Image via WikipediaIn today's world of ever so increasing awareness of the paranormal, we are hearing a lot of terminology that refers to hauntings, paranormal activity and paranormal experiences. This list is a partial run down of the different terms you will more than likely hear as you delve into the world of the paranormal.
Key terms:
Agent: A human being, typically a teenage female, who unknowing directs poltergeist energy.
Angel: Benevolent spiritual beings who help and watch over people.
Apparition: The disembodied soul or spirit that can be seen visually.
Apport: When a solid object seemingly appears from out of nowhere, with the help of the spirits in the presence of a medium.
Asport: When a solid object is teleported to a different location with the help of the spirits in the presence of a medium.
Astral Body: The soul of an individual projected outside of their bodies.
Astral Projection: See Out-Of-Body (OBE).
Atmospheric Apparition: Not actually a ghost or spirit, but instead a "visual imprint" of people and events that was left behind in the environment that continues to replay.
Aura: A field of energy believed by some to surround living creatures.
Automatism: An unconscious or spontaneous muscular movement caused by ghosts or the spirits. Automatic Writing is one form of Automatism.
Channeling: A form of spirit communication where an unseen entity possesses a medium in a controlled environment to impart guidance, wisdom or future events. The channeled entity could be a deceased human being, an Angel, Demon, Elemental or other higher plain spirit.
Clairaudience: A persons ability to hear spirits.
Clairvoyance: Either an internal or external vision of present or future events, spirits, objects, places, and people.
Cold Reading: A psychic reading given with no prior knowledge of the sitter.
Collective Apparition: A ghost or spirit sighting simultaneously by more than one living person.
Crisis Apparition: Ghosts that appear to loved ones and close friends just before or soon after their death.
Cross Correspondence: Information received from the spirit world.
Crossroads: Point where two roads intersection. Said to be a focus point of supernatural energy.
Death Bed Apparitions: See Crisis Apparition.
Demon: Fallen angels associated with evil.
Direct Voice Phenomenon : The voice of a ghost or spirit being spoken to the sitters of a seance. The voice usually comes from some point near the medium, but not through the medium. Sometimes a spirit horn or trumpet is used.
Direct Writing: When ghost or spirit's handwriting appears directly on a previously unmarked, unwritten surface.
Drop-In Communicator: A ghost, spirit or entity that makes its presence known at a seance.
Dowsing: The paranormal detection of underground water or mineral deposits ( or lost persons and objects) using a divining rod or pendulum.
Earth Lights: Luminous phenomena typically shaped in ball form or irregular patches of light appearing randomly and defying explanation.
Ectoplasm: Ectoplasm can be either a solid, liquid or vaporous substance produced by ghosts or spirits, It is usually a milky white color and has an ozone smell. Some forms of ectoplasm are known to move in lifelike patterns.
Electronic Voice Phenomena : EVP is the attempt to capture a ghost or spirits voice on audio recording tapes. Typically there is no voice heard to the people present in the recording but after reviewing the tapes there are strange voices recorded.
Electro-Magnetic Field (EMF) Detectors: Handheld scientific instruments that can pick up electronic and magnetic fields over different frequencies. They can read changes and distortions in the normal electro-magnetic fields.
Elemental Spirit: A spirit associated with one of the classical four elements (fire, earth, air and water).
Energy Vortex: see Ectoplasm.
Extrasensory Perception (ESP): The acquisition of information by means beyond the five human senses.
Exorcism: A religious rite used to cast out a ghost, spirit or entity from a living persons body or a particular location.
Exorcist: A religious "holy man" who conducts an exorcism.
False Awakening: An experience in which a person believes he or she has woken up, but actually is still dreaming.
Family Apparitions: Ghosts that haunt one particular family. Their appearance usally means that someone within the family is about to die.
Focal Person: Person who is at the center of poltergeist activity.
Ghost: The visual appearance of a spirit or soul of a deceased being, human or animal. The disembodied soul or life force.
Ghost Hunter: A living individual who searches out. finds and identifies ghosts and spirits.
Ghost Investigation: a controlled environment, set up to communicate, record, and capture visual evidence of the existence of ghosts.
Ghost buster: A living person who can remove an unwanted ghost, spirit, entity or poltergeist activity from a particular location.
Gray Lady: The ghost of a woman who has died at the hands of a lover or waits for the return of a loved one.
Guardian Angel: An angel believed to protect the individual.
Haunt: A place where a ghost or ghosts frequently return.
Haunting: The continuous manifestation of inexplicable phenomena associated with the presence of ghosts or spirits attached to a particular location.
Haunted Objects: Jewelry, furniture, clothing, etc, that seem to be haunted by a past owner or have been cursed.
