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Definition:
The unexplained belief is used when talking about the unknown. It is used when talking about topics that haven't been discovered yet, or can't be explained. An example of this is if there is other planets with living forms like earth. Since this has not been proven yet and we can only see so far into space, it is unexplained.
Connection:
This is a great article because it provides many great examples of unexplained mysteries. A good example in this article that they provide is when people have near death experiences and see a tunnel of light, or sometimes see God. Since we are only going off statements of people who have been in the situations and we cannot prove it, many people choose not to believe.

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Science is powerful, but there is much it can't explain. And when people see, hear or believe something that is not explained, science finds itself trying to prove things don't exist, and that's truly impossible. In the following pages, you'll learn more about some of the most common inexplicable phenomena - from ghosts to supposed man-like beasts, from incredible experiences at the line between life and death to amazing but unexplained feats of the mind itself. How much of this is real? We'll let you decide.

Related: Check out the 14 biggest historical mysteries that will probably never be solved.

The Taos Hum

Some residents and visitors in the small city of Taos, New Mexico, have for years been annoyed and puzzled by a mysterious and faint low-frequency hum in the desert air.

Oddly, only about 2 percent of Taos residents report hearing the sound. Some believe it is caused by unusual acoustics; others suspect mass hysteria or some secret, sinister purpose. Whether described as a whir, hum, or buzz and whether psychological, natural, or supernatural no one has yet been able to locate the sound's origin. Thing is, a survey revealed that those who claim to hear the sounds actually hear many different sounds, suggesting the experiences may be subjective, not actually objective sounds (and pretty certainly not one particular sound).

The next item on our list could fill big shoes if it had to. Guess what it is?

For decades, large, hairy, manlike beasts called Bigfoot have occasionally been reported by eyewitnesses across America. Despite the thousands of Bigfoot that must exist for a breeding population, not a single body has been found. Not one has been killed by a hunter, struck dead by a speeding car, or even died of natural causes. In the absence of hard evidence like teeth or bones, support comes down to eyewitness sightings and ambiguous photos and films.

Since it is logically impossible to prove a universal negative, science will never be able to prove that creatures like Bigfoot and the Loch Ness monster do not exist, and it is possible that these mysterious beasts lurk far from prying eyes. Call us skeptical, and check out our complete story about Bigfoot.

Intuition

Whether we call it gut feelings, a 'sixth sense,' or something else, we have all experienced intuition at one time or another. Of course, gut feelings are often wrong (how many times during aircraft turbulence have you been sure your plane was going down?), but they do seem to be right much of the time. Psychologists note that people subconsciously pick up information about the world around us, leading us to seemingly sense or know information without knowing exactly how or why we know it. But cases of intuition are difficult to prove or study, and psychology may only be part of the answer.

If your intuition is telling you that the next slide is about mysterious disappearances, you're right!

Mysterious Disappearances

People disappear for various reasons. Most are runaways, some succumb to accident, a few are abducted or killed, but most are eventually found. Not so with the truly mysterious disappearances. From the crew of the Marie Celeste to Jimmy Hoffa, Amelia Earhart, and Natalee Holloway, some people seem to have vanished without a trace. When missing persons are found, it is always through police work, confession, or accident never by 'psychic detectives'). But when the evidence is lacking and leads are lost, even police and forensic science can't always solve the crime.

One word about our next slide: Boo!

Ghosts

From the Shakespeare play "MacBeth" to the NBC show "Medium," spirits of the dead have long made an appearance in our culture and folklore. Many people have reported seeing apparitions of both shadowy strangers and departed loved ones. Though definitive proof for the existence of ghosts remains elusive, sincere eyewitnesses continue to report seeing, photographing, and even communicating with ghosts. Ghost investigators hope to one day prove that the dead can contact the living, providing a final answer to the mystery.

Our next mystery is not about ghosts. Our next mystery is not about ghosts. Wait a minute? Haven't I read that before somewhere?

Deja vu

Deja vu is a French phrase meaning 'already seen,' referring to the distinct, puzzling, and mysterious feeling of having experienced a specific set of circumstances before. A woman might walk into a building, for example, in a foreign country she'd never visited, and sense that the setting is eerily and intimately familiar. Some attribute deja vu to psychic experiences or unbidden glimpses of previous lives. As with intuition (see #3), research into ,human psychology can offer more naturalistic explanations, but ultimately the cause and nature of the phenomenon itself remains a mystery. [ All About Deja Vu]

The next mystery is really out of this world. Read on!

