Pendulums....?

[Elfa Wylde]

ok, here's the question:

I've been reading some about pendulums and dowsing... and i'm wondering.... with pendulums... just how does that work?

I've read that you have to first find out what motion means "yes," "no," and "i don't know"

but once that's done, there's where the info gets kinda vague.
can you ask about anything?

also, years ago i had an aquaintence who claimed to have used a pendulum to find a neighbor's missing horse.
she said the pendulum kept showing the horse to be behind the barn, but it was never there when someone would go out there.... that is until spring, and the "snow drift" melted.

seems their OLD horse had passed on and lay under a healthy blanket of snow til then.
how do you find things? she said she used a map and when it would swing in a circle over and area, she'd draw a closer view until a fairly pinpointed are was discerned.

is she telling the truth?
is there more to it?

in Love and friendship
the ever-curious

[Erincelt]

I'd say its quite likely that she is.

Penudlums work under a very simple principle: Is it A or is it B? So for instance if you wanted to find a card in a deck... divide it up into four piles.. then lay them across from each other in a plus "+" formation.. and use the pendulum to pick two of them.. (aka if it swings left to right, then its those two.. if it swings up and down, its those two).. then divide those two into four piles and keep doing it until eventually you get down to just two cards.

I think you get the idea.. you just have to give it options. Two or four options is usually easiest. And for more complex things... well, the options can always be Yes and No. :) As in.. Am I right? Yes No. *swing swing swing* Yup.

[Annyka]

here you go - get me on this topic!


Well.... I quite often use a pendulum. It has 5 options to choose from.

Yes - Swing back and forth away and towards me.
No - Circle in a anti-clockwise direction
Maybe - Swing accross the body
I don't know - Circle in a clockwise direction
I don't want to answer - not move but quivers on the spot.

I ask the pendulum each time for the response for each answer above, before I do the divination. I usually get the above response, though other people (like my sister) get a different response (like no swinging back and forth and yes swinging accross the body etc)...

Feel free to ask me any questions on my Divination work.

Love and Light
Annyka

[AmbivalentMirage]

I LOVE my pendulum! ;)

It's simply a green-quartz crystal suspended from some string...but it's faithful and accurate.

I once lost my tarot deck and was desperate to find it. So, I drew a map of my bedroom and concentrated on the images on the cards. The pendulum dropped on the map and voilà, my cards WERE there!

I've used it for "yes and no" questions as well, but I'm always concerned about my own desires interfering with the channeling of my psychic energies.

I also use it over a letter-chart. I let it drop to spell out words. I accidentally contacted a spirit with it once... Ahem... But that's another thread entirely...

Another good use is for working on your psychic powers, especially if you are into telekinesis. Focus on moving the pendulum the way YOU want it to move. With practice, you can move it without touching the pendulum. :)... or so I am told. *hasn't achieved that level of ability yet*

[Ryhla]

I've made 2 of my own pendulums. The first one is a glass bead and some chain I got out of one of those quarter machines with the cheese jewelry in it. Anyway I dug through my box of jewelry making stuff and made a pendulum out stuff I had. The second I special ordered some silver chain, jewelry headpins, and moonstone beads. I have some good luck with both, but I have better luck with the first one I made than the second. But I really haven't used the second one much yet.

[Thorferrer]

Ambivalent, how did you know that you accidently contacted a spirit with it, what happened (completely curious)???

[AmbivalentMirage]

Well, I allowed the pendulum to drop over letters, spelling out words... The ghost introduced itself. At this point in the story, I figured it was just your ordinary spirit. However, I began having dreams of the LIFE of this person...seeing them in my house and living with their family. It was creeeepy.

[Xeen]

Okay, that's it... I'm going to make a pendulum out of one of my rings, draw a map of my house, and try to find the rings that I lost.

Well... technically my boyfriend lost them... technically, it was my fault too 'cause I wasn't wearing them at the time like I should have been.

Seems appropriate to use a ring pendulum to find my rings :)

[Ryhla]

I really don't use the pendulum much. I'm still learning how to use it and become comfortable with it. I do use it though at times to help close my energy centers as well as some simple divination. As dowsing use, I haven't tried that yet. In time I most likely will as I become more comfortable with it.

