Do you believe in Ghosts? Stories welcome

[Hex]

So it's getting close to Halloween and it's got me thinking, who here believes in Ghosts. The chance that ghosts were real has always intrigued me. Anything supernatural really.

When I was growing up, my Aunts always told stories of my Grandma's house being haunted. I never witnessed anything and stayed in the house many many times, even in the so called hot spots. Well that all changed when I was 18 years old. I'd been staying with my Grandma for about 3 months due to a less than stellar relationship with my mother. I stayed in what was called the Green Room, due to the carpet being green. The Green Room had a closet that was considered haunted by my Aunts. Still the whole time I was there I saw nothing.

During my stay my Grandma had some people come in and do work on her house. Including new electrical wiring. During their work in the Green Room they moved this couch from the north wall up against the closet door on the east wall. Later that night I was laying in bed watching TV. The bed was against the west wall with the TV on the foot of the bed, so I'd be facing the closet door when watching TV.

All of a sudden I hear a door shut. I look, see nothing. Few minutes later I hear it again and think it was the closet door. I wait a bit, nothing. When I start to focus in on the TV, it happens again. This time I swear I caught the door opening. Eventually this started to happen faster. The door would open, hit the couch that was blocking the door, and slam shut. It got to the point it was happening non stop. Just constantly BAM BAM BAM into the couch and shutting. I grabbed all my shit and slept downstairs for the night. When I woke up, Grandma asked me what happened, I told her and she just smiled. I went upstairs and moved that couch back to it's original spot but never slept up there again.

[Mizango]

No.

[Mizango]

Proof required. Much like nessie, aliens, jesus or bigfoot.

[Silenka]

No.

The possibility is there, but the possibility that life is just a dream is also there. I don't believe ghosts can hurt people, even if they do happen to exist. I firmly believe that if ghosts were capable of existing, we would see a hell of a lot more of them and it wouldn't be restricted to just 'maybes'. A lot of scientific phenomena and psychological explanations cover what people consider 'ghost sightings', psychological being stuff such as paranoia, psychosis, hallucination, and fear. I'm sure someone else can list the strange scientific stuff that might cause people to think they are seeing ghosts.

And those TV shows about ghosts? Right, a bunch of guys stumbling around an old abandoned house are going to find ghosts. Psychic mediums? Most of the major ones have been proven to be cheating and lying to people all along. Humans want to believe in things beyond their own world. Ghosts would be proof that the spirit lives on after death. Lots of people want to believe that. But truthfully, there's about as much proof for ghosts as there is proof for God.

[Silenka]

I'm sure someone else can list the strange scientific stuff that might cause people to think they are seeing ghosts.

Like Miz!

[Hyan]

At first I didn't but then I saw a reality show on TV that proved they exist so now I do.

[foopy]

if ghosts existed, the world would be awash in spirits from beyond. billions of souls have perished throughout history. you wouldn't be able to swing a dead cat without bumping into several ghosts.

then there are people who make claims of dog/cat/animal ghosts. i quickly wonder where the fuckin ultra huge dinosaur ghosts are. they were around for several 100 million years, surely there should be a few t-rex apparitions roaming about.

the only way to reconcile these facts, is to arbitrarily impose restrictions on ghosts.

-only souls that have unfinished business
-only souls that died unjust deaths
-they only appear in secluded areas, like dense forests or my grandmother's closet
-etc

any rational minded person - even after experiencing some sort of 'ghostly' phenomena - should conclude that there is a logical explanation, and not jump to the conclusion of ZMOG GHOSSSSTTTT!!!!

edit: there was a draft in your granny's house.

[SephYuyX]

No, but I swear I saw one when I was about 12. We lived in an old 1880s farm house at the time, and I saw something when I was looking up stairs walk from my room, across the hallway in to my sisters room, where she saw it walk in to her closet.

We later told our parents and described what we saw, and she said we described the man who once lived there, but killed himself when he was about 50 y/o in the early/mid 1900s. His daughter took care of the house after that, and when my parents bought it from her in the late 80s they remember seeing his picture scattered about the house.

We also had a mummified cat in the basement.

[Illumina]

When I was young and still living at home we lived in a house that I'm sure was haunted. Now I'll admit that I was young and had a wild and crazy imagination, but to this day those memories are still as vivid as when they happened (about 18 years ago). Before long things started to escalate in the house and we had to move.