UFOs

There is no doubt that UFOs (Unidentified Flying Objects) exist - many people see things in the skies that they cannot identify, ranging from aircraft to meteors. Whether or not any of those objects and lights are alien spacecraft is another matter entirely; given the fantastic distances and effort involved in just getting to Earth from across the universe, such a scenario seems unlikely.

Still, while careful investigation has revealed known causes for most sighting reports, some UFO incidents will always remain unexplained. [ UFO Sightings & News]

You must check out the next mystery. We're deadly serious.

Near-Death Experiences and Life After Death

People who were once near death have sometimes reported various mystical experiences (such as going into a tunnel and emerging in a light, being reunited with loved ones, a sense of peace, etc.) that may suggest an existence beyond the grave. While such experiences are profound, no one has returned with proof or verifiable information from "beyond the grave."

Skeptics suggest that the experiences are explainable as natural and predictable hallucinations of a traumatized brain. A study of people in cardiac arrest in 2015 found that when the heart is dying, it gets peppered by signals from the brain, which tries to stay active. The scramble of signals might be responsible for near-death experiences, researchers figure.

Two mysteries to go. Can you divine what they might be?

Psychic powers and ESP

Psychic powers and extra-sensory perception ( ESP) rank among the top ten unexplained phenomena if for no other reason than that belief in them is so widespread. Many people believe that intuition (see #3) is a form of psychic power, a way of accessing arcane or special knowledge about the world or the future. Researchers have tested people who claim to have psychic powers, though the results under controlled scientific conditions have so far been negative or ambiguous. Some have argued that psychic powers cannot be tested, or for some reason diminish in the presence of skeptics or scientists. If this is true, science will never be able to prove or disprove the existence of psychic powers.

The Body/Mind Connection

Medical science is only beginning to understand the ways in which the mind influences the body. The placebo effect, for example, demonstrates that people can at times cause a relief in medical symptoms or suffering by believing the cures to be effective - whether they actually are or not. Using processes only poorly understood, the body's ability to heal itself is far more amazing than anything modern medicine could create. So while there are many unexplained phenomena, and frankly some of them are dubious, the explainable science of the body and mind, even if we're still trying to figure much of it out, may be among the most amazing phenomena of all.

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Science is powerful, but it cannot explain everything. And in the vacuum of facts, some strange ideas develop.

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Post 8 - Reason For Belief: Emotional Connection 

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Post 8 - Reason For Belief: Emotional Connection 

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Definition:
One big reason people choose to believe is if they have some sort of emotional or personal connection to a topic. Emotions can blur our thoughts and make us want to believe in something, even though it may be incorrect.
Connection:
The article below answers many questions on what an emotional connection is, as well as some benefits and cons to an emotional connection.

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Welcome to my blog, Emotional Connection!

I'm delighted that the blog premieres on Psychology Today just as my book on the same subject, The One Thing Holding You Back: Unleashing the Power of Emotional Connection, hits the stores.

With that it mind, I'd like to begin by describing Emotional Connection, how it works, and why it's essential in getting ourselves unstuck and functioning at our optimal state of performance and well being.

Recently, in preparation for the book, I discussed all that in an interview. Here it is below. Thanks for taking a look. I'm excited to create a dialogue with you on this subject, and would therefore heartily welcome all your questions and comments.

Q: Why is learning about emotional connection so important?

RC: Most of us grow up without ever learning what an emotion is, how to honor it, or how to feel it successfully. In fact, we get harmful messages to the contrary about "counting to ten" and bottling up our powerful feelings.

The truth about emotions is pretty straightforward. They're messages from the brain that are delivered in the body. To receive these messages we need to feel them where they arise.

If we're lonely, for example, the message might show up as a stab in the heart, a tug in the stomach, a welling behind the eyes, or all three. Counterintuitive as it may seem, to feel a painful emotion fully, at the site of its delivery, is the best way to help it diminish. Not feeling the emotion, on the other hand, causes it to grow stronger, remain longer, and mess up our lives in many ways.

