When it comes to me and the overthinking lump of meat that I have wedged inside my bloody skull, my thoughts are constantly whizzing around. Questions, questions, questions, and inquisitive thoughts bombard my ever-so-slightly large head (thanks, Mum!), barely coming to the surface for air and never coming to a halt to give me a second to think about other things; like which TV show I should watch with my other half on Netflix, which next bestselling book I should read, or just keeping up with current affairs.
So, with my mind becoming fatter with the concept that one day (hopefully not anytime soon!) I’ll be dead and, with no eternal potion to sip on nor magic fountain, I’ll unfortunately succumb to my inevitable demise. The sheer thought of death terrifies me to my core. There are no words to explain how afraid I actually am, but hey, at least it’s not just me. It’ll be you too. Eventually, every single creature, plant, planet, and every living thing will be dead one day. Think about that for a moment, breathe it in and hold it. Still holding it in? Well, you can exhale now, but doesn’t that scare you? I’m scared to death of death and yet I have a deep fascination with it which I can’t seem to shake. I’ve probably always been curious about ‘things’ from a young age. I used to pull toys apart, expensive toys, just to see what was inside and what made them tick! And no, before you ask, I wasn’t a potential serial killer in the making. I just wanted to know. Don’t get me wrong, I understand that death is a completely natural part of life and it makes sense for life to die. Let’s face it, the planet would become slightly claustrophobic otherwise.
As the years quickly went by, I was inspired by the 1996 movie The Craft and I delved into witchcraft. I wanted to know everything. I wanted power and more importantly knowledge. I even bought a spell book at one point. To be honest, I barely read the damn thing and after that my interest in the Wiccan world vanished like a fart in the wind. As I grew older, I eventually discovered something that piqued my interest; the thing that caused those cogs in my brain to turn faster and this time I stuck to it or rather it stuck to me so-to-speak.
Sorry if this post sounds too gloomy or disturbing. I promise I’m not trying to be depressing. That’s a different topic entirely. I just want to share something with you that I’ve never shared before.
What is the point of this post you’re probably asking? After all these years having my own website and now I decide to start a blog - always late to the party! Maybe when I reach sixty, I may as well start my own YouTube channel as well! But, I digress. Like I said, I’ve never written a blog before. I’ve tried many times but always felt like something was missing and I’m not one to talk about my feelings.
So on the subject of death, this focuses purely on the dead and speaking to them. Yes, ghosts. It sounds far-fetched yet there are so many ghost hunters out there. There are countless Facebook groups dedicated to the craft and hundreds of YouTube channels where avid ghost hunters explore these incredible and quite often derelict locations looking for some paranormal evidence. They do get surprisingly amazing responses from the spirits but as someone who has to be present in these situations to believe them I’ll always remain sceptical with most things I see or read online. Clickbait anyone? Maybe you are too and that’s a smart thing. If you’re passionate about something that means a lot to you why would you want to be disappointed? To be honest it hurts when something you love turns out to be one huge lie. This is why I would never lie about the things I’ve witnessed or the results I get. Since I’m not getting paid for writing this what would be the point in lying about things we do not understand? My goal is for like-minded people to read this and maybe inspire them.
So, how do you ghost hunt? Do you have to go to a creepy abandoned house armed with a makeshift P.K.E meter in the middle of the night? My answer to this is simply no. Some of my best sessions have happened in my living room, usually at night. That’s not to say I don’t get any interesting responses during the day and to the best of my knowledge, my house isn’t ‘haunted’. I have tried using the spirit box in the local cemetery, but I always feel quite awkward during the day as there are a lot of people paying their respects. It can be hard to concentrate and I don’t want to offend anyone that doesn’t necessarily get ‘it’, so at home is where I communicate with the departed. What works for me is sitting in a dimly lit room with some ambient rain sounds or white noise playing very lightly in the background and a white candle (for protection) lit next to my spirit box. I start by introducing myself and others that may be with me and then I simply begin asking questions and carry on the conversation with the answers I receive. Sometimes it works surprisingly well and I can have full conversations, other times I’m left questioning myself and doubting my beliefs. I’ve found that some of the best results happen when I’m not recording anything, almost as if they know! One thing that is very consistent though is my energy is drained after a session.
When I think about it, maybe there is some kind of unique balance between the living and the dead, similar to an invisible wall in a video game. If you’re unfamiliar with the concept, an invisible wall is a boundary in the game where the developers don’t want you to venture past. You cannot get through no matter how many times you shoot at it, jump towards it, bash it to death with your massive sword or even grind yourself against that colossal invisible window! The video game is programmed to stop you from entering, but what if you could? If you could push and push until you eventually get to the other side. Just like communicating with the dead, maybe?
A spirit box is not the only thing I use. I also use spirit dice inspired by the popular movie series Insidious. They’re wooden dice with single numbers and letters on all sides and when rolled they spell out words and names. You have the same setup as a spirit box; light the candle, ambient music, etc., and then you ask questions and roll the dice. I’ve had some pretty impressive results that blew both mine and my partner’s minds. We were having full conversations with multiple spirits; we jotted down a lot of notes recording all of these weird and bizarre conversations that were appearing before our eyes. There was one spirit, an elderly man living (yes, he apparently was alive!) on a farm in a different country, Spain if I remember correctly, and another man named Rio who told us about his murder in the Swindon area. He spelled out the word ‘Swindon’ and eventually gave us a postcode; I immediately rushed to Google to confirm the Swindon postcode and it was correct! Were they examples of breaking through the alleged ‘invisible wall’, the other side or mere coincidences? Were our minds yearning to see something in the dice that we wanted to see? Does doing this lighten the burden of life? Maybe that’s what we all want in the end; a mere glimpse that something else is there. Don’t get me wrong, I’m open to interpretations; however, coincidences become patterns and patterns become something much more…
I have many more stories and experiences to share from the weird, strange, and downright creepy. I still have a photo of a spirit’s face in my kitchen from when I just winged it after an unsuccessful ghost box session. I randomly spoke out to the spirits to show themselves on my mobile phone camera and took a few shots only to notice a few days later a ghostly face staring back at me through my kitchen door.
My drive behind exploring the unknown stems from years of fascination and wonder about life, death, and everything in between. I do this in the hope that there is something waiting for us all at the end, a place we can’t begin to comprehend. A place where our dearly deceased loved ones venture, waiting patiently ready to boil the kettle for a cuppa with some biscuits. Mmm, ghost biscuits! So could there be something else for us at the end? I’m not a religious guy at all and I don’t believe in heaven nor hell, but something has to exist and I’ll keep doing what I do. I’d like to think that one day I’ll, we’ll, find out.
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