We lived in a very large house with most of my family and we had to create bedrooms from different rooms throughout the house that weren't originally intended to be used as bedrooms. I personally stayed on the basement floor in a room that was a straight through between a hallway and the laundry room.

The hallway itself was hex-shaped, and straight across from my doorway was my parent’s room. On numerous occasions I would be woken up suddenly in the middle of the night, only to look out into the hex-shaped hallway and see a figure. They looked different most of the time, and they would all behave in different ways.

Some nights it was a small child-like blue-white figure. It would run into my room and mess with my blankets and such, sometimes pulling them up when I had thrown them over my head. When I got really scared, if I closed my eyes tightly and screamed, when I opened them they would be gone. This leaves me to believe that they weren’t trying to scare me, and that they may have just wanted to play with me.

Every so often however something else would appear that scared the shit out of me. It was a very large man that looked to be well over 6 feet tall, and he would appear to be orange/red colored. The scariest part about this man was that he wouldn't ever enter my room, and sometimes it looked as though it wasn't by his choice as he would pace just outside my doorway staring at me. This one was also different in that no matter how much I screamed and yelled he would never go away.

After dealing with this off and on again over a few years other members of the family started having their own experiences, including an uncle of mine who kept seeing a young boy in the house. To make matters worse one year while at a street-wide garage sale, the previous owners of the house returned and got to talking with my grandparents, it was then that they realized that they had moved because their young son had been hit by a car and killed out in front of the house.

The final straw was when the entire family was sitting around the table for a spaghetti dinner, we were about halfway through the meal when we heard a cupboard bang closed. Naturally we all turned to look and then we saw the change jar from atop the fridge lift up, move out a foot from the fridge, smash in midair, and THEN fall to the ground. The lights on the ceiling fan above the kitchen table then went out and could not be turned back on. The bulbs burnt out completely, all 5 of them at once.

Needless to say the house was on the market the next week and we moved out well before it was sold.

[foopy]

No, but I swear I saw one when I was about 12. We lived in an old 1880s farm house at the time, and I saw something when I was looking up stairs walk from my room, across the hallway in to my sisters room, where she saw it walk in to her closet.

We later told our parents and described what we saw, and she said we described the man who once lived there, but killed himself when he was about 50 y/o in the early/mid 1900s. His daughter took care of the house after that, and when my parents bought it from her in the late 80s they remember seeing his picture scattered about the house.

We also had a mummified cat in the basement.

conclusion: 12 yr olds are dumb.

(hehe, no offence to you seph)

[Yabby]

No, but i wish they were. That would would make life fun.

[SephYuyX]

Well, thats why I never took it seriously, young age, etc, could have been anything, but considering when we never knew what he looked like, both of us saw 'it' when we were both in different places, and then years later found out we both saw the same thing, is a hell of a coincidence. Still doesnt matter to me though, the whole ghost thing is ridiculous, same with aliens. If either existed there would have been some actual evidence by now. Inc govt cover ups.

[MisterBob]

Jaffa don't believe in such things

[BerenTebogo]

No, and what the fuck at general this week? Tonight at 10:00 dandelions cure breast cancer! Stay tuned for more.

[foopy]

No, and what the fuck at general this week? Tonight at 10:00 dandelions cure breast cancer! Stay tuned for more.

fuck ya! i can continue to eat out girls.

edit: oh you said breast cancer. let me know when something comes out for throat cancer. thanks!

[Yuri-G]

your post wasn't even edited, good sir. you are lying for dramatic effect. outrageous!

oh and I used to believe in ghosts before I found out about sleep paralysis. that explained away the only ghostly experiences I've ever had.

[Azull]

No but i also remember seeing creepy shit when i was a kid.

When my grandparents lived in Iowa we would visit and both me and my brother would see what i could best describe as shadow people. They were in the shape of a person but pitch black. They would peak around a piler or a corner and when we would go look nothing was there.

When i was younger i would also sometimes half wake up but still be unable to move. One of the times i saw what looked a lot like one of the dudes from Where the Wild Things Are look into my room from the door and walk down the hall. Creeped me the f out.

My Step-Dad swears when he was a kid he was staying at his aunts house which was thought to be haunted. One night he was sleeping in his cousins room when he, his brother, and his other cousin woke up to see the 1st cousin, who was on the top bunk, floating in the air with only his finger tips on the bed. He said when they said something his cousin got startled and fell to the floor, breaking his arm.

