Do ghosts believe in themselves? Here’s what one queer paranormal investigator has to say about it…

The following is an excerpt from Goodbye Hello: Processing Grief and Understanding Death through the Paranormal by paranormal investigator and host of Travel Channel’s Kindred Spirits Adam Berry available through Regalo Press on September 26, 2023.

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Growing up in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, church was a big part of my childhood. My parents weren’t that religious, but every Sunday, Grannie would make sure my brother and I were sitting in a pew at Central Baptist Church. As a child I was “saved” and baptized in the same baptismal tank as my family—but the more sure I became of who I was as a person, the harder it was to feel any connection to a church where the pastor found any excuse to preach against the “evils” of homosexuality. As I got older and found peace within myself, I became more and more estranged from a church that was sermonizing about AIDS as God’s punishment for gay men and that the entire LGBTQ+ community was going to suffer eternal damnation.

By the time I reached high school, I had broken away from traditional organized religion. I had to do it in order to survive, but that doesn’t mean that I am not spiritual or that I don’t believe in God. Nowadays, I have complicated feelings about what heaven and hell are, not just whether they really exist, but whether they are different for people depending on their beliefs. But also, I think my connection to a higher power is deeper because now I am doing it on my own terms. I make no excuses for who I am as a person and God continues to truly bless my life with so many wonderful things.

The study and practice of understanding paranormal phenomena is in and of itself a kind of belief system. Religious practice is grounded completely in belief and faith, and so is the exploration of supernatural phenomena. While we don’t belong to a single organization or possess a unified idea of God in the paranormal community—for example, many people who question the existence of a higher power believe in ghosts and metaphysical concepts— the underlying philosophy is the same. Those of us who take what we do very seriously often study texts about the paranormal, which lead us to have our own theories as to why ghostly activity occurs and how to communicate with spirits. Also, we seek to learn from those who have scholarly ideas about the spiritual world. The one thing we all have in common is faith that there is more going on around us than meets the eye.

None of us can really know, without a doubt, what’s after this life until we get there. Or can we? The more time I have spent researching the paranormal in my life, the more sure I’ve become that communicating with ghosts on this plane of existence can teach me about the afterlife. I believe it’s possible to find out more about what happens after we die from ghosts that we encounter during paranormal investigations. They can teach us about what it’s like wherever they are, and can help shed some light on why some ghosts stay behind. If there really is someplace else for spirits to go after they die, why haven’t the ghosts who have stayed behind made the ultimate transition to where they are supposed to be?

For me, the obvious answer is that if a spirit is doomed to face hell for eternity—or, putting aside whether that’s actually true, if a person who has died believes they will go to hell if they move on—I can absolutely see why they might want to hang on to this earthly realm a bit longer. I mean, if you get to make the decision after you die, the choice seems pretty clear between eternal damnation or hanging out behind the veil with a bunch of mortals.

Why not ask the source, you might wonder. As paranormal investigators, we have access to non-living people who, as far as we can surmise, have experience with the other side. Surely a ghost or two will be able to inform us of what is actually going on, right? Not so fast.

Talking to Spirits About the Great Beyond

In fact, most of the contact we have with spirits is void of the topics of heaven and hell, or any serious questioning about what the afterlife is like. It really never comes up in conversation. Usually, we are focused on trying to find out what they need or want. Whether the spirit knows anything about their version of heaven is not important in terms of what we are trying to accomplish, and holds very little weight.

However, on occasion, we have asked. When Amy and I have brought it up, it’s usually because we know something about a ghost’s spiritual beliefs in life—specifically, when we find out that the person we are trying to contact in spirit form was not religious or didn’t believe in ghosts or anything paranormal in life. That situation raises such interesting questions. Now that they’re in spirit communicating with us, have their views and thoughts changed?

Have they learned anything about the hereafter? What about ghosts? Do they believe in themselves? 

Goodbye Hello: Processing Grief and Understanding Death through the Paranormal by Adam Berry will be available through Regalo Press on September 26, 2023.