[Thorferrer]

I really want to make a pendulum now, but how do you know what to make it out of. I mean, you can't just go pick up any old object and call it a pendulum right? How do I select my "special object."

[Thorferrer]

what about a cross on a chain that I always wear. I is silver with a figure nof jesus on it. Would this be good / bad?

[Ryhla]

Originally posted by Thorferrer

I really want to make a pendulum now, but how do you know what to make it out of. I mean, you can't just go pick up any old object and call it a pendulum right? How do I select my "special object." Actually some people can take just about anything and make it work. Some people can take a washer on a piece of thread and get it to work. I can take just about anything, and make it work...how accurate it is, is another story. I have a necklace of a celtic triskelle on a 30inch chain that I've used at times. One can buy pendulums, but for me, purchasing one doesn't seem to work as well. But I'm also the kind of person who likes to create with my hands. The 2 I've made probably cost me a total of $3, the one made of moonstone and silver being the most expensive of the 2.

[Thorferrer]

how do you test it to find out what movements mean what, and how accurate it is?

[Elfa Wylde]

Ambivalent,
How do you let it drop? I can't seem to picture this idea.
and yes! do tell more about the ghost.
(also if anyone has info this: there are sprits all over my property and house. I get glimpses, and sometimes just plain see them. How can one safely contact them? particularly the two who seem to "live" here with us. not just the passers-through.)

Sorry.. got off subject there a moment....
I love to look for lost things. It's a weird hobby i know, but i always have and i've got a bit of a knack for it i think.
I've been told that the pendulum is the best for this.

and Annyka,
I had no idea there were so many answers one could get. I just thought it was yes, no, and i don't know.

Anyone know of any books on the subject?

[Thorferrer]

some of these subjects I stay away from as far as books go b/c there is too much information on it, that you never really firugre out anything, b/c everyone has their own idea about how i is supposed to work. ;)

[Bainidhe Dub]

I made my pendulum out of a gorgeous Maiden/Priestess crystal pendant that I fell in love with and a handful of iridencent beads.

Btw... is there a spirits/ghost thread? I haven't found one yet... Got a few stories of my own lol...

[Xeen]

Blah! My pendulum thing did NOT work. But here's what I did, which will prolly work with everyone else but me:


The Goal:
Finding a ring that my mom gave me for Xmas, along with the lesser important but still wanted ring I got from my grandma a few hours later on Xmas.

The Pendulum:
I used a cheap broken necklace chain and tied it real well to a ring that's prolly just as cheap. Maybe. Who knows. It didn't take long to make and before I decided to make it and while I was making it, I was thinking (intently, it seems) on making a good reliable pendulum, etc.

Setup:
I drew a map of my house. It looked a lot more terrible than I wanted it to look, but it was my house, in a nutshell. There isn't much to it, but I labled the living room, kitchen, where the car parks, front and back 'porch', bathroom and bedroom.

The Happy Meal:
I sat on the couch in the living room, after making the pendulum and making the map. I held up the pendulum and asked it to give me a response for yes and a response for no. After that, I held the pendulum over the map and began asking.

I asked about the rings being in random rooms, though I highly suspect they're here in the bedroom 'cause that's the last place my bf and I recall seeing them. *mumblegrumblegrouch*

When I got to "Are the rings I'm looking for in the bathroom?" I got my first Yes. Definate yes. Which suprised me.

Soooo this is prolly where I fubar'd. I asked about the rings being in the LAST room (I even asked about them being in the car, just in case!). It said yes to the bedroom, also. But not as 'strongly'.

Me, being INTENT on the idea of those rings being in here, I mentally divided up the room. Just halves. I asked if the rings where on my bf's desk's side of the room, or mine. It said yes to mine (which is the general area that they were last seen).

I asked if they were in the dressor that the ratty cage is sitting on (I've BEEN through this desk FOUR times now). It said yes.

Soooo I get up, excited, hoping that I was STUPID and I just missed the rings the first 3 times.

I decide to ask, for the heck of it, if it was in the bottom drawer. It said yes. I looked. I looked VERY hard.

I'm a few fries short from a happy meal here, guys.

I think other than kind of doubting the pendulum and asking beyond the pendulum saying they were in the bathroom, and then doing the bedroom thing, I had a pretty decent method going on.

If not, feel free to slap me around.

I liked it though, so if anybody gets influenced by this in the future, lemme know how it turned out, eh?