[Wintermute]

I think there's the potential they're real, maybe not "ghosts" in the traditional sense but something.
I've seen/heard things over my life that I couldn't explain.

When I was a kid touring the local convent they showed us the place where they bricked a Nun into her room until she starved and died and I saw a shadow laying on a bed when there was no-one near it in a well-lit room.

I was in class when I was 12 or so and I saw someone standing right behind a classmate then it was gone the second I mentioned it was there, I was later told my description matched his recently deceased grandfather.

I've seen a shadow move at the end of a tunnel across a T-Junction when I know for certain there was nobody back there because I was at the back of the group. One other person saw it.

I've heard the very distinct sound of paws on tiles go past my door after our first dog died but before we bought the second.

My old Uni halls were next to train tracks that people had jumped off-of back in the 1900s and you'd always hear weird shit.

I once turned my head right while sitting down relaxing and there was someone's face right next to mine, gone soon as I "woughfuck"-ed out of the chair.

Hell I've even heard my name called while I was alone inside the house.


That said I'm also massively skeptical.
I've experienced a lot of dodgy shit which I would consider "paranormal" or what have you, but for all the crap I can't explain there's a ton more that I could rationally explained as my brain mis-interpreting what's happening.


What really annoys me though is that people are so polar about it, and the hardcore "believers" are the worst of the bunch.

Spoiler for rant

Spoiler: show

Case in point:
A year or so back a "Psychic Medium" and a bunch of people went for a stroll in the old WW2/Siege Tunnels on a "ghost hunt". People paid money for this.

Now this shit is guaranteed creepy, there's no natural light and any electric lights are few and far between assuming they've even got power. The tunnels are cold, damp, and musty. There's also a ton of condensation so there's always something dripping down the walls or the stalactites.
It's also awesome because you run across old AA Guns, Military detritus, and shit like abandoned Generators left over from WW2.

But generally you go in and the chance you'll get carried away and mis-interpret a sound or shadow is going to be through the roof due to the atmosphere.

Everyone swore they saw something, or heard something.
"I saw a shadow move..." "I heard something over there..."
Well I should hope so dumbass there's 30 of you armed with flashlights inside a cave.

Everyone swore blind they'd taken a picture of a ghost.

WW2 tunnels, no natural light, mob of people moving constantly each armed with a flashlight and camera, every surface is at least partially reflective due to condensation, bugs and dust disturbed by the mob, and the guarantee every camera would take a god-awful grain-filled image due to total lack of sufficient light.

You'd think some people may be a bit hesitant right?
I mean what they're seeing on their photo could be dust floating in mid air, dirt on the lens, bugs attracted by light, bad exposure on the image, stray shadow from a flashlight, image artifacting or heavy grain due to insufficient light...

But no. What they had on film was definitely a ghost.

Never have I wanted to collectively punch so many people at once.

[Woozie]

Isn't Bruce Willis a ghost? How can so many people not believe in them when there's one on TV and in the movies and stuff?

[Silenka]

Sleep paralysis can go fuck itself, it's only happened to me a few times and it's really annoying. But we've been down that road before.

@Illumina, way to be a bunch of pussies, I would have exorcised that shit myself. You're alive and they're not, ffs, man up. After all, what was stopping them from actually touching you if they could touch objects? Seems like all the 'ghosts' in your story did was interact with objects or stand around menacingly. Everything is made of the same stuff (atoms and molecules), so what keeps ghosts from outright killing people if they want them gone so bad? Logic bitches. You can't tell me a 'ghost's' agenda is just to scare the living bejeezus out of people, that seems to be a pretty shitty reason for sticking around. "Oh man, another Monday morning of pushing stuff off countertops, I wonder if they'll get the hint this time" Yeah I don't think so. Or maybe they have a ghost rulebook that says they can do anything except interact with people directly? This is part of why I tend to think of ghosts as BS. Their abilities to interact with the real world seem incredibly limited until it comes to lightbulbs and things made of glass, then apparently it's party time baby. Doesn't make any fucking sense.

I like to think that if my parents came into possession of a haunted house, they would try to make money off the prospect. They probably would sell the rights to filming or investigating there to a TV show or someone interested in that kind of stuff, not just move out and go 'aw shit well now we have to find another place, hope it's not haunted this time'. Of course there's never been any real filmed proof of such things happening so hey, maybe ghosts are just camera-shy.

It's also quite possible that there was some kind of chemical in/around a house as old as that fucking up some heads...