I WANT PROOF, beyond a shadow of a doubt

I have to laugh.....

As a paranormal investigator and one who believe in the paranormal 100%, I get people who put out videos and photos online and claim those as proof positive of the existence of the paranormal.

Having a video of an orb, blinking, seeming to interact with you, obeying a voice command, hovering, or one a hundred other things, that has been recreated in a sterile lab under scientific conditions proves you have a video of dust. Now, one of the supposedly pieces of dust, might not be dust, but till you can prove that scientifically, it's para-interesting period! Just as getting an evp reading from a site is cool, it is not "proof".

I have just gotten done in a discussion with someone on a page on FaceBook who then deleted the whole post for not agreeing with him. You post a photo or a video and only want those that will agree with you comment, PLEASE SPARE US ALL and don't post it if you cannot take what others are going to tell you - or post, "ONLY those that agree that this is proof, need respond".  That way those of us that have read scientific journals, and study as well as participate in this field will know you don’t want to know the truth. It's called learning and evolving. I once thought the same thing about orbs, and people once thought the world was flat.....and we were proven wrong.

The funny part of all this is that I BELIEVE in the paranormal and the afterlife....but I want to be more than a believer, I WANT PROOF, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that they existence......don’t you!

Smartphone Apps and FAKE "GHOSTS"

There are few things that infuriate me more than someone that posts a photo with help of one of the hundred apps out there with a fake ghost for attention.  The fact that they do it in the first place isn't enough, then they defend it and get offended when you question them about the validity of the photo..... REALLY?

Here are just a few fake images we obtained from different apps..(we've put them on one photo as a collage for demonstration purposes)

These are just a few of the images and applications that are available.  I would also like to point your attention to this site on facebook to help point out these fake photos.  

https://www.facebook.com/Ghostfake

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Ghost-App-Ghosts/423618617673367

We, as Paranormal Investigators that truly believe in the existence of "ghosts and the afterlife", would like nothing more than to have CONCRETE proof of what we believe.  Those that submit these FAKE photos and made up stories for attention are hurting those of us that take this seriously and are using scientific methods to debunk all findings, including our own, so that only what is left might become the proof of what we want to find.

I don't know how else to say this, but STOP making fake photos and posting them as the real thing.  You want to make one as a party gag, ok, but don't post them on the internet for others to post as the "real thing".  Cause we can tell, we are collecting data and evidence to disprove these as well. 

“Para-Interesting”, is what this is, until it is proven otherwise ……

Over the last few days I have participated in various discussions on different Paranormal sites on FaceBook over people submitting ONE photo to show PROOF POSITIVE that they've captured the paranormal.  I've them asked if did anyone take reference pictures? This is what you get when putting you camera in "burst" mode when taking pictures during an investigation. Most cameras have that option. It will take 3-5 pictures back to back, and give you a reference for your photos if you stay still. If you catch something on one picture and not the others, you MAY have proof of the unknown.  I asked if they lived close enough, had they tried to go back and re-create what they captured if they didn't have reference pictures. Plus, was there any other corroborating evidence, like and evp’s, videos, meter readings etc...?

The answer was no, no and no. Yet, they clung to their passionate belief that their photo was proof positive all by itself.   With so many Smartphone apps out there that can easily insert a "ghostly apparition" into any picture these days, one photo is no longer evidence at all without the proper back up to prove the possibility otherwise.

As Paranormal Investigator we have to take the stance that it is probably not paranormal BUT, we would not be so quick to throw it out either. Nor would we be able to present it to a client as is without more research.  So, “Para-Interesting”, is what this is, until it is proven otherwise …… with the key word being proven, as in scientifically …. Not to what you believe …. As a Paranormal Investigator, isn't it our job to prove the existence of all things paranormal? How can you do that without quieting the doubts of your harshest skeptics with irrefutable proof based on scientific testing?  The answer is, You cannot….

