Automatic writing is an old form of divination in which messages seem to come out of nowhere through your hand and onto paper. Some who have attempted communicating in this manner, have written lengthy messages, songs — even complete novels.
In most cases the person writes something without conscious thought of what they are writing. The process has often been associated with psychics and the ‘spirit world’. In books and movies it has been depicted as a ‘channel’ for someone, usually deceased, to communicate with the living. The person doing it is considered merely a ‘scribe’ transmitting the message. Automatic writing is essentially done in an altered state of consciousness that is attributed to spirits of the dead. It is believed that the spirits literally manipulate the writing utensil in the hands of the medium to communicate, as the writer is often unaware of what is written and often scrawls text in handwriting that is remarkably different than their own.
Others believe that spirits may also communicate by forming messages in the mind of the medium, which reproduce on the page. Most likely, the medium is writing unconsciously and messages are formed from material in the subconscious mind or from a secondary personality that is gifted with extrasensory perception.
When it comes to the medium’s involvement in the process, some writers slip into a trancelike state, while others are fully awake and simple let the words flow, usually not aware of what’s being written because the messages generally come in very quickly, as though the spirit has only so much energy to funnel the message to the medium. Pens were common tools but many mediums now use blackboards, typewriters or other technology to keep up with the large amount of material produced at such a rapid pace.
Some mediums have also claimed to produce messages from famous historical people, deceased authors and even classical music composers. One of the most famous examples of spirit dictation was the strange case of Pearl Curran, a St. Louis housewife who supposedly channeled a spirit named Patience Worth. On the evening of July 8, 1913, Patience Worth, who claimed to be the spirit of a seventeenth-century Englishwoman, became a spirit control for Pearl Leonore Curran, a young woman in St. Louis, Missouri. Curran was not a practicing medium, nor did she have any interest in Spiritualism, yet during a period of three years, Patience Worth dictated through the process of automatic writing a stream of proverbs, lyric poetry, plays, and a number of intricately constructed novels.
Curran’s formal education had ended in the eighth grade. She seldom read, never traveled, and was completely unfamiliar with any literary people or people with scholarly backgrounds. At no time in her life had she ever given any indication of creative or literary talent. Yet, of one of the spirit-dictated novels, a reviewer for the New York Times wrote that the plot was fashioned with such skill, deftness, and ingenuity that such talent would be envied by many a novelist. In an anthology of the “best” poetry for the year 1917, Patience Worth had five poems selected, to accompany three of Amy Lowell‘s, three of Vachel Lindsay’s, and one by Edgar Lee Masters—all highly respected American poets, critics, and novelists. Was Patience Worth a spirit or a secondary personality of Curran’s? Whoever she was, the large body of literary works that bears her name was transmitted through the process of automatic writing.
The vast majority of people who practice automatic writing on a regular basis do so because they believe that they receive spiritual and material guidance from intelligences in the spirit world or from a higher aspect of their own mind. Most of these individuals cherish this information as highly personal and seldom to be shared with others Individuals who are successful at automatic writing say it usually takes three or four sittings before the first intelligent results are achieved.
Via in part: UnexplainedStuff
Circa71 