Do you believe in ghosts/spirits? Have you ever encountered one?

[-Skye]

I'm just curious to what other people think of the matter, here's my little story

When we first moved to this house it was the largest house we'd ever lived in, I think we moved here when I was around 10, the place was a wreck, a dump and needing a lot of work, my parents fixed it up in about a week and we loved it, we used to live in a bad area so it was a big upgrade, anyway about a week after the renovations were complete, some strange things started happening. A few examples; The stereo would be on full volume when turned on, same for the tv, my parents keys would go missing and they would find them in places such as in the refrigerator, on top of cupboards and various places, we had to run an de-humidifier in one room because it was damp, one night they left it unplugged by accident they came downstairs the next day it was plugged in and turned on.

After a while they thought they thought it was each other messing about trying to freak one another out, then one day all 4 of us (me dad mother sister) seen a shadow just go right across the living room we were like O_O what the hell.. the strange stuff stopped for a while (about a month or so), then one night my sister started screaming, we all jumped out of bed and ran into her room she was standing in the corner of her room tears pouring, we look at the bed and we see a set of hand prints embedded in the memory foam. My parents thought she was doing some stupid joke. (I knew it wasn't, the hand prints were fairly small, the size of mine at age 10, she was 16 and her hands were a lot bigger).

Then the next night I woke up to noises, I could hear whistling, faint whistling, I got up and being the adventurous little boy I was I journeyed down the stairs, as I got closer to our front living room it got louder and louder, I looked inside and could see no one, I walked in and it was right inside my ear, then I felt something touch my shoulder. I collapsed on the floor and woke up at 8am to my mother asking me why I was down here.

I continued and asked her are ghosts real, she asked why and I told her what had happened. The next day our father took me and my sister out to a theme park while my mother got our local priest/father/whatever they're called in to get rid of it, my mother told me he said it wasn't a bad spirit, maybe a child, a naughty child (first thing he said when he walked in without my mother explaining a lot of the situation). I always thought it was just some strange unexplainable medical condition with the fainting (that's what they told me up until I was 15).

SO, why did I make this thread your probably wondering, well, about 30 minutes ago I was standing in the kitchen and then I started hearing a whistle, thinking it was my father I look through the kitchen door and see he wasn't their, I proceeded to move to the hallway to listen for his snoring (He snores like a gorilla, can hear it through the roof), and I could, if my mother was up she would of made a louder noise. I ran to the kitchen and grabbed a knife, since a couple months ago someone broke into our home (but strangely took absolutely nothing at all we've been more wary), I grab the phone ready to dial 999, by this time I'd moved closer to the front living room to see if anyone was their, nobody, I walked in and the whistling was in my ear, had really bad deja vu then I remembered what happened when I was younger, I felt a bit colder and just instantly ran up to my room before some more freaky shit happened.

Now I know a lot of you are going to be thinking PFF YEAH RIGHT LIKE THAT HAPPENED and that's fine, if you choose not to believe in such things or believe my own experience that's your own choice but please keep it to yourself, also don't turn this topic into a discussion about religion, I personally have no solid belief or faith in science, religion, nothing of the sort, I don't know what I believe in.

SO have you had any experiences? Do you believe in ghosts/spirits?

TL;DR: I'm creeped out, want to know other peoples stories/opinions ^^.

[Feldir]

inb4 lock

Infracted

[-Skye]

Why would it be locked? Theirs nothing against it in the OT rules?

[Kalis]

No, but I did used to have these freaky 'nightmares', which could easily have been mistaken for paranormal activity.

I used to be half asleep, but I could sense a presence and feel some 'force' holding me down, which stopped me from moving. One time I 'felt' someone trying to saw my head open. It's difficult to describe, but they were incredibly scary. I knew that I was conscious, but couldn't do anything about it.

I learnt to force myself fully awake when they were happening and they eventually stopped.

