Most Pagans likely find themselves looking for signs from the Universe or from their Gods at some point on their path. We all need reassurance. We all want connection and communication from the Divine. It helps to remind us that we are not alone on this great big rock, hurtling through space. The signs and symbols and messages we receive from our gods can bring us clarity or comfort. But not everything is a sign from the gods.
Chakras
At my store we offer aura and chakra readings. We do these readings using high tech software that reads a person’s biofeedback and translates that information into visuals that we then use to do the readings.
When I do aura and chakra readings, I talk about the openness or closedness of the chakras. Like most other things in life, ideally, we want our chakras to be in a middle range of openness. If a chakra is too open or too closed this can lead to energetic imbalances in a person. In my personal experience, there are certain chakras where an imbalance can greatly interfere with everyday life. In reality, that is true for all chakras. The third eye chakra is one of the chakras that I focus on when talking about the consequences of having an unbalanced chakra because it can affect our discernment.
The Third Eye is Where We Receive Signs
The Third Eye is a chakra most people know about, even if they do not know anything about chakras. I often say that the third eye is the part of the energetic body that tells the rest of us that something is up, something is different, we should pay attention to it. Signs or messages from the gods don’t always show up as angel numbers or a clear visual. Sometimes all the hair on your body stands up, or your stomach does a back flip for no reason. Our intuition shows up in all kinds of ways physically. We just have to learn our body’s language and recognize what it is trying to tell us. Remember, our bodies, brains and subconscious run on symbols and signs – not explicit directions. Unfortunately.
What is the Third Eye?
The third eye chakra, also known as Ajna in Sanskrit, is the sixth chakra, located in the center of the forehead between the eyebrows. It is associated with intuition, insight, and psychic abilities, representing the bridge between the physical and spiritual realms. An open third eye chakra is said to lead to heightened awareness, vivid dreams, and a strong connection to one’s intuition.
When the third eye chakra is in balance, you are able to tune into and trust your intuition and imagination. You can see your life with clarity, self-awareness, and emotional balance. You trust your inner knowledge, which allows you make balanced decisions. You are open to different perspectives and able to receive wisdom from beyond the five senses of sight, touch, sound, taste, and hearing.
When your third eye chakra is blocked, you lose your connection with your inner wisdom. You may feel lost or adrift. You could also feel stuck in the day-to-day. Without the guidance of your inner wisdom, you may be unable to look beyond immediate problems and your own opinions. When you are out of balance, you may have difficulty seeing the bigger picture or get easily overwhelmed. You may feel mentally foggy, anxious, or depressed.
Discernment is the Key to Signs
The gods, the Universe, however you see Source – they are communicating with us. We are sent symbols, specific signs or messages more often than we think. But that does mean that every crow is a sign from Odin. Birds have been viewed as messengers from above by many cultures throughout history. Some people think that seeing cardinals means a loved one is visiting you from the beyond. Others might feel that way about seeing butterflies or even dragonflies.
It is entirely possible that the crow or butterfly is a visitation or a pointed message from the gods. But to know for sure, we have to use discernment.
How to Discern Signs
Usually the first thing anyone is going to recommend about figuring out divine messages from everyday occurrences is to use your intuition. When you see something or hear something that could be a sign, it is likely that your intuition will let you know that this is something different, something you should pay attention to. When this happens to me, if I am not 100% confident that it is a message from the gods, I will file the occurrence away for later – maybe write it down – and wait to see if anything similar happens to me again.
If your intuition is not giving you clarity on something, I often recommend waiting and looking for patterns and meaningful connections. Multiple sightings of the same thing or hearing the same thing multiple times from different sources can be that confirmation you are looking for.
Signs in Your Personal Language
The problem with interpreting signs, symbols or dreams is that every one of us has our own subconscious language. As humans we share a collective unconscious that is loaded with symbols and meaning, but there is still room for each of us to attach personal meaning to symbols, animals, words or pictures.
I love snakes, but if you dream about a snake you may take that dream as a warning or a nightmare. If I dream about a snake, which I do periodically, I usually take that to mean a time of change is upon me or I got to play with a snake in my dream because I don’t get to do that in real life.
So when we are discerning if a sighting was a sign from the gods, or not, we also have to take into consideration our personal feelings or associations with whatever it is that we saw, heard or felt.
The Timing of the Sign
Timing is also important in understanding signs. If you experienced something a day after asking the gods to send you a sign, then definitely pay attention to what you experienced. If you see something unusual that sticks out to you, but you don’t have a personal association with something and you haven’t asked for a sign, it could be nothing. We are likely to get clearer messages from the gods when we ask for them. But that does not mean that everything that happens after you ask for a sign is your sign.
Everyone is going to have a unique experience, and there are always exceptions to everything. However, once we do ask the gods for a sign we can fall into the trap of actively looking for those signs. We see a repetitive number or hear a certain song, and some part of our brain is likely to go “Is that the sign?”
