Is Spirit Companionship a suitable hobby or lifestyle for those who consider themselves to be "Spoonies", or those who subscribe to the Spoon Theory?  Many shops tout companions that proclaim to assist or support those with anxiety or depression, always with the legally-required caveat that spirit companions are not meant to replace a therapist or other medical professional.  But when you first take a glance at Spirit Companionship, the sheer amount of stuff​ can be so overwhelming.  After all, there's a whole lot to learn for a beginner!  Like any new hobby or lifestyle, there is a decided learning curve between when you "get it" and when you, quite simply, don't.  And on top of that, there's a lot to worry about in regards to finances - like adopting a pet from the shelter, you not only need to pay an adoption fee, but you also need to provide things afterward.  Where do you even begin with an altar?  What even is an altar? 

Don't worry - we can break this down to be much less intimidating.  Spirit Companionship is a hobby that can conform to your current lifestyle, and there is a lot less pressure than you'd think when it comes to providing offerings to your companions.

When I was personally first introduced to Companionship, there was a lot of hubbub revolving around the idea that you had to care for your spirit companion.  Statements were thrown around like, "I want a companion, but I just don't have the time or money to provide the spirit what they need," or "That person has a lot of spirits, are they all getting the attention they need?"  But the fact of the matter is, a spirit's necessities are generally something beyond the breadth of what their human companion can provide. 

Unless they are baby or child spirits (a demographic I highly advise against companionship with, because they are often coerced or forced into companionship), there is nothing a spirit cannot provide for themselves.  They often seek companionship because they are hoping to improve their own lives, or to improve the life of their human companion.  They are generally grown adults who, if they need anything, are perfectly capable of fulfilling those needs on their own.  If you are providing a spirit with their needs, or fussing over their every necessity, you should probably re-evaluate your companionship - particularly in a case where, such as with a vampire companion, you are being asked to self-harm in exchange for friendship.

Ultimately, offerings are not crucial, nor are they what makes a companionship work.  Like all relationships, they take an open line of communication and honesty, shared experiences and inside jokes.  They take having common goals to work towards together, and a shared sense of compatibility.  All relationships take effort in one way or another, and that effort does not have to be physically devoting yourself to that person.  Be careful to not blur the line between companion and caretaker, or companion and devotee.

That being said, offerings are still considered an essential element of companionship.  Why?  Well, if years of farming and dating games have taught me anything, it's that gifts create strong bonds.  Like picking up your friend's favorite coffee from Starbucks on the way to their house, thoughtful presents are a sign that you have been thinking of your companion and want them to experience something you think they'll like.  Often, this is in the form of stones and incense listed in the conjurer-provided profile, placed on a dedicated shelf.  

However, offerings can be more abstract, too.  Any kind of bonding activity might be considered an offering, such as taking a walk together or watching a television show.  Offerings can also be sharing something with your companion you thought they'd like - such as a Pinterest board of images you think match their aesthetic, or a song that reminds you of them.  Offerings do not need to cost money or take up space.  And, just like with a human friend, it's not always the most expensive or exclusive gift that will make them the happiest or bring you closer together, anyway.

In my Beginner's Guide, I mention that Altars are not a necessity - and, in fact, some spirits prefer to shy away from the concept of having a portion of your home dedicated directly to them.  Functional items that are used frequently are more likely to be a valuable offering to both yourself and your companion - it's something you can connect with your relationship with them, and send some loving thoughts their way when the functional item is being used.

Altars aside, it can still be difficult to feel guilty for not "doing enough" within a companionship, especially when your companionship is new or you have been suffering from mental health issues that have blocked your access to communication and free time for extended periods.  Spirits tend to be patient beings - not only do they often run fully complex and involved lives of their own, but they are fully understanding that your life does not revolve around them.  Additionally, mental health struggles not only make everything in your life harder, but they can directly affect your metaphysical senses.  This can go both ways - spirits are capable of struggling with mental illness, too!

On your end or that of your spirit companion's, mental illness flare-ups can make it seem like certain spirits if not all of them aren't there when they are.  Bouts of depression and anxiety cause a great deal of self-doubt, and in many cases can weaken or deaden your metaphysical senses.  If you are feeling unwell or are in an unsafe or unstable situation and cannot feel your spirit companions, it's likely that they are quietly providing support from afar, but cannot contact you due to your blockages.  Don't fret - they'll stick around!  Take the time to focus on and care for yourself in the meantime.

For many of us, though, even if we cannot sense our companions, we may feel an obligation to still make offerings to them or spend time with them.  These are our friends, lovers, and teachers, after all - they take up important space in our hearts, and we like to share things with them.  So, in the case that you are low on spoons or strapped for cash, and you wish to bond or make offerings to your spirit companions, there are many options available to you.

About ten months ago on my Tumblr, I made a post outlining some simple or low-effort offering ideas.  Below, I've included these ideas and a few new ones, with further explanations on how to make these offerings work for you, and how to "elevate" them when you have a few more mental and physical resources to work with!

​Offer them a bite of your meal.  Food is a wonderful and easy offering to provide your companion - humans need to eat multiple meals a day, so food is a huge part of our lives.  It's a common point of discussion as to whether you should put aside food specifically for your companion, and then bury it or throw it away.  For those of us who are skittish about the idea of food waste, offering food that you then eat is fully acceptable. 

There are a few ways you can offer your own food to your companion, usually done by reaching out to them and informing them that you're providing an offering.  The first is to offer them the essence of the food itself, so they can eat the "spiritual" portion of it, while you consume the physical nourishment.  You can also set aside a small cut piece on your plate and indicate that only that portion is for them to consume and enjoy.  Spirits are typically capable of taking what they need from a food offering within a few moments - you have no need to worry about letting your dinner get cold!  

Additionally, consider not offering all of your meals to your companions.  While it's a nice thought to consider that you are sharing everything, remember that they are not physically eating your food, often only the essence or taste of it!  They are perfectly capable of feeding themselves when they deem it necessary.  Therefore, consider instead offering them only food you think will be to their extreme liking, such as their favorite flavors, or something new they've mentioned wanting to try!

• Elevate it: Try making or buying a dish specifically for your companion!  Whether it's something that's one of their favorite foods, something from their culture of origin, or just something you really love that you want to share, they'll probably be happy to partake in something you got specifically with them in mind.  If you're not a cook, there is no trouble with getting take-out from your favorite restaurant, or one you haven't tried yet!

Make them an origami animal out of scrap paper.  If your companion takes an animal form, or has a favorite animal, it's very likely that there is an origami tutorial somewhere that can teach you how to make that animal.  Scrap paper is easy to come by, especially when you are still participating in school, or if you have a desk job.  Instead of tossing those notes, consider making them into a little creatures that show off just how much you adore your companion.

• Elevate it: Try to make them out of origami, or doodle them on some scrap paper!  Have you ever received a portrait of yourself drawn by a friend?  How about a statue?  No matter what way you look at it, receiving art that depicts you in a flattering way is always touching.  Even if you're no expert artist, making an effort to draw your companion is time that you were thinking about them, and about giving them a gift.  They're sure to appreciate it.

Light a candle or stick of incense for them.  The most basic of all basic offerings, it's always a good reminder to know that simply lighting whatever scented candle you have lying around, or lighting up that last stick of incense, is a great way to quietly send them some thoughts or energy.  It only takes a moment to light a candle or a stick of incense, but it can provide minutes or several hours of soothing, heartwarming offerings for your companion.

You might be wondering, why candles and incense?  These are traditional offerings within many religions, and their meanings have been lost over the years.  Candles, within witchcraft, are excellent energy generators.  Incense is known for clearing spaces.  Both of them are great symbols for burning away the negative and leaving room only for the positive - something your companion can certainly use if they're having a hard day, or just need to relax!  Additionally, you can use the candle or incense to meditate yourself, or alongside them, with that idea in mind.

