When we fear a thing, we deliver to it on a silver platter power over us. The power to control us in virtually every way, shape and form. You become the marionette and fear becomes the puppet master. With a twitch of its finger fear will move you this way, and that way having you sway about on its own whims. It will feed from the responses it gets from you and grow stronger and stronger.

The question now becomes; will you allow something to control you as its dutiful slave or do you have the spirited soul of a free man?

For a moment lets remember brave King Leonidas and the 300 Spartans which stood before the mighty Persian army at Thermopylae. For two days they held back the thousands of Persians. This is the embodiment of the spirit of a free man. Against all odds, no matter how he feels, he stands and fights. That’s what we must do to fear; stare it in the eyes and when it tells us to lay down our weapons we must respond like a Spartan “ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ” (“Come and get them!”)

When it comes to paranormal activity you must remember that human spirits pose no serious threat to you. You are in total control if you stand up and take it. Generally you will see a great success with that; especially when the whole family comes together and takes a stand. Together you are strong! The same is true with demonic activity in the beginning before it snowballs out of control and you need outside assistance.

So when something happens to you that you cannot explain and fear raises its ugly head you MUST remember to hold your ground and fight like a Spartan! This is your territory and no one and nothing will drive you from it…. ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ!

I’ll be using  Case File #20110428-H “Henry’s Nightmare” as a test case. Hopefully everything will go smoothly. Feel free to email me and offer up suggestions to improve it.

The web address will be ClientPortal.AppalachianParanormalCenter.com

OK, well for now let us get some background information on this phenomenon and forget about the glitz and CGI of a Hollywood Production.

It is October 17, 1774 and a battle took place between Virginia militiamen and a tribal confederation led by; Shawnee Chief, Cornstalk. This battle took place between the Kanawha and Ohio Rivers, which would later; in 1794, be incorporated into the town of Point Pleasant, WV. It seems the Native Americans were deceived into believing the militia was coming there to sign a peace treaty. The militia suffered a massive defeat; never to return to the area again, and it was learned the battle was a rouse to divert attention from colonist independence from Britain by stirring hatred between inhabitants and Native Americans. Realizing this was an elaborate plot which resulted in Cornstalk and his warrior’s demise reportedly with his last breath cursed the area for 200 years. There is small evidence that the curse was a fictitious plot element of a local play during the 1900’s. His curse was a catalyst for many a discussion during  each unfortunate occurrence in Point Pleasant and the surrounding area during that time span, including floods and severe fires that seemed to plague the downtown through the years, and including a murderous hostage situation at the Mason County Courthouse in 1976.

Back To Present Time – Somewhat… 1966

On November 15, 1966, two young couples from Point Pleasant were traveling late at night in their vehicle. They were passing the abandoned World War II TNT factory, about seven miles north of Point Pleasant when they noticed two red lights in the distance by an old generator near the factory gate. They stopped the car, and reportedly discovered that the lights were the glowing red eyes of an immense being, “shaped like a human, but larger, maybe six and a half or seven feet tall, with large wings set against its back. On November 16, several armed townspeople combed the area around the TNT plant for signs of Mothman. Four individuals were driving to a friend’s house in the vicinity of the TNT plant near the igloo’s (concrete dome-shaped dynamite storage bunkers).  The igloos have long been empty owned by the county and various other companies for storage. They were heading back to their car when a figure appeared behind their parked vehicle, It seemed like it had been lying down, slowly emerging up from the ground, huge and gray, with glowing red eyes. The creature walked onto the porch and starred at them through the window.  On November 24, four people reported seeing the creature flying over the TNT area. On the morning of November 25, a man who was driving along Route 62 just north of the TNT, reported seeing the creature standing in a field, and then it spread its massive wings and ascended to the sky. There are stories like this too numerous to mention over the next months in the Point Pleasant WV,TNT area; but in 1967,  The Mothman was sighted again January 11 hovering over the town’s bridge; The Silver Bridge,  and many, many other times that same year. The Silver Bridge was built in 1928, and it collapsed on December 15, 1967 resulting in the death of 46 people. Investigation of the bridge wreckage was linked to the failure of a single eye-bar in a suspension chain due to a manufacturing flaw. There are rumors that the Mothman appears to prophecies disasters and seems to try to warn people of the impending threat. After that; Mothman vanished as mysteriously as he appeared, and was never to be seen again in Point Pleasant township, the surrounding area or to my knowledge anywhere.

