To celebrate the centennial episode tonight, March 5, 8 p.m., EST on CBS, here’s a list of 100 rules that ghosts must follow in the Ghost Whisperer world…
1. GHOST WHISPERERS like Melinda Gordon can see and communicate with earthbound spirits. They help them with unfinished business before crossing them into the light, and give closure to loved ones left behind.
2. A ghost can materialize anywhere he or she wants by concentrating on where it wants to be.
3. Ghosts cannot pick up things. Under duress, in an emotionally charged situation, or in a group they can move things.
4. Ghosts can affect the temperature of small areas, creating hot spots or cold spots. A good indicator is when the thermostat in a room quickly drops for no reason.
5. Ghosts can affect electrical currents, i.e. computers, lights, phones and other household electrical devices.
6. Most children when they are very young can see ghosts.
7. Most earthbound spirits appear wearing the clothes they were wearing when they died.
8. Ghosts may manipulate objects that were on their person when they died, but the objects are insubstantial and can’t be shared with the living. (There are exceptions like Homer the ghost dog’s ball).
9. Ghosts go into the Light shortly after their issues are resolved.
10. Ghosts do not cast shadows — unless they are a ‘shadow’ from the world of the dead.
11. Ghosts can see other ghosts.
12. Most ghosts, like vampires, are not reflected in mirrors or windows. (Ghosts like Bloody Mary are an exception because their aura is tied to reflections.)
13. Ghosts can touch each other.
14. Ghosts have the ability to pass through solid objects.
15. New spirits are on a learning curve with their ghost powers.
16. Ghosts can attend their own funerals and many do!
17. Ghosts can inflict physical harm on the living without realizing they are doing so.
18. Ghosts can feel the thoughts of the living.
19. To recharge, spirits feed off the energy of the living. Ghosts can recharge their energy by creating chaos with the living.
20. Ghosts can visit and communicate with you in your dreams.
21. Ghosts can be sneaky and elusive, appearing out of the corner of your eye.
22. In the world of the living, a ghost can create an “apport,” which is a physical manifestation of something with symbolic significance to the ghost.
23. Ghosts who stay earthbound are normally scared and confused.
24. A person’s ghost arises at the location where they died.
25. Ghosts can appear with the wounds and physical manifestations of their death – although they are not always aware of their deathly appearance.
26. Melinda, and others like her, can filter out the voices of the many ghosts who surround them and focus on the most important ghost by listening with their hearts.
27. Ghost listeners are people like Eli James who can hear earthbound spirits but cannot see them.
28. Initially, a spirit’s appearance can be distorted, even scary. Once they start to interact with the living, they begin to look more like they did when alive.
29. Ghosts do not always retain memories from their experiences in the world of the living.
30. “Guardians” are spirits responsible for bringing babies to the Light when they do not have someone to meet them.
31. Ghosts often stay earthbound in order to help a grieving loved one heal and move on with his or her life.
32. Because of the resentment an earthbound spirit feels about his/her tragic death, the spirit can wreak havoc on the living.
33. When a person commits suicide, his/her spirit can be stuck between the worlds of the living and the dead.
34. Ghosts can force visions of their death onto the living. If those memories are extremely violent, the person’s life can be jeopardized.
35. Ghosts have no sense of time.
36. Out of body experiences occur when a person flat-lines and is resuscitated.
37. Earthbound spirits of children tend to hang out in groups. Adult ghosts typically do not.
38. Spirits can group together for a common purpose and use the strength of their numbers to interact more powerfully with the world of the living.
39. When an extremely large group of souls crosses over together, it is possible for the living to see the Light.
40. Light spirits protect souls and help them cross over. Dark spirits are evil and collect souls to keep them earthbound.
