Speaker 1: What's that at the bed? It's spooky, I'm jooky. I'm
Speaker 1: really sure it's dead. It's coming, it's way.
Speaker 2: Wait a minute, I'm gosted runs dressed lens.
Speaker 3: Plase, Hey boo, it's me Ras. So I'm actually recording
Speaker 3: this right now on my birthday. So today's well, you're
Speaker 3: listening to this. It came out on Thursday. My birthday
Speaker 3: is Wednesday, October twentieth, and.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 3: I'm not that much of a birthday person, but I
Speaker 3: guess it's my whole birthday week celebration. So you know,
Speaker 3: if you want to get me a gift, all I
Speaker 3: ask is just to go tell your friends and your
Speaker 3: followers about Ghosted. You know it's perfect for Halloween times,
Speaker 3: so just you know, spread the word. That's all I
Speaker 3: ask of you. I don't need happy birthdays and balloons
Speaker 3: and cakes and strippers or any of that stuff. Just
Speaker 3: wait strippers for birthdays or bachelorette parties. I don't know
Speaker 3: either way, I don't need a stripper. All I need
Speaker 3: is if you to tell your friends about the show,
Speaker 3: if you want to, I don't know. Thank you anyway.
Speaker 3: I had a lovely weekend. I went to Palm Springs.
Speaker 3: Not to celebrate my birthday, I went for a wedding
Speaker 3: very Hollywood style, ran into actually a lot of previous
Speaker 3: guests that have been on the show, had such a
Speaker 3: nice time.
Speaker 1: And I also had a psychic reading.
Speaker 3: And we actually talk a bit today about this kind
Speaker 3: of thing briefly here at the top of my conversation
Speaker 3: with Michelle Bell and Jay on this part two, we
Speaker 3: talked about storefront psychics.
Speaker 1: And I went to something kind of like that. I mean,
Speaker 1: it was in a store and.
Speaker 3: It was I was with my best friend Sam Pancake,
Speaker 3: former podcast guest, and we took turns getting these readings.
Speaker 3: And this particular person that read me, he had a
Speaker 3: bunch of different cards, so he's like, all right, pick
Speaker 3: three of these and then okay, now pick three of these,
Speaker 3: and now like reach your hand in this mysterious bag
Speaker 3: and pick three things out of it.
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure this was a psychic.
Speaker 3: I went to I don't know, and it was all
Speaker 3: these kind of readings where it was just kind of like, oh,
Speaker 3: I'm just gonna tell you things about you, you know
Speaker 3: what I mean, where it was very like, ah, okay,
Speaker 3: you're you're very strong and you've lived an interesting.
Speaker 1: Life, and.
Speaker 3: You like to eat food, and you breathe, and you
Speaker 3: sometimes sleep at night. It's like get very like, okay,
Speaker 3: you could say that to anyone, you know, that kind
Speaker 3: of a thing. So and then I was like, okay, well,
Speaker 3: can you like tell me a bit about my future?
Speaker 3: And he's like, we have to ask a specific question.
Speaker 3: And so I was like, how will I feel a
Speaker 3: year from today? I feel like that's a good question
Speaker 3: to ask a psychic or a card reader or something.
Speaker 3: And he said that a year from that day, I
Speaker 3: was gonna feel very good. So he must be legit
Speaker 3: because he told me what I wanted to hear.
Speaker 1: You never know about these things. I don't know.
Speaker 3: God, I've spent so much money in my lifetime on psychics.
Speaker 3: But anyway, I should also say I unfortunately had to
Speaker 3: cancel my second live show in la I apologize. I
Speaker 3: had announced it and then I had to basically instantly
Speaker 3: cancel it last week. So very sorry about that. If
Speaker 3: anybody was hoping to go, I'm just doing the one
Speaker 3: on the Friday. It's completely sold out. You could keep
Speaker 3: an eye on my Instagram if for some reason tickets
Speaker 3: do open up somehow, I will post about it, but
Speaker 3: other than that, you know, it's the first one back
Speaker 3: after you know, Lockdown and everything, So you know, we'll
Speaker 3: see how it goes. And maybe I'll just do a
Speaker 3: bunch more. Maybe I'll do them all over the place.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure.
Speaker 3: Right before the pandemic, I had all these plans. I
Speaker 3: was gonna go all over the place doing these these shows.
Speaker 3: But so that's the goal, that's what I hope. Maybe
Speaker 3: that's what the psychic was talking about. I'm not really sure,
Speaker 3: but so I'm sorry about that. For anyone that was
Speaker 3: excited to see that live show, it will not be happy.
Speaker 3: Only the one on the Friday it's sold out. Also,
Speaker 3: next week will be our Halloween show, I guess I
Speaker 3: mean it will be out. I believe that's the twenty eighth,
Speaker 3: so not Halloween exactly. But I thought I would do
Speaker 3: something fun and different, and I did talk about this
Speaker 3: briefly a couple weeks back. I was looking for voice
Speaker 3: notes and stories and questions and that kind of a thing,
Speaker 3: and I posted a bit on my social media as well,
Speaker 3: and so I decided I would do an episode by myself,
Speaker 3: without any guests.
Speaker 1: I was kind of nervous.
Speaker 3: I've never done anything like that, just me talking for
Speaker 3: like an hour, but I think it ended up great.
Speaker 3: And the team at Sturboran's Audio, who produced my podcast,
Speaker 3: we shot it in person on video.
Speaker 1: I almost said film, How old am I on video?
Speaker 3: So there will be a link next week in the
Speaker 3: description of the episode where you could watch it for
Speaker 3: the first ever on video episode.