One of the earliest and probably most convincing explanations I have heard and researched is the theory that The Mothman was in fact a misidentified bird; The Sandhill Crane, which had probably strayed from it’s normal migration pattern and in fact during the late 1960′s had become somewhat of a problem in surrounding regions. The Sandhill Crane is a very large bird with an average wingspan of over 5 feet but can reach lenghts of up to 7 feet. It’s body stands a average of 39 inches tall and it is described as having the ability to soar large distances without the use of it’s wings as well as emitting a very unusual shrieking sound. Also from the picture on the right, those large red markings on the head could seem quite ominous to a frightened individual looking at it in their headlights on a dark lonely road and with an imagination already fueled by local stories and folklore. There are numerous other theories into The Mothman mystery including hoaxes; of course, parapsychological and precognative events; probably stemming from premonitions of tragedy striking a town already plagued with mishaps, or general folklore story additions just to make a good tale even better. I’m not here to draw a conclusion; but instead, present some facts. You make up your own mind or theory as to the mystery of  The Mothman Prophecies.

#1 – Hatred of Scripture

Someone who is possessed by a demonic entity will not abide scripture. The recitation of scripture will elicit a violent reaction. Also the person generally should not be able to recite scripture; rarely will they be able to.  They will also tend to  show an aversion to things like a cross or holy water. If the location is infested with a demonic presence the recitation of scripture will have a decidedly pronounced effect in the area. There may be physical manifestations such as objects being hurled through the air, temperature changes (typically warmer), feelings of heaviness, and auditory phenomena.

#2 – Multiple Personalities

These personalities manifest themselves with no previous history of mental illness. They do not generally manifest themselves in everyday life. These personalities are like primal forces with intelligence and malice.

#3 – Voice Change

More often this occurs with the multiple personalities the demonic entity manifests. The person makes a very unusual and seemingly impossible voice. There are times when the voice may seem to be coming from many places or from many people with an echo. 9 out of 10 we’re not talking an Amityville Horror “GET OUT!” voice, this voice can be high pitched or even simply whispery. The most common and oh so subtle is the growl.

#4 – Super-Human Physical Capabilities

Those who are possessed, when the demon has been angered, are capable of feats of great strength. Rarely they might also exhibit great dexterity.

#5 – Qui Lingo Is Est

Many times the possessed will speak in a language in which they have no previous knowledge. Sometimes it’s a dead language. Since demonic entities have apparently existed throughout the history of our species it knows many languages from various cultures separated both in place and time.

#6 – Changes In Eating Habit

The person eats excessively without putting on poundage or the person does not eat at all and seems to become lard ass. Sometimes the possessed will eat something unimaginable (like insects or various other unmentionable foulness), or their tastes for foods will become drastically different.

#7 – Wounds

Scratches, punctures, welts and in extreme cases even words might appear on the skin. If there are letters or words make sure that it’s not an effect like Wayne Houchin’s Stigmata.

#8 – Physical & Visual  Phenomena

Phenomena such as moving objects, feeling a great weight is pushing down on you, shadows seem to move or morph, the appearance of someone familiar, etc. can be signposts of demonic entities.

#9 – Auditory Phenomena

Sounds such as growling, knocking on the walls or ceiling, a relatives voice calling for you but they are not there are symptoms of a demonic presence.

#10 – Stench

I understand hygiene is important but this is more than mere B.O. Not in every case will you come across this but a foul stench like rotting flesh can accompany a demonic haunting.

First stop on your trek should be your local County Clerk’s office to look at land records. All you need is the address and you can work your way back in time to find the previous owners. Make sure you take notes of all the names you discover. You can also look for property tax related indexes but they may be at a different county office. Someone will at the County Clerk’s office will tell you where to find them.

Visit the your local library and ask to see the city directories. Most have a reverse look up section where you can find your address and see who is listed as a resident. Now that you have some names, you can look up the last name of the resident in the directories and see if an occupation is listed. For example: Holmes, Sherlock detective b. 221B Baker Street

By now you should have a pretty extensive list of owners and residents, you can also search through the archives of your local newspaper (most likely you’ll find these in the library). One of your house’s former occupants may have been newsworthy or infamous!

You might also check the library for old Insurance maps that detail the lot sizes and layout of structures. You can see if any additions have been made to the property over time.

That’s all there is to it. See it’s not as hard as you thought! I hope this helps you in the discovery of the history of your home. If you have just began renovations to your home and started to have paranormal experiences that could be the cause of it. Check out Tool Time: Renovations & Paranormal Activity

Make sure that you note the recording time for later analysis. Once you have gone through everything take your notes and go through each recording device and dump them to your computer, if you haven’t already done so. I’m not going to get into how to dump the audio here. You can either refer to your device’s manual or you can do a little research on the ole interweb and find that part out.

In this article, I’m primarily dealing with how to eliminate background noise in your possible evp recording. As stated in EVP 101, you will need some sort of audio editing application and in this case I’ll be using Adobe Audition to walk you through the process step by step. Just keep in mind that you will not be using the same settings that I’ll be using on your recoding because no two beasts are alike and you will have to modify for the background noise that you’re trying to eliminate. That said come inside the show’s about to start.

