I Ain't Afraid of No Ghosts!

With Halloween just a couple days away, I decided now would be a superb time for my "ghost" blog! So that's what this is...

Growing up, I was fascinated with the supernatural. My friend, Keith, and I developed something of an obcession for awhile, and we started checking out books from the library about all sorts of "supernatural" phenomena, like ghosts, monsters, and aliens. At some point, we even came to believe that we had a ghost on our hands, when someone drew the word "ghost" in the dirt and left it to be found and we let our imaginations run wild (supported a bit by my brother pranking us a bit, which resulted in the ghost following us home from school...).

As I got older, I grew into something of a cross between Mulder and Scully. I was skeptical, but I also "wanted to believe." And that has resulted in both a continued interest in all sorts of fantastic and supernatural stories, as well as me developing more reasoned theories on what may exist in the world, how and why. When it comes to ghosts, I both believe and don't believe in the existence of such things.

As with all things in my life, I'm deeply impacted by a religious upbringing. My religious beliefs have led me to believe in a Spirit, independent of (though tied to) our physical body, but it has also made me skeptical of the idea of spirits separated from their bodies through death lingering in this realm. I just don't think that happens. When a person dies, I believe their Spirit goes somewhere, and white light or not, I don't really believe that a Spirit can turn away from that destination and hang out here instead.

So I said that I both believe and don't believe, but what I just said seems to say that I firmly don't believe, right? Well... not exactly. It just says that I don't think the ghost phenomena is caused by a Spirit that's stuck here. (And I should say: I do believe that SOME of the ghost phenomena may be legit; though I'm also sure there's plenty that's people letting their imaginations run wild, not unlike ours did as kids...) So what do I think ghosts are really all about?

Well, if you've been reading my blog or if you've read any of my book, Legends of Az, you may be hip to the fact that I'm a strong believer in the possibility of so-called mental powers... I think that part of the function of the brain is to be a conduit between our physical bodies and our true essences: our Spirits. I believe the Spirit is an incredibly powerful thing, and that our brains in that function have a lot of untapped potential for what they could theoretically do. I actually believe there's a whole Spiritual world out there, that our Spirit interacts with, and leaves little imprints on. You might think of this in the general realm of "auras," or perhaps the astral plane.

Anyway, the imprint of that "aura," if you will, is what I think ghosts potentially are. Ghosts are often said to be produced by paritcularly violent deaths, or are associated with places or things that the person had a strong attachment to in some way. I think this jives perfectly with the idea of our Spirits. Say that a particularly mad individual (I mean that as the original definition of mad, by the way) were to commit a particularly ghastly murder, woulnd't you think that that may leave a sort of imprint on the place in which it happened? I think that ghosts aren't really the person sticking around, but an echo of them. So in a way, it could be a little bit of that person, or that emotion, or that act.

For a lot of people, this idea is not very easy to accept. Many Christians find it easy enough to think of us as having Spirits, but they don't seem able to think of the full extent of what that might mean, or the effects it may have on the world around us. Granted, I could be absolutely wrong, but I think that there are things in this world that are not easily explained. We can ignore those things, or we can believe in the wilder theories, but I choose to believe in what I consider to be the most likely explanation. I think that there is some truth to every fiction, and that it may be found by trying to find an explanation in what you know to be true.

So... that's all pretty easy and simple. You don't have to agree with me. I'm just telling you that's what I think. Of course, with this belief, ghosts don't necessarily lose any of their scary points, since they might be capable of as much as imprints as they would be as Spirits... particularly since some imprints may be more strongly imprinted than others... But then again, an imprint is essentially little more than an idea... I don't know where I'm going with this...

Okay, so... maybe next time you think to calm yourself down at the thought of ghosts, maybe it won't be so easy to just push the thought away because you don't believe that Spirits linger... because maybe they don't. But that doesn't mean that ghosts don't exist...!!!

Next time... I'm not sure yet what my next subject will be, but with elections next week, don't be surprised if something politically-slanted crops up... Then again, I kinda hate politics, so don't be surprised if I go for something sillier either.