41. If a dark spirit takes the soul of a light spirit, the dark spirit becomes invincible.
42. A child ghost will often remain earthbound waiting or searching for it’s parents.
43. When a soul crosses over into the Light, the handicaps it had in life are gone. Every soul is perfect.
44. A ghost who experienced a violent death may relive that experience while trapped as an earthbound spirit.
45. Ghosts can use infrasound, a frequency that’s so low we can’t hear it, to make their presence felt.
46. Ghosts are often confused about the way they died, blaming the wrong people for their death.
47. When a person is brain dead and on life support, their soul is outside the body, but still tethered to it.
48. Souls are assigned new bodies when they are reincarnated.
49. Ghosts exhaust their powers when they act aggressively.
50. A walk-in can only occur to a corpse if the spirit originally inhabiting the body abandons it.
51. Spirits choose to manifest, you can’t make them do it.
52. Dark spirits can manipulate the recently departed to stay earthbound.
53. People who die, even for a short time, and see the Light, always come back changed.
54. Dark spirits feed on negative emotions (anger, hate, jealousy).
55. Spirits can be visible in photographs because cameras detect a broader spectrum of energy than the human eye.
56. Ghost visits can be triggered by a birth, death, or special holiday.
57. Ghosts may appear as a younger version of themselves.
58. Sometimes a ghost doesn’t initially realize he/she is dead.
59. The power of love is often strong enough to save even an angry, vengeful earthbound spirit.
60. Animal spirits can be earthbound.
61. Animals (particularly dogs) can sense the presence of a ghost.
62. Ghosts can appear under water.
63. Ghosts can create visions for empaths.
64. A ghost needs the living to help it sort out the mystery of his/her death.
65. A ghost can manifest in strange and unexpected places, like dollhouses, if that’s where it’s unfinished business is.
66. As ghost’s memories begin to return, many times recollections come in waves.
67. In the case of twins, when one is living and the other’s dead, the ghost twin tries to reconnect with the living twin through thoughts or shared memories.
68. Beware of ghost stories like Bloody Mary, because sometimes, they can conjure up ghosts.
69. There is no limit on how long a spirit can be earthbound.
70. Spirits do exist in the Underworld.
71. In the ghost world, love never dies.
72. If a ghost dies naked, it remains naked when intersecting with the living.
73. If a person is passionate about music, in death, the ghost keeps the music alive.
74. There is a unique group of ghosts from the spirit world that connects with children — they are known as ‘Shinies’.
75. An earthbound spirit can look as robust as the living.
76. Ghosts can possess the living to do ‘automatic writing’ which helps get their messages across.
77. Ghosts can communicate through Electronic Voice Phenomena – known as ‘white noise’.
78. Ghosts can remain earthbound until they take revenge on the living.
79. Not every earthbound ghost is destined to cross into the Light — some are sucked to the Dark Side.
80. Ghosts can fear other ghosts.
81. Ghosts can appear as auras, a subtle, pervasive atmosphere seen emanating from an object or place.
82. Ouija boards can create unexpected and unwanted ghost activity.
83. A ghost can make the inhabitants of a house it is haunting feel weak and sick.
84. The living can hear noisy ghosts.
85. A ghost can attach itself to a living person whom it believes it will have a future connection through reincarnation.
86. Ghosts can follow their passion even in death.
87. Ghost children remain banded together if they perished together.
88. Ghost visions can transport the empathic to strange and unusual places.
89. Ghosts can reunite the living with long lost relatives.
90. Ghosts become restless if their bodies are not laid to rest in accordance with their desires.
91. A birth in the world of the living can cause a spirit in the world of the dead to become active.
92. Ghosts play practical jokes on the living.
93. If a ghost experienced addiction while alive, it can conjure up those symptoms when haunting a person.
94. Ghosts cannot take the living into the Light.
95. Ghosts can mistakenly haunt the wrong house or the wrong person without being aware of it.
96. Ghosts have no sense of time.
97. An earthbound spirit of a child may follow a living child home to play.
98. Some earthbound spirits will attach themselves to their belongings, including a favorite charm or piece of jewelry.
99. Earthbound spirits get a lot of energy from crowds of people, i.e. hospitals, police precincts, and malls.
100. Ghosts typically do not hang around cemeteries because there is very little living energy there.