Speaker 1: And the whole team at Star Wars did such a
Speaker 1: great job.
Speaker 3: We've got fun, little cute effects, and I listen to
Speaker 3: voice notes from you guys and answer some questions, and
Speaker 3: I tell some stories and we listen to EVPs and
Speaker 3: it's just like, you know, it's a cute little slumber
Speaker 3: party and I'm trying something different, and I hope you
Speaker 3: enjoy it. So look out for that next week as
Speaker 3: we celebrate Halloween. Oh god, we're so close to it,
Speaker 3: which almost makes me sad.
Speaker 1: I get sad. I hate okay.
Speaker 3: I just need to be in the moment because I
Speaker 3: get sad as I get close to Halloween, because then
Speaker 3: it means it's over. I hope you guys are having fun.
Speaker 3: I hope you're going to all the places, all the
Speaker 3: spooky things wherever you live. And you're watching lots of
Speaker 3: good spooky movies. Anyway, I hope I can give you
Speaker 3: a little bit more of that today with the conclusion
Speaker 3: to my conversation with Michelle Belna and this second part
Speaker 3: we get into a lot of stuff again. We talk
Speaker 3: about psychic stuff, we talk about conjuring demons, and then
Speaker 3: we get into world religions. Now again, this is inspired
Speaker 3: by the book that I was reading that she wrote,
Speaker 3: and she does talk a lot in the book about
Speaker 3: the various religions of the world and their views on
Speaker 3: this dark sided stuff, and so we talk about that,
Speaker 3: and on Patreon this week we talk even more about it.
Speaker 3: We talk about the d Book, which is something I
Speaker 3: had heard about but I don't know a bunch about.
Speaker 3: It's a Jewish mythological figure that is, you know, a
Speaker 3: malicious spirit. Some you know compare it to a demon,
Speaker 3: and she had a lot to say about it. So
Speaker 3: if you got a patroon dot com slash Ross dress
Speaker 3: well as on my second tier, we talk about that.
Speaker 3: And on my first year this week, on my way
Speaker 3: home from Palm Springs with Sam, I did a little
Speaker 3: mini episode of the little podcast that Sam and I
Speaker 3: did A couple of months ago on Patreon and I
Speaker 3: just talked to him about Halloween and it's fun and
Speaker 3: we hear a little bit about his past Halloween experiences. Okay,
Speaker 3: I say we get into it. I hope you enjoy
Speaker 3: part two with Michelle Bell and j On with the show. Well,
Speaker 3: the last time you were on, we talked a lot
Speaker 3: of about you being you know, a psychic and the
Speaker 3: abilities that you have. And one thing that I was
Speaker 3: thinking about more as I was reading your book, since
Speaker 3: it's a ghost Hunter's Guide, was I wanted to hear
Speaker 3: more about your thoughts of when being a psychic. You
Speaker 3: know you just you your thoughts of a psychic in
Speaker 3: terms of paranormal investigation.
Speaker 1: When is then a good tool? When is that how
Speaker 1: do you like to use it, etc.
Speaker 2: Well, from the last story I mentioned, I always like
Speaker 2: a second or third opinion, and that goes with using
Speaker 2: a psychic for any kind of paranormal investigation. Especially psychic
Speaker 2: abilities are really useful and also it's really easy to
Speaker 2: be front loaded. If you are working as a psychic
Speaker 2: for a paranoral investigation team, you should not also be
Speaker 2: the person researching the property. You should ideally be kept
Speaker 2: in the dark as much as possible so that you
Speaker 2: have as accurate a reading as is humanly possible. Now,
Speaker 2: we can never be one hundred percent objective, and we
Speaker 2: should always have our perceptions checked someone. You know, if
Speaker 2: you walk into a room and you're like, I see
Speaker 2: someone who looks like this, and I think this happened there,
Speaker 2: you shouldn't be the person who then tries to do
Speaker 2: the research to prove it. So also the team should.
Speaker 2: In my opinion, the best use of a psychic on
Speaker 2: a paranormal team is as one of the various methods
Speaker 2: used to measure, read, and perceive what's in the location,
Speaker 2: and should be used like any other tool, which is
Speaker 2: to say, taken with a great assault, and always verified
Speaker 2: whenever possible. As a psychic, I try really hard not
Speaker 2: to get invested in being right or wrong. I simply
Speaker 2: try to experience and report those experiences as objectively as possible,
Speaker 2: with as little interpretation as possible. That can be difficult
Speaker 2: when you know it's just me and I'm being called
Speaker 2: on to play multiple roles. I'm both the investigator and
Speaker 2: the researcher, and also the person trying to solve the
Speaker 2: haunting and the person trying to like just read the
Speaker 2: room and get a feel for what's actually there. That requires,
Speaker 2: in my opinion, a fair amount of training for objectivity,
Speaker 2: to be able to step back and not let your
Speaker 2: ego get all wound up in whether you're right or
Speaker 2: how cool it is, but to just try to let
Speaker 2: things speak to you and do that as safely as possible.
Speaker 3: Do you have days where your psychic abilities are just
Speaker 3: like just not you can't, can't get it to happen?
Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think anybody who works as a psychic
Speaker 2: needs to get very comfortable with saying I got nothing yeah,
Speaker 2: because if you hit a point where you're not getting
Speaker 2: anything in a space, ay, there might be nothing to
Speaker 2: get be It just might be you that day, And
Speaker 2: if you try too hard, you may start making stuff
Speaker 2: up and at that point you start losing your objectivity.
