Now just a bit about the momentously strange field in which we find ourselves as investigators or interested parties: 

 

Firstly I think I should come clean and say that personally I feel that the terms paranormal and supernatural sort of misrepresent what 'all this' is or may actually be about. Everything's natural whether or not we understand or believe it. Also, I think it's not necessarily about belief per se, rather acceptance of something else. 

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That said, it's usulally easier to use these terms than the overly syllabic alternative. I feel (and maybe this is just me) that they are words that have become synonymous with largely inaccurate perceptions of 'weird stuff' - what I prefer to call anomalous phenomena.  But you can't go around saying that all the time because it's a bit of a tongue twister, so for the sake of this website and for its visitors, I will stick with paranormal. But it's an icky one.

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There's a few other iffy members in the terminology stable too. Take for example...

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GHOST.  The cliched use (that many now take to be the gospel definition of all things strange) of the word ghost is so vastly and probably inappropriately used for something that is but one tiny light in an immense sky of stars. It is like referring to the entirety of the world's fauna by referencing an ant. Sure, this is one example amidst a million others, all different, all inexplicably intricate. Ghost to most folk just means the shade of a dead human. Where to begin?!

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Personally, and this is just my opinion so it matters not in the grand scheme of things, but I think that a true ghost is an apparition, just a physical imprint with maybe a basic form of intelligence.  The towering plume of blacker than black 'smoke' that accompanied my friend up a set of stairs, now this I would term a ghost I think. This 'thing' was seen twice more in the same area that week - once by a young boy and his sceptic father who said it was a "tower of black".  I will add here that the father is no longer a sceptic. I also would categorise my latest photo from a blacked-out B Wing at Shepton Mallet Prison as a ghost. (See gallery).

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As for the fading monk that my Mother saw sat on the end of her bed in Spain up in the mountains, who remained there after she switched on the light, smiling at her... now that, he would be a what, intelligent ghost rather than an apparition maybe? Why does anything have to be any one denomination of entity?

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THE 'D' WORD!

And whilst I'm on about personal griping bugbears, I think that if I hear the word 'demon' one more time on the TV ghost shows, I'll combust! In the sense that most people proffer the 'D' word they mean it to be a sort of inhuman devil, something with fangs and red eyes intent on causing harm to its human hosts. I think that the Victorians and Hollywood have much to do with this.  If demon ultimately means something non-human then I reckon that the majority of anomalously phenomenal activity is demonic. But that very word, the 'D' word, for me simply conjurs up Hollywood-style religious over-the-top cliches that have zero bearing on the majority of activity.  It's absurd.  No wonder the sceptics think us believers all insane.

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There are probably multitudes of variants within the field of non-human/inhuman entities, not everything has hooves, horns and big old gnashers!  

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I had a non-human entity causing havoc in my 80's semi for several years. Do I think this has anything to do with Satan, do I think the scratches I received had anything to do with the holy trinity (as a certain TV investigator is so fond of telling us that it most certainly is?!) No, I do not. What I feel may be the case is that (a) I live on the site of a medieval friary, which was in turn built on a Roman dump and burial ground. The 1600s prison lay 200m away by the river that runs through the village. This equates to a lot of compounded life! (b) I dabble in strange things (c) I think there is possibly an ex-resident still here. The EVPs I still capture let me know I'm not alone in the house, and I think it's a blend of all elements that go towards producing activity.

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I and many other investigators are not religious. I will point out here that I was raised a practising Christian, was baptised and confirmed somewhat against my will. I felt as if I'd been forced to join a club I wasn't sure I wanted to be in.  

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I still held my morals though, and feel that this is what religion is really about - getting people to treat others in a certain way, but bound together by intricate rituals from times past.  When I was 16 I stopped going to church.  Please don't misunderstand me - I'm not anti-religion, I'm just not religious myself.

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I respect religion and people who do abide by it. I get emotional at services. There's a binding reverence in churches and other religious buildings, and I utterly understand this.  To stand in an empty church and to listen, to feel... The care and love of those who have passed through the building is tangible. I love very much many family and friends who attend church, and this is a special things.  I enjoy hymns, love carols... who doesn't?   Religion fluffs off on all of us, many from our school years, and therefore it's always going to have that special sanctity.  I love Gregorian chant.  What was Christmas as a child without Christmas Eve' in bed waiting for you know who, with Mum and Nana out at the midnight service, Dad cooking mince pies and sausage rolls, with the chant playing loud...? Magic! Goosebumps just thinking about it.

