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- Nov 25, 2020
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Greetings all.
I just thought I would share with you my very first 'official' paranormal experience. This is the one experience that changed everything for me, as far as my beliefs go, and kicked off an 8-year stint as a Spirit Board medium.
Although I had experienced some strange things as a child in our family home at the time, which I still have very vivid memories of to this day, I was a complete skeptic when it came to ghosts and other paranormal stuff. I just had not witnessed, nor experienced, anything in my adult life that made me think about the subject at any great length. That was until an event that occurred in 1994.
I was based in Bosnia and Herzegovina as part of the United Nations Protection force during the war there. Soldiers, being soldiers, do almost anything to keep themselves amused (and keep their minds off the things they were seeing on a daily basis) and I came in one day from a patrol around Novi Travnik to find my ISO container accommodation unit full with fellow soldiers, along with a close friend, who for the benefit of this I will call 'Bob', sat at a makeshift table with a Spirit Board. We were told that Bob was going to do a seance and amused by it all, we eagerly sat down to watch what was going to unfold.
Bob kicked off his session with three other soldiers around the board with him and within a few minutes, had made contact with something on the board. That 'something' turned out to be Joanna, the girlfriend of 'Jim' (not real name) who had passed away in a car crash (she was hit by a drunk driver) a few months prior to his deployment and was one of those sitting at the board. Now Jim was obviously a little upset through the interaction, but the rest of us observing found it highly amusing and again, soldiers being soldiers, were shouting banter to the four men at the table and the 'fake' presentation they were performing. They took this all with a pinch of salt initially, but as time went on, they were quite visibly getting annoyed with our outbursts......
It finally came to a head with Bob losing his cool amongst jeers of "I saw him push the glass!" - mainly from me! He instructed Jim to leave the board, after excusing him, go into the next unit, write something on a bit of paper, place it in an envelope, seal it and then come back. Jim shot off and returned a few minutes later with envelope in-hand and was instructed by Bob to place it on one corner of the board. Bob continued for a few minutes more, to the backdrop of more jeering and banter from my direction, before turning to me and inviting me onto the board. Wanting to prove the whole thing as a set-up, I jumped at the chance and sat next to Bob. He then pulled another 3 men from the jeering crowd and invited them to join in place of the guys already on the board. After the swap, Bob gave me a few basic dos and don'ts before LEAVING THE BOARD HIMSELF.
There were now four complete skeptics sat around the board with fingers on the glass. Under prompts from Bob, now sat on a bunk across from us, I started asking questions to Joanna.
The first time the glass moved, honestly, I felt like I messed myself - along with the other 3 guys on it. The crowd, seeing our reactions, realised that everything was not as it seemed and a silence fell upon the unit for the first time that night. After a further period of communication, I was confused, unnerved and unsure of what was going on. Most of all though, I was intrigued. But Bob was about to pull the final act that would make me question what I thought about the paranormal forever......
Under suggestion from Bob, we asked if Joanna could see what was on the paper sealed within the envelope and on the corner of the board, to which she replied 'Yes'. We asked her to spell out what the message was, to which she responded 'Frends forever' - and no, I did not make a spelling mistake. You see, Jim was slightly dyslexic and when we opened the envelope, that was EXACTLY how he had written it on the paper - I will never forget it. You could have heard a pin drop...........
Eleven skeptics walked into that unit that night - 15 believers walked out!
Anyway, a long story short, I found out after that Bob was Wicca and did Spirit Boards on a regular basis. So of course, I spent as much of my free time with him, until I left the Army in 1998, and learned what I could about Spirit Boards from him. I then spent further time with people he had introduced me to in civvy street during periods of leave and learned more. I went on to conduct regular Spirit Board sessions myself for 8-years after.
As I stated earlier, my views and beliefs did a complete U-turn following this event. I have experienced and witnessed too many unexplainable things during my 8-year period as a Spirit Board medium, many of which throws the theory of the ideomotor effect out into the trash. I myself repeated Bob's 'little example' on occasions to show people that the sessions were no hoax, with the occasional visit still from Joanna, who was only too happy to communicate with me further.
I hope to be able to share some more of my experiences with you in the not too distant future.