Speaker 3: That's my problem with like storefront psychics. You know, there's
Speaker 3: a demand for them to tell me something if I'm
Speaker 3: going to go and pay my thirty dollars, And I'm
Speaker 3: just like, did they really like get a hit every time?
Speaker 3: Or are they just you know, coming up with something.
Speaker 2: One thing I can say for sure about that is
Speaker 2: I don't trust myself to do that, which is why
Speaker 2: I don't do readings for hire, because the pressure of
Speaker 2: someone who's now paid me money to tell them something,
Speaker 2: there is pressure to perform there, and I get all
Speaker 2: tamed up on myself. I find it a lot easier
Speaker 2: to just get a call from from Jack or Katrina
Speaker 2: or somebody and like, hey, we've got a cool space
Speaker 2: and we'd like to just throw you into it blindfolded,
Speaker 2: and I'm all like cool. I love experiences, but you know,
Speaker 2: make me do it for money, and that pressure to
Speaker 2: perform becomes a really slippery slope.
Speaker 1: So you don't feel that pressure when there's like a
Speaker 1: camera crew and all that.
Speaker 2: No, because for me, that's more experimentation. I'm getting an
Speaker 2: opportunity to be in the field and just test the abilities,
Speaker 2: and I'm trusting the team around me to confirm, deny,
Speaker 2: or debunk anything I come up with. It's a way
Speaker 2: of one sort of stretching my abilities, but more than that,
Speaker 2: just get confirmation, some validation that what I'm doing has
Speaker 2: like a real aff effect in the world. It's not
Speaker 2: just stories that I'm telling in my head, because I'm
Speaker 2: also a fiction writer, Like I can make some stories up.
Speaker 3: Well, but doesn't doesn't a lot of that, you know,
Speaker 3: isn't it all kind of a what's the chicken or
Speaker 3: the ag whatever?
Speaker 2: Like?
Speaker 3: You know, doesn't it kind of inform some of the
Speaker 3: stories that you can fictionalize later as well with your writing.
Speaker 2: That my shadow Side series with conspiracy of Angels and
Speaker 2: harsh gods and whatnot, I freely use that as a
Speaker 2: playground to experiment with what if about certain abilities and
Speaker 2: also to sort of share with people how I experience
Speaker 2: the world, but in like a bigger, louder, dramatized sort
Speaker 2: of way. Yeah, I don't think that there's a way
Speaker 2: for me to divorce the way in which I experience
Speaker 2: the world from any of my writing. It's so much
Speaker 2: an integral part of me.
Speaker 3: I'm glad that you put up portals to Hell because
Speaker 3: you know that's sort of uh. That show came out
Speaker 3: right when this podcast really started, and Katrina was I
Speaker 3: think she was my first TV ghost Hunter guest. And
Speaker 3: she's been on like three times now, and Jack's been on,
Speaker 3: and You've been on, and it's become that's become like
Speaker 3: kind of our definitely one of our favorite shows over here.
Speaker 3: A ghosted by Roz Jessephlez and I saw you on
Speaker 3: the most recent batch of episodes. Do you yeah, when
Speaker 3: you you show up to these places, I just I
Speaker 3: love watching you on these shows. You show up to
Speaker 3: these places, you confirm all this stuff, and then you're like,
Speaker 3: all right, have fun, bye guys.
Speaker 2: Totally.
Speaker 1: So then what do you do? You just go back
Speaker 1: to like your hotel room and yep.
Speaker 2: Hotel room or half the time, I literally like a
Speaker 2: drive out and I turn around and I just drive
Speaker 2: back home.
Speaker 1: Is that exhausting for you spiritually or.
Speaker 2: A little bit? But I think it's like training for
Speaker 2: a marathon. I've been doing that sort of stuff so
Speaker 2: much that I know how it to paint myself, And
Speaker 2: even in locations that are pretty extensive and overwhelming, I
Speaker 2: know when I'm wearing thin, and I know when to
Speaker 2: ask to stop. Twenty years ago probably wouldn't be able
Speaker 2: to just you know, dive into Penhurst and wander around
Speaker 2: blindfolded for like two three hours. I have a terrible
Speaker 2: sense of time, so I literally have no idea how
Speaker 2: long these things take. Like I'm just there in my
Speaker 2: zone with the with the blindfold on and just in
Speaker 2: my head and you know, just kind of getting moved
Speaker 2: from space to space and just trying not to bang
Speaker 2: ahead on anything, and it sort of plays out in
Speaker 2: its own none time, like it's just it's just I
Speaker 2: don't know the feel of the space. It's hard to describe.
Speaker 2: It's really hard to put into words, and I'm a wordsmith.
Speaker 3: Well, A lot of the places that they go to,
Speaker 3: like a common thread is that there may have been
Speaker 3: or there is proof of people trying to conjure up
Speaker 3: demons or you know, that sort of a thing.
Speaker 1: And I have kind of an idiot question about that.
Speaker 3: I don't think any questions when somebody's trying to summon
Speaker 3: a demon.
Speaker 1: I mean, what are they hoping is going to happen?
Speaker 2: That is a damn good question, because sometimes I really wonder.
Speaker 3: Even as I was reading your book, I was like,
Speaker 3: wait a minute, why do people do this? Like especially
Speaker 3: people like I don't know, just like a bunch of
Speaker 3: goth teenagers, I just want to try out or whatever,
Speaker 3: Like what then what?
Speaker 2: What? So?
Speaker 1: Then you get your d man, what are you gonna
Speaker 1: do with that?
Speaker 2: I think a lot of modern people, especially when it's
Speaker 2: younger folks who are like cool, I'm gonna summon Baphame.
