Have you ever felt an otherworldly presence among you, something beyond our realm, reaching out, calling you?
Drawn to discover ghosts, there has been a growth of paranormal investigators exploring supposedly haunted locations.
The increasing popularity of ghost investigations poses an important question.
What influences paranormal pursuits?
Neuropsychologist, President and Founder of The Australian Parapsychological Research Association (APRA), Dr Vladimir Dubaj is a paranormal investigator.
His paranormal intrigue developed as a teenager.
“As a teenager, I came across the topic of outer body experiences,” he said.
“I read a couple of books on out-of-body experiences and the thought that my consciousness can leave my body during sleep … was just an incredible concept.”
Dubaj’s interest in out-of-body experiences influenced him to search for ghosts.
“My thought was what’s an alternative to looking at consciousness outside of the body; ghosts,” he said.
“I kind of started looking at haunted locations to see if we could pick anything up.”
According to Dubaj, ghost investigators find haunted locations scientifically, searching for irregular electromagnetic frequencies (EMF) to identify and find paranormal activity.
“What we found was that there’s a significant increase in ghost reports during geomagnetic storms,” Dubaj said.
“When there’s electromagnetic fluctuations around the world in that area, people tend to experience ghost activity a lot more frequently.”
He believes another paranormal investigation tool is trigger objects.
Varying from little coffins or music boxes, which play music if irregular motion is sensed, or trigger balls lighting up to acknowledge EMF fluctuations, said Dubaj.
“A trigger object is an object we leave on the ground in the hope that ghosts can interact with it … when they do interact with it, it lights up,” he said.
Psychologist and Clinical Hypnotherapist Joyce Bok has extensive ghost-investigation experience.
Bok said she’s had many paranormal encounters through her ghost hobby venture Salubrious Events.
She had an investigation with Dubaj in Mount Martha.
“We saw this distortion moving past the room past a window, and it almost looked like the window was moving because it was kind of wobbling visually,” she said.
“About five or six people saw this run past[…] a few seconds later, a trigger object lit up all by itself.”
A haunted history with each investigation location is present; in her Yarraville Masonic Lodge investigation, a cult allegedly gathered there for rituals, said Bok.
“We felt a lot of energy in the big community hall, so we set up a lot of trigger objects there and they were all going off […] the EMF’s machine was going wild,” she said.
Ghost investigation isn’t for all; commonly feared by those of strong faith and religious belief.
Senior Altar Server at Saint Joseph’s Parish and practising Catholic Lachlan Spencer, doesn’t believe in paranormal investigating.
“I personally would not say that things like paranormal activity or sort of ghosts in particular would really be something that I believe in,” he said.
“There’s definitely more meaningful and holistic things to be gained from believing and participating and giving yourself up to a religion and that higher power in your life.”
Spencer’s spiritual beliefs formed through religious upbringing and attending Catholic schools.
“I’ve always been a practising Catholic and member of the Catholic Church, so I’ve had a lot of involvement.”
He was concerned by paranormal investigators exploring supposedly haunted locations, remaining unfamiliar with potentially dangerous surroundings.
“I’m not particularly a fan of going onto other people’s property to do it … I don’t think that’s a good idea and I don’t think that’s something you should be messing around with,” he said.
“I don’t really believe it to be a particularly great idea or a practice that will really yield anything.”
Comparing both sides’ spiritual practices and why they follow them, there were intriguing similarities.
“If your loved one passes on, knowing that they have a soul or consciousness that survives after the physical body has died … it might help with the grieving process,” Bok said.
“It’s just really like a calling upon some other resources to help guide you in life … the main benefit is really knowing that there’s life outside of the physical.”
Spencer shares similar spiritual views to Bok based on his religious upbringing.
“There is definitely a purpose and sort of spirit that everyone has … their spirit will live on despite their physical body not,” he said.
“With religion, there’s a lot of peace and sort of identity that you can find within yourself.”
Bok and Spencer share beliefs in life beyond the physical and how spirituality helps you understand life and yourself.
Religion historically has been normalised as one of the most common spiritual expressions compared to other spiritual practices.
As our world evolves and paranormal practices grow in popularity and belief, may normalised modern spiritual expressions shift?
