T he word planchette means “plank, small board, or platform.” It’s applied to a small moving platform used to communicate with spirits. A form of it is found with the Ouija® board.
The planchette is generally heart-shaped, or it can be circular. It rests on three supports—two of them are castors or small wheels (or maybe tipped with felt so that they glide easily over a paper surface), and the third is the point of a pencil or pen. This writing instrument goes through a hole in the planchette so that it protrudes underneath to align with the two wheels. If the planchette rests on a sheet of paper, then as it is moved about the paper, the pen-point leaves a line. With the fingertips of the operator resting lightly on the edge of the planchette (much as on the edge of the table used for table-tipping), spirit can use the person’s muscles to direct the pen and produce writing.
The apparatus was invented in 1853 by a Frenchman and was quickly adopted by Spiritualists around the world. It’s applied to a small moving platform used to communicate with spirits. (Another form of it is found on the Ouija® board, which I’ll discuss later.)
Start as with the earlier exercises: breathing, meditation, white light, invitation to spirit. Then focus your attention on the planchette and ask spirit to communicate. Ask that it write on the paper, using the planchette. You will find that with practice and perseverance the planchette will, in fact, start to move. Usually it moves around and around the paper, getting faster and faster. This is spirit “getting the feel” of your muscles and of the energy available. It will then settle down and you can ask it questions. Rest the tips of the fingers of both hands on the rim of the planchette, to give spirit as much energy as possible. The answers to the questions will be written out, either fully or in symbolic form. Sometimes a picture will be drawn rather than a sentence spelled out. Sometimes, too, initials will be written rather than full names.
Initially (as with doodles), you may have to study what seems like a mess of scribbling in order to find anything at all that seems relevant. The more you use the planchette, however, the more used to it will spirit become until good, immediately readable information is provided. So be patient. But, as I say, whatever comes through will be significant—it may just need sorting and recognizing.
On occasion, spirit will use the planchette to produce art, the scribbling rapidly becoming shading and hatching to produce a drawing. It may be a sketch of the spirit himself or herself, or it may be something pertinent to the contact—like a scene where spirit used to live, for example. There are endless possibilities as to what may be produced.