Speaker 2: I don't know, that they actually think that far ahead.
Speaker 2: I actually, here's my real thought is an awful lot
Speaker 2: of people who are trying to do that are really
Speaker 2: looking for incontrovertible proof that spirits either exist or don't,
Speaker 2: and so they shoot for the biggest, baddest, most extreme
Speaker 2: experience they can possibly think about. If that kicks their butts,
Speaker 2: they have proof. Okay, I think it's really a dare
Speaker 2: to reality to prove itself or have nothing happen and
Speaker 2: make them then go home and feel better that there
Speaker 2: really aren't spooky things out there. Now, we want to
Speaker 2: go back to the ritual magic and ceremonial magic of
Speaker 2: Middle Ages and Renaissance. They were sum many demons mainly
Speaker 2: as tutelary spirits, as things to teach them and things
Speaker 2: to protect them and things. Oh man, there are so
Speaker 2: many demons that were supposedly summoned in order to get hookups.
Speaker 2: It's really off the charts. How many spells and demons
Speaker 2: specifically from that time period, or about getting somebody to
Speaker 2: strip naked in front of you, or find it like
Speaker 2: like all the ladies in town to just irresistibly throw
Speaker 2: themselves at you. It is so much about just sexy
Speaker 2: times for like little aspiring insults.
Speaker 1: Really, okay, so we'll staying on this topic. Yeah, When
Speaker 1: so somebody.
Speaker 3: Opens the door, they bring in some kind of dark
Speaker 3: energy into a space that later ends up on Discovery
Speaker 3: Plus's portals to help.
Speaker 2: Right, does so.
Speaker 3: A demon or whatever word we want to use, a
Speaker 3: dark energy? Why would it then now linger in that
Speaker 3: space or does it sometimes get unleashed into the world,
Speaker 3: or does it attached to the people that open this
Speaker 3: door or what happens there.
Speaker 2: Typically there are some beliefs that one of the reasons
Speaker 2: entities will try so hard to be called into the
Speaker 2: world is that they can't really come through on their own.
Speaker 2: Do they need to be invited in some way or another.
Speaker 2: That's a fairly deep part of folklore, and you know,
Speaker 2: it's worked its way into like our vampire myth that
Speaker 2: like vampires must be invited inside. But that notion of invitation,
Speaker 2: or the inability to cross the boundaries themselves without assistance,
Speaker 2: that has some compelling details to me, that there are
Speaker 2: certain things that are so alien to our world or
Speaker 2: the way in which things work in it, that outside
Speaker 2: of really unique and extreme circumstances, they can't really manifest
Speaker 2: here I also think that there are plenty of spirits
Speaker 2: their native here, and a ritual like that, rather than
Speaker 2: opening a door to let them in, creates a lot
Speaker 2: of energy, creates a lot of power to feed them,
Speaker 2: to strengthen them, to give them a little bit more
Speaker 2: oomph for manifesting and for being present. And again I
Speaker 2: think most spirits think with their stomachs in the sense
Speaker 2: that everything is energy and their energy, and they need
Speaker 2: to eat as much as we do. And again, they
Speaker 2: don't have ghostly McDonald's. They eat people. They eat the
Speaker 2: emotional residue of energy from traumatic events, from joyous events.
Speaker 2: A lot of the stuff that we get on the shows,
Speaker 2: of course, are dark and negative, because those are the
Speaker 2: ones that stand out, like you're not going to port
Speaker 2: a haunting of a spirit that hangs around the merryground
Speaker 2: that makes everybody feel happy. Nobody cares. Actually, you're just
Speaker 2: you're just thrilled that this place makes you feel delighted
Speaker 2: every time you walk in it. That spirits still getting
Speaker 2: something out of it, but we don't find it inconvenient.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, I still I mean I would prefer
Speaker 3: a nice, happy spirit. But again, I understand why people
Speaker 3: want to see on TV. The dark, spooky, ooky, kooky
Speaker 3: stuff makes sense.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I like the spooky stuff too.
Speaker 1: You know, something I.
Speaker 3: Really like in your book is the mention of different
Speaker 3: world religions and having understanding of various beliefs, and you
Speaker 3: actually go through different, you know, common religions, some less
Speaker 3: common religions that we might not have known much about,
Speaker 3: and go into their beliefs on you know, dark stuff
Speaker 3: and good stuff and and all of that, and and
Speaker 3: so how does that benefit a ghost hunter?
Speaker 2: First of all, not every family you might be investigating
Speaker 2: will be Christian, not every location will have, you know,
Speaker 2: been Christian from start to finish. And there are a
Speaker 2: lot of different approaches to spirits, a lot of different
Speaker 2: types and perspectives. And what spirits are. A really good
Speaker 2: contrast is in Islam, most of what we would identify
Speaker 2: as from poltergeists to ghosts to fairies to most means
Speaker 2: our gin from their perspective genie, Yeah, genies, what we
Speaker 2: identify as as demonic possession. Ninety nine percent of the times,
Speaker 2: I guarantee if it was a Muslim looking at that,
Speaker 2: that's just a gin that has taken possession of a person.
