When the Veil Thins
Is Communication Between the Realms Possible?
Halloween, 2025
Are there times of the year when the veil separating our world from “the other side” actually thins, and makes communication between the worlds more possible? Here’s a short passage from my book When the Stars Align (chapter 11) where I discuss that.
“(It’s long been believed there are) times when the proverbial ‘veil’ seems to become thinner, making communication between dimensions that much easier. Samhain and the Day of the Dead are two of those. Another is the German and Austrian tradition of Rauhnacht, the period between Christmas Day and epiphany on January 6, when the doorway to the underworld opens and interaction between realms becomes more fluid. (Interestingly, Charles Dickens’ story A Christmas Carol describes Scrooge being visited by the Ghost of Christmas Past during that very period.) The same ‘veil-thinning’ quality likely holds true for powerful configurations involving Neptune, or certain zodiacal times of the year, such as the months of Pisces or Scorpio. It hardly seems accidental that Samhain, Day of the Dead, and Halloween all happen when the Sun is moving through Scorpio—the sign most associated with hidden mysteries and the occult. In the yogic tradition, it’s believed that the 49 days following a person’s passing are a time when that veil is especially thin.”
So the esoteric traditions certainly thought there were such times. I also believe there are broader periods through history when that veil thins more dramatically than others. One of those was the 1990s, around the conjunction of Uranus and Neptune (exact in 1993 but with an orb of influence extending several years on either side). Besides more popular expressions of interest in the paranormal like we saw with TV shows like “Twin Peaks, “Sightings” and “The X-Files,” or the late night radio broadcasts of Art Bell, that decade saw an explosion of interest in the phenomenon of crop circles, which many believed to be communications from non-human intelligences.
But that was also a period which saw a growing interest in efforts by American and European researchers to find ways of using technology for contacting the deceased—a pitch-perfect expression of technological Uranus combined with metaphysical Neptune. Though this research had been around for some years by that point, it really started attracting media attention in tandem during the Uranus-Neptune conjunction. In connection with my work for Quest Magazine at that time, I attended a large conference around this topic in the Chicago suburbs during the early 1990s; it was sponsored by the Institute of Noetic Sciences, with figures like ex-astronaut Edgar Mitchell in attendance, and focused on the work of figures like Konstantin Raudive. This Youtube video/audio focuses on a sampling of Raudive’s research.
Another one of those windows of possible veil-thinning was the period around (and following) the actual discovery of Neptune in 1846, which seemed to herald a new phase in humanity’s concern with the “other side.” Among other things, this was a time that saw the inauguration of the mediumship craze, now considered the “birth of modern spiritualism,” which started with the Fox sisters in Hydesville, New York in 1848.
That trend reached a crescendo later that century during the rare, once-every-five-centuries conjunction of Pluto and Neptune in the 1890s—a combination which was like a battering ram into the wall separating the material and astral realms. (I treat that development and its implications in my earlier Substack entry, “Parting of the Veil: Reflections on the Extraordinary 1800s,” which you can see here: https://raygrasse.substack.com/p/parting-of-the-veil-reflections-on.)
Which brings us back to the question I posed in the sub-title to this piece: Is communication between realms really possible?
My understanding—based on both my own experience as well as accounts related by others—is that yes, it’s possible, to varying degrees. From our side of the divide, that communication may be initiated through prayer, rituals, mediumship, or simply directing one’s thoughts and intentions to the departed, which I personally think the departed can sense; while from the other side of that divide, it can come in the form of psychic impressions, the smell of perfume or food, or encounters in dreams. That last one is what happened to my friend George. After his wife of several decades died, he had an unusually vivid dream in which she appeared to be walking in a beautiful field, wearing her original wedding dress and looking happy, with their deceased dog Maggie prancing alongside her. It was not like any normal dream, he said. (Curiously, the same night his wife died, the clock in their house stopped at the minute she passed. I’ve heard many such stories like that myself—including one in my own family.)