Be it an orb, a face or line of light..... if there is another explanation for that being in your photo, then you need more to prove it otherwise or you are relying on just hope and belief.  You have to have scientific proof positive.  You have to become your own harshest critic in order to do this; even though you are the one that believes.

And if you are someone who post a photo on the internet and then become offended when someone questions its validity, then please, DON’T POST IT.  With so many FAKES out there, you are not being realistic.  If you have belief in something, then your goal should be to make your case intelligently and with an informed perspective with a civil exchange of ideas.  That is how people learn. I have been proven wrong in my prior beliefs regarding orbs.  I once was a staunch defender that they were of the paranormal realm.  Now seeing sterile rooms where researchers were able to reproduce and show that orbs are just dust and light, I have had to evolve to find other evidence to prove the existence of the Paranormal.

When in doubt toss it out is out motto.  Science has proven over and over again that Orbs can be recreated to do all the spectacular things Paranormal Investigators once used as proof.  We need to evolve every time that scientific evidence is presented and find new ways to prove what we believe. Because of conditions we as humans are susceptible to, such as Pareidolia and Apophenia that can affect our ability to see what is actually right in front of us. Human perception is a tricky thing, especially to those of us trying to prove the existence of the Paranormal!   

Rock County Paranormal Society

http://www.rcparanormal.com/

Are you a "Good or a Bad Witch" and Wiccan Practices

Everyone has heard of the infamous Salem witchcraft trials of 1692, but do you know what a Witch or someone that has chosen to practice Wicca Religion really is?  

What it isn't, is the flash, popularity and drama that television and movies have lent to it. First of all People that practice Wicca are NOT Witches, but all Witches practice Wicca. Some use the terms interchangeably.  But they are not the same thing.  Much like being a Christian, does not necessarily make you a Methodist, simply because you claim to be Christian.  You could be Catholic, Protestant, or one of many other denominations or you could just choose to believe in a higher power and may not participate at all in organized religion.

Next we need to distinguish between magic and Magick.  Magic is illusion done for entertainment.  Famous people that you may have heard of are David Copperfield and Houdini.  They make people “disappear” and saw people in half.  These are tricks and their secrets are coveted.  If you knew the “tricks” behind these, you too could do what they do.

Magick is studied techniques for harnessing internal and external energies that will help us change ourselves and our environment.  Aleister Crowley  is the one credited with using the spelling to mark a  difference between the two words and meaning when he had an experience in Egypt in 1904.  To genuine practitioners, we'd know exactly what we were talking about and the only time we even have to bother to differentiate or explain is when we are talking with someone outside the Wiccan Religion or the Art of Magick.

Now I’d like to dispel some common misconceptions. 

Asking someone if they are a good Witch or a bad Witch is like asking someone if they are a good catholic or a bad catholic.  It has to do with ethical standards.  Wiccans believe in the ethical guideline called the "Threefold Law," which states that whatever a person wishes upon someone else returns to them three times over, according to "Wiccan Spirituality" (Green Magic, 2002).  Wicca opposes the use of negative, harmful magic and discourages people from hurting others physically or emotionally, according to "Wicca for Life" (Citadel Press, 2003).  Witches, Druids and other pagan belief systems and religions have their own ethical standards.  

So, to finally answer that questions, I need to say that just as in everyday life, there are good people and bad people.  Most people are both good and bad simultaneously and the path they choose and the ethics their culture and religions adhere to are what eventually labels them as good or bad in that particular society.  Most people walk what Wicca calls the "middle way".

Next, neither Witches nor Wiccans worship Satan.  Satan is part of Christianity and Muslim Religions and Satanism.  And the Pentagram is NOT Satanic.  That impression is thanks to Hollywood and novels.  The five pointed star represents the elements, Air, Earth, Fire & Water and the top point to “Spirit”.  Negative connotations of witchcraft  led its followers to stop referring to themselves as witches and go by "Wiccans" instead, according to "Wicca A to Z" (Citadel Press, 1998). 