Speaker 2: Incubus succubists from their perspective gin and understanding what those
Speaker 2: perspectives are, if there really is a categorical difference, or
Speaker 2: if it's simply different words that we use. These help
Speaker 2: us understand people's experiences better. You don't want to go
Speaker 2: into a Pagan household with a Catholic priest and have
Speaker 2: the Catholic priest run their ritual to remove things, because
Speaker 2: that doesn't speak to the pagan family at all, and
Speaker 2: vice versa. You wouldn't take a Pagan priest and have
Speaker 2: them make a Catholic family go through a whole like
Speaker 2: you know, casting the circle and you know, sword and
Speaker 2: chalice and all of that, because that's not going to
Speaker 2: mean anything to them either. So having different perspectives gives
Speaker 2: us a wider arsenal, first of all, to combat things
Speaker 2: or to assess how to combat them, but also how
Speaker 2: to speak to the people who are having those experiences,
Speaker 2: because we all have different languages for what is out
Speaker 2: there beyond our physical world, and whether it's a ghost
Speaker 2: or Poulter guys to demon or a gin, a penan gallon,
Speaker 2: or something stranger, whether those are real or not is
Speaker 2: more immaterial. If you are a good paranal investigator out
Speaker 2: to try to solve a haunting. For people, the most
Speaker 2: important thing is the people experiencing it believe it, So
Speaker 2: you need to know why and what they might be
Speaker 2: interpreting for that belief, and then how do you deal
Speaker 2: with it from your perspective you.
Speaker 3: I mean, well, and I know you've been working on
Speaker 3: I believe last time you said you were working on
Speaker 3: a book about is It Past Live?
Speaker 1: Yeah, so how's that going. I feel like I can't
Speaker 1: imagine how much research that could lead you on.
Speaker 2: Oh, that one has, okay, So I can never work
Speaker 2: on one project once that one has spawned a workbook,
Speaker 2: a card deck, neither of which are in production yet.
Speaker 2: And I'm slowly chipping away at the past life stuff
Speaker 2: because it's so very personal. I've had memories since I
Speaker 2: was very tiny. I personally believe some of the things
Speaker 2: that I know. It's not like I haven't made a
Speaker 2: point of also researching them this life. But in many
Speaker 2: cases it's stuff where I'm like, Okay, I know that
Speaker 2: the ancient Egyptians have had a water clock, and the
Speaker 2: central part of it was in the form of a
Speaker 2: bamboon pissing and it would take a pee once on
Speaker 2: the hour, every hour. That's the weirdest thing ever to know.
Speaker 2: Does that exist?
Speaker 1: It sounds amass, right, but yes it does.
Speaker 2: So the past life stuff is deeply personal, and trying
Speaker 2: to find the right the right way to kind of
Speaker 2: navigate that because I want it to be a workable
Speaker 2: book for everyone. I don't want to just be like going,
Speaker 2: well in my day, I remember blah blah blah, like
Speaker 2: I just don't want it to be an autobiographical recounting
Speaker 2: of like all of my ridiculous past life memories, because
Speaker 2: that just seems, well, that would probably be interesting. I
Speaker 2: don't know that it's all that useful beyond just fun stories.
Speaker 1: Well I do like those too, but I get what
Speaker 1: you mean. I mean, do you think that.
Speaker 3: Your psychic abilities have you know, gone with you in
Speaker 3: all of your past lives?
Speaker 2: I definitely think that there are some things that I've
Speaker 2: carried with me over and over again, and trying to
Speaker 2: track that down was one of the first motivators when
Speaker 2: I was a teen to confirm some of the things
Speaker 2: that had come forth as probable past life memories, to
Speaker 2: try to just understand, like how much of us do
Speaker 2: we carry from lifetime? To lifetime. If this is a
Speaker 2: possible thing, like if this is part of your worldview
Speaker 2: and you accept that not only does the human soul
Speaker 2: survive death but maybe also comes back. Does it get
Speaker 2: wiped clean? Is it normal for that to happen? Does
Speaker 2: it just get you know, kind of tossed in the
Speaker 2: unconscious bin of things that you're not really aware of,
Speaker 2: but you're carrying anyway, And you know, how normal is
Speaker 2: it to remember as much as someone does?
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, some of my favorite stories are the ones
Speaker 3: of children that had these very specific memories, and it
Speaker 3: kind of brings into question all.
Speaker 1: Of this stuff of how did that happen?
Speaker 3: Did it was that supposed to get wiped clean and
Speaker 3: it's somehow leaked into this lifetime or why would that be?
Speaker 2: I think it's telling that there's a certain age range
Speaker 2: in which children have these incredibly specific memories. A bit
Speaker 2: around children who've just been able to pull out names,
Speaker 2: who describe you know, people or circumstances or you know, buildings,
Speaker 2: things that they've never had had access to. You know,
Speaker 2: there are two, three, maybe four. Knowing a little bit
Speaker 2: about theories of development and memory and the maturation of
Speaker 2: the human brain, there's a process that we go through
Speaker 2: as we grow into not just our bodies but also
Speaker 2: our neurology, where personally, I think it's not that the
Speaker 2: world us these memories. It's not like parents have necessarily
Speaker 2: told the kids, you know, that's not okay, or shamed
Speaker 2: them into that, although that definitely happens. But I also
Speaker 2: think that as they individuate, as they get more grounded
Speaker 2: in this life and acclimate to the body and their
Speaker 2: geography and their family, those other memories that come forth
Speaker 2: with such clarity in their very formative years become less
Speaker 2: relevant because they are in the past. They're from a
Speaker 2: life that no longer has any anchor points or any context.
Speaker 2: And I do think that people are more likely to
Speaker 2: remember things that are useful to them, things that might
Speaker 2: have a resonance in this life, things that maybe teach
Speaker 2: them something useful, something survivable here and now. Otherwise again
Speaker 2: it's just stories.