Q: Often the message an emotion sends is unhelpful or just plain wrong - like buy this! or be afraid of that! If I pause to feel such emotions fully, aren't I just encouraging them?

RC: No, the opposite is true. To feel an emotion you must become aware of it. With that awareness you're best able to assess its validity. Without it, you're only able to respond to the emotion unconsciously.

Let's say you're afraid of intimacy in romantic relationships. You can't make yourself unafraid by trying not to be. But letting yourself experience the fear will reveal its origins from the past. You'll then be able to address and heal those earlier events. In the process you'll literally recalibrate your emotional response. You'll become less fearful going forward, and only when appropriate.

Q: You say that the one thing holding us back from our greatest possible success and well being is resistance to emotion. How so?

RC: Whenever you're not willing to feel an emotion, your choices and behaviors stem from your avoidance of that emotion. Your resistance then runs your life, and is directly contrary to your overall best interest.

Take the case of a man who's unable to feel inferior. This resistance is likely to make him allergic to criticism. He'll go out of his way to avoid criticism, or to deflect it, and will therefore deny himself the chance to hear potentially crucial feedback.

Q: If avoiding emotions is so detrimental, why do we do it?

RC: Through a glitch in evolution, our brains are wired to perceive challenging emotions as life threatening. We respond the same way to loneliness, for example, as to footsteps in a dark alley.

But emotions are inside of us, so we can't actually run away from them. All we can do, therefore, is attempt to stuff them down or numb ourselves to their affects. In doing so we'll use anything at our disposal - alcohol, cigarettes, porn, gambling, TV, the Internet, shopping, Chunky Monkey. Emotional suppression is a trillion dollar industry with countless tentacles reaching deep into every corner of our culture.

In truth, however, it's not really the substances and activities to which we're addicted. What we're addicted to, at our core, is emotional resistance.

Q: Which emotions do people most commonly resist?

RC: In the book I list thirty-three commonly resisted emotions. These emotions aren't just the usual suspects like anger or hurt. They also include more specific emotions like jealousy or lack.

Resistance to jealousy, for example, leads to controlling behavior in relationships. We think that jealousy itself is the source of such behavior when in fact it's the resistance. A person who is able to experience jealousy directly, physically, loses all need to control.

Resistance to lack, likewise, leads to hasty and unwise spending. A person who can tolerate the visceral sensation of not having enough is able to remain patient, and discerning, when presented with possible purchases.

Q: So how do we fix this glitch in evolution, release our habitual resistance, and start connecting to our emotions directly?

RC: The antidote to emotional resistance is acceptance. This means learning to accept your emotions, in your body, as soon as they arise. This acceptance is not mental or theoretical - it's a practical skill.

I call this skill surfing. With internal surfing, your attention is the surfer, and the emotion is the wave. Here's how it works. Suppose someone rejects you. Your initial inclination is to drown your sorrows. Instead, you locate the raw sensation of rejection in your body. Then, you remain attentive to that sensation as it moves and shifts. In the process you ride it out. Soon, much sooner than you'd imagine, this leaves you cleansed, refreshed, and truly over it.

Q: Aren't you making this sound a lot simpler than it is?

RC: No, it really is that simple. But not easy. Often, temporarily, the wave is excruciating. It takes a lot of practice not to bail. After quickly getting to "shore" a few times, however, your motivation grows exponentially.

Another difficulty is that surfing often brings up all kinds of distracting thoughts. In the above example, while surfing, you might simultaneously notice thoughts like, "No wonder I got rejected - I'm a total loser." Or, "I'm better off by myself." Or, "What should I have for dinner?"

Dealing with such thoughts requires noticing them dispassionately, like clouds in the sky, while doing your best to remain on the wave or catching the very next one if you "wipe out."

To be clear, surfing an emotion doesn't mean you must give credence to the thoughts associated with it. In other words, feeling like a loser for a few minutes doesn't mean you ever have to believe that you truly are one.

Q: Besides feeling better as quickly as possible, are there additional benefits to the process of emotional connection?

RC: Whenever we successfully surf an emotion, we also begin to clear ourselves of its backlog.

Staying with the example of rejection, the degree of its sting is connected to how much previously unfelt rejection we currently have on board. With enough surfing it's eventually possible, believe it or not, to experience serious rejection with relatively little upset.

Q: Doesn't this also have something to do with negative patterns?

