Fear

Remember that it is only fear, and fear is the great crippler. As a result, much homage has been paid, throughout the course of human history, to what is perhaps the greatest antidote to fear, which is of course, courage. But courage is not so much a product of sheer bravery as it is the momentary absence of fear, the blind will to power. It is knowing which course of action is the most appropriate - regardless of personal welfare. Thus, it is the willful abandonment to whatever fate may be in store, in the face of what may seem like overwhelming odds, that makes even the meekest of men into giants, should the genuine need arise.

Believe It or Not

Believe it. Or not. People spend their entire lives believing in all sorts of things that both are and are not real. And unless you happen to be omnipotent and "godlike," you're really just another believer. Even if all you believe in is putting down everyone who doesn't believe in everything you happen to not believe in.

Basically, ANYONE who claims to have all the answers, based on their politics, religion, atheism, science, or whatever they do or don't believe in, is simply trying to blow smoke up everybody's rectum - and thereby gain legions of faithful followers who share their beliefs and non-beliefs.

NO, YOU DON'T KNOW EVERYTHING.

You can get educated and you can voice your opinion, but you still don't know everything. Or rather, you can TRY to get educated. There is a lot of misinformation out there, so try not to get too carried away by the latest snippet of propaganda that trips your trigger. After all, we are all susceptible to half truths and propaganda.

This is what it means to be human. This is what makes you, in the end, just like everybody else who simply doesn't have all the answers. Sooner or later, everyone plays a part in the great human drama - whether you fancy yourself Jesus, Judas, a disciple of someone else' school of thought, or just another asshole screaming, "crucify him!"

Shadow Man

The entity I often sense hanging around in the upper level parking area downstairs in the building my wife and I live in appeared in the guise of a "shadow person," just after midnight today. While dropping off a big box to be recycled, I saw the profile of a completely blacked out, fully silhouetted figure moving extremely fast. It walked straight towards a wall and vanished just before it would have (had it been a living person) walked right into it.

There was no sound made by this thing whatsoever at all, and I only turned to catch a glimpse of it because I could feel (as I often do) that something was no more than three or so yards away. Maybe it was a prankster, or a shy neighborhood tenant darting in between the two rows of cars near the recycled goods? 100% doubtful. That close, moving that quickly, and this man sized figure made no sound at all?

Besides, when I was heading back toward the main lobby elevator, I paused by the guard office (where I could see the only guard on duty standing within) and stared for a long time at the spot where the figure had abruptly disappeared. Nothing there. Until... I realized it was still standing there. It was simply so transparent that if you didn't have a strong sixth sense, and didn't know where to look, you'd have completely missed it altogether.

So believe what you will. Or not. I've known about this particular shadow man for a long time. And he knows that I know about him, too.

What If We All Just Refrained From Being Judgemental

Okay, SORRRRRY, frightened and/or prejudging people of the hard headed and often ridiculing skeptical crowd!  But strange things really DO sometimes happen in this world, despite anyone's prior preconceived (prejudiced) notions about things that go bump in the night.  Or the day for that matter.

So, whether one happens to be a theist, an ANTI-theist, or just someone who has YET to experience anything of a genuinely paranormal nature, this old world of ours is full of inexplicable and often just plain unexplainable things.  And that's just the way it really, honestly is.

Naturally, I genuinely wish that no one ever had to deal with paranormal experiences that frighten or cause them to question their sanity, let alone the sanity of others.  But honestly, weird, creepy, spine tingling, chilling things really do happen every now and then, you know!  In fact, the real truth is that somebody somewhere every single day really does experience paranormal phenomena of one type or another.  It's just a matter of personal belief.  Or maybe not.  Maybe it's a matter of personal, intellectual admission or shameless denial.

So I really am sorry, pseudo-scientific pontificates who otherwise know just about everything there is to know!  The world we live in can be frightening when we don't fully understand it.  But is the unknown, is what we don't currently understand, it is really all that scary?  As 32nd US president Franklin Delano Roosevelt once wrote, "There is nothing to fear but fear itself."  So here's really my question to any and all skeptics, whether they may be hiding behind the latest "modern," cutting edge scientific theories or not:

If "there are no gods, and there are no ghosts" (as most Chinese have been taught since the rise of communism), then why should anyone deny all the reams and reams of mounting evidence?  Or, as Charles Dickens' obviously fictional ghost of Jacob Marley put it so eloquently in the landmark English classic, A Christmas Carol,   "Man of the worldly mind!" replied the Ghost, "do you believe in me or not?"

