The Black Vase

Today I like to share a paranormal encounter that I had when I was a kid. I had many eerie encounters in my old house, and this story is one of those unforgettable ones.

I was around seven years old. It was a Saturday afternoon and I was alone at home. While growing up, I spent my Saturday mornings watching cartoons and doing school homework in the afternoons.

I had a study table in my room where I used to do my school work. There was a shiny black vase on my study table. My parents placed the vase there to make the table look pretty. My bed was in front of my study table, about a meter away. When I sat at my table, I could see the reflection of my bed on the vase.

That afternoon, I was sitting at my table doing maths. As I was looking down at my workbook for quite some time, I decided to look up for a while to give my neck a light stretch. I didn’t know this stretch would later take me into a “seat paralysis” mode.

I am uncertain about how this happened but my vision swiftly and steadily landed on the vase when I looked up. And the next moment, I developed an uncontrollable sense of mysterious pull that kept my eyes glued on that vase.

My attention towards the vase grew stronger and stronger. I started looking at the vase so intensely as though I was madly in love with it. Simultaneously, I felt another form of soothing energy helping me pull my attention away from the vase. It was like an invisible and mystical mental tug-of-war that was happening within me.

I knew one thing for sure, this soothing energy was relentlessly working to rescue me from the vase that beckons me to look deeper. However, my temptations to look at the vase superseded my obedience to this soothing energy.

As I visually plunged into the vase, I saw a reflection of a figure sitting on my bed. It was tall, lean and had long hair but there were no features on its face. From the reflection, the face appeared plain and oval-shaped. The body structure was built like a man.

My heart started beating fast, it never beat this fast before. I was also feeling that my heart was slowly sinking into my stomach. It was a warm Saturday afternoon but my guts were freezing like ice. My cheeks and jaws were shaking and vibrating by themselves. I was breathing fast and shallow and I became utterly petrified. My mind was repeating saying these words in Tamil, “go away!…go away!… please don’t hurt me….please!” I was hoping the figure could hear my silent pleas and show me some mercy.

Around fifteen minutes passed, I was still frozen on my chair, looking at the vase and waiting for the damn strange figure to leave my room and my home! It didn’t leave. Many voices were running inside my head…..“Why is it here? What does it want? Please God, can you chase it away!”

Two other distinctive voices were also going on inside me. I remember vividly…the first voice in me said, “turn around and look!” and the second one said, “don’t turn around!” I decided to listen to the second voice as it was soothing, comforting and assuring.

Around thirty minutes passed, the figure was still comfortably sitting on my bed. Tears were rolling down and drying off on my numb and cold cheeks.

Suddenly, my house doorbell rang. It sounded to me like the rescue alarm from the universe. The sound of the bell broke my attention from the vase, and my eyes shifted away from the vase for a second.

I stole a quick glance at the vase again and guess what….. the strange figure was no longer on my bed. I felt extremely relieved, I started breathing fast and deep this time. I could catch more air. I felt like I was reborn.

I took a few seconds to think about this strange encounter. Before I could think any further, the doorbell rang again. I got up and tip-toed quietly out of my room, still holding some fear that I might accidentally bump onto that figure.

I opened the door and saw my parents looking dismayed; perhaps they were wondering what took me so long to answer. I shared my encounter with my parents that day, and they immediately discarded the vase. They didn’t share with me anything after that.

After many years, I found out from my parents that they received the vase from my late uncle, who worked as an undertaker. He found the vase somewhere near his work environment. He brought it home as it appeared to be in good and usable condition.

To this day, I doubt whether it was the vase that holds opposing forces of the universe or my old house itself was packed with negative energies. I can remember having many nightmares while sleeping on the bed. I had questions running in my mind like, was the figure watching me while I slept? Did it touch me?

There might be unknown causes and reasons for my experience but I learned two beautiful lessons. The lesson is, always listen to the soothing inner voice when making decisions. I believe that the soothing inner voices are the voices of the allied forces of the universe that connect with us to protect, guide and liberate. Some of these allied forces are called angels, spirit guides or guardians of the universe.

The second lesson is never to allow the noises in the head to interfere with the messages of these soothing inner voice. When I felt fear, doubt and perplexity, I had many thoughts going on in my mind but I chose to listen to the one that made me feel right.

Thank you for reading my spooky encounters.