• Elevate it: Make a candle specifically for your companion at home!  There are several candle-making kits that you can buy from a craft store, including scents and all the wax chips you need to make a colorful or beautifully scented candle that fits your companion's preferences.  This is also a great way to recycle a jar or old glass candle that's been burnt through.  For an extra witchy touch, just before the candle is set, sprinkle the top with some herbs and crystal chips (make sure to research if they are safe to be heated first)!

Find a quote in a book you think they'd like, and leave it open for them.  Words are powerful.  Have you ever sent a family member a meme that was only words, or a quote that you read or heard somewhere, that you thought was relevant to their situation or interests?  The same thing applies here.  If you have an altar for your spirit companion, leaving a book open in their space with a sticky note pointed at the quote you think they would love is a perfect way to let them know you're thinking of them.

Additionally, consider starting a small journal of quotes just for your companion.  It can be something as simple as the back page of a notebook you carry around, or a note on your phone.  This offering is rather small, but it is still immensely thoughtful.

• Elevate it: Read a whole book with your companion!  Just like having a book club with friends, reading with your companion is a great way to bond and start conversation over differing worldviews and ideas.  When you get engrossed in a really good book, it can become hard to hear your companions - so consider stopping at chapter or section breaks to ask them what they think about the plot, the characters, or any big twists that have just occurred.  Bonus points if the book depicts their species in an interesting light!  While you can pick any book to read with your companion, picking books on your companion's behalf is a service we offer at The Dragon's Library.

Pour them a shotglass of water/tea/etc.  For many companions, drinks are just as viable an offering as food.  Many spirits have preferences for tea or coffee flavors, and even for alcohol types and cocktails (if you're into that sort of thing)!  It doesn't need to get very complicated, and often using whatever you have on hand is fine.  Those of us who have just brewed a fresh pot of tea, though, might balk at the idea of pouring an entire mug of tea that will only get cold, to be poured down the drain or into a potted plant.  Consider pouring your spirit companion a tiny portion - a shotglass will do fine.  Remember that with offerings, it's the quality and intention, not the quantity, that counts!

Additionally, when it comes to aquatic companions, water, from tap or from the ocean, are often welcomed offerings.  If you feel like water is a plain offering, feel free to infuse it with a crystal, or by letting it soak up the energies of the sun and moon.  Just remember that crystal-infused water is not safe for you to drink unless the crystal was not placed directly in the water, and unless water is distilled, it can develop bacteria when stored for long periods of time!  Other kinds of water you can use for offerings are sea water, river water, lake water, rain water, and snow water.

In the original list, I also mentioned that pasta water is good for offerings.  Pasta water is the water leftover after you've boiled pasta within it, which is usually made funky with all kinds of starch from the pasta, as well as whatever salt or oil you put into the water.  If you're making sauce from scratch, it's often a good idea to put some of the pasta water in there - but you might want to consider offering it to your companion, as well!  It's rich with vitamins and minerals, which also makes it ideal for watering plants.  It's a straight upgrade from plain tap water, which will provide your companion with an extra boost of energy, or at the very least, make them laugh.

Feel free to have as much fun as possible with your shotglass, as well.  You can make it a bonding activity to seek out the perfect shotglass for your companion's offerings.  Shotglasses are common and inexpensive, often with fun designs printed directly on the glass instead of sculpted into it, so there are a lot of potential options you can find!

• Elevate it: Make a cocktail (or mocktail) with your companion in mind!  Many spirit companions have preferences for alcohol, and many of them have their own distinct aesthetic that can certainly be transferred to a colorful, themed cocktail.  If you are 21+, experiment with getting new and exciting ingredients, or following a fun recipe you haven't tried before.  You may be surprised by what you and your companion can compare by way of taste preferences!

Take an old crystal you already own, cleanse it in the sun, and offer it.  When it comes to our capitalist society, we often caught up in the idea of giving gifts that are new.  Re-gifting is taboo in our culture, and gifting something that is used is considered just plain gross and rude!  But, not only do spirit companions come from an entirely different culture than ours, they interact with their offerings in a way that is not quite physical.  Therefore, a cleansed crystal is the perfect gift for a spirit who you want to give a little pick-me-up.

When gifting your crystal, if you have the energy to spare, consider taking a few moments to charge it with your own energy, with preferably positive feelings, such as love or joy.  This will make the crystal gift all the more special to your spirit companion.  Once the crystal has run out of its charge, cleanse it again and start all over!

• Elevate it: Turn their favorite crystal into jewelry!  While there is no necessity for multiple vessels for a spirit, it could be considered a devotional act to wear a piece of jewelry that they associate with themselves.  If there is a crystal you find your companion gravitating towards, consider putting it into a crystal cage pendant, or learning to wire-wrap or macrame and turning it into a wearable object.  Then, every time you wear their crystal, you'll think of them and remember to contact them.  If you're well-versed in the astral, consider making an astral copy for them, as well, so you can have a matching set!

Put on a movie or TV show you think they’d like.  In our cultural consciousness, we've been taught to believe that watching television is a "lazy" activity with little merit.  However, watching movies or TV shows are just another way to absorb art - and for many people, their favorite shows are a big part of their identity.  However, watching TV doesn't have to be downtime for your companionship!

I highly encourage those who are low-energy to invite their spirit companions to come along to watch a movie or TV show with them.  If you can, try to use a pendulum to chat with them during the show or between episodes, to see if they're liking it, and chat about what they thought.  Spirits can come from extremely diverse cultures, so their preferences and interests regarding any given piece of media may really surprise you!

• ​Elevate it: Play a video game with your companion!  While this isn't necessarily something that requires more energy or spoons, it can be a bit harder to divide your attention between a companion and actively playing a video game.  For this reason, I recommend starting with games that are slow-paced, farming or life simulator games, such as Stardew Valley or Animal Crossing, and eventually expanding to more intense choice-based RPGs to allow your companion to weigh in with their opinions on the plot and story!

If they’re sun aligned, place their vessel in the sun for a bit.  If they’re moon aligned… well, you get it.   One of the simplest acts you can do for your companion is help them to receive the energies they are well-aligned with, even when they are not with you or their vessel is not around you.  Although placing certain stones in direct sunlight can be damaging to the specimen, it can be a great idea to still place it on a shady windowsill or countertop to ensure that your spirit gets some sunny energy throughout the day.  Likewise, leave your moon-aligned spirit's vessel on a moonlit windowsill in your bedroom while you sleep.  

Store your spirit's vessel with mindfulness - even if you can't charge a stone to offer to them, you can certainly put their vessel somewhere that makes sense for them!    At the very least, if your spirit is sun or fire aligned, leave their in a brightly lit room on a day you don't have it with you, rather than relegating it to a dark box or poorly lit room.  If you have a spirit who loves the water, leave their vessel by a fish tank or bathtub.  If you have a spirit who loves greenery and plantlife, leave their vessel near a potted plant, and so on and so forth.  This is a great way to let your spirit companion know that you are thinking about them and their preferences, even when you might not have the ability to dedicate entire rituals or objects to them.

• Elevate it: Provide your spirit with a space crafted specially for them!  Whether this is a special spot on the altar surrounded by images and items they like, or a special storage or charging box you've painted yourself in their favorite colors and aesthetics, the extra personal touch will be important to them.  Giving them a special space in your home will make them feel more welcome there, and can be a great offering for them on your hardest days.

Dedicate a plant to them.  Every time you water the plant, it's an offering.  Even if you don't have a green thumb, find a plant that requires very little attention and keep it in your home.  Did you know the most common cause for death in easy-to-care-for plants, such as succulents, is overwatering?  Many plants like this need to be watered once a month or less.  On a day when you're feeling well, pick one plant that is fully grown that both you and your companion like. 

Plants are most likely to survive if they're purchased from a local nursery, as big box retail stores tend to put them in incorrect soil and pot conditions - so if you buy it from a large retailer, you may need to also re-pot it in appropriate soil and a pot with a drainage hole.  Once you have the plant set up for success, pend a little bit of time to perform research on that specimen.  Most notably, check how much light it needs and how often it should be watered, then set a recurring timer on your phone calendar in order to remember exactly when to water it - don't let it be a guessing game!