I believe that when we begin to actively look for signs, symbols or messages we are likely going to miss them. This can happen when we get an idea or begin to think that we want our sign/symbol/message to look a certain way. Suddenly you are hyper-conscious of your third eye and every time the wind blows the gods are talking to you. Or the gods send you a flower as your sign and you don’t realize that is your sign because you don’t like that flower, or it’s not the same color you expected.
Confirmation
Asking for confirmation if you are genuinely confused about a sign is a great thing to do. Let’s say you have been seeing the same flower show up in multiple places – your social media feeds, in a logo or on the table at lunch. You notice that you’ve been seeing this flower a lot lately but you’re not sure if it is significant. I think it is perfectly reasonable to go to your gods and negotiate with them about sending you a clearer message.
When this happens to me, I acknowledge that I have been seeing this certain thing and I think it is a message but I am unsure of it being a message or what it might mean. I usually then remind my gods I am human, with a human brain, and I am going to need them to be more obvious. I might then ask for them to send me another flower within the next five days but the flower must be blue this time.
I have found that sometimes reminding the gods that you are a human with a human brain can be helpful – although I doubt the gods ever forget that we are much more limited than them. Also setting a time limit and giving specific parameters can help you narrow down if the flower really was a sign or if the local flower shop just overordered gerbera daisies. Besides, gerbera daisies are not naturally blue so if I see one, I can be more confident it is a message.
When we are trying to discern messages, we should be mindful of falling into some cognitive bias traps.
Confirmation Biases
Confirmation bias is one of my favorite tools for ruling out questionable signs. It’s easy to fall into the habit of favoring information that confirms what we already believe—especially when we’re looking for meaning in the world around us. This can lead us to interpret random events as signs simply because they align with our expectations or desires. While personal symbolism is powerful, it’s also important to pause and ask: Is this truly a message, or am I projecting meaning onto coincidence?
I use this tool in journey work. When I am meditating or taking a journey I am looking for interactions, advice or signs that surprise me. If I do not experience something in my meditation that I am not expecting, there is a good chance I am creating the entire scenario in my head and it is not an authentic experience.
Pareidoila
Pareidolia is another discernment issue I am familiar with through my years of investigating the paranormal. Pareidolia is the psychological phenomenon where the mind perceives a meaningful image or pattern where one doesn’t actually exist. It’s the tendency to see familiar shapes, often faces, in random objects like clouds, rocks, or trees. This is a normal human experience and is often considered a form of apophenia which is the tendency to find patterns in random data.
Our brains love to humanize everything, even that pattern of burnt edges on your toast. Oftentimes pareidolia is fun but it does not mean that what you think you’re seeing is really there. And if you take a photo of something and zoom in really tightly on any area of the photo, it will pixelate and your brain will then begin trying to make sense of the nonsense. Hence, pareidolia. Our brains are fascinating organs that try their best to analyze, understand and make sense of everything it senses, but we live in a world of randomness and chance. Not everything has meaning and not everything happens for a reason.
Overthinking
Lastly, overthinking and rumination can interfere with our intuitive ability to discern messages from the Universe. When we dwell too long on certain thoughts or worries, it can distort how we interpret the world around us. A passing moment might take on outsized meaning, or we might read too deeply into an event that was never meant to carry such weight. This kind of mental looping can cloud our discernment, pulling us away from the present and into stories that may not serve our growth. Gently stepping back, breathing, and reconnecting with what’s real can help restore our balance and perspective.
What if it is Not a Sign?
So what if it is not a sign? You saw a vulture riding a thermal and panicked because vultures could mean death. Anything is possible, but it is likely that vulture was just enjoying the warm air and exercising. Perhaps a butterfly landed on you. It could be a sign that your beloved grandmother is watching over you. It could also be just a happy occurrence. If you are standing in the butterfly feeding tent at your local botanical garden, while it is a cool photo opp, it probably isn’t a spiritual event.
My take on seeing things that are not signs from the Universe is that I was still blessed to see them. I love nature. I love looking at it. I love animals and plants and trees and flowers. I love a beautiful sky whether sunny with puffy clouds or dark and brooding. Nature awes me. And like many spiritual people, I find birds fascinating and I love to watch them fly around my backyard and listen to them sing.
I currently live in a great neighborhood where sightings of crows, kites and cultures are a daily thing for me. I work with Odin, who is historically connected to ravens. Modern Pagans tend to include crows as a substitute for ravens since they are the urban cousin and true raven sightings in the city are practically unheard of. Does this mean that the crows in my tree are Odin’s emissaries keeping an eye on me? Hardly. I do not believe I have actually ever thought that. But I adore seeing them and feel blessed every time I do.
Maybe what you saw/felt/heard was not a sign. That is okay. And it is okay to be disappointed that something was not a sign. But take that experience and flip it. Who cares if it wasn’t the gods. You still got to experience something really cool, and that is its own blessing.
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