*If you would like to follow along CLICK HERE if you wish to download the original unmodified file.

Now that you’ve dumped the audio isolate the section that you want to work with. Keep a few seconds before and after what you think may be an EVP. If you’re using the example file this has already been done for you.

Let’s take a look at the waveform. You can’t really see much of anything going on here just by looking at it so play through it. Right around the 2 second mark is where this EVP is.

Go to effects, amplitude, amplify/fade. What we’re going to do is amplify the file. With linear editing applications always, always, always preview what you are about to do to your file before applying destructive effects (effects applied directly to the file itself as opposed to being in an “effects rack” which you can turn on and off particular effects anytime you wish). Anyway apply a 23 db boost to this file. All where doin here is giving ourselves a little more room to work with. It’s better the more data you have coming in but with EVP work your kinda stuck with what you get.

Since we have the file prepped to work with I’ll be showing you two ways to reduce background noise. One we’ll be using filters specifically designed to reduce background noise and a simple graphic equalizer. The second way being just using a simple graphic equalizer.

So lets get started with the noise reduction. Go to effects, noise reduction, noise reduction. What you’re going to do here is capture a profile. Basically it analyzes the recording for you and determines what to reduce. The default settings  are fine. Once that’s done you’ll see a funny wavy line. What it is that we’re going to play with is the noise reduction level. Hit the preview button, start low and work your way up until you’re satisfied. In my case I chose 40. Hit the bypass check box and listen to the original wave and make sure that you’re satisfied before you click ok. You can hear that the EVP voice has come out well.

I’m still not quite satisfied with it so lets keep going. Go to Filters, graphic eq. For simplicity sake use the 20 band EQ and select return all to zero. This effect also live updates just like the others so we can hear the changes we make before we actually apply it. This is really the same process that would be used for isolating the EVP voices without the noise reduction filter. As with any audio editing it’s preferable to cut frequencies than it is to add them. Key thing is to play with it until you get something you like. See the image below to get the settings I used.

Here’s the finished work.

Let’s say you didn’t have any noise reduction filter like that; what would you do? Any basic audio editng application will have a way to amplify the wave file and and EQ. Here’s the settings I used for a Graphic EQ alone to reduce the background noise.

Check it out now.

Like I said you will need to play with the settings for your own EVPs. At least here I’ve given you a starting point on how to do it.

“The scientists of today think deeply instead of clearly. One must be sane to think clearly, but one can think deeply and be quite insane.”

- Nikola Tesla

An electromagnetic field is a physical field produced by electrically charged objects. It affects the behavior of charged objects in the vicinity of the field. The electromagnetic field extends indefinitely throughout space and describes the electromagnetic interaction. It is one of the four fundamental forces. The electromagnetic field can be viewed as the combination of an electric field and a magnetic field. The electric field is produced by stationary charges, and the magnetic field by moving charges. These two are often described as the sources of the field.

In the past, electrically charged objects were thought to produce two types of field associated with their charge property. An electric field is produced when the charge is stationary with respect to an observer measuring the properties of the charge, and a magnetic field  (as well as an electric field) is produced when the charge moves (creating an electric current) with respect to this observer. Over time, it was realized that the electric and magnetic fields are better thought of as two parts of a greater whole — the electromagnetic field.

Once this electromagnetic field has been produced from a given charge distribution, other charged objects in this field will experience a force (in a similar way that planets experience a force in the gravitational field of the Sun). If these other charges and currents are comparable in size to the sources producing the above electromagnetic field, then a new net electromagnetic field will be produced. Thus, the electromagnetic field may be viewed as a dynamic entity that causes other charges and currents to move, and which is also affected by them.

The potential effects of electromagnetic fields on human health vary widely depending on the frequency and intensity of the fields. For more info on that check out This Is Your Brain. This Is Your Brain On EMR. Any Questions?

I know. I know. Your thinking; “yada, yada, yada what does this have to do with paranormal activity?” Well a hypothesis out there is that entities (spirits) trying to manifest themselves will cause a charging of the particles in the atmosphere surrounding them. This is why an unexplainable reading higher than baseline on your EMF detector would be an indication of paranormal activity; lets say anywhere between 2 miligaus and 7 miligaus from a base line reading of .4 miligaus .

I just wanted to get your feet wet in understanding what an electromagnetic field is. Later on down the road we’ll get into entities and EMF.

Some believe that disturbance to the property may provoke spirits that have been otherwise dormant back to life as it were. Alterations to a home that an entity holds dear, and may be quite protective of, may stir enough emotional energy for the spirit to make its presence known.

