The big wish of the majority of paranormal investigators I know is to have every investigation be wild and exciting and full of activity.
By Rebecca Nidey
Everything I Need To Know I Learned In A Haunted House
If you are a fan of any of the ghost hunting television shows or movies, you are led to believe that all investigations are just that with a few demons thrown in for good measure. However, the reality is that the majority of hauntings are of the quiet, everyday sort.
Whether a haunting is a residual that is echoing the past or an intelligent one with interaction with spirits, they are all based on energy. Science has theorized that we are all made up of energy. It has even been said that energy never dies, it only changes form. My own personal theory is that just as we leave traces of DNA everywhere we have been, we leave bits of our energy also.
Unless you are a complete adrenaline junkie, your life is filled with everyday occurrences. You may get up in the morning and retire to your bedroom at the same time and in the same home every day for years. During that period between when you arise and when you go to sleep you go about your normal tasks and routines. It may be housework or a job outside the home. You raise children or love and nurture other children you come in contact with. Every Sabbath you go to the place of worship of your choice. For rest and relaxation you may join organizations, partake in the arts such as concerts or museums, plant flowers or vegetables in your garden or any number of other satisfying activities.
As you go about your life, not only do you leave traces of energy on your environment, you do so on anyone you come in contact with. The more time you spend in an area or with people (or anything living), the more energy you leave there. To illustrate this point, think about the people from your childhood who had the most impact on you. Did your parents or grandparents leave loving energy on you? Perhaps that bully you went through grade school with left dents full of nasty energy in your being. As you go through life, think of those you know now and the how their energy affects you.
If you take this theory and apply it to paranormal research and ghost hunting, it isn’t too far of a leap to see how the energy left behind can create and fuel a haunting and activities. Have you ever walked into a site of an alleged haunting and immediately felt like the atmosphere was nasty? The energy left could have been from years of a bickering marriage by the former residents. This might be simply the residual stains of unhappiness leaving smears of energy. If there had been actual physical or mental abuse, the activity might be from the energy of one or more of the couple being locked to the place just as they were locked in the unhappy marriage. The reverse could be someplace filled with happiness, such as a nursery school that still has the DNA of joy imprinted on the space.
While it is true that there is almost always both residual and intelligent hauntings at the sites of catastrophic events such as battles, fires, mass murders, and the such; hauntings can occur because of the more mundane events of life. The energy left behind by the more epic events is more like scars gouged into the atmosphere. That energy is louder and more easily felt. The traces of energy from everyday occurrences become more of a gentle groove worn into those areas that becomes deeper, like the trickle of water that, over the years, creates a canyon.
As paranormal investigators we may enjoy that “in your face” kind of activity caused by chaotic events from the past. Those are the ones that stand out in our mind and create those times that we like to discuss in those reverent “remember when” tones. However, I find the quieter hauntings satisfying also. They are a reminder that, as life goes on, our deaths do not extinguish the influence we have on our environment and those we have left behind. Even the possessions we had during life (and most especially the more beloved ones) can hold traces of our energy auras. That cameo brooch left to you by your favorite aunt is not only a reminder of the love she had for you… it contains the energy of that love. In my February column I talked about the mourning jewelry that I collect. There are times that I feel the sorrow emanating from those pieces, the energy of the pain caused by the loss of a loved one.
It doesn’t matter what the possession is, the energy was left there by the previous owner. A married couple who are dear friends once owned a business that included a book store and jewelry store that included estate jewelry. While visiting them there I would often smell the odor of pipe tobacco and perfume while perusing the items. As a lover of both books and antique jewelry, I know the satisfaction of owning both. Many of the items in my collection of books and jewelry have sentimental meaning to me. These quiet, everyday items must also have been held dear by the previous departed owners. Is it any wonder that those same items might not only have traces of their energy attached to them, but also be visited by those deceased owners in order to cherish their memories of them?
As a paranormal investigator, I ask you to not underestimate the magic of hauntings caused by everyday things. As human beings, I ask that you not lose sight of the value of everyday things. One day we will be gone from body into spirit and it is important to think about the traces of energy that we leave behind. I hope that the spiritual DNA I have left from my life is kind, loving and peaceful.
About the Author:
Through her work on the investigative team for the Crawford County Illinois Ghost Hunters, Rebecca Nidey has an understanding of the paranormal, spiritual, and metaphysical worlds and how they work together.
Rebecca has trained in the Healing Touch technique (a form of energy healing). She is a certified Psychic Medium trained by Belle Salisbury, and she is a certified Paranormal Researcher.
Rebecca is the associate editor for Bellesprit Magazine and also writes a column titled Everything I Need To Know I Learned In A Haunted House. She has been a co-host of several radio programs for the Haunted Voices Radio Network and HeyZ Radio Network highlighting the Paranormal, metaphysical and literary fields.
To learn more about Rebecca or to schedule a reading you can contact her at https://www.facebook.com/rebecca.nidey.