I just thought I would share with you my very first 'official' paranormal experience. This is the one experience that changed everything for me, as far as my beliefs go, and kicked off an 8-year stint as a Spirit Board medium.
Although I had experienced some strange things as a child in our family home at the time, which I still have very vivid memories of to this day, I was a complete skeptic when it came to ghosts and other paranormal stuff. I just had not witnessed, nor experienced, anything in my adult life that made me think about the subject at any great length. That was until an event that occurred in 1994.
I was based in Bosnia and Herzegovina as part of the United Nations Protection force during the war there. Soldiers, being soldiers, do almost anything to keep themselves amused (and keep their minds off the things they were seeing on a daily basis) and I came in one day from a patrol around Novi Travnik to find my ISO container accommodation unit full with fellow soldiers, along with a close friend, who for the benefit of this I will call 'Bob', sat at a makeshift table with a Spirit Board. We were told that Bob was going to do a seance and amused by it all, we eagerly sat down to watch what was going to unfold.
Bob kicked off his session with three other soldiers around the board with him and within a few minutes, had made contact with something on the board. That 'something' turned out to be Joanna, the girlfriend of 'Jim' (not real name) who had passed away in a car crash (she was hit by a drunk driver) a few months prior to his deployment and was one of those sitting at the board. Now Jim was obviously a little upset through the interaction, but the rest of us observing found it highly amusing and again, soldiers being soldiers, were shouting banter to the four men at the table and the 'fake' presentation they were performing. They took this all with a pinch of salt initially, but as time went on, they were quite visibly getting annoyed with our outbursts......
It finally came to a head with Bob losing his cool amongst jeers of "I saw him push the glass!" - mainly from me! He instructed Jim to leave the board, after excusing him, go into the next unit, write something on a bit of paper, place it in an envelope, seal it and then come back. Jim shot off and returned a few minutes later with envelope in-hand and was instructed by Bob to place it on one corner of the board. Bob continued for a few minutes more, to the backdrop of more jeering and banter from my direction, before turning to me and inviting me onto the board. Wanting to prove the whole thing as a set-up, I jumped at the chance and sat next to Bob. He then pulled another 3 men from the jeering crowd and invited them to join in place of the guys already on the board. After the swap, Bob gave me a few basic dos and don'ts before LEAVING THE BOARD HIMSELF.
There were now four complete skeptics sat around the board with fingers on the glass. Under prompts from Bob, now sat on a bunk across from us, I started asking questions to Joanna.
The first time the glass moved, honestly, I felt like I messed myself - along with the other 3 guys on it. The crowd, seeing our reactions, realised that everything was not as it seemed and a silence fell upon the unit for the first time that night. After a further period of communication, I was confused, unnerved and unsure of what was going on. Most of all though, I was intrigued. But Bob was about to pull the final act that would make me question what I thought about the paranormal forever......
Under suggestion from Bob, we asked if Joanna could see what was on the paper sealed within the envelope and on the corner of the board, to which she replied 'Yes'. We asked her to spell out what the message was, to which she responded 'Frends forever' - and no, I did not make a spelling mistake. You see, Jim was slightly dyslexic and when we opened the envelope, that was EXACTLY how he had written it on the paper - I will never forget it. You could have heard a pin drop...........
Eleven skeptics walked into that unit that night - 15 believers walked out!
Anyway, a long story short, I found out after that Bob was Wicca and did Spirit Boards on a regular basis. So of course, I spent as much of my free time with him, until I left the Army in 1998, and learned what I could about Spirit Boards from him. I then spent further time with people he had introduced me to in civvy street during periods of leave and learned more. I went on to conduct regular Spirit Board sessions myself for 8-years after.
As I stated earlier, my views and beliefs did a complete U-turn following this event. I have experienced and witnessed too many unexplainable things during my 8-year period as a Spirit Board medium, many of which throws the theory of the ideomotor effect out into the trash. I myself repeated Bob's 'little example' on occasions to show people that the sessions were no hoax, with the occasional visit still from Joanna, who was only too happy to communicate with me further.
I hope to be able to share some more of my experiences with you in the not too distant future.