Gameplay Example: Cole from Sixth Sense

Please see the movie, this contains potential spoilers. It's very likely available at your library, via Kanopy, etc. It's also a drama/thriller and has some jump scares, please be sure to check DoesTheDogDie.com for trigger warnings before watching if needed.

This is something like a fan fiction, character exploration, educational in nature showing how folks might use this game & an example of how using journaling to explore, uncover, and heal trauma might work. We do not have any affiliation or rights to Sixth Sense or its characters.

Note - some details may not 100% match the theatrical release of the movie. We took some license with the details.

It starts some time after the movie -- months? Years? Who knows.

Character Development

I see dead people, and they think they're still alive. I don't get to enjoy myself. They're everywhere, and many of them are extremely scary. They're in my house, my bedroom, they follow me everywhere, the ones that can. I can't rest. I can't relax. I can't even go to the bathroom.

Sensations

[Roll 12: emptiness.] 

It's like I don't even belong to myself. 

[Roll 11: dissociation.]

I'm disconnected from life with one foot in the land of the living and one in the land of the dead. I have no boundaries, no barriers. Everyone comes and goes as they please. I'm almost never alone, and have no chance to experience myself without someone barging in on me. My skin crawls. I feel cold. I have no agency. There is no me, only a beacon, a lighthouse of death, drawing lost souls in a mirror-world of purgatory. They are all but lost in the darkness until they find my light. I am not a person. I'm an empty tower shooting a beam of promise into a world of phantoms, tying up loose ends before they can move on to a safer haven.

Encountering Square Pegs

[Roll 2: obsession. Roll two: work.] 

I am driven by their needs, their unfinished business. I don't feel like I have a choice. Everything revolves around their needs: circling, circling, circling. There is only the next lost traveler, my job as their ambassador to the living, the next quest, the next soul to usher onwards. When I can't sleep, I do the work. When I can't eat, I do the work. When I can't bathe, I do the work. They are always present, compelling. Might as well. 

Attachment story

[Roll 8: being seen, being heard.]

In a way I've wanted this. The spirits see me. They hear me. 

I don't have to earn attention. I don't have to do anything, just my very existence. They come and seek me out. They come into my spaces. They tell me they need something.

I don't like being alone. Nobody sees or hears you when you're alone. How I keep doing the work reminds me of my mother. She's always working. In the morning, she's getting ready to work. She's always handing me off to a "friend" before I go to school. In the evening, she's at her second job, working again. She's not there when I come home, I let myself in.

I feel so — alone. So unseen, so unheard, that maybe I started putting out that signal to call someone to me. Maybe I was shining that light like a flashlight out into the world, looking for someone who could actually listen. 

Hmm, Mom thought grandma wasn't proud of her, and she worked extra hard to try to prove herself worthy. I know she's a single mom, but she wasn't always there for me. Ironically, she also had to work to prove herself to grandma, and because of that, she neglected me. She worked harder and harder, and I was seen less and less. I put on a show, and mom couldn't find the real me behind the curtain. She was too busy to look. I did try to tell the truth, and no one could hear me. No one could help me. Actually, the first person to really listen to me was a ghost. That's ironic, because now all I do is listen to ghosts. I'm still not being seen or heard. I feel empty because no one connects with me, even myself. I feel disconnected, like  my need to exist plays second fiddle to helping souls move on from mortal existence. I have no say over this power, so I use it as an excuse to maintain the empty place. The beacon that draws lost souls to me is the emptiness I used to fill.

I can't be heard, so I listen. I'm invisible, so I see ghosts. I can't get what I need, so I take orders to fulfill what others need. I barely exist, so I escort souls out of existence. It often feels like the only way I have any control at all, so I do it all the time. Do I rejoin the land of the living? Pull myself back together? Should I own that I deserve to be seen, that I'm worth listening to. This is not a gift. There will never be a day when all the work is done and I get to rest. I lost myself, everything I mortgaged to the gift, and there we go. Not even time enough to write this passage before the room gets so cold I can see my breath, but this time I no longer care. I'm done.

Removing Square Pegs

I just screamed at the ghost. Told it to go away. I'm done helping them. I'm turning the beacon off. This lighthouse is closed. Go find another death doula. My name isn't Charon — it's Cole. Go pay the ferryman.

Uncovering Lost Bits

[Roll 1: values. Roll 3: honesty.] 

I tried to be honest and wasn't heard, and then I stopped being honest with myself. I kept this gift, but made it a curse because my mother didn't hear me, because I had to cut away a big chunk of myself that wasn't believed and leave it behind. I had to fake being normal, fake that I cared about these ghosts. How could I care when I was not even there anymore? 

For a while I almost I had a guardian spirit watching over me, Dr Crow — and although he helped me work on my fears, he didn't help me work on myself. He didn't really hear me either. He helped solve the surface problem, but not the deeper problem. 

Do you know why I'm afraid when I'm alone? I'm afraid because I cease to exist. I lost myself being alone —with mom off working after dad left — no eyes to help me see myself, no questions to help me hear myself. I needed to be seen and heard, and there were always ghosts, starting with grandma. But they always saw what they wanted to see. She saw grandpa. Dr Crow saw another kid he couldn't help. 

I need to be honest with myself; no one is going to fix me, not Dr Crow, not my mom, not another therapist or ghost. They can't fix me. I've lost myself somewhere, and I have to find me. Who Am I? Am I the guy who saves poltergeists, or am I Cole Sear? 

Where did I get lost? When? Was it after dad died and left us? 

Yeah. I think a part of me left to try to follow dad. That's when everything got worse. We moved in with Grandma. Mom started working more, then grandma got sick and died. Part of me had followed dad, and there was no one else there except grandma's ghost. When I went to follow dad, he didn't become a ghost. The real me couldn't follow him where he went. I wore his glasses like that would bring me closer to him — or maybe… because then I might feel connected with myself? 

I have to let go of dad and really mourn him, be fully honest with myself that he's gone. And I can't fill the vacancy from trying to follow him with ghosts. I also need to be really honest with myself that I did this — gift to see spirits aside. I chose to see ghosts over guardian spirits. I did it hoping to find my dad, and yet he's really gone. 

So much of me is wrapped up in the glasses like they're some kind of talisman that might help me find him. I keep them and wear them, trying to connect with him. So actually, the glasses are a link to where I can find me. I haven't been able to throw them away, because it hurts too much — and of course, it would. I can't throw myself away. 

Welcome Back

Hi, me. We need to have a talk. 

You know, when dad died and left us, his life was complete. It's kind of ironic, because we still need him. And even though we keep on sending out a signal for years, he hasn't shown up. I think he moved on a long time ago. 

We don't need to keep looking for him. And I really want you to come back home. 

I'm never going to get dad back, and it's way too much to lose you too. Please come back. Come away from the glasses. I really need you. I want you to come back and help me figure out who we are, so we can move on with our life. Are you ready? 

"Yes."

Thank you so much. 

"Let's call Mom and see if we can visit Dad's grave together, okay?"

Yes.