Every time you water this plant, or even every time you touch or handle the plant, think of your companion's name with intention.  As you interact with the plant, envision a cord of connection between yourself and your companion, empowered by the energies of the plant.  This can be a long-lasting way to remember your companion, and even when life gets in the way of your bonding time, you can set aside these special moments just for them.

• Elevate it: Grow a plant from seed!  Although it can be tempting to start with a seed packet because they are so affordable, growing plants from seed is a completely different skill from keeping adult plants alive.  Seedlings are temperamental and delicate, and can easily die or not sprout at all if not kept in the right conditions, which can be frustrating to those new to plants.  Once you've established a good routine for taking care of your plants, try the next step of growing plants from seeds.  Before you know it, you might have a whole garden on your hands to share with your companion!

Craft a music playlist dedicated to them.  For many people, music is an intrinsic part of our lives - we use it for our daily commute, for staying focused while working or being creative, or just to fill the silence during down time.  It can often be an important part of someone's life to share their favorite tunes with a friend - so why have it be any different with a spirit companion?  Think of this as crafting a mixtape for someone you like dearly.

Using the music platform of your choice, create a new playlist in your companion's name.  Then, try to find songs that they like - whether this means looking at specific genres that fit their personality, lyrics that remind you of them, or moods that the two of you share.  It's okay to edit this playlist over time - and when they come to visit, play it for them and let them know why each song made you think of them!

• Elevate it: Craft your playlist using shufflemancy!  If you haven't tried shufflemancy before, take a look at the section about it in this communication post.  Put your music on the biggest shuffle playlist you can, and use a die or a random number generator in tandem with your companion in order to have them pick out songs from the list.  When you land on a song, thing about the message your companion might be telling you here - is this a song that indicates something about them?  Something about you?  An emotion they understand, a common experience the both of you share?  Or is it just something they like?  Even if you don't have an answer right now, add it to the playlist - it might make sense to you later.  The more you practice this, the more it is likely to be a helpful method of communication for you and your companion to share!

​Create something for them.  Using materials you have around your home, create something for your companion.  Create a portrait of your companion, or draw something they like (such as, if your companion loves frogs, draw them a frog).  Write them a poem or a short story, or create a little figure out of clay.  Create a moodboard out of pretty images you found on Pinterest.  Start a collage or junk journal, and paste little bits of paper and stationery in it, writing about why the pieces make you think of your companion.  Don't worry about your skill level or accuracy when it comes to art - after all, when it comes to gifts, it's the thought that counts!  Your companion will simply be honored to know you thought of them.

• Elevate it: Make your creation into a performance!  Whether this is a dance, a skit, or a song, take your time when you are low on energy to plan out or write your performance, and when you feel up to it, perform it for your companion.  If you are capable, you could even perform it for them in the astral, so you don't have to use up your physical body's precious reserves of energy.

Go on a walk with them.  If you have the time and energy to spare, simply take some time to separate yourself from the energies of your home in order to clear your head.  Take a stroll around your neighborhood and invite your spirit companion to come along with you, so you two can chat or simply enjoy each others' company.  Leave the phone at home.  You might be surprised at how refreshing and rejuvenating this is for you, and in the meantime, you'll get to spend some dedicated quality time with your companion.  Don't set any expectations for this time with them - you don't need to entertain, and they don't need to perform, either.  Sometimes, the best quality time you spend together are the quiet moments.

• Elevate it: Take a day to go hiking with your companion.  Hiking spots are often affordable and easy to access, only charging a few dollars for parking.  Look for a local state-governed hiking or walking trail, pack a bottle of water and some snacks, and go enjoy your time in nature for a few hours.  Keep your phone in a plastic ziplock bag, stored inside your hiking pack, in case it rains.  Invite your companion to enjoy the hike with you.  Pay attention to park maps and take a photo of them if you can, keeping track of your turns so you don't become lost - if you aren't already active, you may want to keep your walk to less than a mile to start.  Many trails have checkpoints for distance, or opportunities to loop back around to the entrance.  This is an especially wonderful offering for spirits who are connected to nature or earth energies!

Rearrange and clean your altar.  If you already have an altar dedicated to your companion, you don't have to add anything to it in order to use it as an offering to your companion!  Tidy it up - remove the items from the altar and wipe them off with a dry cloth, eradicating any dust.  Clean the surface beneath or shake out the altar cloth.  Place the items back in a new, fresh way.  Make new patterns or arrangements with the items that were already there - or add a few from your stash!  This process only needs to take a few minutes, but it's a wonderful way to show reverence and appreciation for your companion without having to look for or purchase new offerings.

• Elevate it!: Create an e-altar for your companion!  Whether this means starting a new Tumblr blog or Twitter account, creating a Pinterest board for your companion, coding a Carrd or opening a new website just for them, fill this e-altar with images, aesthetics, quotes, songs, and more than you know they'll like.  This is a great way to keep your altar and offerings for them updated without needing to constantly purchase new items, and is a wonderful option for witches who need to keep their practices private!

In conclusion, every spirit's relationship with their companion is different.  Some spirits are more demanding than others, but most simply want to spend their time with their companion.  Our daily lives are just as fascinating to them as theirs are to us - so don't be afraid to invite them along on your daily life, just to show them what you are doing or spend some quiet time together!

What are some easy and simple ways you bond with your companions on days when you don't feel your best?  Comment and share below!

​So, let's address a few myths about telepathy.

If you weren't born doing it, you can't develop it.  Myth!  Telepathy, like most other psychic skills, is something that anybody has the ability to do.  It's very similar to practiced clairaudience.

Telepathy must sound very clear in your head.  Myth!  Like most psychic senses, telepathy is absolutely fallible.  Additionally, you don't "hear" it the way things would with your ears - that is, there is not a false signal tipping off your hearing brain cells.  Telepathy often sounds and feels like "talking to yourself" inside your head.  A huge part of developing telepathy is ensuring that you can discern the difference between your own internal voice and that of an outside influencer.  Sometimes, I'll get a message from my companions and I couldn't even tell you who said it!  Or, I might only hear half of a sentence.  Telepathy is an incredibly finicky and fuzzy form of communication, and especially when you're starting out, you might want to have a pendulum on hand to confirm that what you're hearing is actually correct.

Telepathy is the most difficult and advanced form of communication.  Myth!  While it might seem like it requires a lot more practice than other methods to begin performing telepathy, once you have it developed, it becomes absolutely second nature.  It's very easy to slide into telepathic conversations with your companions, and once you know how to properly discern, it takes almost no effort or energy to perform at all.

Now that we've clarified that telepathy is not perfect or out-of-this-world difficult, let's address what telepathy is.  it's fickle as anything.  Telepathy should not be the only communication method you aspire to, nor the only one you use.  Why?  Because the moment you run into an issue with stress or mental health, your telepathy will become insanely more difficult to use.