Speaker 3: Yeah, God, that stuff is so fascinating to me. But
Speaker 3: you know, it's I guess that's kind of similar to
Speaker 3: the idea that kids can see ghosts, you know, as
Speaker 3: they're young, and then as they get older for whatever reason.
Speaker 3: There's a lot of theories that ability usually goes away.
Speaker 2: Usually Yeah, Usually, I like the theory that some of
Speaker 2: the most powerful witches and magical practitioners are children simply
Speaker 2: because it never occurs to them as they can't.
Speaker 3: Mmmm, right now, what about when we're dealing with children's spirits.
Speaker 1: Does that ring true as well?
Speaker 2: Spirits of children who died as children are kind of
Speaker 2: a separate and distinct category from spirits that appear as children.
Speaker 2: What a ghost human? When someone who is human dies,
Speaker 2: usually the first way that they present themselves is as
Speaker 2: they remember themselves. It's a little bit like their avatar
Speaker 2: and the matrix how they think they should look, and
Speaker 2: that's how they will project themselves to people. But as
Speaker 2: we learned in Tibetan Buddhist teachings, you're not stuck with that.
Speaker 2: You have whatever appearance you're able to focus on and
Speaker 2: project whatever you are able to really relate to. So
Speaker 2: I've encountered spirits who died in their seventies, died in
Speaker 2: their eighties who noetheless appear as children because they choose to,
Speaker 2: or because that's where they have anchored, like that's the
Speaker 2: best place that they relate to as who they are,
Speaker 2: and they're not even necessarily limited to only appearing like that,
Speaker 2: they may shift along their own personal timeline. It's taught
Speaker 2: me that appearance with spirits at least is also a
Speaker 2: method of communication. Ah, they are communicating something with how
Speaker 2: they appear and what they project to you, whether that
Speaker 2: communication is part of their personality or how they think
Speaker 2: they're going to best relate to you. But appearance is
Speaker 2: not static for spirits. That said, children's spirits are I
Speaker 2: don't want to sound horrible about the closest to like
Speaker 2: what I experience with animal spirits, in the sense that
Speaker 2: they're very uncomplicated, even if something bad happened to them.
Speaker 2: If they're hanging around and their children who died early,
Speaker 2: they're there because they want to be. They're there because
Speaker 2: they're still having fun. Very rarely have I encountered genuinely
Speaker 2: a human child spirit that I felt was trapped. It
Speaker 2: felt more like they wanted to engage and just hadn't
Speaker 2: gotten bored yet.
Speaker 1: What about like if they just don't know that they're dead,
Speaker 1: Is that a thing?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yes, sometimes that's a thing, And that does seem
Speaker 2: to be a little bit more common with children's spirits
Speaker 2: or not only do they not know, they just kind
Speaker 2: of don't care if they're engaged. They're happy to still
Speaker 2: run around doing what they're doing. There is some belief
Speaker 2: in various aspects of spiritualism and whatnot that when you
Speaker 2: cross over, when you die, you kind of go through
Speaker 2: this transformative process where you're opened up to the mysteries
Speaker 2: of the universe. It's one of the core principles of
Speaker 2: medieval and Renaissance necromancy, of all things, even Greek and
Speaker 2: Roman necromancy. Crossing over meant that you had some hidden
Speaker 2: knowledge of the world, that you could prognosticate the future,
Speaker 2: that you could talk about where burying treasure was. That's
Speaker 2: never been my experience. Spirits are a little bit more
Speaker 2: psychic or telepathic. It's kind of the way that they communicate.
Speaker 2: They're a little bit more able to move around once
Speaker 2: they figure that out. But it's not like they're all knowing,
Speaker 2: it's not like they're all seeing. So even a child spirit,
Speaker 2: they may change a little bit in their psychology and
Speaker 2: the emotional way that they interact with people, but only
Speaker 2: in their own time, only as they learn and grow.
Speaker 2: I really think that there's a journey for any soul
Speaker 2: once it's crossed over. We don't stop growing and changing.
Speaker 2: We don't stop learning. And that process more than just
Speaker 2: sending something into the light, we're casting it out of space.
Speaker 2: That process is how they get over whatever they've been
Speaker 2: through and also move on to whatever comes next.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I usually end my episodes by rattling off just a
Speaker 3: bunch of paranormal phenomenas, and then my guess, you.
Speaker 1: Say, oh, I believe in that, or I heard about
Speaker 1: this or about that, and I'm I feel like I
Speaker 1: might do it with you. It would be a whole
Speaker 1: different story.
Speaker 2: But everything comes down. Everything I believe comes with a
Speaker 2: qualification and footnotes.
Speaker 1: I love it though, So here I'll just list ofp
Speaker 1: a couple of things. Just tell me.
Speaker 3: I guess it's almost like a word association kind of
Speaker 3: it there. I don't know what what comes to mind.
Speaker 3: Maybe you have a story or something you don't we don't.
Speaker 1: We don't, I don't.
Speaker 3: I won't make you tell me everything, but if you
Speaker 3: think it's something to share about these things?
Speaker 1: Okay, what about haunted dolls?
Speaker 2: Really cool? My wife hates them?
Speaker 1: Have you ever owned one?
Speaker 2: I own several and keeps them an inspiration house because
Speaker 2: see above, my wife hates them.