[Xeen]

Anybody interested in getting technical with your pendulum works:
http://realmagick.com/articles/57/2057.html

That link has a very reasonable cleansing method and such. My bf has a really nice quartz crystal (somewhere in the car, grr). I'll make him a pendulum :)

I rember back in the good old days, I used to do the method this person described for finding out the 'yes' and the 'no'. I always asked "Am I female?" to get my yes, and my "Am I male?" to get my no. I forgot about that 'til now :)

http://www.triplemoon.com/pend.html
Yet another link that you might like.
You will note that, once again, there will be different views on how things are done. It's all up to the individual, supposedly. One never knows. One may never know.

http://www.scns.com/earthen/other/seanachaidh/pendulum.html
One more for yas.

http://www.deeziner.com/bos/ii/divination/pendulum.htm
Okay, last one. I hope.

[Jeleia]

My boyfriend bought me a really good book on Pendulums last year...

Pendulum Magick by D. J. Conway

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1580910939/qid=1049177512/sr=1-2/ref=sr_1_2/104-0684465-9841509?v=glance&s=books

Good book. :)

[ApatheticLight]

from my own experiences, crystals make somewhat biased pendulums for dowsing. I've had slightly more accurate results with the metal or wood ones, this could be due to the fact that crystals have more of a tendancy to pick up what you're feeling and thinking rather than what may actually be. Though as I've said, this is for myself only, also what I have a tendacy to do is to place my hand under the swinging pendulum to complete the circut, but only when I'm genuinely clueless as to the answer (such as when someone's asking me to answer a question they ask mentally).

Pendulums work wonders when doing a tarot reading as well.

[Jeleia]

Originally posted by ApatheticLight
Pendulums work wonders when doing a tarot reading as well.

I've never thought of doing this before. How do you usually use a pendulum in a Tarot reading?

Does anyone else practice this technique?

[Ryhla]

I friend of mine uses a pendulum in tarot at times. He usually separates the cards into 3 or 4 piles depending on the reading and uses the pendulum to help determine which pile to continue the reading from. For him, it works.

[Ravens_Tears]

I know pendulumd and dowsing works!:) My maternal Grandmother used a simple sewing needle and was extremely accurate. My Uncle and Paternal Grandfather was/were dowsers and very high in demand for finding water and other things...

[cydira]

Now for those of y'all that's heard the scientific reasoning behind this so many times that you're nearly cross-eyed, just skip my post. :) I've *carefully* read through the thread and I figured since folks had posted links, if some one were to be having the same problems as I am tonight with connecting to links, I might post this to help out some. :)

In a nutshell, a pendulumn works because of motions made by your hand that you are unconscious of. For some people, there may be a *very* slight twitch that will make the pendulumn circle clock wise to answer yes and swing left to right to answer no. For others, it will be different. That's part of the reason why people generally have different ways of answering yes and no with their pendulumns, even if it is to the *same* question.

A great way to get a feeling for this unconscious twitching is to take a ruler or a pencil and put a paper-clip on the end of it. Then, hold your arm and your hand very still. As you watch, eventually the paper-clip will begin to jump on the pencil or ruler and fall off. This works best with a ruler and even better with a meter stick because they exaggerate the motion that you'll place unconsciously on it all alot more then a pencil will. The motion determining yes and no is directly related to the subtle cues that your body gives you when you are answering with either of those answers in certianty. If you lie, your body really does give you away, despite how much control you have!

To find out what gives you a yes, a no, and a maeby answer, ask questions that are obvious. The "I don't know" would probably work if you tried something that you honestly had no knowledge of. Or it could be determined by a process of elemination. <shrugs> In my case, it was through a process of elemination.

Now, with that dry stuff aside, yes, you can make a pendulumn out of anything! It ranges from the elaborate and very expensive crystal and precious metals to a button on a string. There are some "traditional" methods of making a pendulumn. Amoung the Pennsylvania Dutch, if one were to make a pendulumn it would be with a woman's wedding band and a strand of hair. In Appliachia, this is one of roughly three traditions. The others is to make one from a sewing needle and thread or a button on a string.

Sailors and fishermen would make them from their fishing line and lures. There are some people who claim that the Gypsies made their pendulumns from periced silver coins and thread. The list is virtually endless and it's growing everyday.

