'd come to escort him. Paolo reported happily that, "The drive to drink is nonexistent. Lots more positive feelings toward Kathy. I even like going home at night."
But the persistent George had not actually gone into the Light, after all! He was discovered to still be hanging around. It took another session to convince him to go.
Patient: A lot of people are holding their hands out to me.
Fiore: Take someone's hand.
Patient: I want to, but I just can't. Can't. (Desperately.)
Once George finally did leave, Paolo blurted out, "He's gone!" Asked how he felt, he first said (rather surprisingly), "Upset!" Then, crying, he added, "I feel free! Oh, God!… that voice I always hear is gone!… Oh, God! Oh, I wasted so much time! So much of my life, God! I've got so much to do!" (The possession had lasted from age fifteen to age fifty.)
After more sessions, Paolo reported that his desire to drink was gone, he was going home every night, and his marital relationship was back on track. He'd dropped eight pounds without dieting and finally felt he was in charge of his own life.
All this is all interesting enough. And I'm willing to believe that the patients in the case histories Fiore highlights may well have had some problem with an overshadowing or obsessing spirit.
For me, the trouble arises in Fiore's claim (or working hypothesis?) that spirit possession is remarkably common, even ubiquitous. To help the reader determine if he is harboring an unwanted spirit (or spirits), she provides a list of signs and symptoms indicative of possession. Unfortunately, most of these feelings and behaviors are experienced by all of us at one time or another. The danger signs include:
- a persistent low energy level
- mood swings
- inner dialogues
- use of drugs and alcohol
- impulsiveness (e.g., occasional shopping sprees)
- forgetfulness (e.g. walking into a room and not remembering why you are there)
- problems with concentration ("Do you feel like you're in a fog at times? Perhaps you have a drugged entity or an elderly spirit with you.")
- anxiety or depression that comes out of the blue or stays in the background most of the time
- difficulty recuperating from illness
- difficulty reading and processing Fiore's book ("If you found it hard to read, could not finish certain cases or sections because of anxiety or any other emotional response, then you probably are resonating to possessing spirits.")
She does note that it's the overall picture, not just one or two symptoms, that really counts. Nevertheless, these are all pretty common symptoms, issues, and behaviors. It's hard to imagine anyone who wouldn't say yes to many of the things on this list.
Not surprisingly, Fiore believes that possession is not hard to come by. In fact, it can come about as a result of almost any moment of weakness. At various points we are told that
The vibrations of your aura vary constantly…. Being upset, depressed, fearful, jealous, or envious are all poisons that change the color of your aura to murky, unpleasant ones – and slow it down. The stronger the negative emotions, the weaker your protection! … Spirits can enter a weakened aura as easily as someone can walk through an open door.
An excellent way to protect yourself is to avoid using "recreational" drugs and alcohol. The amount that weakens the aura varies from person to person and also depends on the energy level. Some of my patients have lowered their resistance with only two glasses of wine. Even getting "stoned" or drunk once can result in a possession that can last a lifetime!…
Possessions can occur after surgery or during hospitalizations.…
At funerals, and at all the events associated with them, you need extra protection around yourself.[Pages 138 – 140]
Substance abuse is often a big element in possession. If you abuse drugs and/or alcohol, you can be sure you are possessed. [Page 121]
I believe that most of my patients who were possessed by many spirits, and who frequently picked up new ones in between therapy sessions, were "uncontrolled" mediums or "sensitives." This was especially the case when they had not abused drugs and alcohol. The slightest things weakened their auras: eating a meal with MSG or taking one tablet of pain medication. Even driving by a cemetery or visiting a friend in the hospital resulted in a new possession. [Page 116]
As you can see, in Fiore's view, possession is an ever-present threat. It can happen for almost any reason – because you had a second glass of wine, or a single aspirin, or ate the wrong food, or drove past a graveyard, or underwent surgery, or even visited someone in the hospital. Elsewhere she says that using a Ouija board, attending a séance, visiting a psychic or medium, practicing automatic writing, or trying to get in touch with deceased loved ones or spirit guides can also invite possession. Moreover, children are frequently prone to possession even when they have no obvious risk factors. Apparently a child's aura is often weak enough to allow spirits to get in whenever they wish. She also believes that so-called imaginary friends in childhood are actual spirits, whose close proximity to the child naturally increases the chance of possession.
The only protection against this chronic danger is constantly invoking White Light as a shield around yourself, and also using it to cleanse your home, which can become a repository for wandering spirits. Fiore says she cleanses every room of her home on a daily basis and practices the White Light exercise whenever she feels under stress.
Frankly, it all sounds pretty paranoid. I'm not sure that anyone really can or should live this way. If spirit possession is this easy, then most people must be possessed, at least at certain times in their lives. This is, in fact, Fiore's opinion. Not surprisingly, in her practice, she has found countless cases of possession, including cases where a given patient was possessed by dozens of spirits. She writes:
Since I became aware of this phenomenon, I found that at least seventy percent of my patients were possessed and it was this condition that caused their dis-ease [sic]. Most of these people were relieved – through depossession techniques – of more than one entity. Occasional patients were unwitting hosts to as many as fifty or more! [Page 3]
Seventy percent! Either spirit harassment is a much bigger problem than almost anyone thinks … or Fiore's own assumptions are being imposed on her patients through the mechanism of hypnosis, which allows direct communication with the highly suggestible subconscious mind. In 1987, when her book was published, the problem of confabulation under hypnosis may not have been as well understood as it is today. Back then, it was still common for hypnotherapists to assist their patients in recovering suppressed memories of childhood abuse – memories that later turned out, in many cases, to be completely false. Families were torn apart by the complicated feelings and painful accusations resulting from these therapeutic techniques.
From what we know today, the subconscious mind is extremely eager to please, and it will follow the lead of the hypnotist in imagining a scenario consistent with the hypnotist's suggestions. This is provably true in many instances of recovered memory syndrome, and very likely true in many cases of past-life regression and spirit possession, as well.
The bottom line, as I see it, is that Fiore may well have hit upon a valid technique for dealing with certain patients who actually do suffer from spirit harassment, but she has probably taken it too far, seeing examples of the problem everywhere she looks and inculcating a hypervigilant attitude that doesn't seem conducive to inner peace or mental health.
Her book points up the possible danger of spirit contact — but also the dangers of surrendering to a worldview that may do us more harm than good.
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