Our dreams are a fascinating reflection of who we are. They change as we grow as people, often dissolving our anxieties, interactions and thoughts into one big thick stew of images that are often challenging to interpret. Carl Jung once wrote in his collection of essays, Civilization in Transition, “The […]
Resident Spirits
When it comes to spirituality and the climate crisis, I’m more in tune with nature
The current climate crisis and accompanying erratic weather — deadly heat waves in Europe and the high swells in Hawaii — have me thinking about my spirituality. I’ve never been one for organized religion. I’ll admit to being an apatheist — one who has a general apathy towards the existence […]
True crime: The greatest influence on our modern ghost stories
There is a strong relationship between the paranormal and true crime. Tailing along like an awkward teenage third wheel is mental health because, in a lot of the more gruesome cases, there’s an element of deviation. Horror tropes borrow strongly from true crime. Look at a fair amount of our […]
It’s no surprise humans are excluded from alleged ‘galactic federation’
By now, most people have heard the musings of the former head of Israel’s Defense Ministry’s space directorate that there is a galactic federation and humans are not welcome. Additionally, America’s belligerent, Tang-skinned leader knows about it. It’s a lurid detail that was disclosed by Haim Eshed to Israel’s Yediot […]
What to listen to this Halloween
Paranormal and pop culture go hand-in-hand. I’m often reminded of the “Supernatural” episode where the Winchester brothers battle a tulpa. It’s a broken telephone episode that features people telling a ghost story, and altering it as the plot progresses. New tropes are added to snazzy it up or to keep […]
We need more diversity in our paranormal TV
Myling of Sweden. Banshee of Ireland. Manananggal of the Philippines. Mami Wata of Nigeria. Ifrit of the Middle East. Domovoy of Russia. La Llorona of Mexico. Chudail of Pakistan. Wendigo of the First Nations. And the Yurei of Japan. With the most commonly reported supernatural entity in the world being […]
Pandemic gives us a chance to reflect on the afterlife
Ever since I wrote the feature on past life regression in Canada, my mind has been thinking about what comes next. And maybe the pandemic is creating a minor existential crisis for all of us because a virus is threatening our very way of life and claiming a lot of […]
The challenges of being a journalist who digs in the paranormal dirt
I could probably defend the reason why I started the Superstitious Times until my vocal cords seize up, but some people will still see the endeavour as a Fox Mulder-esque pursuit. I prefer Dr. John Montague of Shirley Jackson’s universe because much like him, my fascination with what people believe […]
Being in the right headspace helps to process paranormal
A few years ago, I was having a conversation with an old university friend about the paranormal, and how as a neuroscientist he had induced ghostly sounds and associated symptoms of a haunting in a laboratory. I was hoping that he would share his thoughts in a column for the […]
Always remember the ‘unidentified’ in UFO, and take the Scully approach
There’s been a higher volume of UFO news over the past few months, ranging from the U.S. Navy changing their approach to members reporting sightings to the increased numbers of purported sightings. Often times, the usual suspects — International Business Times and the Independent — are publishing odd-ball claims of […]