Speaker 1: Are they about the house.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there are two that have music boxes in them
Speaker 2: and they will play, and that's Clara and Nathan. And
Speaker 2: Clara is whatever's attached to Clara. I don't think it's
Speaker 2: a child. It is a bit cheeky and annoying, and
Speaker 2: she is actually the only thing that I've thought about
Speaker 2: buying in her own little space, because she knocks things
Speaker 2: around sometimes and disturbs guests. Most haunted dolls are more
Speaker 2: what I would call residual hauntings. The energy, the love,
Speaker 2: the personality that someone has projected on them over a
Speaker 2: long period of time has sort of worked its way
Speaker 2: soaked into the doll itself, and what you're responding to
Speaker 2: is a psychic imprint. But every once in a while
Speaker 2: there's something that has gone, hey, this looks like a
Speaker 2: person just enough for me to want to be connected
Speaker 2: to it and use it as sort of an image
Speaker 2: and an anchor.
Speaker 3: I mean is that it's not unlike what we were
Speaker 3: talking about with psychic vamporism and the obsessing spirits.
Speaker 2: Right object, a doll, a poppet, human image, figurine, Like
Speaker 2: that's really old magic, making something in the shape of
Speaker 2: a person to be host to something thou shalt not
Speaker 2: worship false idols, The idea that you could make an
Speaker 2: idol of a god and the god would inhabit it,
Speaker 2: that all is of a piece. The idea that adult
Speaker 2: is a human image.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I guess so.
Speaker 3: Because Yeah, I mean, I hear about the different haunted objects,
Speaker 3: but it seems like the most common that at least
Speaker 3: I hear about.
Speaker 1: Are they resemble humans?
Speaker 3: I mean, I don't hear a lot about like, oh,
Speaker 3: this haunted bag of Dorito's that.
Speaker 1: I don't know.
Speaker 2: It's various things psychologically. Also, it's easy to project a
Speaker 2: lot on again, because they look like us. They have
Speaker 2: a face. Our brains are wired to expect a personality
Speaker 2: on the other side of that face.
Speaker 1: What about Bigfoot? What do you think of that?
Speaker 2: I grew up watching Bigfoot, Wild Boy and like the
Speaker 2: Foggy Creek Monster and all those like weird documentaries from
Speaker 2: the seventies. It would be really cool. I've never seen
Speaker 2: anything out in the woods myself. I'm fascinated by the concept.
Speaker 1: Okay, but you're not ruling it out. It's possible.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we'll rule it out.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's probably good. What about like Lockness Monster, same thing.
Speaker 2: I'm a little bit less likely to believe in the
Speaker 2: Lockness Monster, but it's a nice story and certainly a
Speaker 2: good excuse to go to Scotland. Right.
Speaker 1: How about UFOs?
Speaker 2: You Those are one of the things that actually just
Speaker 2: concerts me on a pretty deep level. I had an
Speaker 2: uncle who was in the Air Force in Vietnam. He
Speaker 2: had a really high security clearance and he had something
Speaker 2: to do with Project Blue Book.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: Yeah, one hundred percent believed in UFOs. We went UFO watching,
Speaker 2: he and I and I definitely saw a couple of
Speaker 2: weird things while I was with him. I, on like
Speaker 2: a deep, fundamental personal level, cannot bring myself to believe
Speaker 2: in the idea of a physical craft with actual physical beings,
Speaker 2: like in the same way that some people hear ghosts
Speaker 2: and they're just like nah. I have some deep, like
Speaker 2: just something in me resists that if that were to
Speaker 2: actually like land in my backyard and there were aliens
Speaker 2: of any shape size of the description that physically walked out,
Speaker 2: I am not sure what I would do, because there's
Speaker 2: my reality would be like huh, not that I think
Speaker 2: there's no other intelligent life in the universe. It's more
Speaker 2: than I'm like, but why would they bother to be here. Really.
Speaker 2: That said, I don't have a problem thinking about things
Speaker 2: that could move here or travel here, transd interdimensionally through
Speaker 2: some way that isn't strictly physical. I guess it really
Speaker 2: comes down to the fact that I don't know that
Speaker 2: I trust a physical craft to be able to travel
Speaker 2: in a way. It's really hard for me to wrap
Speaker 2: my head around.
Speaker 1: What about time travel?
Speaker 2: That gets weird and loopy. I'm not sure. I like
Speaker 2: to think of time again. Part of my personal worldview
Speaker 2: is pretty linear, but I've also met some people who
Speaker 2: seem to experience it in a really weird way. Not
Speaker 2: going to rule it out, but it comes with so
Speaker 2: many qualifications and questions for me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, okay, here's one more. And this could be
Speaker 1: a lot. You know, there's a lot of things. I mean,
Speaker 1: any of these topics, there's a lot. But I was
Speaker 1: thinking about this. I was reading your book The Idea
Speaker 1: of Curses.
Speaker 2: I think that unfortunately they're used way too often to
Speaker 2: scam people into paying a lot of money to get
Speaker 2: the curse lifted that isn't actually there. But you know,
Speaker 2: is it possible to do something to someone someone magically,
Speaker 2: to bind them to I can see circumstances where something
Speaker 2: would fit the necessary uh qualities to be called a curse.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because like sometimes.
Speaker 3: I've talked about like movies that are cursed, you know,
Speaker 3: allegedly or you know there's and then you can also
Speaker 3: get into conspiracy theories and stuff like that. And the
Speaker 3: Kennedy family has a curse on them, and that's sort
Speaker 3: of a thing.
Speaker 1: I mean, do you think that that's possible.
Speaker 2: I don't know. See I suddenly like the long pause
Speaker 2: with me going back and digging through some of the
Speaker 2: Irish folklore that I inherited from my family. They're definitely
Speaker 2: in Irish family our ideas that you can have like
Speaker 2: a banshee or spirit or a family curse, and that
Speaker 2: curse gets passed on because one of your ancestors broke
Speaker 2: a taboo or made a promise that they didn't carry out.
