Almost every culture has a concept of a “Resident Spirit,” House Spirit, or Household Deity. They’re known by a variety of names (Nisse, Tomte, Lares), although individual house spirits each have a name of their own as well. Most of the time their activities go unnoticed and are mistaken for the sound of the “house settling” or “tree branches in the wind,” but sometimes, if treated properly, they can help find lost objects, give advice, and help keep an eye on things as an ally.
Nobody really knows what these entities actually “are” or where they come from. Spirits of ancestors? Sure! Nature spirits who have always been there? Why not! Egregores that manifest based on the collective will of the residents of the place? Hey, it’s possible! The point is, if there’s a place, there’s a Spirit, and if there’s a Spirit, you can try to communicate with it.
Another note: although we refer to these entities as “House Spirits,” they’re often (though not always) associated not with a specific “house,” but with a specific person or household (“family”). This means that no matter your living situation, it’s possible for you to connect with these beings. So, why not give it a try? First, you’ll need to figure out what to call your friendly domestic spirit.
To divine a name for your House Spirit:
Determining a spirit’s name can be a complicated process. In some traditions, the spirit is cajoled or threatened with punishment until they reveal what they’re called. In other traditions, names can be determined via scrying, in dreams, through tarot, or many other ways that are dependent on cultural context.
Our approach takes the spirit’s inherent right to self-determination into account.
As this is the case, there are three ways to determine the name of a spirit that are true to the… er… spirit… of Liminal Ecology:
1. Research. If it’s a spirit from a particular tradition, its name can often be found in texts or folklore or stories from that tradition.
2. Ask it. Just what it says on the tin. Ask the spirit its’ name and it may tell you. This leaves a great deal to your own intuition and experience. If the spirit isn’t interested in sharing, it’s a non-starter.
3. Name-in-Common. This is the method we’re going to entertain here. Using this method, you devise a “name” using your own methods. It could be complicated, or based on a tradition like the Greco-Egyptian magical practice of assigning astrological and elemental correspondences to each letter. It could be divined via a ouija board or pendulum. It could be generated using an online random name generator. You could just make one up that sounds cool or neat!
However, once you’ve decided this name, you need to get the spirit to agree that you’ll both use it, mutually, to refer to the spirit in your interactions with it. Doing this can be as simple as speaking the proposed Name-in-Common, formally asking the spirit if it agrees to be called this, and flipping a coin. You could also use a pendulum, cast lots, etc. If it replies “no,” try again with a new Name-in-Common until you get one the spirit agrees with.
Once the spirit agrees, formalize it by writing down the name somewhere and setting out an offering. You can even make a small shrine somewhere to your House Spirit; the more often offerings are left, the stronger the relationship you’re building with your new Friend.
Some caveats:
a. Remember, you’re not trying to control or coerce the spirit in this system because that’s shitty behavior. You’re just establishing communication and mutual understanding. However, you’re also acting respectfully, and the results of treating your Spirit with respect will be evident in the results of your practice.
b. Because we respect the spirit’s right to self-determination, and because this isn’t the spirit’s “True Name,” it has the right to NOT respond to your actions.
c. You will not need the spirit’s permission to share the Name-in-Common, but each Name-in-Common can only be ‘used’ by members of the household in which the agreement was made. In other words, I can’t go around asking someone else’s Resident Spirit to do stuff just because I happen to know its Name-in-Common.
d. If you end up establishing the right kind of relationship with your Resident Spirit, it may still choose to share its “True Name” with you at some point.
e. You can change the Name-in-Common if the Resident Spirit agrees to the new name.
Contacting Your House Spirit:
Instructions:
1. Collect some paper, a writing utensil, and seven small items (“lots”) from around your domicile, small enough to fit into the palm of your hand. Something pea or coin sized is perfect: wood, metal, stone, glass, fiber (cloth, etc.), grain (rice, fruity pebble), plastic toy, etc. Each item should be no larger than a bezoar.