RC: Negative patterns are caused by stored-up, resisted emotions. They are the way resisted emotions try to get our attention, so that we'll finally feel them.

If you're carrying around a lot of bottled up rejection, to complete our example, you'll actually draw people into your life who are bound to reject you. The good news is that once you surf your way free of that rejection, the pattern loses its power.

Q: What are the greatest stumbling blocks people encounter when trying to release their emotional resistance and begin feeling successfully?

· Analyzing - an attempt to figure our way out of an emotion
"What's going on? Why am I feeling so anxious?"

· Judging - a decision that something's wrong with the emotion, or with us for having it
"This guilt is too much. I shouldn't let him get to me."

· Assessing - excessive focus on how well or poorly we're connecting
"I'm not feeling much of anything. Am I doing this right?"

· Bargaining - conditions placed on how long or how deeply we're willing to feel
"I'll feel this grief fully today, but it better not show up again tomorrow."

Whenever these stumbling blocks occur, the solution is simply to notice them with equanimity and resume surfing as soon as possible.

Q: When people are falling short of their dreams and goals and can't tell which emotions they're resisting, what are they supposed to do?

RC: A big portion of the book is devoted to answering this question. The basic steps are:

1) Find the Flinch - Identify the aspect of moving toward your vision that causes you to pull up short

2) Cut to the Chase - Examine the "worst-case scenario" in going forward and determine how that outcome would make you feel

3) Weather the Storm - Imagine that outcome as a reality, and then connect with the entire range of emotions that arise.

4) Repeat As Necessary - Apply the same course of action if and when you get stuck again in pursuit of your goal, regarding the same emotions from before or any new ones that may arise.

Let's see this in action. A client of mine always wanted to write but never got around to it. His flinch occurred every time he walked past his waiting computer. His worst-case scenario was writing something that his most loved and respected friends thought was pure drek. He realized this would make him feel like an abject failure.

Together, we imagined that he wrote a whole novel, was super excited about it, and gave it to his friends who were promptly horrified. They hated the book vehemently and ridiculed him for writing it.

His emotional response to this imaginary situation was a daunting wave of shame. I guided him to stay on the wave through many challenges and distractions, and after a few minutes it abated.

"Well," he told me, "that really wasn't so bad. I kind of feel like, "Oh, well, at least I tried. That's better than never writing anything."

This process revealed to my client that the one thing holding him back had been his resistance to shame. Repeated a few more times, it released his resistance almost completely. Now, with nothing holding him back, he writes at least thirty minutes a day.

Q: You maintain that emotional resistance is also a health hazard. In what way?

RC: Our emotions want and need to be felt. The harder and longer we keep them locked within, the more they struggle to get out. One result of this battle is stress, which is proven to be a leading cause of serious illness. Another result is the depletion of our life energy, which quickly turns into depression.

Q: You also tout emotional connection as an effective way to end addictions and compulsions. Can you describe how that works?

RC: All addictions and compulsions, as I mentioned earlier, are really about resisting emotions. Once we connect with those emotions, addictions and compulsions lose both their purpose and power.

If you're unwilling to feel disappointment, for instance, you might flop on the couch every week, eat popcorn, watch American Idol and snicker at all the contestants. But once you become willing to experience disappointment, both old and new, you might actually sign up for the Open Mike Night at your local pub.

Or if you're unwilling to feel distrust, you might check your spouse's email over and over. You might even be convinced that you're doing this precisely because you distrust. But once you become willing to feel your distrust directly, your need for hyper vigilance would cease. Instead, you could then choose to talk openly with your spouse about the feeling. Or, if your spouse truly is untrustworthy, you might finally be able to move onto a more healthy relationship.

Q: In Chapter Two, you say that men need emotional connection even more than women. But most men don't like anything remotely "touchy feely." So how do you get around that?

RC: Men in our society have been conditioned to believe that connecting to emotions is a sign of weakness. Yet this is a losing strategy, because wherever emotions are disparaged or denied, they run the show even more forcefully from behind the scenes.

Consider the world of corporate management. A manager who won't allow himself to feel stupid will often feign expertise and make deals that are indeed stupid. A manager who's resistant to boredom will often gloss over lengthy reports and remain ignorant of critical information.

