Have any of these happened to you: a chill runs down your spine for no reason. You wake up at exactly 3:33 am. Someone pops into your head out of nowhere and ten minutes later they’re calling you. A flash of light catches your eye and then it’s gone.
These are all signs a spirit is trying to communicate with you.
In this week’s episode of Dear Gabby, I’m joined by evidential medium Travis Holt to explore six specific signs that show up when we’re being guided by spirit.
Sign #1: Unexplained Physical Sensations
The first sign that spirit is connecting with you is a physical sensation. A chill down your spine. Numb hands. A feeling like you’re being touched or moved.
Travis explains it through energy fields. We each have an electromagnetic field around us, and we happen to be housed in a physical body. Our loved ones in spirit still have an energy field too, but theirs is no longer contained by a body. When their energy comes close to ours, the two fields blend, and we feel that blending physically as chills or tingles.
“Our body will physically react to the energy that’s around us.”
How to Tell the Difference Between Anxiety and Spirit
Here’s where this gets personal for Travis. Growing up, he would feel his chest tighten and his throat close up, and he assumed it was anxiety. He carried that belief for years, until he sat with his mentor, the late Pat Longo, who named the exact sensation he’d never described to anyone. She told him that sometimes what feels like anxiety is actually him connecting with the energy of spirit, and his brain was simply mislabeling it.
That moment helped Travis learn to tell the difference for himself between ordinary anxiety and the felt sense of spirit nearby. He’s clear that this isn’t a gift reserved for professional mediums. He believes it’s an ability everyone has, as he puts it, he doesn’t own this ability, he stewards it.
For me, this sign shows up as my hands going numb, and sometimes as a sudden rush of love that moves through my whole body. During our conversation, the second Travis mentioned Pat’s name, I felt exactly that. Nothing is an accident, and that includes the timing of a name coming through at the right moment.
Sign #2: Strange Electronic Blips
The second sign is when your electronics start acting up. A song plays out of nowhere. The TV shows you exactly what you need to see. The lights flicker. Your phone rings and there’s no one there.
Travis isn’t a scientist, by his own admission, but he believes there’s real logic here. If our souls and our electromagnetic fields are one and the same, it makes sense that they could influence the electricity around us.
He told a story from early in his mediumship career. He was doing a video reading for a young woman whose parents had both passed, and it happened to be her birthday. She told him all she wanted was to hear her parents say hi one more time. Right then, his smart speaker in the next room switched on and said “hi,” completely unprompted. When he checked in afterward, she told him her own smart speaker had been saying hi to her, unprompted, every day since she’d booked the session.
When Spirit Uses Your Phone, TV, or Smart Speaker
I have my own version of this story. Years ago, when I still had a BlackBerry, I opened the notes app a few months after my grandfather passed and found a note that simply said “grandpa’s here.” I hadn’t written it.
For years after that, my grandparents’ photo would appear stuck at the very bottom of my camera roll, no matter how many photos I took, and it never moved. Recently, without any explanation, it’s gone. When I asked Travis what that might mean, what he heard was simple: I don’t need to see them that way anymore, because I can feel them now instead. Sometimes a sign disappearing is its own kind of message.
Sign #3: Waking Up in the Middle of the Night
The third sign is waking up suddenly, often at the same time, night after night.
Travis explains it through brainwave states. When we’re in normal waking conversation, we’re in a beta brainwave state, alert and focused, which isn’t especially receptive. Deep sleep runs on the slower delta waves. But in that in-between space, when you’re gently relaxing or just waking, you’re in alpha, and that’s when your guardrails come down and you’re more open to receiving.
Is It Hormones, Stress, or Spirit? How to Tell the Difference
To be clear, waking up at night can absolutely be stress or hormones, and it’s worth checking in on those first. But Travis says there’s often a vibrational difference between waking up because you’re hungry or anxious and waking up because someone is trying to reach you. If it happens regularly, take a slow breath and simply ask, what are you trying to tell me? Then let yourself go back to sleep. He keeps a notebook by his bed for exactly this reason.
Sign #4: Someone Pops Into Your Head Out of Nowhere
The fourth sign is when a person suddenly crosses your mind, and then they call, or you run into them, or an email shows up from them out of the blue.
Sometimes this is a loved one in spirit letting you know they’re near. Travis shared that right before his grandfather passed, his late grandmother, who he hadn’t thought of consciously, popped into his mind, and he immediately felt that his grandfather was preparing to go. Other times, it’s simply a nudge toward someone still living, maybe a friend who needs a call, or a name someone else mentions to you that turns out to matter months later.
I’ve had this happen with a name a friend gave me almost in passing, a name I had no reason to remember. Months later, that connection led me to exactly the person I needed. You just have to follow the nudge and make the call.
Sign #5: A Flash or Spark of Light
The fifth sign is catching a spark or flash of light out of the corner of your eye.