If you’re unable to find one or more of the “lots,” write the word on a slip of paper and ball up the paper. Set the lots aside somewhere safe.
2. Using your writing utensil/paper, draw a large, rough floor plan/map of the interior of the your residence. Fill the paper if possible. Don’t worry too much about scale or artistic skill. Be sure to indicate windows and doors, and cardinal directions (use a compass if you need). If your house has two floors, draw them both. If you’re in an apartment/condo/townhouse, just do your residence. If you’re in a one-room apartment, studio, vehicle, tent, etc., it’s okay to label sections of the diagram as “rooms!”
3. Open and then close all of the doors and windows leading to the outdoors in your domicile (if it’s safe/if you’re able to do so). Opening and closing the front door will suffice. Turn off as many lights and appliances as possible (not the router though!). Candle light is fine and may even help!
4. Address the House Spirit, either by its Name-in-Common or by “Spirit of this House/Apartment/Condo/Tent (etc.).” Ask it to tell you something. You could ask a question, or you could just let it speak. Thank it in advance, and let it know that it doesn’t have to talk if it doesn’t want to.
5. Now, toss the lots onto your map (if you miss, toss them until at least four land on the map). Note the room each lot has fallen into. Multiple lots in a room are fine.
6. Go into each room and find an object made of, in full or in part, the material of the lots which have fallen . For instance, if my wooden lot falls into the kitchen, I might select a wooden spoon. If the metal lot also falls there, I might choose a metal spoon as well. It’s okay to interpret loosely; “grains” could be food, but could also be grains of sand or pebbles. If you’re not able to find an object in the room indicated by the lot, that’s fine; just keep it in mind.
7. When you’ve collected as many objects from around the house as there are lots, you can intuit their meaning based on the following ROUGH correspondences.
If you use your dining room as the office use the office, or if you don’t have a dining room, use the room where you eat.
If you have personal associations with particular rooms, positive or negative, it’s fine to interpret accordingly:
KITCHEN: Nourishment (physical and emotional/mental), Craft, Food, Initiation
DINING AREA: Tradition, Holidays, Consumption, Celebration
BEDROOM: Rest, Relaxation, Love, Children, Health
BATHROOM: Cleanliness, Water, Disposal, Respite
LIVING ROOM/HEARTH: Family, Foundations, Community, Entertainment
OFFICE/WORKSPACE: Work, Industry, Study, Communication, Money
Remember, if you go into a room knowing in advance what you’re going to choose, you’re not listening to the Spirit, you’re listening to yourself (and kind of insulting the Spirit).
8. Rooms in which lots didn’t land don’t need to be part of the reading. However, if you weren’t able to find an object in a room in which a lot landed, this means something is lacking, or the meaning is “reversed:”
KITCHEN: Malnourishment (physical and emotional/mental), Bad Luck, Lack, Obfuscation
DINING AREA: Conflict, Labor, Pollution, Mourning
BEDROOM: Unrest, Anxiety, Animosity, Illness, Death
BATHROOM: Infestation, Decay, Waste, Unpleasantness
LIVING ROOM/HEARTH: Enemies, Destruction, Illusion
OFFICE/WORKSPACE: Drudgery, Ignorance, Miscommunication, Lack of Money
When the operation is complete, say “Thank you” using your Spirit’s Name-in-Common. Remember: always courteously thank your Spirit regardless of whether the communication in question “makes sense”– these entities have a wider field of vision than you, so what they’ve communicated with you may not be readily recognizable immediately. A small gift or offering of some kind may also be in order.
After some time, you may get to know more about your House Spirit– it may prefer certain incenses or offerings (ours prefers a Rosemary fumigation), and develop a rapport that doesn’t necessitate a ritual of any kind. Or, you may find that using some kind of structured method like this is necessary every time. The point is that respecting these entities as entities with self-determination is really the best way to establish a relationship with them.
Give this a try, and let us know how well it worked for you if you do!