Ghosts vs. Spirits

[Debi]

Chip Coffey posted this today and I found it to be very close to my own beliefs. Wanted to share.

Chip Coffey - Psychic and Medium
3 hrs ·
Let's talk about earthbound spirits or lost souls or whatever we choose to label them.

Yesterday, I posted about Ebba Andersson, a young child who died when the Titanic sank in 1912. I communicated with the spirit of Ebba during an investigation at the Titanic Museum in Pigeon Forge, TN. Many people were concerned that her spirit is earthbound or lost. Ebba's soul is NOT earthbound or lost.

I have been investigating the paranormal and communicating with the deceased for many years and I rarely...and I mean almost never...encounter spirits who have not made their transition into the Afterlife.

Many people mistakenly believe that spirits who communicate with investigators during paranormal investigations are earthbound, that they have not completed their transition between the world of the living and the Afterlife. Not true. The vast majority of spirits HAVE completed their transition and briefly return to the third dimension in order to interact with the living.

Spirits often visit people with whom they feel a kinship. Or places or things that were meaningful to them during their lifetime. They may also return to interact with the living when we "call them up" or attempt to make a connection with them, such as during a paranormal investigation or readings with a medium.

So, please let your mind be at peace with regard to earthbound spirits because there truly are not that many "lost souls."

(What I have written above is based on my own beliefs and on my personal experiences.)

 

[Debi]

My own thoughts on this are that spirits are much different entities than ghosts or haunts. I am of the same belief as Chip on the spirits. I believe they have crossed and just visit to interact at times.

Ghosts/hauntings I've come to see as something quite different. I'm not sure yet if these are dimensional interactions of some sort (like bleeding over in space time events) or actual lost souls. Some I believe to be demonic in nature, which are demons from other planes of existance, although some may call that plane hell. Of course we also have the residual hauntings, which we all know are like tape recordings on replay.

What are your thoughts on this distinction?

 

[WitchAndShaman]

My own thoughts on this are that spirits are much different entities than ghosts or haunts. I am of the same belief as Chip on the spirits. I believe they have crossed and just visit to interact at times.

Ghosts/hauntings I've come to see as something quite different. I'm not sure yet if these are dimensional interactions of some sort (like bleeding over in space time events) or actual lost souls. Some I believe to be demonic in nature, which are demons from other planes of existance, although some may call that plane hell. Of course we also have the residual hauntings, which we all know are like tape recordings on replay.

What are your thoughts on this distinction?

Thank you for posting this Debi. I’ve been thinking for most of the past week about how to start a post on the same subject. Since my own beliefs are still evolving (like in this week) I was uncertain how to start the thread - I probably could have just opened the thread with a question instead of a statement.

Okay, uncertain what I want to say so I’ll ponder it. But, I do think that the classic haunting occurrences and ghosts in general are not the same source/cause.

 

[WitchAndShaman]

Oh boy! This is such a multifaceted issue for me. I think Debi that you too are making some distinction between spirits, ghosts, and haunting. For me these items become even more fractured because of the different ways that I think about others that interact with these entities - like ghost “hunters”, mediums, fortune tellers/readers, etc. (That might be my most carelessly broad use of “etc.” ever.)

My ideas are so fractured I might have to contribute to this thread in baby step postings.

So I’ll start by posting a familiar somewhat recurring caveat. That is that most of my inputs will come from my experiences with psi (telepathy and empathy and precognition) and witchcraft/energy manipulation. I think my own experiences with spirits/ghosts/haunting total a dozen (or fewer based on interpretations of the events).

Though I think I had experienced one minor haunting. I don’t think I have experiences with demons.

 

[Debi]

baby step postings.

All good by me! Baby steps it is!

 

[Debi]

I think Debi that you too are making some distinction between spirits, ghosts, and haunting.

I most certainly am, Wands. I will write more on the morrow of this.

 

[WitchAndShaman]

Okay, I’ll start with something simple, self contained, yet still just as mysterious to me. The phenomenon typically referred to as “residual haunting”.

I’m impressed by popular culture that these are past events being replayed. These kinds of haunting don’t show any intelligence nor interactivity. I can get on board with that even though I don’t understanding the “how” for the technique of the original recording of the event.

I have one conceptual problem with this though so anyone please chime in. Popularly the recordings are thought to be triggered by a very emotional, often times violate event. Sounds plausible. However, what I hear reported by those viewing the residual playbacks is often not a scene of tragedy - no dismembered bodies, no gunshot wounds, etc. Typically it is a playback of a rather plain person seen or heard walking around. So I can only suspect that these would be recordings created of long slow tragedies like prolonged illnesses or longtime episodes of loneliness.

So I’m going to throw out my own weird idea (not convinced yet) which might even be controversial. I would like to offer up that these residual haunting could be recordings - even if triggered by tragedy - of how the source person(s) remembered him or her self. What I mean is, if a tragedy triggered the recording, it’s not necessarily a recording of the tragedic event but instead a recording of the person’s most memorable, most idealistic view of themself.

There, that strange idea is now out there for critique please.