Currently on the market there is three major types of pendulumns. One is a crystal suspended from a chain. These generally are very popular and, depending on the stone, will work well for dowsing for specific substances (clear quartz for water, jet for coal, etc.). Another is a metal point suspended from a chain. These range pretty wildly in the success that's been rated by the people who do dowsing that I've spoken to. Some get great results and others prefer the other two. I think it depends on the person.

From a magical standpoint, I'd be inclined to argue that a metal one or a crystal one that is formed with some kind of metal in it (ie pyrite or chrysacolla) would work better because metal conducts energy better then much of anything else. The third type is along the lines of what some one mentioned earlier about using a pendulumn made from a ring to find a ring. Using the concept that like attracts like, there are hollow pendulumns made that allows one to put a sample of a substance inside it that they are dowsing for. From what I've been able to learn in my reading of the journal by the Dowsing society here in western NY (state), most of the professional dowsers will use these if they're going to be using a pendulumn.

Using a pendulumn is a form of dowsing as well as divination. I consider dowsing to be a little different from divination, perhaps as a subset. The reason why is because most of the time, people look for answers to questions when they're using a divination method and they're looking for somethign when they're dowsing. I've read of professional dowsers using everything from a pendulumn to a fishing pole to the "traditional" forked branch.

[cydira]

In dowsing with a forked branch, it works differently then using a pendulumn. One feels a tug at the end of the branch and it will "pull" them to where the object they are searching for is located. From what I've heard, using a fishing pole requres you to hold the narrow end and let the handle bob, it's kinda like using a pendulumn. I don't know too much about that form of dowsing and I haven't found much in my reaserch... yet! :)

There's one other too that is used in dowsing. It's a pair of rods that are bent at right angles. You hold one in each hand and you will still have that tug to it like the forked branch method, but they rods will also either move away from each other or cross each other. From what I have heard, when the rods cross each other that is a positive sign and when they move away from each other that's a negative sign. You start out holding them straight, but don't grasp them too firmly.

I haven't tried the fishing pole method or the dowsing rods method, but I've had a little luck with the forked branch. I'm a bit better with my pendulumn, but I'm still learning.

Most of the information I put up here has come from a couple of different source. There's a book called Pendulumn Magic for Beginners. I forget what the author's name is, I don't think it's the same one as D. J. Conway wrote, so I might have the title wrong. Also, I pulled some of it out of my various books on Wicca in general. And most of it came from the journal published by the Dowsing Association up here in western NY (state).

I hope this helps. :)

[Annyka]

I have a pendulum that hangs of the bottom of a shelf where it is free to swing as far as it wants.

The other day (before I read the science explanations-which I already knew) I thought I would see if I could get the pendulum to work without me holding it.

I held my hand about 2 inches (5cm for all those metric ppl) underneath the crystal and asked it some questions.

It wasn't as predominant as when I hold it, but the crystal moved.... Now I am trying to increase the movements so they are obvious to everyone.....

But.... is there a science explanation to how that works?

Annyka
(oh and I started my degree in science before moving to teaching, because I am a lover of science and try to explain everything using science - I am not tring to discredit anyone.)

[cydira]

It's called psychokenisis. (However it's spelled. :P ) That's where you move something by the force of thought. Now most of the time, psychokenisis (or PK for short) is considered to be the effect of conscious and deliberately directed thought. I think that what you described is an example of unconscious PK.

That's what happens when people seem to have a problem with a poltergeist, but there's no ghost. It's often that there's some one that can do PK and they're doing it unconsciously, possibly out of stress.

But that's what I've been able to find.

PK is pretty wild stuff. I'm not quite focused enough to beable to manage it yet, but I think after I spend more time in meditation and in concentration on that, I'll beable to do it. And when I say concentration, I don't mean that everyone that does PK has to concentrate intently to do it. Some people need to do that inorder to get any results from PK while other's don't need to. It's kinda like the difference between someone needing to concentrate intently to do math problems and someone else not having to concentrate intently to do math problems. <shrugs>

I hope it helps. :)

***
I just reread your post and I forgot to add one little thing. Another possibility, aside from PK, could be that it's the influence of your energy field (aura) with that of the pendulumn. If so, then it's alot like when you hold it, just thorugh a little different mechanism. :)