[Ettan]

Nah I do not, and I have never seen any.
I believe people who claim they have are either delusional (cracy) or it just their mind playing tricks on them. Dark alleyway -> mind imagining things ect.
I do not believe in any form of afterlife either. Afaik nothing stays or moves on after you die, you just rot and decompose.
But because it will be the same for everyone else I am completely fine with dying.

[Deleted]

You either believe a million supernatural things without proof or you dont believe in the supernatural. I'm in the latter grp.

[-Skye]

No, but I did used to have these freaky 'nightmares', which could easily have been mistaken for paranormal activity.

I used to be half asleep, but I could sense a presence and feel some 'force' holding me down, which stopped me from moving. One time I 'felt' someone trying to saw my head open. It's difficult to describe, but they were incredibly scary. I knew that I was conscious, but couldn't do anything about it.

I learnt to force myself fully awake when they were happening and they eventually stopped.

I've heard of that before, It's a sleeping dis-order I think, I honestly don't remember the name though >.< bah..

[personn5]

I've heard of that before, It's a sleeping dis-order I think, I honestly don't remember the name though >.< bah..

Sleep Paralysis or something like it, I believe.

[-Skye]

Sleep Paralysis or something like it, I believe.

YES! That's it

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sleep_paralysis

I remember the picture of the goblin on the man

[Spectral]

Of course not, don't be silly.

[-Skye]

Of course not, don't be silly.

Why is it being silly? I know science and all that dis-proves it by a long shot, but maybe some things really are un-explainable?

[Panquake]

No I don't believe in Ghosts or spirits.

[Deleted]

Nope. Let me put it this way, if there were truly ghosts, spirits or whatever in this world we would KNOW about it, we would have real proof of it, there are so many people who constantly claim they have seen this or that, yet their "proof" is always lacking. It's always simple stuff as a weird noise, a shadow, something that was moved or the like. Never is there real footage of it. Why would even a ghost/spirit waste their time in doing simple "tricks" like that? It's just illogical.

For each time a person's ghost story is proven untrue those who believe in it just shake their heads and turn their focus to another one...

[Spectral]

I personally have no solid belief or faith in science [snip]

Well, that much is obvious.

[Jayburner]

I had a winged angel stand over my bed one night.

[Spectral]

Why is it being silly? I know science and all that dis-proves it by a long shot, but maybe some things really are un-explainable?

That's why it's being silly. Because there's no plausible mechanism for ghosts or spirits.

[Kalis]

Why is it being silly? I know science and all that dis-proves it by a long shot, but maybe some things really are un-explainable?

Nothing is unexplainable, there are just things that we don't yet have an explanation for.

Thanks for the link on the sleep paralysis, and also to personn5 for remembering it.

[Deleted]

Sleep Paralysis or something like it, I believe.

Odd, same thing happened to me, but I was standing in my room, I could feel something around me, but I was completely paralyzed. However this was happening in the dream, when I woke up I could move. Happened a lot to me and still does.

OT: I try not to think about the fact if I believe or disbelieve. I always get freaked out!

[Kolo]

I personally have no solid belief or faith in science.

... so you have no faith in something real and want us to believe a ghost story.

[Deleted]

I like to think there is. I also think that although science explains a lot of things to do with the paranormal (See - EM waves can make you feel a presence/the feeling of being observed) but things like DMT make me think there is much more to life than we can explain. I'm christian - by choice, my parents are both atheists - so I believe in an afterlife and in ghosts. I'm unsure of some paranormal activities such as malevolent ghosts but I do think there is definitely the chance of a paranormal presence.

... so you have no faith in something real and want us to believe a ghost story.

I'd just like to point out how hypocritical that is...
You have no faith in him and would swear by science.
He has no faith in science and would swear by the story.

Neither religion/faith/paranormal or science are absolute. Our opinions are subjective.
I imagine that my disposition about the opinions on the absolution of science comes from the fact that I HATE the idea of trying to take away someone's faith in something (be it God(s) or ghosts) simply because you don't have that faith (because of your logic or requiring more hard evidence). Faith is a good thing to those people. Trying to take it away because you don't have it is very childish and control-freaky.