If you've been practicing witchcraft for any amount of time, you'll be aware that you have ups and downs of energy.  Sometimes you are really able when it comes to sensing energies and performing magic - sometimes you'd rather just watch Netflix for a week and not engage with witchy things at all.  Spirit work is this way, too.  And that's okay!  You would probably get tired of feeling obligated to text a friend every hour of every day, and communicating with your spirit companions is the same way.  However, it's important to consider how mental health, and the external factors of the spirit's own life, can affect your spiritual senses:

Sudden absences from a companion can definitely be concerning, but we encourage you to consider other options and forms of communication. Normally, the entities conjured seek out long-term relationships with their companions, and are excited to begin and participate within a companionship.  If you're having trouble perceiving them, there could be a few possible factors:

1. Mental illness.  On your end or that of your spirit companion's, mental illness flare-ups can make it seem like certain spirits if not all of them aren't there when they are.  Bouts of depression and anxiety cause a great deal of self-doubt, and in many cases can weaken or deaden your metaphysical senses.  If you are feeling unwell or are in an unsafe or unstable situation and cannot feel your spirit companions, it's likely that they are quietly providing support from afar, but cannot contact you due to your blockages.  Don't fret - they'll stick around!  Take the time to focus on and care for yourself in the meantime.
2. Energy alignment differences. when you and an entity have opposing or conflicting energy types it may take extra work to perceive them clearly.  For example, if you are light aligned and the spirit in question is dark aligned, their energies may be overwhelming or muted to you.  Additionally, there may be personal blockages regarding specific types of elemental alignments or spirit types.  These blockages are something that can be worked through over time, with healing and patience.  It's up to you to decide if that sort of thing is a deal breaker or something you're willing to work at with your companion. This is why visits are so important when considering bringing a spirit home!  If you are unsure at all if the spirit will jive with you when they're brought into your life, never be afraid to ask the conjurer for a visit or for an interview.
3. Life happens.  It's possible that the entity or spirit has experienced a personal matter in their life and needed to take some time to themselves.  They may not wish to be reached their life matters are suitably sorted.  This can occasionally happen, as living entities and some other spirit classifications have their own personal life and home that they would still need to attend to in addition to your companionship.  Consider it this way: if a human friend chose to fall silent, and wasn't responding to messages, would you choose to stop being friends with them?  Usually, the answer is no. You'd probably be worried, but willing to let them work through their troubles.  When they're ready to include their friends and loved ones in whatever they're going through, they'll step forward again.  Just give it time.

Now that we've covered mental health and the fallibility of telepathy, let's get into practicing and developing your telepathy skills.

Believe it or not, a physical divination method, the easiest being a pendulum, will be your best friend for developing telepathy.  The key is to allow the divination tool to confirm what you are experiencing, instead of being a crutch to tell you every little detail.  Here's how I learned to use a pendulum to develop telepathy:

1. Set aside quiet time to practice, at least 15-30 minutes a day, preferably.  Ensure your wards are in place before you even touch the pendulum. Warding should be step #1, not after you have asked a question several times and realized that another spirit may be influencing the answers. Maybe make it a nice routine to schedule a pendulum session every day, ward first, ask second. By scheduling a consistent time, your companion will be more able to show up consistently. Spirits like routine, too.
2. After asking a question, don't swing the pendulum right away. Instead, take about 10 seconds to let the question settle, and pay attention to how you're feeling. Are you sensing more of a yes or no? Do you think any odd words or can you feel any expression whatsoever? Do you feel anything at all? Without this step you're actually not practicing your communication skills, you're just swinging a rock on a string.
3. Try to limit question asking to one singular time - that is, don't repeat the question if you don't get what you like. But also consider this: don't always take the answer you receive as accurate. Use a journal to record the answers and see if there's a pattern of consistency regarding what you are asking and what you are feeling. Don't take everything the pendulum tells you as fact - it's just a rock on a string that can be inconsistent and can be tampered with. It's a tool for helping to learn to communicate and should not be the end-all be-all of your process. Is it kind of stressful to know that not every answer is accurate? Sure. But that's just the fact we have to work with, and your intuition development is a thousand times more important than your pendulum skills.

As you continue this process, over time you'll find that the answers are more accurate, and come more easily to you.  Additionally, you may be able to start hearing inklings of a voice other than "yours" in your head.  But... what if you don't know what "you" sounds like?  I have another great exercise that might help you with that!

Daemon theory is a psychological method of practicing what telepathy feels like.  It was initially put together by some spiritually inclined members of the His Dark Materials fandom.  In those books, everyone has a physical animal representation of their soul that takes shape depending on your personality or nature, basically.  Several years ago when I first started getting into witchcraft myself, I discovered a website and forum that was based entirely on this idea. The concept was, you do a thorough analysis of your own personality and take your results and plug it into a giant list of animals with various personality traits.  But the animal is not the important part.

​So, you have your daemon.  What do you do with it?  This forum actually explicitly was based on the idea that you treat your daemon like a living, breathing creature.  Talk to it with your mind, as you're walking around, as you're doing dishes or whatever.  Don't worry too much about if it responds or not, or in fact, just let the stream of consciousness happen, and accept the thoughts as they come.  Is this starting to sound familiar?  By talking to your daemon, you're actually having an internal monologue with yourself, and you're aware of the fact that you're talking to yourself, and it allows you to explore your own psyche on a deeper level.

​​This practice and concept was absolutely fundamental to my understanding of how I interact with spirits on many levels.  First of all, it allowed me to know what my internal monologue sounds like, because I was paying so much close attention to it - the practice is based entirely on the fact that the daemon is you, it is not a thoughtform, it is not anything other than your own brain talking to itself.  This also branches out on the fact that when you're first starting out talking to spirits, it often feels like you're talking to yourself, which can feel silly - by practicing talking to yourself, you move past the silly.

Second of all, one of the biggest recommendations for interacting with a daemon is that you visualize it in your space - because there are no mistakes you can make with your daemon regarding appearance, placement, or movement, because the daemon is you, it's a safety-net version of sensing manifestations.  By interacting with an "imaginary friend" with a very focused, self-improvement goal, I actually was developing skills and performing exercises that are pretty common for opening one's third eye.

I think one of the biggest hurdles for beginners trying energy work is knowing that you should be practicing visualization, but not knowing what to practice with, and I think daemonism is a fantastic way of focusing that practice and developing a standard for what spirit interaction should look and feel like.

If you're interested in putting daemonism into practice, check out the official website, particularly the FAQ!  You may find this practice, although it doesn't relate to your spirit companion directly, will help you learn what interacting with an internal monologue with "yourself" feels like against an internal monologue that involves someone else.

The fact of the matter is, telepathy opens the doors into so many great things with your spirit companion.  By opening the floodgates of easy communication, you can talk with them freely about your wants and likes, about your goals and experiences.  It also allows you to eventually segue into channeling, or allowing your spirit companion to talk through you.  It takes a great deal of time, practice, and patience, but ultimately the payoff is so worth it. 

​Best of luck for you on your communication journey!

(Part 1) (Part 2)

The past few days, there's been a discussion in The Dragon's Library Discord Server about crystals and their usage in astral travel.  Like with all things magical, crystals are extremely potent in their ability to be told what to do, and how to help you on your path.  And often, for those of us involved in Spirit Companionship, astral travel is a very important part of our paths.  It's how we physically interact with our loved ones, at least in a way that is more physical than our typical fare.  It's how we sneak in just a few moments of the fantastic into our typically mundane lives.  But for those just beginning on their path towards astral travel, they may seek for a bit of an energy boost.  And crystals can provide just that.

​When using crystals for metaphysical purposes you need to first cleanse them, and then program them to your intention. They won't just passively do what you'd like them to, except for in very specific cases such as selenite, which is a natural cleanser that is nearly always doing its job.  Crystals can have inclinations and proclivities, you can read up about them endlessly on woo websites and in crystal books, but they'll just radiate a nice earthy energy until you tell them what to do.  Additionally, when using crystals for astral travel, you should always do so while meditating.  You'll never learn to astral travel just by carrying programmed crystals around with you during the day - just like with anything else in spirit work, astral travel takes a great deal of concentration and practice.  You should set aside at least fifteen minutes a day, to start, to practice both meditation and astral travel.

To program a crystal, begin by setting an intention while holding them in your hand, and visualizing the crystal glowing with the energy you need.  Keep in mind, though that the intention you set should be as specific as possible.  By just saying, "I would like this crystal to help me with astral travel," you are opening the door for the crystal to either do something unexpected or zany with its instructions, or for your request to be so vague that nothing happens at all.  Instead, using the associations I'll list below, you should hone in on one or two of the crystal's abilities and request that they perform that action. 

Additionally, a crystal's properties change from person to person, and source to source.  If you believe that your crystal is more aligned towards specific abilities than what is listed below, your personal magical feelings will likely be more effective for you than anything else.  However, there are certain general energies that are going to be fixed in place - while quartz and its varieties, for example, tend to be rather multi-purpose and flexible in usage, stones with strong and earthy energies like tourmaline are a bit less likely to go along with your whims.