Although it's based on ancient beliefs, including aspects of paganism and nature-based spirituality, Wicca was founded by anthropologist Gerald Gardner in the early 1950s, according to "Magico-Religious Groups and Ritualistic Activities" (CRC Press, 2008).  

"Wicca is a new religion that combines surviving folk traditions and more modern elements. It is loosely based on Western European pagan rites and rituals that have been performed for centuries — before, during and after the time of Jesus — such as reverence of nature, observance of the cycle of the seasons, celebration of the harvest, and doing magic," according to "Wicca for Beginners" (Llewellyn Worldwide, 2006).

There is no bible that Wiccans follow. Wiccans may make a "Book of Shadows" for themselves, or may pass one down from a teacher of the faith to his or her student, but that BoS serves as a reference book, according to "Living Wicca" (Llewellyn Worldwide, 1993).  Also referred to as a grimoire, mirror book or magical diary, a BoS is a customized book in which a Wiccan records information he or she finds useful to practicing the faith. While not every Wiccan has a BoS, those that do fill theirs with myths, ceremonies, spells, religious ritual instructions, prayers, herbal lore or personal records of dreams, according to "Living Wicca."

I think this is enough to digest in one sitting.  I will write more later…….

This was a simplistic overview of facts after I was asked what it meant to be a good Witch.  In dealing with the paranormal in my research and everyday life, I have found that when writing things like this, I often learn as much about myself as I mean to convey.  I am a believer in a higher power/energy, but I don’t believe in the “Hallmark” photo of God, Jesus or of a Heaven and Hell.  I do believe that our energy goes on to something else. I also believe that everyone is on their own journey.  I will allow you to believe what you want and please allow me the same courtesy.  So mode it be…. 

Faces in Mirrors, Windows, Clouds, Smoke, Etc... Pareidolia and Apophenia

The mind is an incredible thing; it can turn some blobs on your grilled cheese sandwich into a face, a cloud into a face and reflections of light from your flash on a mirror into a face. Faces, as found by the scientists at the University of Bremen in Germany, were given different priority in your brain. In fact they believe that there is a whole section of the brain specifically for face recognition. This study was published in the October 2007 edition of the Journal Science.


MIT as well as many other accredited scientific research facilities have also dedicated years of study to the phenomena and found that "These turn out to be very simple relationships, things like the eyes are always darker than the forehead, and the mouth is darker than the cheeks," Sinha said. "If you put together about 12 of these relationships, you get a template that you can use to locate a face." Eventually, they entered in the information they got from MRI studies on what our brains were recognizing when we were shown faces, even those with less than 12 pixels of resolution and found that the computer could do as good a job as the human brain. "This suggests that, like the computer, the human brain processes faces holistically, like coherent landscapes, rather than one feature at a time."

Once in a while, MIT found that the computer emits a false alarm. "This is a good analogy for what the human brain might be doing," Sinha said. "Like the computer, it's trying to determine what the regularities are in all of these faces to create a prototype.

"But this prototype is not perfect. Sometimes genuine faces do not match these regularities, and sometimes non faces satisfy them."people have gotten so used to seeing faces everywhere that sensitivity to them is high enough to produce constant false positives.

There are many other scientific studies that have been done that all come to the same conclusion. With that being said, would a ghost, that has multiple other ways of manifesting and making itself known really need to be a partially smear or unrecognizable possible face?

Both scientist and trained photographers have known for years that this is a quirk of the human brain and pixilation.  The human imagination and need to find faces in everything is just how we are wired and finding faces where they really are not is just an environmental anomaly and not something paranormal at all...... and neither is the face of "Jesus" or Marilyn Monroe in your grilled cheese sandwich.....

ORBS and the Paranormal........

As a paranormal investigator, you'd think I'd support every orb as being something other worldly, but in fact, I am just the opposite. Being an investigator means that you are there to prove that something is an actual paranormal event by ruling out any other possibility. Not simply claiming that everything you see is that, just because you wish it to be so. With this being said, here is what I believe and the common theories by others that support my findings.

