Have you ever experienced a paranormal phenomenon?

[Blackadder]

what about religious phenomenon?

I have been to some Christian mass gatherings where really strange things happened. (Never to me) People act in weird ways and they (the Christians) think the Holy ghost? (I don't know the exact theology about it) makes that happen.

well I can certainly say something happened but I have no evidence it is paranormal. I would like to read about some scientific explanations about religious mass hysteria

 

[JihadJane]

Your ignorance on this subject is not evidence of your powers.

I am not claiming any special powers. From my experience it seems anyone can do it.

If industrial civilisation survives the end of the fossil fuel era I'm sure scientists, in a hundred years time, will agree with my assessment that science's current understanding of consciousness and the mind is primitive.

Amazing. Prove it. There's a million dollars awaiting you.

Not really. Do some training yourself and claim the money yourself!

 

[paximperium]

I am not claiming any special powers. From my experience it seems anyone can do it.

Really? Then be very very specific about these powers. What can you do?

If industrial civilisation survives the end of the fossil fuel era I'm sure scientists, in a hundred years time, will agree with my assessment that science's current understanding of consciousness and the mind is primitive.

What garbage. Oh, nobody has said that we don't fully understand the brain as of yet, but then out lack of understanding of the brain does not in anyway make your magical claims even plausible.

Not really. Do some training yourself and claim the money yourself!

The cop-out of every psychic. Pathetic coward. You don't even believe in your so-called powers.

 

[chillzero]

I think if you jump on anyone who claims 'yes' to any of these, other potential participants are going to be put off. So perhaps we could cool off a little?

To the topic:
For myself, yes - I had several 'psychic' events, plus I had two other experiences which at the time I put down to two of my grandparents contacting me from 'the other side'. I believed my grandmother spoke to me once: I heard her voice as clearly as I hear anyone's speaking to me on the same room. I also believed my grandfather's spirit came to visit and watch over my daughter every night until I became so distressed by it I asked him to stop.

I also believed I had once 'communicated' with my spirit guide, who I believed I had physically felt standing by my shoulder for years.

 

[Darat]

Chill I don't think anyone is jumping on anyone - JihadJane is making a claim of being able to do something that would for little effort earn her(?) a million dollars yet is not willing to make that million dollars - a rather strange attitude.

 

[Darat]

I am not claiming any special powers. From my experience it seems anyone can do it.

...snip...

Thankfully for you the million dollars are not dependent on your views of your "non-special powers", the JREF considers remote viewing a suitable "ability" to earn you a cool one million dollars.

...snip...

Not really. Do some training yourself and claim the money yourself!

If you aren't bothered about getting your hands on a million dollars for yourself why not do it and give all the money to a charity?

 

[chillzero]

Chill I don't think anyone is jumping on anyone - JihadJane is making a claim of being able to do something that would for little effort earn her(?) a million dollars yet is not willing to make that million dollars - a rather strange attitude.

Well, the language is a bit confrontational in the post before mine, that's all. Anyway, I didn't feel that the thread was posted in order to confront those who claim they did have paranormal experiences, rather to gauge how many people feel they did and possibly discuss those.

*shrug*
just my two cents.

 

[Cainkane1]

I once saw Lon Chaney walk across the living room floor wearing his werewolf costume but I believe I was just lonely and bored.

 

[Cuddles]

I've seen lots of UFOs. Never seen anything paranormal though.

 

[Spektator]

For several years I thought I had had either a precognitive dream or a spirit visitation: as I recalled it, a close friend woke me up late at night to say "goodbye," and the next morning I learned he had died in a car accident. Only I kept a journal, and after several years of telling the story like that I re-read my journal and discovered I'd had the dream days after his death, on the night following his funeral, in fact. Memory plays tricks.

I once saw a spectacular UFO that later turned out to be a high-altitude weather balloon releasing an instrument package.

A friend did a Tarot reading for me once that said I was wasting my time on a project I was working on, that it would never come to fruition. A year after that it was published as a textbook, and I still receive royalties on it after more than ten years.

And there were other things. I once as a joke claimed to do a psychic reading on someone about whom I had gained accidental knowledge and badly frightened her, to my lasting regret. I once tried to demonstrate the old "one-ahead" mind-reading technique to a class studying critical thinking...only to have some students from the Baptist Student Union ask the administration to fire me, because I was obviously in league with Satan.

Real paranormal stuff? No.