The energy of demolition or construction is sometimes all that’s needed to provide the strength for a spirit to display activity. Renovations often come with teams of laborers, high stress levels for both the homeowner and contractor, and dozens of energy emitting tools to get the job done – all things that can act as a power source for paranormal activity. Though none of these aspects can really be avoided, it often helps lower the intensity of  paranormal activity if you keep a cool head during the renovation and to take time to relax.

Though this kind of paranormal activity  can make progress difficult, this type of haunting usually settles down after the renovations are complete. If it continues weeks or even months after renovations are been completed, recruit an experienced team of paranormal investigators in your area (nearly all work for free) for help.

Like I said 9 out of 10 any activity you are experienceing will more than likely come to a screeching halt after the renovation is done. But if it continues or you feel threatened in any way please contact us and we’ll help.

The short answer to that question is NO.  Any judge that hears claims like this related to paranormal phenomenon is going to throw the case out of his court room.

Generally dealing in property the old saying caveat emptor (let the buyer beware) is the standby. There really is nothing that anyone can bring up against you that will hold up in court in the highly unlikely event that it does get that far.

So lets say that it does get around that your house is haunted. The broad term in real estate lingo is called stigmatized property. Stigmatized property refers to any condition that buyers or tenants may shun the property outside of physical condition. This refers to murder, suicide or haunting.

There was one case in New York where someone was attempting to market their house as haunted (as a selling point) and later retracted that statement. So the other party was upset and attempted to sue them for fraudulent misrepresentation.  Stambovsky v. Ackley was decided on July 18th 1991. The New York Supreme Court affirmed the dismissal of the fraudulent misrepresentation action and stated that the realtor was under no duty to disclose the haunting to potential buyers.

This is the only case I’m aware of that made it that far. So I mean it’s highly unlikely that it will happen but it could and more than likely it will get thrown out. So in my opinion there isn’t really any risk or threat involved here.

So if it is a concern for you simply ask the paranormal investigative group not to disclose the location of the home. Besides any legit group should already have their i’s doted and there t’s crossed; they should have a confidentiality agreement that you sign and specify exactly what information they can release. We have one and keep one copy on file and the other is the client’s to keep.

Accept the things to which fate binds you, and love the people with whom fate brings you together, but do so with all your heart.

- Marcus Aurelius

A stoic philosophy can be an asset during paranormal investigations. With it you will have a cool head and your emotions will be under control. Also there is the added benefit of professionalism it can give you when you see that shadow moving down the hallway and you don’t run and scream.

Basically stoicism is living in harmony with nature and accepting that which it deals to you. Not living “contrary to nature” is a key theme you will find. One must stand in the face of danger with composure. Whatever happens isn’t contrary to nature and fate has bound you to it.

Stoicism teaches the development of self-control and fortitude as a means of overcoming destructive emotions; the philosophy holds that becoming a clear and unbiased thinker allows one to understand the universal reason. A primary aspect of Stoicism involves improving the individual’s ethical and moral well-being: “Virtue consists in a will which is in agreement with Nature.” This principle also applies to the realm of interpersonal relationships; “to be free from anger, envy, and jealousy,” and to accept even slaves as “equals of other men, because all alike are sons of God.”

The Stoic ethic espouses a deterministic perspective; in regards to those who lack Stoic virtue, Cleanthes once said that the wicked man is “like a dog tied to a cart, and compelled to go wherever it goes.”  A Stoic  would amend his will to suit the world and remain, “sick and yet happy, in peril and yet happy, dying and yet happy, in exile and happy, in disgrace and happy,” positing a “completely autonomous” individual will, and at the same time a universe that is “a rigidly deterministic single whole.”

“Make for yourself a definition or description of the thing which is presented to you, so as to see distinctly what kind of a thing it is in its substance, in its nudity, in its complete entirety, and tell yourself its proper name, and the names of the things of which it has been compounded, and into which it will be resolved. For nothing is so productive of elevation of mind as to be able to examine methodically and truly every object which is presented to you in life, and always to look at things so as to see at the same time what kind of universe this is, and what kind of use everything performs in it, and what value everything has with reference to the whole.”

-Marcus Aurelius

For Stoics, reason means not only using logic, but also understanding the processes of nature; the logos(universal reason) inherent in all things. Living according to reason and virtue is to live in harmony with the divine order of the universe, in recognition of the common reason and essential value of all people. The four cardinal virtues of the Stoic philosophy are wisdom, courage,  justice, and temperance.

Stoicism, as regarded today, is seen as being emotionless and that’s simply not the case. As I’ve tried to get across to you that everything is filtered through reason. You can see that a stoic philosophy can help you in a paranormal investigation. Not only that it will help you with life and your interpersonal relationships. I’m sure you can tell that Marcus Aurelius is my favorite. It’s a good place to start and there’s a good modern translation of the Meditations called The Emperors Handbook. Check it out!