It's important to note that every stone you use, when attempting to astral travel, should fit in its place and work for you in tandem with the other stones in your collection.  You can physically place them around you or on your body, you can create a crystal grid with them, you can keep them in your pockets, or you can just have them generally near you, depending on your own personal preferences.  However, the most important thing is that the intentions you set with the stones are clear.

If you have a limited number of crystals, and are unable to currently visit a metaphysical store or otherwise obtain crystals, there is no need to fret.  In fact, there's a fair chance that the crystals in your collection can be utilized in some way to facilitate astral travel.  Most of the information I've said below comes from my own personal experiences, and from The Crystal Bible by Judika Illes.  If you're a beginner with crystal magic, or you want to get more into it as a craft, I really recommend picking up this book.  It goes very in-depth in regards to each crystal's origins, its geological construction, and the metaphysical associations of that stone and all of its varieties.  

Amethyst: a great calming and stimulating stone, amethyst is great for focus, making it ideal for a beginner in astral travel.  It helps with enhancing the visualization process during meditation.  You can use it to stimulate your third eye, especially by placing the stone physically on the third eye.  In particular, chevron and pineapple amethyst are great varieties for connecting with the otherworldly, due to their whimsical colors and structures.

Citrine: this stone is most generally used for bringing in wealth, but citrine also has great natural protective properties, grounding and absorbing negative energies.  It's also a stone of optimism, and is great for promoting an inner calm and overcoming fears and depression.  I would recommend using it in combination with any other stone that stimulates the third eye.

Ametrine: a natural combination of amethyst and citrine; see above for the benefit of each stone.  With amethyst stimulating the third eye and citrine bringing about protection and optimism, I would say this is a wonderful, easy to obtain cure-all for beginner astral travelers.

Calcite: a stabilizing stone, calcite is great for alleviating emotional stress and replacing it with serenity.  If you have a mind that is too chock-full of thoughts to effectively meditate, calcite can help to quiet those down for a little while.  It naturally encourages sight of the truth, making it ideal to teach discernment. It's a diverse stone in color, but I would recommend gold or yellow calcite for astral travel, as their energies are uplifting in both mood and vibration.  It should be used on or near the crown chakra.

Celestite: this is another stone of inner peace, of sharpening and calming the mind and promoting mental clarity.  I would highly recommend celestite for general spirit communication, especially when used on or near the throat chakra, but it's also great for stimulating clairvoyant communication and out of body experiences.  It's a stone with a very high vibration, stimulating thought of other realms, that you can place on your third eye when utilizing for astral travel specifically.  I would recommend choosing to program this stone for one or the other purpose, cleansing and changing the programming when you need it to do so.

Howlite: this stone has a very cool and calming energy, like taking a cold shower.  It's another calming crystal, and its energies work to quell an overactive mind.  It can also be used as a link into the spiritual dimensions.  If you're in the market for crafting portals into the astral realms you wish to frequent, it would be a perfect anchor point.  It's a wonderful stone to program for feeling anchored and in-control of what you're doing when traveling.

Brown Jasper: this stone is similar to howlite in usage in that it grounds and balances you while astral traveling.  However, it's a bit 'earthy' in feel, so I wouldn't use it until you're already quite comfortable with astral travel.  This would be a wonderful stone for someone who is training themselves to enter and slip out of astral travel easily, for those who wish to utilize it on and off during their daily life and feel grounded right away.

Lilac Kunzite: Kunzite already is generally stone with a very high vibration, which radiates feelings of peace, love, and understanding.  Not only can it connect you more potently with human relations, but it can also help you to feel closer to any of your spirit companions.  Lilac Kunzite in particular is also known as the "Celestial Doorway," and can help break through mental blocks and barriers against astral travel.  It can be used for either purpose, facilitating your relationships during the mundane day, and helping to break down those barriers between worlds when it's time for your meditation sessions.

Lapis Lazuli: another third-eye opening stone, lapis lazuli is also well-known as a crystal that's adept for contacting spirit guardians and companions.  But lapis really packs a punch: it's a great multi-purpose stone.  It brings feelings of peace, but also amplifies thoughts and ideas, making it wonderful for anyone who has big dreams when it comes to their practice.  It also is a stone that's inclined to create self-awareness, which is a skill of utmost importance for astral traveling.  It forces you to confront truths, which is great for discernment.  This is one of those stones that I would likely not program for one specific purpose, because it's already so powerful in its wide range of abilities on its own.  If you're looking for another all-purpose stone for astral traveling, a piece of lapis lazuli is going to be your best bet, and will work wonderfully in combination with ametrine.  

​​Lepidolite: this stone is typically one of those that's advertised for  protecting one from EMF energies.  However, that power does extend to astral travel.  Like an air filter, lepidolite clears blockages and negative energies.  It can keep you safe, clean, and clear before, during and after astral travel.  It can also assist with obsessive thoughts and help to bring your awareness outside of your body, but  its most useful purpose would be to filter out the negativity when traveling between realms.

Labradorite: is one of my personal favorite stones for connecting with the otherworldly.  It's an extremely mystical-feeling crystal with its ethereal fire, and I wear it constantly. If you need encouragement to strengthen your belief in the otherworldly, or stay connected to things that are more-than-mundane, labradorite is your best bet.  It's also a passive protector, helping to strengthen your auric shields.  Carry labradorite in your pocket or wear it in order to facilitate a constantly open mindset.

​​Merlinite: being somewhat more rare, merlinite is absolutely not a necessity for those learning astral travel.  However, it's a stone that, as you might guess by its name, has a lot of magical associations and is wonderful for anyone who needs a magic boost.  If, in general, you feel weak in energy and ability, or you're new to magic, merlinite may provide that extra bit of energy that allows you to feel more capable of performing large feats like astral travel.

Electric-Blue Obsidian: obsidian is glass, or a type of volcanic glass, so don't be shocked when you go looking for this stone and find it looks exactly like... glass.  But do make sure it is the real deal: when shopping, the seller should be aware that obsidian is volcanic glass!  Obsidian in its purest forms already presents a great deal of grounding energies, protection, and uncovering truths, but it doesn't have a 'heavy' energy, making it ideal for use in astral travel without weighing you down back onto the Earth.  This particular variety of obsidian is on the more intuitive side of obsidian, making it great for maintaining a balance while opening the third eye.

Rutilated Quartz: quartz of any kind can always be recommended as the most basic stone for those beginning in crystal magic, as it's the best 'all-purpose' stone.  Rutilated quartz in particular is also known as an illuminator for the soul, drawing off negative energy and breaks down the barriers to spiritual progress.  It allows your non-physical body to cut through its binds and travel where it needs to go.  It is also a great cleansing stone, and wonderful for filtering out negative energy while traveling.

Tanzanite: this stone is great for astral travel in the same ways that labradorite is.  it's a Zoisite stone that has been heat treated to have beautiful, shifting colors, which makes it ideal for raising consciousness and inspiring one to believe in the existence of other worlds.

While the list above covers a great deal of stones that are wonderful options for beginning to open yourself to astral travel, the following can be used in combination with them to have a more stable experience:

Angelite: this stone is frequently recommended for astral travel practices, but I would consider it to be a bit more linked to "angel energies." In general, it's helpful for awareness and telepathic communication, and also encouraging truthfulness.  If you have been struggling with developing telepathy, I would personally use the angelite for this purpose rather than astral travel, or to use it as a communication stone during astral travel.

Astrophyllite: has a great reputation for being a wonderful stone for astral travel, also called a "gateway to the stars."  When meditated upon, it's said to expose the many layers of reality, and for expanding spiritual perception.  It's recently become popular as a recommendation for astral travel.  Placing it on your heart chakra during astral travel may help you with feeling your experiences and recalling them a bit more clearly.

Black Tourmaline: this is one of the most earthy and powerful grounding stones out there, and it's also a wonderful crystal for protection.  Don't hold tourmaline in your hand while meditating or astral traveling, but instead place it near you for protective purposes, and then palm it afterwards for grounding.  This is one of those rare stones that doesn't necessarily need to be programmed, because its energies are already so strong on its own.