Travis says he doesn’t physically see spirit the way movies portray it, as a full apparition standing behind someone. What he sees is light: sparks, sparkles, sometimes a shimmer like heat waves rising off pavement. He believes that’s actually the truest representation of what spirit is, energy without a physical form.
You Don’t Need to See a Full Apparition for It to Be Real
I see this sign too, usually as sparks or tinsel-like light just behind someone’s shoulder. I think of it as a puncture in the veil between this world and the spiritual one. If they’re pure light on the other side, a spark of light here is a small tear in the curtain, a way of saying I’m close, the veil is thin right now.
Sign #6: Spirit Delivers the Sign You Asked For
The sixth and most beloved sign is the one most of you already know: you ask spirit to show you a specific sign, and it shows up.
If you’ve read The Universe Has Your Back or Super Attractor, you know I talk about this a lot. Travis has his own story. On a morning he was heading to teach at a retreat centre, he wrote in his journal, wouldn’t it be so fun to see a blue horse today. He arrived to find a statue of a white horse right outside his classroom, and later learned that at night, lit up, it glows blue.
My own version of this is the lily. Lilies have long been a sign for me, tied to trying to conceive my son. On one of the hardest nights of that process, my husband’s phone, locked and sitting untouched on the table, started playing a song called “I Saw the Sign,” and the lyrics were “Way go Lilly”.
The “Wouldn’t It Be So Fun If” Practice
Travis shared the exact language he uses when he’s asking for a sign. Instead of saying “I need to see this sign,” which can put you in a place of lack or desperation, try: wouldn’t it be so fun if. As in, wouldn’t it be so fun if I got the answer I’ve been looking for. That small shift moves you from searching into receiving, and receiving is the frequency signs actually show up in.
How Do You Know If You’re a Medium?
Here’s something Travis said that I want you to really sit with: we’re all mediums. Working professionally as one isn’t about having an ability no one else has. It’s about learning to steward and trust an ability that’s already available to you.
If you’ve ever mistaken the sensation of spirit for anxiety, the way Travis did for years, or if any of these six signs sound familiar to you, that’s worth paying attention to. You don’t need formal training to start noticing. You just need to get curious about what your body and your attention are already trying to tell you.
A Practice to Strengthen Your Connection: Sitting in the Power
Travis closed our conversation by leading a practice mediums call sitting in the power. It’s an exercise that connects you with your own energy, expands it, and then intentionally blends it with the energy of source, spirit, God, or whatever word feels right to you. The goal isn’t just to receive signs. It’s to recharge your own spiritual battery so you feel full. Press play on the episode to try the meditation now.
Resources
Read Travis’ book Are You There, Spirit? It’s Me, Travis: Life Lessons from the Other Side
Read my book The Universe Has Your Back.
Want to go deeper? Join me for Dear Guides Live on Nov 21 in NYC for a day dedicated to connecting to your angels and spirit guides. Get all the details here.
Get my free manifesting meditation
Frequently Asked Questions
What are the signs that a spirit is trying to contact you? Common signs include unexplained physical sensations like chills or tingles, electronics acting strangely, waking up at the same time every night, a person popping into your mind right before they reach out, seeing a flash or spark of light, and receiving a specific sign you asked spirit for.
Can spirits interfere with electronics? Many mediums believe so. The idea is that a soul’s energy, no longer contained by a physical body, can influence the electromagnetic fields around us, which is why people report smart speakers switching on, songs playing unprompted, lights flickering, or phones ringing with no one there.
Why do I wake up at the same time every night, like 3am? It can be stress or hormones, worth checking on first. But it can also happen because your brainwaves are more open during sleep, making it easier for spirit or loved ones to reach you. Many people describe a felt difference between a stress wake-up and a visit.
What does it mean when someone pops into your head out of nowhere? It can mean they’re thinking of you right then, that spirit is nudging you to reach out because they need to hear from you, or, if it’s someone who has passed, that they’re letting you know they’re near.
How do I know if I’m seeing a sign from spirit versus just my imagination? Signs from spirit tend to feel distinct, like a chill, a rush of love, or a spark of light showing up at a meaningful moment. You don’t need to see a full apparition for it to be real. Most people experience flashes or sparkles rather than anything like a movie ghost.
Why do I feel chills or a tingle when a loved one in spirit is near? One explanation is that we each have an energy field, and a loved one’s field, no longer contained by a body, blends with ours when they’re close. That blending often registers in the body as chills, tingles, or a sensation like something touching the back of your head.
About Gabby
Gabrielle Bernstein is a #1 New York Times bestselling author, motivational speaker, and host of the Dear Guides podcast. Her books include The Universe Has Your Back and Super Attractor. She has spent more than two decades helping people heal, trust their intuition, and recognize the guidance that’s already all around them.
Travis Holp is an evidential medium and the author of Are You There, Spirit? It’s Me, Travis: Life Lessons from the Other Side