 

[Senex]

Chill I don't think anyone is jumping on anyone -

That's the problem in a nutshell.

I can honestly state that my life has never been visited by the paranormal -- and I doubt it ever will.

 

[Limbo]

Numerous instances of seemingly anomalous cognition. Plus a group 'UFO' sighting at close range. Plus a group 'poltergeist' encounter with stuff flying around, noises, lights and appliances acting crazy, etc. Plus other odd things. Odd dreams, etc.

 

[oldunbeliever]

Does this count?

I said no, but after thinking about the OP's original poll premise I probably should have said yes. I have had what some people I describe it to construe as a NDE but which I feel certain was nothing more than a drug-induced dream. Those who construe otherwise are, I believe, simply deluded. But nonetheless they are fervent in their beliefs.

 

[calibos]

I once saw a shadowy figure disappear right in front of my eyes.....until my brain refreshed its visual perceptual cache and re-drew the figure as a waving bush and shadows.

I once saw a ufo make a sharp instantaneous 90 degree turn.......until I realised that I had just witnessed a chance alignment of two aircraft at different heights crossing each others paths from my perspective made all the more convincing because of the patches of cloud in the area which happened to hide one as the other appeared just after the crossover point.

I once found I was being psychically messed with by a window cleaner because I got waves of goosebumps whenever I saw him walking down the street.....until I realised it was his rubber blade sqeeuking on the window the first time we met that aroused my spider senses and now my nervous system assosciated this guy with this sensation and initiated the goosebumps whether the guy was cleaing windows or not.

I once heard the ghost of a baby crying until I really listened and realised it was a bunch of feral cats.

I once took vitamin C after contracting a cold on the recommendation of a friend. Sure enough my cold disappeared about 2 weeks later.

The difference between my paranormal experiences and those of a believer is that while we both think it would be cool for the paranormal and supernatural to be true, he 'really' wants it to be true so doesn't rationally examine the experience, whereas I would prefer not to turn off my brain and ignore the evidence.

 

[Safe-Keeper]

Damnit, should've read OP before voting.

Remove one reply from "Seen UFO". I've seen something that I at the time didn't know what was. I do now, though.

 

[paximperium]

I think if you jump on anyone who claims 'yes' to any of these, other potential participants are going to be put off. So perhaps we could cool off a little?

I have no issue with people stating their personal experiences when it comes to "supernatural" experiences, I have an issue with people claiming powers and refusing to produce evidence when called on it.

You will notice that she/he/it claimed to be able to produce these "non-supernatural" trained psychic powers at will.

 

[quarky]

Mine all involve wild animals. It might not qualify as paranormal, because I live in a wild place and love wild animals. Here's one quirky thing that often happens:
A moment before encountering a snake, I think of a snake. A snake image appears in my mind; then I see the snake.

 

[ksbluesfan]

I've seen lights in the sky that didn't have an obvious explanation. I don't believe they were spacecrafts from a civilization far from Earth, but I'm not sure what they were.

 

[ExMinister]

I used to think I had precognitive dreams until I went back through my dream journal and realized that while I did have some dreams that seemed to predict the future, I also had predictions that were wrong. Most of my hard to explain experiences are dream or sleep related and I've spent a lot of time trying to work out rational explanations for them in the past year or so.

Really most of the things I once would have unquestioningly considered paranormal (such as success using a pendulum, Ouija board, Tarot cards, visionary experiences etc.) I now have found rational explanations for, or (in the case of visionary experiences) I at least realize there is just as likely a rational explanation as a paranormal one.

There is still one thing that I haven't been able to explain and that is a situation 10 years ago when I was going through a great deal of stress and would set off the alarms in stores whenever I went in or out. It only happened in the stores that had the frame type thing you have to walk through to get in or out. It lasted for several months then stopped. I guess my paranormal explanation at the time was that my emotional upset was causing my energy to "spike" and set off the alarms (kind of like the woo explanation for poltergeist activity). I still don't have a rational explanation for that one. Most of the others I've been able to explain.

 

[Soapy Sam]

I once received a second class stamped letter the same day it was posted.
Other than that, no.

ETA-ExMinister. This happened to me several times a few days before Christmas about ten years ago.
Turned out I had bought a jacket as a present, which had an "Oboe" sensor tucked away in an inside pocket.
Luckily I found it before I gave it to the unsuspecting girlfriend.