Most of us never see a ghost. Sure we may experience some minor psychic event, such as an object being moved from where we last saw it, or our dog gazing intently at something we cannot see. On the whole, a ghost sighting is a rare occurrence. Unless you know better? Are there such things as ghosts?
Reddit user, King Six_o_Things, was living in Germany as a teen while his father was stationed there. He was walking home at night with a friend to the apartment blocks where they lived when a black shape appeared right in front of them. He described it as ‘nothing’, a figure-like black space. There was no shadow, reflection or anything else to give the shape form. The thing undulated in the middle of the street and they both felt it was looking right at them. Then it started moving toward them, rising as it mounted the curb. Needless to say, neither teen hung around to see what it was. They both ran to the safety of their homes and it was a long time before they ventured out in the dark again.
What Are Ghosts Really?
No-one knows what ghosts are. Probably because not many people stay around to find out. Here are the main theories as to what a ghost is:
- Spirits of dead people or animals
- Residual energy, perhaps where a traumatic event occurred
- Messengers between their dimension and ours
- Angels
- Invisible demons (poltergeists)
- Psychological phenomena; the viewer imagined it
- Shadows
- Fiction/lies
- Real, live people.
Paranormal investigator Lee Brickley tells the story of a family shocked by the sound of screaming as they walked through Birches Valley, Cannock Chase, England. The valley is said to be haunted by one or more child ghosts with holes for eyes, though there has been no sighting for thirty years until recently when several people have reported glimpses of children dressed in white.
The unnamed shocked woman said: "We instantly started running towards the noise. We couldn’t find a child anywhere and so stopped to catch our breath.
“That’s when I turned round and saw a girl stood behind me, no more than 10 years old, with her hands over her eyes. It was as if she was waiting for a birthday cake.
“I asked if she was OK and if she had been the one screaming. She put her arms down by her side and opened her eyes. That’s when I saw they were completely black, no iris, no white, nothing.”
Excerpted from the Daily Mirror
Ghosts are Everywhere
Every culture has a reference to ghosts in one form or another. In ancient Egypt it was thought that a ghost formed at the time of a person’s death, then took on the personality and attributes of the person to carry on living life in exactly the same way in the netherworld. In ancient Greece, ghosts were nothing more than nebulous mist, sometimes called upon for advice.
Ghosts really took hold in Victorian Britain, when it became a craze. Spiritualism was considered a fashionable form of entertainment and you weren’t considered credible unless you had some experience of a haunting. Ghost stories flourished. All this interest was probably due to the popularity of the periodical press. Publishers needed to fill their pages and sell copy, so what better topic than the latest reported haunting?
The Gothic ghost story became the most popular fiction genre at the time, led by the best-selling novel, “The Night-Side of Nature” (1848), which was a collection ghostly anecdotes and stories by Catherine Crowden.
In America this ghostly renaissance came much later. In the 1990s, in fact, when a plethora of ghost and horror movies were served up in movie theaters and in novels. Belief in the paranormal escalated. A 2005 Gallup poll found that approximately 32% of Americans believe in ghosts, spirits and the paranormal.
Mexico is very much populated with ghosts, from Aztec and Mayan spirits right up to recently deceased people. Ghosts are as much part of Mexican and Spanish culture as rock and roll is to Americans. It’s part of every day life.
An internet user called, “Beautiful Soul” shares a story where he was waiting for a friend in his car outside a Mexican nightclub. He thought he heard the sound of drunken girls laughing loudly behind the car, but couldn’t see anything. He saw his friend running towards the car and opened the door for him. His friend looked terrified. He described hearing a loud whistle right behind him before being hit on the back of the head sharply. When he turned he saw ‘the ugliest bird’ hovering over him with an almost human girl’s face. The two boys drove away. As they did, they looked out of the car window and saw two strange-looking birds flying alongside making an unearthly laughing sound.
So Are There Such Things as Ghosts?
The wealth of personal accounts throughout history suggests that ghosts are real for sure. Some psychics say that ghosts are right here with us and that the vast majority mean us no harm. Most are the spirits of loved ones keeping a quiet, watchful eye on our well-being.
The scary experiences are usually caused by lower entities, stuck between dimensions and who enjoy creating havoc and frightening people. Again, most of them do not have any physical power to harm us. Or do they?
“Wilfer" a self-described skeptic also living in Mexico, describes an evening when he was in the family kitchen, getting himself a glass of water after dinner, when he noticed his cat staring at something in the room that Wilfer couldn’t see. He didn’t pay much attention because their cats had Bede doing that a lot since they moved into the apartment. Next thing, Wilfer felt a pressure on his lower leg, as if something was squeezing it. He looked down but there was nothing there. He mentioned it to his wife and when she looked at it, the area had reddened as if it had been bumped. Next day, the redness had formed into a very distinct bite mark.
Images via Pixabay