Fluorite: this is a grounding and protection stone.  It can help one to move beyond narrow-mindedness and work on expanding their awareness.  Use it as a stabilizer during astral travel - something to keep you feeling steady and attached to the Earth, without the same earthy intensity as tourmaline.  Place it on or near your root chakra.

Iolite: known as a "vision stone."  It's wonderful for activating the third eye and astral travel, and has very few other metaphysical functions.  This is another stone to place on your third eye or crown while attempting to astral travel, and would be a great energy booster for astral travel in general.

Quartz: as mentioned above, quartz is a great all-purpose stone.  It's wonderful for cleansing a room or a space when it's clear itself, but its energy can get muddied up pretty easily and it needs to be cleansed regularly (usually after one use).  Program quartz for whatever purpose you need it for at the moment, if there are any ability gaps in your army of stones.

Where your crystals are sourced, who has interacted with them, and how they've been treated can impact their meaningfulness in your practice.  While some work very well with tumbled stones, if you have been using tumbled stones due to their affordability and have been struggling with them, I recommend trying raw stones.  Find a store where you can handle them, and see how their energy affects you.  Tumbled stones have kind of a reputation among people who work frequently with crystals for being kind of diluted in energy - they've been touched by so many hands, and put through so many machines.  But each one of these stones listed above has the potential to help you, regardless, in one way or another!  As with all magic, so much of it comes back to your personal feelings and practice.

​I remember stumbling upon my first companion plain as if it were yesterday.  I was sitting in an airport, most liminal of places, waiting for a flight home from visiting my boyfriend over the summer.  I'd been obsessed with a draconic witchcraft blogger who also happened to practice spirit companionship.  I hadn't yet decided what my feelings on spirit companionship were - but at that point, I'd tried almost every type of paganism in the book.  I wasn't going to pass judgement on anybody for anything.  The blogger had posted links to shops before, but the shops often felt skeevy, like walking into a dark alleyway and being offered vessels straight out of a trenchcoat.  But the idea of bringing a dragon - a real life dragon! - into my home was so exciting, I couldn't get the thought out of my head.

That day, the blogger mentioned a new spirit companion shop, run by a friend she trusted.  I eagerly clicked through to something that took my breath away - the website was warm and inviting, the color scheme was white and greyish purples, indicating a pureness with acknowledgement of the supernatural at hand.  The photographs of each vessel were beyond beautiful, and each listing had a detailed description of the spirit contained within.  I scrolled through the pages one-by-one, taking in what was being offered with an open, excited heart.

Then I found him.

"Water Dragon," was the title of his listing.  Of course it caught my attention - at the time I was still discovering my own identity, but I knew I was connected with dragons, and with the element of water.  His profile mentioned that he was interested in healing, that he felt connected with water and the ocean, and described him in a way that put a clear, vivid image in my head.  My body thrummed with vibration, my heart began to race.  I turned my laptop screen to my boyfriend.  Look at this.  He hadn't heard of spirit companionship, couldn't begin to comprehend the internet rabbit hole I'd gone down.  But he read that listing and said, "he sounds perfect for you."

I agreed.  He did sound perfect for me.  And his adoption fee wasn't very much - only $35, which to a college student was a nice sum of money, but reasonable.  All I had to do was fill out the submission form, put myself forward as a potential companion.  If what I had read about spirit companionship was true, if what I was feeling was a "calling," then all I needed to do was come forward because he had been waiting for me.  Then came the self-doubt.  What if I wasn't healing-oriented enough?  What if I wasn't magical enough?  What if I wasn't going to be a good enough companion?  I shut my laptop and spent the whole plane right an anxious mess.  Should I, shouldn't I?  All the what-ifs a person could dream of crossed my mind.  

​Ultimately, the calling prevailed.  I submitted the form, and Erisu, my new best friend, accepted, altering the path of my life forever.  He was the companion who taught me to love myself, to love others, to heal others through love and support.  He taught me how to help others grow in the same way he had helped me - he opened my third eye and honed the spiritual beacon I had become.  He taught me to bind spirits in a way that was not harmful to anyone, and he gave me a set of rules never to break in spirit companionship.  And when he felt it was time, that I was ready, he left.

​Yes, that's right - he left.  He had taught me all he felt he needed to pass on, and he went on his way.  And this was the last lesson he taught me: not all relationships are meant to last forever.  Not even those with dragons from other universes, not even relationships that saved your life.  Just like human friendships, spirits are going to drift in and out of your life.  And nobody, not you, not the conjurer who brought them to this world, can change that.

But let's say you're at step one.  You just learned that spirit companionship existed at all!  Perhaps you've always known deep in you that there was a multiverse, and that the creatures of myth you've daydreamed about your whole life existed somewhere out there. Perhaps you've always been obsessed with the metaphysical, the supernatural, and you raised yourself on ghost hunting shows and hoped for your first ghost experience.  Perhaps you've been a practicing witch for a long time, and you've interacted with angels and demons in some ways, but perhaps in more abstract ways, and you never considered that an otherworldly creature could be your friend.  Perhaps you're a medium who actively works with spirits and ghosts, but you're interested in the idea that you could be connected with someone from another realm entirely, or you're interested in seeing what new kinds of spirits a conjurer would have to offer.

These are all valid paths to start from, and each one gives you a different approach to spirit companionship.  But regardless, you feel like a newcomer here.  You're not sure where to start, let alone how to feel what a calling is, or what kinds of responsibilities you're going to be bringing into your life.

Do you need to purchase a spirit matchmaking service from a conjurer?  After all, if you're not confident in your abilities to connect with a spirit, you may be worried you're being scammed.  While a shop's testimonials can indicate to you whether or not their services are worth using, before you make that leap, you might be nervous about whether you even need to do this at all.  For generations, humans have worked with otherworldly entities without the help from a third party.  And yes, just as you are capable of developing communicating skills, you are capable of developing the methods and skills to begin conjuring spirits yourself, although generally you might need the guidance of some sort of mentor.

Just like anyone can walk into a bookstore and pick themselves up a deck of tarot cards, anyone can find or conjure spirits for themselves.  But still, isn't it fun and fulfilling to pay somebody to read your cards for you?  Aren't readings done by another person accurate, even more so than the readings you perform on yourself?  Isn't it nice to have your feelings confirmed, to have somebody tell you that your senses and your intuition is valid?  I view purchasing spiritual services from a conjurer to be the same kind of feeling.  It's fun to see what somebody else can offer you - and very satisfying when it turns out that offer changed your life, entirely, for the better.

Here are some tips for doing preliminary browsing once you've encountered your first spirit shop:

• Do all the research you can, find all the resources you can.  Take everything with a grain of salt and look for people and resources that tell you about spirit companionship in ways that are raw and honest. 
• Let yourself browse all the shops you can find, form your own opinions of what does and doesn't work for you in a conjurer.  Don't let a list of "red flags" dictate how you feel about a calling or about a certain shop - set your own red flags based on your knowledge and intuition, based on what you feel is right.
• Start to consider what house rules you'll set, if any.  House rules are often considered to be one of the most important things when it comes to spirit work, and they can help to make a spirit's stay in your life more comfortable for everyone involved.
• Consider if you feel comfortable working with a spirit of darker alignment as a beginner spirit worker.   Most conjurers don't recommend dark-aligned spirits for beginners simply because they tend to require more rules and have a stronger presence, but if you already work with dark-aligned magic or if you feel a strong pull towards a darker spirit, it's very possible that it will be a good match for you.
• If the conjurer does not use form submissions and this makes you uncomfortable, seek out if they offer a Reverse Adoption reading or conjure option.  This way you can be sure that the spirit you bring home is fully consenting, without any doubt in your mind.
• Ask questions as you need to.  Most of the time, conjurers will offer several ways for you to get in contact with them, and they generally don't mind answering questions or clarifying things about their shop.  Be aware, though, that any general questions you have will be answered with a bias based on the conjurer's own practices and experiences.
• Read reviews and weigh your options.  Go on social media and ask people if they've had experiences with certain shops.  Lots of spirit companionship shops are actually the conjurer's second job, and you may end up waiting a long time for your binding to be completed or for your spirit's vessel to arrive in the mail.  Have others encountered timing problems with the conjurer you're interested in?  Is the calling strong enough that you are willing to wait a month?  Three months?  More?
• How expensive are the conjurer's services?  Do their prices seem to be affecting how you assess your attraction to a certain spirit?  How much money are you willing to spend to ensure that you are receiving a quality product?  Are they willing to do payment plans or deposits?