 

[Paulm]

Okay,
So I’m going to throw out my own weird idea (not convinced yet) which might even be controversial. I would like to offer up that these residual haunting could be recordings - even if triggered by tragedy - of how the source person(s) remembered him or her self. What I mean is, if a tragedy triggered the recording, it’s not necessarily a recording of the tragedic event but instead a recording of the person’s most memorable, most idealistic view of themself.

There, that strange idea is now out there for critique please.

post any idea / theory you may have, don't worry about it being controversial, especially in a field that is entirely controversial itself.
this field of study has no absolute certainties as of yet... even the "experts" still disagree on each others findings, methods and ideas.
throwing your ideas in for discussion is in a way forming a "think tank" for those responding and over the course of discussion, finding a solution or verifiable idea, that's how theories and experiences can be verified, debunked or whatever. so feel free to throw any idea out there no matter how strange you may think it is.

 

[WitchAndShaman]

post any idea / theory you may have, don't worry about it being controversial, especially in a field that is entirely controversial itself.
this field of study has no absolute certainties as of yet... even the "experts" still disagree on each others findings, methods and ideas.
throwing your ideas in for discussion is in a way forming a "think tank" for those responding and over the course of discussion, finding a solution or verifiable idea, that's how theories and experiences can be verified, debunked or whatever. so feel free to throw any idea out there no matter how strange you may think it is.

Thanks for the reminder Paulm. I now have all the poetic license I need to spring more ideas on you all. Some of my sharings might be more mainstream paranormal but others could be wicked stuff.

I encourage all the inputs I can get please.

 

[Debi]

Well, starting with residual haunts as the first baby step! There are several thoughts on the "how" these events get captured in stone to play back. It apears it does not have to be based on the level of emotional energy in some theories, but in possible increases in Magnetic waves or fields. Here's a few thoughts on that from an article I was reading recently.

Limestone Quartz Magnetite and Residual Paranormal Hauntings Study by Long Island Paranormal Investigators - Ghost Haunted Demonic Investigation Ghost Hunter New York NY

The theory that magnetite can generate a residual haunting isn’t as far fetched as it may seem. There is no way to test to see if a magnetic field holds any kind of past events in them, but we do know that high magnetic field have a lot of energy in them. There are many theories related to high magnetic fields. One of the theories is the Bermuda Triangle theory. In the Bermuda Triangle there are high magnetic fields that are present. Some of the stories that are linked to the Bermuda Triangle is that some ships, and planes that go through the Triangle have disturbances on there electronic equipment, such as radar, fuel gauges, altimeters, barometers, lights, etc. Some of the ships and planes that enter into the Bermuda Triangle never come out of it. Some say that they are lost in time. There was one story that I heard about a plane that was flying from Bermuda to Florida. The plane was about 20 minutes off of the coast of Florida. The pilot could actually see the coast of Florida. He had communications with the airport. The airport in Florida picked his plane up on radar. A few minutes later his electrical equipment started acting up, and the gauges of his plane started spinning around, and he disappeared off of the radar screen, and lost communication with the airport. The pilot didn’t panic and he just kept heading towards the coast of Florida because it was in his vision. Two hours later he gained communications back with the airport and he popped back up on the radar screen. The airport stated that when he popped back up on their radar screen that he was in the same spot that he was when they lost him off of radar. 20 minutes later the plane landed with no problems. For 2 hours the plane did not move an inch. The Magnetic fields that exist in the Bermuda Triangle must fluctuate if these stories are true because every day planes and ships pass through there with no problems at all.

The US Navy had supposedly done an experiment using high magnetic fields, but they deny that this experiment ever took place. The name of the experiment was called the Philadelphia Experiment, or the Montauk Project. They took a ship and equipped it with a high magnetic field generator. The name of the ship was the USS Eldridge. The idea was to make the ship disappear and then reappear at another location. When the ship disappeared it would also disappear off of radar as well. Supposedly the Navy had done a few tests with this and for the most part it worked. They were successful in making the ship disappear and reappear using high magnetic fields. The experiment took a plunge when they did a test with a crew on board. They were able to make the ship disappear with no problems, but when the ship reappeared the crew that was on the ship became part of the ship. For example some crewmembers were embedded into the floor, some of them were part of the walls and the railings etc. Many died but there were some survivors. If this experiment really did take place and the stories of the Bermuda Triangle are true then I would say that magnetite could possible generate a residual haunting, based on these other theories.

Quartz: Quartz is one of the most common minerals that are around. Quartz forms a significant part of most igneous rocks. Some facts about quartz are as follows.

"When crystal quartz is cut at an exact angle to its axis, pressure on it generates a minute electrical charge. This effect makes quartz of great usefulness in radio, television, and radar. The supply of natural radio quartz is so limited that methods for growing quartz crystals in the laboratory have been developed. Quartz transmits short light waves (ultraviolet) better than glass. When not of radio quality, crystal quartz is melted to form blanks to make special lenses and prisms."(Source: Rocks and Minerals 1962, Zim and Shaffer, page 77)

I would say that Quartz has the properties to possible generate a residual haunting. Quartz is a basic transmitter for radio, television and radar. An interesting thing about quartz also is that doubly terminated quartz crystals are often found in Limestone cavities. So it may be possible that people thought that it was Limestone that was creating a residual haunting when it could have been quartz that was really causing it to happen.