I agree that 95% of orbs are not paranormal....but there are some that change direction, hover, blink, etc... caught on video, just cannot be explained away...... and those are what I believe are paranormal.

There was a FALSE ORB EXPERIMENT done by MidNight Walkers Paranormal Research Society, click on this link to see the full findings: MidNight Walkers Experiment

Their experiment came to this conclusion:

Their "experiment had no intention to disprove the existence of real paranormal orbs. Its intention was to supply pictures of false orbs for comparing an unknown orb image in determining its authenticity."

Which is similar to what I am saying..... they also provided so many photos of known items that look very much like what many people catch everyday and are dust, insects and more..... this image is from the study......insects

this is is also from the study, but is of dust

I want to prove that ghosts and an afterlife exists, so I won't take a photo that I cannot recreate, and subject to the harshest scrutiny rather than claim that upon seeing it, that it's paranormal.  Only after examination and ruling out any other possibility, will I claim that......

Earth-Bound Spirits, Lost Souls, Ghosts & Poltergeists

First of all, Earth-Bound Spirits, Lost Souls, Ghosts and Poltergeists are HUMAN SOULS. In this case, we are not dealing with "demons", lower astral beings, negative entities, etc., however they are distinct from one another.

Earthbound spirits:  In short Earth-bound or Lost Souls haven't been around for a long time.   They tend to haunt people they knew in life. They could drift around for years, never finding a way to communicate with us. Or they might get lucky; bring their message across to us and then go, that is, return to the spirit world where they belong.  But how do they get stuck here in the first place?

Most everyone has read or heard somewhere that a sudden/abrupt or unexpected death could cause a soul to become lost or confused about what’s happening to them and perhaps that’s why the linger.  But not all souls that are here have passed in that manner.  So what else could cause a soul to stay in our plain here on earth?

Another theory is that when someone carries guilt about things they've done wrong, they simply don’t believe they are worthy and refuse to move to the light and avoid the invitations from angels and loved ones there.  Along these same lines those that were taught by religions that hell is real, and have abused or lived lifestyles that they were taught was unworthy, now fear the light because they are afraid of not being accepted into heaven.  Then you have those who hate and want revenge for their departure and will linger here for eternity to achieve that goal.

Other than those that are confused or unaware of what has happened to them, fear is the single biggest reason that people get lost between plains.  With this bring said, those of us here on earth should not label lost souls as being bad, evil or anything other than a person that is no longer alive.  They still have feelings like you or I and may be confused, lost, frightened, and angry and even grieve their own deaths.  We should instead be willing to help them move on to the next plain of existence.

For the majority, if we treat them with respect, even if being in their presence and behavior is disturbing, lost souls will respond to good faith reasoning and are considered non-violent. Our focus should be on the fact that they need our help to move on to the next realm and most of them are completely harmless.

Very rarely, some can be so confused, so lost, or so angry that one can become threatened physically.  If violence occurs, cease contact IMMEDIATELY and find a medium/healer or priest that is trained to deal with this situation.  Whom you choose is based on your own personal and religious beliefs.  Again, these situations are RARE, not as frequent as television and movies would have you believe.  If you see one of these in your entire lifetime; that would even be rare.  I am not saying that this does not exist, however, the majority are simply confused and do not mean you harm.

Lost Souls,  Ghost & Poltergeists will generally cause some the following types of disturbances

Ø Toys move across the floor by themselves

Ø Knock items off shelves onto the floor

Ø Rattling, knocking, scraping noises

Ø Shadows moving around the home or building

Ø Talking in the distance

Ø  Walking into areas and being overwhelmed with emotions you did not currently feel

Ø Very Cold Spots

The longer they've been around the more activity you will get....