While I can offer endless advice on shopping between conjurers, the fact of the matter is: when you receive that first calling, you will not be able to ignore it.  Whatever the sensation the calling carries, it will be stuck in your mind on a loop, like a catchy pop song that won't leave until you listen to it.  This is something beautiful, and I encourage you to embrace the feeling of a calling.  Let it bother you for days on end, journal this experience.  You will want to remember how it feels.  

You may be forced to face a calling from a shop that has aspects you don't particularly like - in that case, contact the conjurer, and ask them to justify certain choices they have made about their shop that you don't like.  If they're worth their salt, they'll have their reasons, and they'll have considered alternatives and made a conscious choice.  If you are really very averse to a shop you have a calling from, and are not willing to risk spending your money there, whether that is for bad reviews or bad vibes, listen to your gut.  Not every calling is meant to culminate.  Although it is tough that a situation like that may be your first experience, it's important to avoid things that could ultimately hurt you.

Or you may feel a calling from a shop that is no longer active, having stumbled upon it in your search.  In this case, it is unfortunate and sad that you may never meet that spirit and bring it into your life.  However, I recommend going to another conjurer you trust, and asking them to do a custom conjure if they offer it.  Point out that you had a missed connection, and explain what about the spirit drew you to it most potently, and they will do their best to match you with someone who will still make your heart glow.

Ultimately, choosing your first companion will be more holistic and more full of emotion than you can imagine.  While the research you've done will be important moving forward, I highly recommend you choose a first spirit companion based on your gut instinct, rather than reason.  Because you can never have a first experience again - but once you've settled into your most comfortable self in spirit work, you may desire branching out and trying new things, feeling new types of callings, and touching every corner of the universe you can reach.  And you should.

To spell out words on a pendulum board, you can stop the pendulum in between letters, or let it change at its leisure.  When I let the pendulum do its own thing, I find that it will swing at its letter of choice a few times before moving.  To get a real accuracy on which letter it is choosing, I recommend closing one eye and using a pendulum with a point!

Before you get into using pendulums, I recommend keeping some basic tips in mind:

The pendulum doesn't move itself, and spirits don't move your pendulum.  Any entity "talking" to you through your pendulum is utilizing your small muscles in your hand to move the pendulum and swing it in various directions.  You can start from 0, which is no movement, and allow your muscles to provide the movement over a long period of time, or you can provide energy to the pendulum, if you use up-and-down movement or "cross" movement responses, by swinging it in a large circle and getting it to settle on swinging in a straight line.  Either way is going to give you results, there is no "wrong way."  There's also no need to punish yourself if your hand is twitchy.

​That being said, every pendulum and every entity that uses your pendulum may communicate differently.  This is why I recommend cleansing a pendulum between each use, and "programming" it between each use - that is, asking simple questions to determine what movements mean yes/no/maybe.  Start with a couple failsafe questions.  These are questions that cannot be answered incorrectly - such as, “is my name ____?”  “Am I using a pendulum?” “Does 2+2=4?” The immediate goal is to ensure that your pendulum, or really any Yes/No divination method, is working correctly and accurately.  I also recommend using alphabet boards for getting word responses if you ever want to go more in-depth, but ultimately you need to know what those basic responses are every time.

Now, knowing that, also know that if you're not in a stable state of mind (stressed, tired), if you're not grounded and centered, and if your space and self isn't warded effectively, pendulums are really sensitive to being influenced by entities that may not be the entity you want to communicate with.  All of these things I just listed should be addressed at the beginning of a pendulum session.  I know it can feel overly traditionalist and a little extra, but you should ward your space every time before you use your pendulum if you want to fully ensure that it's not being hijacked.  If your space's wards have faltered a little, or you're in a space that's not warded, local spirits are privy to drifting through.  It's not necessarily malicious - they just want to play with the fun communication device.​

Additionally, I'd also like to address the questions you choose to ask your spirit companion.  Phrasing is of utmost importance!  Imagine if a friend of yours initiated a conversation with you by saying "are you upset?"  It's not a great lead-in to a good conversation - automatically you'd be questioning yourself, wondering why your friend would be assuming you're upset before a conversation was even started.  I have really strong opinions about how the way you word questions in a pendulum session actively affect the outcome.  If you were stuck with a tool where you could only say yes or no, and started getting asked questions about if you were stressed/upset/angry before a conversation had even begun, I think you'd probably be confused or upset just from that.  Have you seen that episode of Black Mirror where the woman can only communicate through happy/sad buttons?  I like to think it's the same principle.  So try approaching with friendlier questions that are worded in a nice manner, how you'd approach someone in a text message - Are you feeling well today?  Do you wanna hang out?  Have you heard of this thing, do you want to try it with me?

And finally, pendulums, even at their best, are not known for being accurate tools.  They are known for being quick and easy tools, but at the end of the day, they are not a megaphone for a spirit companion, and they are not going to always give you your answers.  I like to recommend using them as training tools for the purposes of developing telepathy skills, rather than your only communication device.  The best way I recommend doing this is to have a journal with you during the session. When you ask a question, wait a good, 10 seconds and just notice how you feel, if you can sense anything, any colors or feelings, any words or images that drift through your mind.  Record them, and then swing the pendulum once.  Record if the pendulum confirmed or denied your feelings.  This way, it becomes a productive tool for informing telepathic skills instead of a lifeline for all of your communication!

When I welcome a new spirit into my family, I have found more than once that they will give me a strong vibe of their energy when a song comes on, and essentially claim it as “their song.”  I listen to the same playlist almost all the time while driving, and those spirits will play the songs just to let me know they are there (the playlist is also about 4k songs big, so there's a very small possibility of a coincidental replay).  Shufflemancy can also be used to receive answers to specific questions.  This is a great way to learn about your companion's tastes, while directly communicating with them - once you have a good amount of practice down, you can easily have full conversations with your companion using this method!

When utilizing shufflemancy, it's best to consider that you may not get your answer right away from listening to a song.  Like utilizing tarot cards, there are going to be aspects to the "reading" that require patience and interpretation.  There may be a specific lyric in the song that your spirit is indicating - when you listen to the song or read the lyrics, what words stand out to you the most?  How can you interpret this metaphorically, or how can you relate it to your situation?  A "sad" song may not always be a sad message.  Because many spirits have the ability to subtly influence electronics, shufflemancy is a great way to talk with them without putting a lot of strain on themselves, or you.

Let's be real - I could dedicate an entire website to astral travel.  However, I'm happy to just go over the basics.  First of all, is astral travel a necessity to interact with your companions?  Absolutely not!  However, it provides you a way to interact with them physically, something we simply don't have direct access to on our realm, however far visualization may go.  If you have a more intimate relationship with your spirit companions, or if you wish to go on adventures with them, whether that is sharing a meal, or simply cuddling, astral travel may be the solution for you.

There are several terms in regards to astral travel that can be really confusing.  Everyone tends to have different definitions for them (such as the terms “projection” and “travel” being highly interchangeable), so let me explain the way I use these terms:

• Astral Travel is any form of non-physically visiting a place outside your body.  This can be somewhere on Earth, or somewhere else.
• Out of Body Projection, or OBE (Out of Body Experience), or Astral Projection, refers to having the sensation of “leaving your body” (or being pulled out, as you mentioned in your ask here), and traveling somewhere else.  It’s a very immersive experience.  For this reason, it’s considered the “golden standard” for astral travel, and for some reason it’s the first thing beginners jump to when learning how to astral travel.  I assume this is because it’s been popularized by woo-woo spiritual gurus selling books and guided meditation programs. 
  