Well, that's just exactly it in a nutshell, you see!  Avowed skeptics simply do not believe.  They've got no other real arguments OTHER than the fact that they simply refuse to believe, actually.  By coming right out, before hearing all the facts, and pronouncing that they do not believe, they are in fact strongly suggesting that they will not, they simply cannot believe.  Ever.

But let us assume for a moment, that there really are unclassified hominids roaming around in North America, the Himalayas, and even in other remote parts of the world.  Let's imagine that there really are a host of cryptid animals out there that we high and mighty humans have yet to full document,  master and bully into submission.  Let's imagine that there IS some sort of life after what we call "death."  Let's imagine that there really ARE entities that plague the living (or simply try to frighten some people away, perhaps because they'd in fact rather be left alone).  Let's imagine that there really is life on other worlds, and some of them have actually already visited us.  Perhaps clandestinely and often, and possibly even many times over the ages.

Let's not get emotional about any of this though.  Let's merely just pause for a moment and just... well, not "want to believe," but purely and simply RESERVE JUDGEMENT.  In other words, let's just not be PREJUDICED towards individuals who may really have encountered strange and as yet unexplained phenomena!  I mean, can we try THAT for a change?

Yes, otherwise well meaning but judgmental folk of the "modern" pseudo-scientific cloth, let's not DISCRIMINATE for a change.  Let's not be hasty.  Let's not RIDICULE others simply to be... what?  To appear to be the smartest, the most knowledgeable in all the land?  Or maybe the coolest geeks in high school, who knew all the answers on every test, but never got quite enough recognition for your untapped brilliance?

One way or another, if all of the above is even remotely plausible, then what happens next?  What happens if we all really do just stop....  Stop pointing fingers.  Stop accusing the literally millions of eye witnesses of being foolish, mistaken and/or possibly just plain nuts!  What then?  Would the modern world really return to a Dark Age fraught with blind superstition and ignorance?  For some perhaps.  But isn't that the way the world in fact works right now?  I mean, isn't that how things ALREADY are for quite a number of people around the world?

So, seriously, honestly... would absolutely everyone around us really, suddenly get hysterical and start burning witches all over again, if the current lack of solid, quantitative scientific evidence to disprove any and all things of a paranormal nature were simply to stop being thrown in the faces of everyone who genuinely has experienced as yet unexplainable phenomena?  Or the reverse perhaps; would everyone start persecuting any and all priests and clergymen, for example, simply because some of them have been literally caught with their pants down, doing terrible, terrible things?  How about all the others who haven't?  All the ones who have actually helped people via their faith and good intentions?  What about all of them?

In other words, in the absence of true provability, does plausibility really have to go out the window, like the proverbial baby with the bathwater?  Uh... no.  I personally think absolutely, unequivocally NOT.

Either way, I personally am not telling ANYONE what to think, not to think, believe or not to believe.  Because beliefs are ultimately like the minds and the mouths that spew them; numerous and quite simply varied. Or even sometimes like the rectums that pass our all too human gas!  Yes, just like opinions, everyone everywhere really does have a mouth and a rectum.  And sooner or later, if we're more or less capable, learned (or otherwise ignorant) and maybe just in need of a good old fashioned bowel movement, we all certainly do find a way to make ourselves heard, don't we?

But I leave you this:  Mere opinion does not sound scientific theory make.  And without solid proof to the contrary, of ANYTHING really, we're all just spewing various human gases and naturally occurring odors.  Because that's just the way it is in the much vaunted and even storied "real world."

Lastly, believe it or not... well, you know what comes next, don't you?  You know!  That passage from Hamlet that everyone eventually quotes when things of a paranormal nature come up between skeptics and those conveniently labeled "believers."  That one expression that good old William Shakespeare wrote way back in the early 1600s.  You know, like MORE THAN 400 YEARS AGO!  Yeah, that one.  So I think I'd better bow to the bard, for now.  I'll gratefully let that most famous of Wills have the true last words here.  And here of course, they are:

"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.  ~ Hamlet (1.5.167-8)