Ghosts:

Ghosts are people who usually lost their lives a long time, even centuries, ago. Unlike earthbound spirits, they usually prefer to haunt specific places rather than people. Perhaps one of the reasons for this may be because the people that they knew in life are probably all dead by now. Ghosts have lost all attachment to people on Earth, however they are comforted by their old, familiar mansion, surrounded by comforting, familiar sights, sounds and breezes. An earthbound soul could indeed run the risk of turning into a ghost if it isn't aware that it is dead, or that it has any alternatives to drifting aimlessly about its old home. It may hang around; at first it is happy to be in the presence of its family.  But one day, the family leaves or they die and pass joyfully into the spirit world. And the ghost is left all alone and adrift on the earth plane, neither a fully formed human being nor a spirit where it belongs.

Poltergeists:

One theory on Poltergeists; is that they have been formless spirits for so long that they don’t remember they were once human.  Another belief is that some pre-adolescents have the ability to subconsciously act in a manner resembling poltergeist behavior that they two are confused….but let’s focus on actual true Poltergeists.

In being in existence for centuries at the very least, that they have acquired a great deal of knowledge and expertise about how to survive and use their natural resources to their advantage. They are the ones blamed for moving objects, telekinesis and materializations.  This isn’t saying that others could not also do this.  But it is believed that it would take time to figure out how to do this.

Spirits that are here on the earth plain do have access to a source of power and energy.  As humans, we eat to get energy.  As spirits, they must find a source in order to do anything.  They can take it from people, from batteries, electrical storms or any other source that they wish.

Earthbound spirits:

Earthbound spirits usually get that energy from their loved ones. They don't suck the energy from their loved ones on purpose, or because they wish to harm their loved ones, but instinctually for survival. They NEED that energy to remain alive as souls.

Ghosts:

They like to suck energy from their surroundings and environment rather than from people.

Poltergeists:

Poltergeists absolutely LOVE to terrorize people! That is literally what gives them life. And since it is something that they also do so consummately well, thanks in large part to their terrific telekinetic abilities, they are in no danger of running out of victims to supply them with life energy and vital force in the very near future.

Like negative non-human, lower astral entities (which I will write about in a future blog), poltergeists thrive and prosper in an environment chock full of negativity, heaving, heavy human emotions, fear, terror, rage and frustration. That is why you will so often find them lurking about troubled individuals, who feed them a constant stream of power with their unremitting unhappiness.

Earthbound spirits:

As I said before, earthbound spirits tend to just hang around. They don't do much else. They may be actively in search of a psychic medium to help them out. Or maybe they just like to be around their granddaughter and her young, fresh energy.  They might accidentally make a noise or move something, but it probably wasn't intentional.

Ghosts:

Ghosts haunt. That is what they do, that is what makes them ghosts. Outside of haunting, I believe that there are very few other activities that appeal especially to them.  However, they do on occasion scare the living daylights out of people with their mere, generally inoffensive presence. They also tend to be distressed and sorrowful beings, and all that unhappiness, we do have to admit, does tend to rub off on us and make us also feel downright bad and stressed-out when we find ourselves around ghosts.

Poltergeists:

What poltergeists do is more than obvious, and you can read a great deal about them in the paranormal literature that abounds out there in bookshops and libraries. Poltergeists like to haunt families and places. They move objects, often quite violently, since they are themselves usually of a violent, perverted and aberrant character, oftentimes with more than a healthy dose of feelings of hatred and spite towards other people and the human race in general.  Poltergeists like to play around with people, just simply because they can.

This was a simplistic overview of what basic theories of Earth-Bound Spirits, Lost Souls, Ghost’s & Poltergeists may be.  In dealing with the paranormal in my research and life, I have found that when writing things like this, I often learn as much about myself as I mean to convey.  I am a believer in a higher power/energy, but I don’t believe in the “Hallmark” photo of God, Jesus or of a Heaven and Hell.  I do believe that our energy goes on to something else. I also believe that everyone is on their own journey.  I will allow you to believe what you want and please allow me the same courtesy.  So mode it be….