Or that inter-dimensional communication might take the form of synchronistic “messages” in our environment. I’ve heard countless stories over the years of possible communications from the departed involving butterflies or birds, which appear at important moments. I know of one especially poignant story where a woman got into her car and hurriedly backed out of the family garage—tragically running over her two young children in the process, causing their deaths. She was so traumatized by the experience that she couldn’t even attend the children’s funeral, and it was a full year before she mustered up the strength to visit the gravesite of the children. When she did, there were two butterflies perched on the headstone of the children’s joint grave. They remained there for some time before flying off. She had a powerful intuitive sense it was a message letting her know that the children were okay and she could finally “move on.” Was it really a sign from the children, or perhaps the universe? Or was it just a coincidence? She certainly believed it was from the children—and no one could possibly convince her otherwise.
This might be a good point to mention an experience I had while still a teenager, which I semi-seriously refer to now as my “experiment in necromancy.” A close friend of mine in high school, a charismatic young man named Harmon Cooper, died unexpectedly of spinal meningitis. It came as a huge shock to those of us who knew him. It was several weeks after attending his closed-casket wake that I traveled with my family to visit some relatives overseas, who lived in an old structure from the 1800s.
One night in the upstairs bedroom I was staying in, I got it in my head to see if I could communicate with Harmon. So after everyone else had gone to sleep, I laid there with the lights on in the room and decided to send out an intention to Harmon in his new realm, wherever that might be. Mentally, I said, “Harmon, if you can hear me, send me a sign of your presence. Perhaps move the light fixture hanging from the ceiling here to show me that you’ve heard me.” I kept that up for a good hour, but by the end of that hour nothing had transpired, so I finally gave up, turned out the lights and went to sleep.
Several hours later, probably around 3 AM in the morning, I awoke to see a glowing human form at the foot of my bed, motionless. I rubbed my eyes, thinking this must surely be a problem with my vision. But after clearing my eyes, the phantasm only became sharper—at which point I realized I might well be looking at a ghost. I thought my heart would explode from sheer fright, and I instinctively rolled over to bury my face in the pillow, hoping the disembodied form would simply go away. I laid that way for several more hours, coward that I was, refusing to turn around until dawn arrived and light began filling the room.
It wasn’t until the next morning that I put two and two together and realized it might have been Harmon that I saw, responding to my call. Looking back on the experience now, of course, I do wish I’d had my wits about me enough to try and communicate with that ghostly form, so as to find out for sure. But if it was Harmon, I have no doubt it was possible because such a short amount of time had elapsed since his passing.
That’s because I believe the longer a soul has been on the other side, the harder that inter-dimensional contact becomes. Why? Because, according to some mystics, departed souls become increasingly engrossed over time in their new lives on the other side, which makes it difficult for them to hear us or even be motivated to contact us at that point. (The exception to this is thought to be elevated “masters” who can transcend those problems and freely communicate to those of us on this side of the veil.) For much the same reason, I’m skeptical of claims from mediums and channelers who say they’ve contacted famous individuals who have been dead for many decades or even centuries, like Abraham Lincoln or Leonardo da Vinci (not to mention the fact those souls may well have reincarnated into new bodies since their passing).
Should you remain skeptical yourself about all this, however, you might try reading the recent book Chasing Evil: Shocking Crimes, Supernatural Forces, and an FBI Agent’s Search for Hope and Justice. It tells the story of medium John Edwards and his work with no-nonsense police officer Robert Hilland in solving various cold-case crimes, in ways that shocked the previously skeptical officer. It may or may not convert you, but I think you’ll certainly find yourself more open to the possibility after reading it. This half-hour video features an interview with the two gentlemen.
Happy Halloween!
Ray Grasse is a writer, astrologer, and photographer living in the American Midwest. He is author of ten books, most recently In the Company of Gods and So, What Am I Doing Here, Anyway? His websites are www.raygrasse.com and www.raygrassephotography.com.