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It is a spiritual thing, not necessarily religious I think. Perhaps THAT is the difference?  Paranormal phenomena has nothing to do with religion. It is far beyond the confines of humanity.

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I do wonder why we use inappropriate wording so much. Perhaps it is because these misnomers have become a sort of one-size-fits-all for any haunt-type phenomena. It doesn't necessarily mean that it is the result of dead people getting cheeky. 

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I have been asked if I "believe in the paranormal?" Let's break that down.

You mean, things that science can't explain? Well...yes! All paranormal/supernatural refer to are things beyond our understanding. And why should a 'paranormal' experience be spooky? Why should it all be about darkness, death, decay and morbidity? Probably it's because physical death freaks us all out, and that this is the most graspable strand of weirdness that we as mortals, can dabble in and achieve evidential results.

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So it begs the question, if you can't actually define ghosts, that can you really hunt them?

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As an investigator in any parapsychological field you must be more like a counsellor, scientist, theorist, judge, sceptic, mediator, experimenter, be an emotional sponge, psychiatrist, friend, shepherd, or perhaps even a minder! But the term Ghost Hunting has become the norm for many, and that's not going to change any time soon. Those working within the field, the commercial one too, understand the true meaning - but trying to convey this to the masses who think that every bump in the night is a spook, is difficult.

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Just recently I've been thinking about the importance of death in the role of the production of phenomena.

We are all conscious and emotional beings; emotions are the tendrils of the conscious self. We are all units of life, batteries if you will. As we go about our day-to-day lives in this mortal state in which we currently find ourselves, we're constantly imprinting our emotional selves, leaving footprints of our consciousness. And that's all emotions, all the time, not just massively positive or negative ones. We're constantly laying down layers of ourselves during our lifetimes.  If this sounds bonkers than hear me out.

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Whilst watching QI, the subject of Quatum Entanglement came up. It was hugely simplified, and I'm going to dumb it down even more; but basically, in 2017 scientists split a proton in half. One half was kept in the lab, the other removed over a distance of 500km. Physical alterations were made to the lab half, and those exact changes also presented themselves on the removed portion, all those miles away. Split consciousness. Would this go some way to explaining twin-phenomena? Twins were once a single cell, before splitting. There have always been reports of twins experiencing the same symptoms, pain, and thoughts even though physically far from each other. Could it be? I wonder.

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So, when it comes to the moment of physical death and smashing out the other side of it, I believe that the consciousness fractures, shattering the 'self'. Nothing can be more of an emotional shock than to experience death - even a peaceful one. If indeed the consciousness fractures at this time (a little like wearing a wooly jumper and squeezing through bramble hedges) this would be a heavy-hitting emotional deposit, unlike any other.

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Could this play into the popular theory that hauntings and phenomena largely only occur in places that have borne witness to strong emotional moments and tragic deaths? I can concur that the places I've recorded that have such a past, have indeed provided strong EVP (and other phenomena, I have no doubt - for where there is EVP there is other phenomena). I mean, I can record pretty much anywhere, even really 'dull' places, and I get EVP, but the quality and calibre of the recordings I get from historic places with a sad and brutal past, are something else.​

Could it be that phenomena is quite literally all around us all the time, but it is only the strongest stuff that we pick up on, for the very reason that these are the types that pack the strongest emotional punch? 

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For centuries the emphasis on all paranormal phenomena, even within the ranks of 'believers', seems to be heavily biased to it all to do with death and dead people.Of course, death does come into it; but now I am beginning to think that it's not so much to do with 'just death' after all; more that it's to do with life and the emotional imprints that we are all laying down all the time. Is it really about the disembodied consciousness continuing post-mortal death? ​​​​​​​​

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(For a more in-depth look at this theory please see my blog, 'Sentience, Slug-trails, and Divots of the Conscious self?'. Some of it is repeated, my apologies!).

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