How to Act Like You're Possessed

Co-authored by Amber Crain

Last Updated: May 24, 2021 References

Whether you want to pretend to be possessed as part of a Halloween costume or you simply want to pull a disturbing prank on your friends and family, you can learn to act the part fairly easily by following a few behavior and personality guidelines. Pair your new behavior modifications with some convincing makeup tricks and you’ll soon be able to appear realistically possessed without difficulty.

Method 1

Method 1 of 3:

Exhibiting Sudden Personality Changes

1
Become withdrawn, quiet and defensive. One of the most tell-tale signs of demonic possession is a sudden change in personality. A usually happy and social person might become quiet and withdrawn, followed by negativity and hostility. Be very quiet and only speak when you are spoken to.
- Reply in a monotone, emotionless voice and act defensively when you are asked any questions about your behavior.
- You can also mimic people in a sarcastic voice when they talk to you, repeating whatever they say in an eerie tone before abruptly walking away.
2
Show a lack of interest in all of your hobbies. Appear listless at all times and don't visibly enjoy anything. When asked your opinion or when friends and family try to otherwise draw you into a conversation, respond with a sullen “I don't care” and stare off into the distance.
3
Develop sudden and violent verbal outbursts. Make angry, unexpected comments in the midst of a casual conversation or a quiet dinner. Have explosive, violent reactions to benign, random things. Make it seem like these comments and reactions are happening without your control.
- Look disoriented and confused after a sudden outburst.^{[1]
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  Research source} It should be over almost as quickly as it began, leaving everyone around you feeling jolted and confused.
- Project your voice loudly, give it a sharp edge, and speak more quickly than you normally would during these verbal outbursts.
- Twitch a bit, like you’re experiencing muscle spasms.
4
Keep a blank, exhausted look on your face. Walk around in a sort of fugue state, almost like you’re sleepwalking. Look exhausted and completely without energy, as though you haven’t been sleeping well or eating enough.
- When someone does stop you or tries to get your attention, narrow your eyes a bit and stare at them wordlessly before returning to your blank, empty facial expression.
- Don’t overdo it. You want to look exhausted and even a little bored. If you’re too dramatic, it won’t be believable.
5
Leave incriminating books and images lying around. Place books about the occult and drawings of strange symbols in places where people will see them. Be seen tracing over a symbol on a piece of paper over and over again, as though you’re in a trance, until your pen tears through the paper. Look perplexed by this.
- Keep these incidents to a minimum – maybe one or two instances. If your room is suddenly littered with crystals, tarot cards, and other occult tools, it won’t be quite as believable.
- Such incidents will plant the idea in the minds of your friends and family that something very sinister is going on with you, but it won’t be so over the top that it reveals your ruse.
6
Do unnerving things in public. Sit in a chair facing the wall and laugh hysterically to yourself. Be seen having furtive conversations with no one in dark corners. Rock back and forth catatonically while repeating a phrase under your breath. Hiss at people suddenly as you walk by them.
- This is another area in which you don’t want to overdo it to be believable. Start with an isolated incident and have them grow more frequent and weirder as time goes by.
- You also want to avoid being too dramatic with these incidents because it might get you into trouble at school or work. This takes all the fun out of your prank.

Method 2

Method 2 of 3:

Using Makeup to Look Possessed

1
Apply a pale concealer to your face, neck, and lips.^{[2]
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Research source} Choose a concealer that is at least a few shades lighter than your natural skin tone. Make sure to apply the makeup evenly to create the right pallor. You can also add a white face cream or powder — the kind sold at Halloween — over the concealer to lighten it up even more.
- To make your skin tone look more even and convincingly pale, apply the concealer/white makeup to your chest, hands and any other skin that’s showing.
- Lightly dust all of the areas where you’ve applied the white makeup with a translucent powder. This will “set” the makeup and make it last longer.
2
Apply matte brown, gray or purple eyeshadow under your eyes.^{[3]
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Research source} Use an eyeshadow brush to apply matte brown and purple eye shadow beneath your eyes to make them look hollow and sunken in. Add a little bit of gray eyeshadow beneath your eyes to give the look dimension.
- For a slightly more extreme look, apply the eyeshadow to the inner corners of your eyes, your eyelids and creases of your eyes.
- Apply a very small amount of black eyeshadow to the inner corners of your eyes, in addition to the purples, browns and grays, for an extremely dramatic look.^{[4]
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3
Contour your cheekbones.^{[5]
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Research source} Dust a brown or gray matte eyeshadow beneath your cheekbones in a straight line. This will give your face a gaunt, malnourished look. Blend the makeup well.
- The goal is to look very unhealthy, but not to look like you’re wearing any makeup to achieve that look.
- The contour line you create should begin at your hairline at the top of your cheeks and follow the cheekbone down, stopping about 1 inch from your mouth on each side.
4
Color your eyes, cheeks and nose with red makeup. Apply a pink, maroon or red lip stain or eyeshadow to your eyelids, the inner corners of your eyes, and beneath your eyes. Add a little of the red color to the tip of your nose. Use a red lipliner pencil to redden your lower waterline (the inner edge of your lower eyelid, above your lashes), which will make you look sickly and exhausted.
- Blend the red makeup on your face well so that it looks a little more natural. You don’t want it to look too obvious that you’ve applied makeup.
- Once you’ve applied the red lipliner to your waterline, use the end of a Q-tip to smudge it slightly. This will blend it a bit and give it a more natural appearance.
5
Define and deepen your facial lines.^{[6]
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Research source} Using a small angle brush, apply matte brown (or gray) eyeshadow to the lines and creases in your face. Focus particularly on the lines that run from the sides of your nose to the sides of your mouth and the lines that run down from the ends of your mouth when you frown.
- Don’t forget to darken the lines that appear between your eyebrows when you push them together, as well as the lines that appear on your forehead when you raise your eyebrows as high as you can.
- Defining and deepening your facial lines with dark makeup will make you look haggard, exhausted and angry.^{[7]
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- Apply it so that the makeup doesn’t look too dark or obvious.
6
Draw veins on your cheeks and forehead. Use small angle brush and blue or green eyeshadow to lightly draw veins on your cheeks and forehead. For a creepy flair, let your hand wobble a bit as you draw the veins in.
- If you want the color to really pop, wet the angle brush slightly before dipping it in the eyeshadow.
- Blue or green gel eyeliner or cream eyeshadow are also great options to draw the veins.
7
Dust your face lightly with a sheer or white powder. This will make your newly drawn “veins” look like they’re sitting beneath your skin. The powder will also help set the rest of your makeup and remove any shine from your face.^{[8]
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- Use a large, fluffy powder puff or blush brush to apply the powder to ensure you get a very light, even dusting.
8
Make your lips look dry and cracked. Pucker your lips and fill in the lines with a dark eyeshadow or eyeliner pencil. Apply some pink/red/maroon eyeshadow to the inner edge of your lips. This will enhance the dehydrated look of your lips, and it will also make the inside of your mouth look a bit bloody and mottled.
9
Make your hair look greasy and stringy. Spritz your hair with water/hairspray and/or gel, and work it into sections with your fingers so that your hair looks messy and hangs down in your face. Wear your hair as long and messy as possible.
- If you can go a few days without washing it, this will definitely help further the illusion.
10
Darken your fingernails and fingertips to look dirty.^{[9]
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Research source} Pat black eyeshadow under your fingernails and around your nail beds. Drag the eyeshadow down your fingers so that the “dirt” is heaviest at the fingernail and gets lighter as it moves down your finger.
- Paint a small amount of reddish brown liquid lipstick around a few of your cuticles for a slightly bloody look.

Method 3

Method 3 of 3:

Displaying Physical Disturbances

1
Wake up screaming. Frequent nightmares are another common sign of demonic possession, so pretend to have them fairly consistently. Scream unintelligibly and thrash around so that you’ll look unkempt and sweaty when someone inevitably comes to check on you. Open your eyes as wide as you can and make sure your facial expression shows that you are terrified.
- When asked about the nature of your nightmares, get upset and shake your head hysterically, as though you can’t even fathom verbalizing what you’ve seen.
- The most effective time to do this is between midnight and around 2am. Others in the house won’t be deeply asleep yet, so they will be easier to wake and more on edge when they do.
2
Practice yoga, strength and flexibility training. Possessed people are often depicted in popular cinema as being able to contort their bodies.^{[10]
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Research source} It is also common for them to display superhuman strength. You can increase your strength and flexibility through yoga, light stretching and weight training.
- Arrange yourself in contorted looking positions after your “nightmares." Maintain a completely straight face.
- To prevent injury, stretch your muscles out in private before attempting a contortion incident.
- Keep your contortions simple. It won’t take much on your part to unnerve the person that witnesses this.
3
Act catatonic and go long periods without blinking. When others attempt to talk to you or move you, remain silent, keep your body rigid and your eyes unfocused. Make it difficult for anyone to physically move you while you’re “catatonic.” Pretend to black out.
- Once you snap out of it, act as though nothing happened. Argue defensively with anyone who wants to talk about it.
- Show signs of memory loss around others, and hint that you’ve been losing stretches of time.
4
Practice rolling your eyes so that only the whites show. Keep your head facing forward, then look up as far as you can using only your eyes — don’t move your head. Move your eyes upward until you can’t move them any further, then lower your eyelids slightly to hide whatever is left of your iris.
- Make sure you aren’t completely closing your eyes when you do this. Practice getting it right with the camera on your phone. Take video and stills.
- Some people find it helpful to close their eyes first. Close your eyes, look up at the ceiling (with your eyes still closed), then open your eyes while still looking upward.
5
Rehearse extreme facial contortions and pained expressions. Exorcists say that possessed people often contort their faces in extreme, frightening ways. Their facial expressions also communicate that they are in pain. Sit in front of a mirror and practice contorted and pained facial expressions.^{[11]
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- Once you get a few choice facial expressions down, use them after your “nightmares” and other weird incidents that you’ve staged.
- If possible, use props to enhance your contortions and expressions.
- The classic vomiting scene in The Exorcist movie is widely recognized, so it would be pretty hilarious to incorporate some thick pea soup into one of your incidents.
6
Learn a new language or a few Latin phrases. In horror movies, possessed people often speak in Latin, but any foreign language will probably disturb your friends and family if you suddenly start speaking it. If you don't have time to learn a new language, simply learn a few Latin phrases.
- A common phrase the possessed use in horror movies is “Legio mihi nomen est, quia multi sumus” which means “I am Legion, for we are many.”^{[12]
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  Research source} Even saying this in English will probably be extremely scary to others.
- Be cautious about foreign languages if your loved ones study them. You don't want your sister announcing that your Latin has a very poor accent, with bad grammar.
- Another option is simply incoherent babbling. If you go this route, try to make it sound like you are speaking another language by inserting pauses and using inflection on some of your “words”.
7
Develop a creepy voice. In film, when a demon speaks through the possessed person, its voice is often very low, sinister and a bit raspy. Play around with your voice to see what sorts of strange and frightening sounds you can make. Check out a few online instructional videos to increase your vocal range — particularly moving into deeper registers.
- Record yourself speaking in your creepy voice with your phone. Use an app to make your voice sound deeper and scarier, then play the recording late at night or when you’re around other people.
- Incorporate other vocalizations like wheezing, hissing, growling, and screaming. Use these sounds in between sentences or words.

Community Q&A

Question

Are there any tips on how to act possessed by an evil doll?

Throwythethrowawayacc

Community Answer

Instead of nightmares, keep the doll in your room and play loud thumping noises on your phone. When someone comes to check, stare at the doll. Stare at it often, and give it a name. Write the name on things in a scratchy font. Pretend the doll is speaking through you - practice a scary high-pitched voice to use.
Question

Is there anyway to get my friends to help me with this?

Community Answer

Get one friend on it that whom you can trust then let them help you prank your other friends by spreading rumors about your possession.
Question

Will this help me get a boyfriend?

Community Answer

Probably not. If you're trying to put forth the impression that he's the only person who can exorcise you, you're essentially being abusive, and if he's smart, he'll just walk away before getting into a relationship with someone like you. On the other hand, if he likes you better possessed than not, he's not the right one in that situation either. The only situation I could really see is if your crush is into acting and you reveal your well-done ruse at the end, then he might be impressed and want to go out with you.

Warnings

People may think that you have a mental illness, such as depression (losing interest in favorite things, seeming empty inside), or a disability such as autism (which may involve rocking and repeating words or phrases). You may be taken to a doctor for a mental health evaluation.

⧼thumbs_response⧽
Helpful 48 Not Helpful 8
Anybody in their right mind will know to drop the act after a while. Since, to be honest, it would be your fault if you didn't have enough common sense to drop the act.

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