Speaker 2: From a metaphysical and ethical standpoint, I just have a
Speaker 2: hard time thinking that reality would be that cruel that
Speaker 2: you now could be cursed for some something that one
Speaker 2: of your ancestors five generations ago did. At the same time,
Speaker 2: it makes me wonder about, honestly more a little bit
Speaker 2: about magical lineages or reincarnational stuff that we may carry forward,
Speaker 2: that we might be carrying because of something we did
Speaker 2: in the past and interpret it now as a curse
Speaker 2: because we don't have a better word for it.
Speaker 3: Oh okay, Yeah, it's kind of similar to past life
Speaker 3: stuff and all of that.
Speaker 1: Hmm. Well, Michelle, you've been so generous with your time.
Speaker 2: It's always good talking to you.
Speaker 3: It's like, my brain is so like I'm thinking about
Speaker 3: so many things, and that's what I love.
Speaker 1: I love it. This is great.
Speaker 3: I guess I guess we should wrap it up. But
Speaker 3: you know, can you tell people what you're working on
Speaker 3: and where they can find you in all that stuff?
Speaker 2: Oh, let's see. Everything that you probably want to find
Speaker 2: is at my website at Michelle Belange dot com. If
Speaker 2: you want to learn from my classes, pick my brain
Speaker 2: and my discord and do other things like that, the
Speaker 2: best way to do that is to join my Patreon
Speaker 2: at patreon dot com slash Haunted. That's pretty much where
Speaker 2: I have this awesome community and we do weekly chats
Speaker 2: and there's a ridiculous amount of recorded classes for people
Speaker 2: to poke through. So if you want to hear me
Speaker 2: talk about everything from Wiji boards to fairies to how
Speaker 2: to do in depth energy work. That's the place to go.
Speaker 2: There is my haunted Airbnb inspiration house and you can
Speaker 2: rend that on Airbnb and if you want to catch
Speaker 2: a little taste about it, the World's most Amazing vacation
Speaker 2: rentals on Netflix their Paranormal Places episode. It's the first
Speaker 2: one that they go to and you get to see
Speaker 2: me and a Wiji board session. Woo. Let's see what
Speaker 2: else I'm on sort of media. Oh yeah, Portals to
Speaker 2: Hell and lots of books, a stupid amount of books.
Speaker 2: And currently, on top of everything else, I'm working on
Speaker 2: a couple of games, so we'll see see what happens
Speaker 2: with that. I'm an old school gamer D and D
Speaker 2: and various tabletop role playing games. I wrote material for
Speaker 2: Onyx Paths ghost Hunters supplement for the World of Darkness
Speaker 2: if you are a player of vamp by the Masquerade
Speaker 2: that's coming out fairly soon. They wanted somebody who actually
Speaker 2: does it for a living to write some bits for
Speaker 2: the game, and I'd been writing games and running them
Speaker 2: from like forever ago. As a note, it was definitely
Speaker 2: gen Con and Origins is in Columbus, and that's only
Speaker 2: going to make any sense to other gamers.
Speaker 3: Well, it's always it's so fun to hear about people,
Speaker 3: you know, a psychic, somebody that's very do you call
Speaker 3: yourself an expert or you know, in a cult, in
Speaker 3: the cult de knowledges, all these things that all these
Speaker 3: titles that you have, and then to hear about the
Speaker 3: very human things you know that you like as well,
Speaker 3: like playing games.
Speaker 1: I love that.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, hardcore gamer keeek, I love it.
Speaker 3: Well, Michelle, you gave us the goods once again, and
Speaker 3: I love it. And I hope that you come back sometime,
Speaker 3: you know, if you got another book, next time you
Speaker 3: have a book coming out or anything, please come back.
Speaker 2: Conversations are always good. Thank you.
Speaker 3: Thank you to Michelle Balane. Get to her website, buy
Speaker 3: her books. She is just the greatest. I'm so happy
Speaker 3: to get to know her, and hopefully one day I'll
Speaker 3: meet her in person and hope to have her back
Speaker 3: again some other time, because wow, has she taken us
Speaker 3: to school and taught as things and she makes me
Speaker 3: feel better about this spooky stuff, to be honest. So
Speaker 3: if you wanna hear a little bit more as we
Speaker 3: talk about the dibbook, go to Patreon dot com slash
Speaker 3: roz dress plus my second tier and on my first tier.
Speaker 3: This week you can watch me and my friend Sam
Speaker 3: driving in the car talking about Halloween.
Speaker 1: Guys for my birthday.
Speaker 3: Please tell your friends about the show and also rate
Speaker 3: it five stars on Apple Podcasts or where you rate
Speaker 3: a podcast five stars. My Patreon is patroon dot com
Speaker 3: slash Rosdressfales. I am on Instagram at Roz Hernandez. We
Speaker 3: have the Facebook group Ghosted.
Speaker 1: By rozdres Fales.
Speaker 3: And also I'd like to do a listener episode soon,
Speaker 3: so please send your listener stories to ghosted by Roz
Speaker 3: at gmail dot com with the subject line listener episode
Speaker 3: and just put a little bit the bullet points of
Speaker 3: what your stories look like. And next week you're gonna
Speaker 3: get to hear and if you'd like, see me as well,
Speaker 3: So be subscribe to the show and look out for that.
Speaker 1: I love you all, both living and dead. But if
Speaker 1: I didn't ask you to haunt me, don't haunt me.
Speaker 1: Came back Star means there a podcast network