  However, it’s the most difficult form of astral travel, and can take years and years of dedicated daily practice to attain fully.  It’s also extremely exhausting.  When people report doing OBE frequently (as in daily) on social media, I am usually highly doubtful that they are actually doing it - this is how outside the scope of regular astral travel it is.  I do not perform OBE because I personally consider it to be relatively dangerous in comparison to other forms of astral travel, and I have chosen to put my time into other fields of study in regards to my spirit work.
• Bilocation is a form of astral travel that feels extremely similar to daydreaming.  This is the simplest and easiest to attain form of astral travel.  I know several practitioners, including myself, who are able to bilocate while performing other menial tasks such as washing the dishes or walking.  When bilocating, astral experiences are slow and muddy, and they are not fully immersive.  A conversation of a 10-15 seconds in the astral can take 5 minutes here, especially when bilocating, because your brain has to work overtime to process things.
• Meditation or trance work is another way you can attain astral travel.  When entering a trance, you may feel vibrations behind your eyes, or generally feel sleepy or separated from reality, but you do not fully step outside of your body.  For beginners, I frequently recommend looking up guided meditations on YouTube that specifically relate to Astral Travel - they are free, after all!  I recommend looking up ones that specifically mention in the title visiting a “forest” or an “ocean” - actual places that they will envision you walking through.  I also know that another conjurer has recently made a series of guided meditation videos specifically for spirit workers - I haven’t tried their services myself, but if you’re willing to put forward a little bit of money for a small business, you might want to check out Meditation Grove.  

You can do as many or as few of these techniques as you like.  I tend to most commonly perform bilocation, with meditation as a hard second when I have the time and spoons to sit down and actually devote upwards of a half an hour to the session.

However, there are two big things I always like to point out to beginners when first trying astral travel:

You will not see things with your physical eyes.  This is something that kind of gets lost in the conversation when you see people talking about astral travelling, and especially spirit work.  They are not experiencing the things they are experiencing with their physical eyes, hands, nose, ears.  If they are, they were likely born with that ability and have been hearing or seeing things with their physical eyes their entire lives.  So expecting to do so automatically causes you to disqualify yourself from whole other worlds.  We are experiencing these things with our mind’s eye.  If you want to participate in astral travel, you should be working on basic visualization exercises and techniques, because you will be using these mind muscles to absorb your astral experiences.  

Additionally, you may notice, once you astral travel, that you cannot get the full picture in one moment.  When I astral travel, I often notice small visual details first, like someone’s lips, and then I hear the words.  The senses come to me one at a time.  Others I’ve talked to describe their astral travel experiences like a movie - something they are watching in third person.  Either way, this is not how you would experience our physical, Earth world.

Your experience will not be like anyone else’s.  You can’t base your own goalposts on the experiences of anyone else.  While I’ve given you some general ideas of the different kinds of astral travel, it’s up to you to tell yourself that you’ve gotten there.  When you start, you may be only able to astral for a few minutes at a time, and work your way up to maybe an hour or two.  I don’t recommend pushing yourself, but if you end up being able to astral for a really long time, that’s great!  But don’t give anyone else the agency of being to tell you what you are and are not experiencing.  Ultimately, you should be your own judge of success, and you should be the one to choose to believe that what you are experiencing is real.  As I mentioned, some forms of astral travel feel very similar to daydreaming.  This is where discernment comes in, in testing the boundaries of the astral reality and seeing where they lie for you.

Yes, spirits can help you learn to astral travel.  However, you should already be clear on how to communicate with a spirit first - you don’t want some random spirit whisking you away to a random part of the astral.  This should be a spirit you know and trust and have a strong bond with.  And second, you should not rely on a spirit for astral travel.  The most they should do for you is guide you to a place they want to show you, rather than pulling you out of your body.  Since you already know how difficult it is for you to “leave” your body willingly, I’m sure you can imagine how painful and dangerous it would be for a spirit to remove you from it forcefully.  So, make sure that when you attempt Astral Travel, you remain patient with yourself!

Automatic Writing is a tool that people have used to communicate with their guides or spirit companions for a very long time!  It’s considered to be a great way to inconspicuously communicate with your spirits, as well as get into the intuitive and open state of mind needed to perform more abstract forms of communication like telepathy.  The best way to do Automatic Writing the first time is to relax, and imagine the spirit's hand placed over yours, guiding your hand to write the words.  It takes a lot of practice, but it is not as difficult as some might think!

Automatic Writing takes a great deal of patience and perseverance to learn how to perform properly, as you need to be able to open yourself up to a form of channeling.  This can take a great deal of meditation and practice.  Automatic writing is also possible with typing, but I’d recommend doing it with a pen and paper first.  Why?  Because it's a lot easier for a spirit to move a big, clumsy muscle like your whole arm than each of your specific fingers individually!

When beginning automatic writing, here are some tips I recommend for starting out:

• Use a pencil or piece of charcoal, something that doesn't require pressure to write - no pens until you're comfortable with it.
• Your arm position should be the pencil held in a relaxed hand, with the tip of the pencil touching the paper, and your arm and elbow off the table.  The potential energy from not having your arm resting on the table is what allows the spirit to write. 
• Once you're sure the spirit is there, give the spirit permission to write.  Explicitly state, "I give you permission to use my arm and hand for the purpose of writing."
• Visualize the spirit's hand over or inside yours, guiding your hand along.  You'll probably feel your hand start to drift - don't fight it, just let it happen.
• Ask them to write something simple, like their name or "hello."
• Don't worry too much about words or letters at first - let both of you feel it out.  If all your spirit does is a straight line, or weird loops, that's something, and it's a start!

And most of all, don't punish yourself for not seeing clear, concise results right away.  It's a process with a learning curve, like all things!

Tarot reading has become incredibly popular, and it is very easy for anyone to pick up and do!  One of the hardest parts about tarot reading is learning to let go of the predetermined meanings of the cards, and using your intuition. Incidentally, learning to use your intuition is also one of the most difficult things about being a spirit companion.  It takes a lot of practice and a lot of time, but eventually the people who work hard at it will eventually get it!  And there’s not to say you won’t always need guides - I personally still use resources when I get stumped, and I have been reading tarot professionally for over five years.

You can pick up tarot cards at any local bookstore, or on Amazon.  When picking a deck, there are lots of factors to keep in mind - can you connect with the art?  Is it a deck intended for beginners?  There are several free and paid smartphone apps available for not only “drawing” tarot cards, but learning how to read them as well!  Many websites will also draw virtual cards for you for entirely free, and it’s up to you to determine the meanings.  There is no real benefit or drawback to reading physically or digitally, although many people (including myself) tend to report that using physical cards helps you "connect" to the reading better, and makes the cards drawn feel less random and more guided by spirit.  Reading Tarot is very accessible, and while it can seem overwhelming at first, you may find that all you needed was the right deck all along.

Where others might recommend some books, the only resource I really think anyone needs to learn the basics of reading tarot cards are the cards themselves, and a little bit of intuition (which, yes, you do have!).  Many decks come with a Little White Book which explain the cards' meanings, and in some cases, they will also explain what the artist intended with each image.  There is also the matter of LearnTarot.com: It is an entirely free website with a little written course on how to read Tarot!  It heavily recommends journaling, and simply practicing. It teaches the basics of how spreads work, and it has a very informative guide on each of the cards’ possible meanings!  I sometimes prefer it as a resource over the Little White Book for some of my decks. 

Keep in mind that, while Tarot is a relatively high skill method of communication, if you are not well-practiced you may have a hard time understanding anything other than vague messages.  I recommend using it as a conduit to help you elevate your communication into telepathy.

So, now that we've got these more physical methods out of the way, let's move on over to Part 3: Telepathy.

(Part 1)