Cursed Items?



Remember the “Brady Bunch” episode with the cursed tiki object the boys found in Hawaii? It made for a fascinating tale, but can an item be cursed?

I’ve had a lot of people ask me that question. Understandably, as someone who reads objects, I might have some insight. The best way I can put it is this; an item with a history imprinted in it filled with pain and anguish, anger and resentment can, in fact, affect how you feel when you’re in contact with it, it can even make an entire room uncomfortable. Is it “cursed” in the sense that owning it will somehow make bad things befall you? No, not in a sentient way, but perhaps in a subconscious way. It’s more like you will make bad decisions or be influenced by the emotion of it. It can take you to a dark place. That’s not the same as being cursed or possessed, but it can sure as hell feel like a curse.

The Hope diamond and James Dean’s car that he crashed and died in were two items well known to be “cursed.” The hope diamond was repeatedly associated with death, suicide, madness, bankruptcy, and murder. Well, within the context to the diamond itself, being priceless and unbelievably rare, those who would covet it might not be of the best caliber of mind or lifestyle. It’s sort of like the spending rich playboy finding a bad end. That is one element of the “curse” of the stone, but the other one is the negative energy it accrues as it is passed on from owner to owner. For example, a family wedding ring passed on can sometimes be comforting if you believe it to be associated with a marriage that lasted a long time, but if it were worn by an elderly woman who had suffered widowhood and lots of arthritic pain, it may be possessed of melancholy.

James Dean’s car was parted out after his crash and the people who received the parts found horrible deaths, but then these were men who raced cars. The tires of the car being reused blew out and caused an accident, but then again reusing tires from an accident, probably not a good idea.

The curse of items is threefold; the mindset of the people who believe items can be cursed (superstitious nature, religiousness), the cumulative energy the item has accrued affecting the mood and decision-making of the people using it (making you depressed or angry) and the practicality of the item, i.e. some items by their nature beg to give you problems: I took a piece of rusted barbed wire from the desert to use for vines to grow up in my garden. I cut myself on it many times even though it was hanging way above my head. I kept reaching up to hang wind chimes nearby and got caught. That’s not a curse. That’s stupidity. You don’t put barbed wire in your garden and expect to not get snagged.

Some items hold their “history” longer than others. Metals, stone, and wood seem to hold information from past owners better. Paper and fabric are short-lived, sometimes just a few months maximum. If you take a stone from a cemetery, will it curse you? Not likely. The stone was nothing more than a part of an outdoor environment. Now, had that stone been on the ground where someone fell down following a stabbing and died a long and slow death, it might perhaps retain some very painful memories creating a sense of helplessness to those who hold it.

It’s human nature to be superstition and to look for patterns. Some folks can look at a flooding rain and notice it happened mid month. The next month, they notice it again, and the next. Soon, they truly believe that heavy rains only come mid month. We are superstitious about many things, like walking over a person’s grave, under a ladder, or having a black cat cross our path. Depending on your tendency to believe in magic and sometimes your religious upbringing, these superstitions can be strong. Convincing someone they aren’t cursed is not an easy process. If they give the object away, more than likely they will quit focusing on bad things happening to them and begin to focus on the good things and use that as a positive reinforcement that the item was indeed cursed. It’s all about focus. Remember the line from “Skeleton Key”? “It only works if you believe in it.”

Whether you believe you have the ability to read an object or not, you are being influenced by them all the time. People who collect antiques or buy items in flea markets know this sensation. They see something interesting, pick it up, examine it, and suddenly it no longer seems as interesting as it appeared from afar. They set it back down and move on.

My best advice is to allow yourself to handle used items before thinking of bringing them home and adding them to the family’s environment. This is much like the decision to adopt a puppy, you need to make sure it’s a good fit. Trust your instincts. If you can hold the item and it fascinates you and you find it beautiful, turn it in your hands, and imagine yourself already purchasing it, that’s a good sign. If you hold it in your hands and want to place it back quickly, frown at the price, wonder if it would work at home, and talk yourself out of it, those might sound like practical considerations, but something positively radiating will be worth the price tag and you know you’ll find a niche for it.

Comments

  1. I have been believing my instinct. And in many cases when I ignore, I become a looser.
    I didnt want to believe in that as in some occasions it went differently.
    After reading this post, I have different outlook!
    Thanks Autumn Forest for explanation

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  2. Chib;
    I am glad to help. Having some insight into the information objects hold, I know there are some that I have removed from my home because they changed the whole tone of my room. We are influenced sometimes by things we can't see and can't pinpoint, but often times, it's the energy from another person in a crowd or an object that's been touched in grief like a headstone or a memorial. It's amazing how much it affects us and we don't even realize it.

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  3. This is wonderful. I was watching an epistode of The Haunted? the other day and they did an entire episode on a woman being tormented by a haunted picture. People never think of things as haunted or cursed, but we forget that some people bond more closely to objects than locations.

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  4. I had a friend who called in an emergency one day-her son bought a Civil War picture of some generals and when he brought it home and looked at it, he thought it was haunted. She called me because he wouldn't hang it up. From reading objects, I know that paper (even photos) just don't hold energy that long. I asked her what the picture looked like. She studied it and laughed. "Well, they are a bunch of sour angry old bearded men." Voila! I told her to tell her son that the photo could not be holding any residual and that if he were to hang it up in honor of them, it might be a good sign of respect, but perhaps put it in another part of the house (for his comfort purely. I wouldn't want them staring at me in my room either). He saved himself $40 and kept a picture worth probably more than that. Over time, he'll get used to looking at them. He felt a great relief to know that the photo couldn't hold memories that long. But, you can see how easy it is to get spooked.

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  5. Are cursed items the same as haunted objects?

    Also, I found this post pretty interesting and though I doubt it's of any relevant consequence it reminded me of this one time I found this piece of jewelry in the park. It was a really wooded and secluded dirt path park with little foot traffic. Anyways I was walking back to my car and on the trail back I happened to look down and caught sight of something silver. I bent down to pick whatever it was up but it was packed pretty well in the ground so I had to wrench it free. I did, and found it to be a rather big, thick (real) silver ring so I cleaned it up and wore it and absolutely loved it. This was back when I was in high school and I wore it for a good year with no "problems" until it started to disappear. I would take it off and not be able to find it (though I'm sure this was more my fault than anything paranormal), and once I took it off at a public pool and forgot it and had to run back and get it. It was still there thankfully, but at last I went to the beach and somehow it slipped off my finger and I lost it. I really searched the ground over for this ring but it was gone and no one else had grabbed it since I was there watching hawk-eyed for it. I always thought how weird yet cool it was that I'd just happened to find this thing that wasn't even mine, had it for a time, then I ended up losing it just like its previous owner had. Strange!

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  6. Grim;
    I've heard of similar situations. My estimate would be that, because it was not a gift and not something you paid for, the care you took with it was different than something precious. It's really a matter of focus and attention. Had it perhaps had a really fantastically positive feeling about it, you might have taken a keener mental note of where it was at all times, like a parent with a child.

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  7. This is great information and I wish more people would follow their gut instinct when acquiring items. I won't buy an item for our house without laying hands on it first. I have passed on keeping many family antiques because 'the feel' wasn't right.

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