Something New To Read

I know a lot of people seem to laugh me off when I talk about ghosts or how I 'get' information. People can believe whatever they want, think whatever they want. A lot of people are skeptical, I get that. People who don't really know what to think become skeptical listening to other skeptics.

When I listened to this: www.richardwiseman.com/paranormality/ChrisFrench.html  I was thinking about that power of suggestion. The guy says that he used to be a believer and became a skeptic after reading something written by another skeptic. The suggestion here is this: "I suggest you believe what I believe". Instead of letting experience guide your beliefs. This is how I feel about skeptics. Like I say, everyone can have their own opinion. I'm not even telling everyone everything because I know it all seems to far fetched. Either you are 'a man (or woman) of science, or faith. There always seems to be a scientific explanation for things, yet there are so many instances where there doesn't seem to be an explanation at all.

Since everyone is entitled to their own opinions, I started reading that book and was reading the opinions of Richard Wiseman. The title itself made me feel like he's a real skeptic. A lot of people want to prove, or rather disprove the paranormal stuff. I'm okay with that because I'd rather the truth be discovered whether it is something that can be explained scientifically or not. I'd rather know one way or another.

It's interesting, I suppose, from that point of view to see what people are saying and why they either believe or not.

There were some things I read I wanted to comment on.

The thing is how they focused a lot on the results of studies. Because only from these studies could they get their 'scientific data'. More of these studies were deemed failures and it was more the norm for these studies to fail.

Also how the power of suggestion can have people 'read more into' something that was said in a conversation for example. I believe there to be meanings that haven't been 'actually implied'. That's the hidden meaning. Like how something doesn't make sense until later on because the meaning hasn't been discovered or uncovered.

The studies I find interesting because the results are of interest to lots of people.

It's really funny about this: On the bus home, I was reading one of those free newspapers, thinking that I like having interesting reading material, not knowing that Sean had suggested something for me to read. In the back of the newspaper is the astrology section and my horoscope said this:

When in doubt today, take the road less traveled.
If you fail to conquer your dream, at least you'll have an exciting story.
It's not always about the result, but rather the process.

It reminds me of the saying that if you keep doing something the same way, you'll always get the same result. You have to do things differently to get a different result. Maybe, just maybe, the studies failed not because the results weren't right, but because the process wasn't right.

I do enjoy science, if there is a scientific explanation for things, then it helps to make sense of it. (And making sense of something all depends on the interpretation of the findings.)

I'm not saying that I think I'm psychic. I don't really believe I have any 'special abilities' or 'skills'. I can't see ghosts, but that doesn't mean that I don't feel 'something' (a change in the surrounding energy). That 'egocentric thinking' could be a good reason WHY some people BELIEVE. But I'm not one to pretend that I'm something I'm not. I believe for my own reasons. I try to test my theories when I can and I often don't do any 'tests'. I ask questions. Not because I'm a skeptic, but because like other people, I want to have some sort of 'meaning'. Okay, I will agree that people can 'create' 'meaning' out of meaninglessness, but if there is a connection to something, there could be meaning associated with the connection. That is what I look for. The kind of info I get seems vague and could mean anything and can possibly mean nothing at all. The thing is that I don't know whether or not it means something or not because I have to ask those questions that are hard to ask to get the answers. One of the reasons I think there could be meaning if because I got a certain name whereas I could have gotten another name.

You know how radios can pick up on different signals at different frequencies? I think that the mind can work that way, too. I think it's like this: you have to have a certain frequency to pick up on a certain signal. You can turn the dial and pick up almost anything from anywhere. You can even get different frequencies like how you can be on a radio receiver and pick up on a signal from a telephone. But radio receivers aren't meant for telephones. Telephones are meant for telephones. Radios are meant for radios. They shouldn't mix, but they can and they do. It's something along those lines.

How is that even possible? I believe that it is connected to energy. It's everywhere around us and most of us don't know all the ways it can work or all the things it can do or be used for. Mind power = energy.
Thought waves (or brainwaves) = energy. Heat = energy. Without energy not even the smallest signal could be transmitted or received. Mind manipulation isn't about manipulating the mind, it is about manipulating the energy that the mind uses and the way the mind uses it.

Anyone can make vague statements like: You will travel to some place and the name of the place will start with the letter B. It is vague because there are lots of places that could start with the letter B. But if they gave more specific information, I'd be more inclined to wonder how they got that information.

I went to see a psychic at a psychic fair because it was my first time seeing one and I wanted to try it out. It was so long ago that I don't remember a lot about what she said. The things that she was right about, I remember those because she was right. That goes for a lot of people and I was reading that in the book. How people cling to the things that were proven right and forget the things they were wrong about. The thing is I feel that the things that could be 'wrong' could be meant for something else and could be 'right' in other contexts. That's why some people think some things as being too vague, because they could also be applied and should probably be applied elsewhere.

While I was traveling on the bus, around strangers, I got vibes. Mostly names. Of course, how do you strike up a conversation and try to make it seem normal enough to work your way up to asking those questions. I like having 'volunteers' because I like conducting my own experiments. If I'm wrong, fine, okay, no big deal. If I'm right, I want to know why and how I got the information.

The information is just the result. The how is the process. The why is the explanation.

I'm still going to keep reading the book, but I'll say this: I'd rather be a believer or at least have an open mind than just being so skeptical as to try to tell other people why they shouldn't believe.

The word agnostic came up, too. Sort of half-way between believer and non-believer. "I have to see it to believe it" way of thinking. Experience is the only way to really make one's mind up. I can say I believe in my experiences because I'm the one who experienced it.