Ley Lines: Invisible lines that run between sacred objects or locations.
Levitation: The paranormal raising or suspension of an object or person.
Lucid Dreams: A dream where the dreamer does not know that they are dreaming.
Luminous Phenomena: The experience of strange lights or glows, often around objects or people.
Magnetometer: A technical device used to study the strength, direction and fluctuation or magnetic fields.
Materialization: The manifestation of physical objects, animals or people.
Medium: A person with a gift to communicate with ghosts and spirits on behave of the living.
Modern Apparitions: "New" Ghosts of deceased individuals. They appear in fashion from the current time.
Near-Death Experience : A phenomenon in which a person clinically dies or comes very close to death only to be revived and then can recall in great detail stories of spiritual worlds and other supernatural events.
Orb: A mass of energy in the shape of a ball, there are several classifications depending on size, ghostly apparitions are usually always associated with an orb and are present.
Ouija Board: A board with letters and numbers used by people who are attempting to communicate with ghosts or spirits.
Out-Of-Body : Also called Astral Projection. The phenomenon in which a living person's spirit can exit their body, travel the earth and other spiritual worlds and then return back to their bodies.
Paranormal: Beyond the normal.
Parapsychology: The scientific study of unusual events associated with the human experience and PSI subjects.
Percipient: A living person who sees a ghost, spirit or paranormal event. Phantom Animals: Ghosts of deceased animals.
Photographic Apparitions: Ghosts and spirits that you can't see, but appear in photographs after they are developed.
Poltergeist: "Noisy Ghost." Poltergeists are invisible masses of spirit energy that may or may not be connected to a living human Agent. Some of the most common poltergeists activities include loud unexplained noise, levitations, the moving of objects, and electrical problems.
Possession: When a persons mind and body are taken over by ghosts, spirits or other supernatural entities such as demons.
Precognition: The paranormal awareness of future events.
PSI: A general term used to denote the unknown factors responsible for a variety of paranormal phenomena.
Psychic: Popular term used to denote a person who regularly uses, or who appears to be especially gifted with, psi abilities.
Psychic echo: When sounds from the past have mysteriously recorded themselves into the natural environment.
Psychokinesis : Mind Movement. Psychokinesis (PK) is the apparent ability to influence the environment by intention alone.
Purgatory: The place where the souls of those who have died must go to be cleansed of all their sin before they can be admitted to Heaven.
Radio Voice Phenomenon : The voice of a ghost or spirit communicating through a regular radio.
Reciprocal Apparition: An experience where both the agent and the ghost or spirit see and react to each other.
Recurring Apparitions: Ghosts or spirits that appear in regular cycles, usually once a year, on the anniversary of their dead for example.
Reincarnation: The belief that a soul can be reborn into a new body after death.
Repressed Psychokinetic Energy: A theoretical psychic force unconsciously produced by an individual while undergoing a physical or mental trauma.
Retro-cognition: Paranormal knowledge of past events.
Seance: The gathering of a group of individuals for the purpose of communicating for the ghost of the dead.
Sensitive: Someone who is aware or can detect paranormal events beyond the range of their five human senses.
Sixth sense: Popular term for ESP.
Sleep Paralysis: A frightening state of seeming to being awake but unable to move.
Soul: The spiritual life force or essence, carrying an individual's personality and consciousness of all actions.
Spectre: A ghost or apparition.
Spirit: Often used to define the soul of a person, but it can also be used to represent places such as sacred lakes or objects, shrines, and elemental entities.
Spirit Detection: The reading made by scientific equipment (EMF Detectors, Temperature changes, etc.) when a ghost or spirit is present.
Spirit Photography: Photographs of figures or faces, believed by some to be those of deceased persons.
Spirit Profile: Researching the background and history of the ghost or spirit, then determining it's consistent patterns as a result of the findings.
Spiritualism: Belief systems that ghosts and spirits can and do communicate with the living.
Stigmata: Unexplained markings on a person's body that correspond to the wounds of Christ.
Super-ESP: A more powerful form of telepathy that allow certain individuals to pick up information about a deceased person from other living people.
Supernatural: Something that exists of occurs through some means other than any know force in nature or science.
Time-Slips: Moments where the past and present collide at one point. Telepathy: Mind-to-mind communication.
Telephone Calls From The Dead: When a person receives a telephone call from someone who is dead. The person may or may not know that the caller is deceased.
Teleportation: Paranormal transportation of an object from one location to another, even throgh solid objects.
Transportation Apparitions: The appearance of ghostly cars, trucks, ships, bicycles, carriages, trains, airplanes and anything else that carry people. They haunt their old routes.
Vortex: A opening or doorway between our world and the spirit world.
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