Learning to spot such emotional resistance in others provides a unique competitive edge. Learning to spot and release it within oneself is even more powerful. Plus, one's own emotional connection requires no outward expression and therefore no one else needs to know about it. Men love that!

Q: You draw a big distinction between emotional connection and having an emotional orientation. What's the difference?

RC: Many people talk, write, and even obsess about their emotions without ever actually feeling them. On the surface these people seem emotion-friendly, but in truth they're as resistant as the greatest stoic.

Consider two friends who go over every detail of a recent slight they recently endured. Instead of surfing whatever anger and hurt is present, and resolving the annoyance in just a couple of minutes, they prolong it with lengthy conversation about the emotions. All the while, the emotions themselves are left unattended, unfelt, and festering.

It's also worth pointing out that many counselors and therapists enable such behavior. They might consistently ask variations of the famous question, "And how does that make you feel?" without ever providing the time, space, and instruction necessary for the clients to actually connect with those emotions.

Such therapists aren't trained to feel emotions directly themselves, and therefore can't offer the skill to their clients. Ask potential therapists to describe exactly what if means to feel emotions directly. The quality of their answer will be a great indicator of your future therapeutic success.

Q: Your suggestion to "Feel first, think later" seems like the exact opposite of what parents, bosses, and the world as a whole expect of us. How can we possibly function well if we're always stopping to pay attention to our emotions?

RC: To be specific, my advice is not to act out or somehow become victims to our emotions at any point. Let's use anger as an example. Acting out anger might mean yelling, which is rarely helpful. Becoming a victim to anger might mean fixating upon it, and stoking it, rather than just surfing it out of your system quickly.

What I'm suggesting is simply to recognize and connect with your emotions before addressing any important issue. Here's the reason: When you try to think your way out of a problem before feeling the emotions already arisen within you in regard to that problem, your thoughts can't be trusted.

You might, for example, resist the feeling of hatred for another person because you've been taught that it's wrong. But feelings are never right or wrong; they just are. So the first whiff of hate might kick up a thought like, "I shouldn't feel that way about him. He doesn't know any better."

Such a statement may be true, and even seem helpful, but coming prior to emotional connection it would really be a sophisticated attempt to shield you from the hate. If you left it at that and moved on, an unsurfed wave of hatred would remain to wreak havoc in your core.

Remember: feelings that arise in your body stay in your body unless and until you're willing to feel them.

Q: Doesn't your idea of feeling all emotions, even negative ones like jealously and resentment, contrast with the message of The Secret? Wasn't that idea to stay focused on the positive?

RC: The perspective put forth in "The Secret" and similar books is that we must uplift "negative" emotions into more positive states or else we'll attract more negativity. What I'm saying is that all emotions are valid and need to be felt, in order to receive their message and allow them to depart. The only way to shift from a negative emotional state to a more expansive one is to feel your way through it. No type of will power or self-talk will ever take the place of simple, straightforward feeling.

That said, focusing on the positive is a great practice, as long as doesn't mask simultaneous resistance or turn into a sanctioned way of maintaining it.

Q: What's the link between your approach and Freud's "repetition compulsion?"

RC: Freud theorized that as adults we recreate traumatic experiences from childhood as a way of mastering them once and for all. He wasn't so specific on how that mastery takes place, however, and most of us can attest that simply repeating traumatic experiences without ever learning from them doesn't get us anywhere.

My work with clients has shown me over and over that emotional connection is not just a fast and efficient way to master (or heal) previous trauma. In reality, it's the only way.

Q: How does emotional resistance pertain to our current economic crisis?

RC: Our current economic crisis, at root, is an emotional problem. Clearly, we have been seduced into living beyond our means for way too long. But what made us so susceptible? The answer is our resistance the feeling of lack that I described earlier. We've lost the ability to want things without being able to have them.

If we continue to resist the emotion of lack collectively, any economic fix will prove to be temporary and unsustainable. Learning to surf our lack, on the other hand, will enable us to see the future clearly and to act wisely.

Here's a small but broadly applicable example. I want a new car. My old one is dented and dirty and doesn't have any of the cool stuff like GPS. I see lots of commercials for new models with all the bells and whistles. I cringe inside at being left behind, and start wondering if I could find a way to afford the higher payments.

But then I catch myself - I've been thinking before feeling - and notice the tightness in my chest. I surf it for a few moments and it becomes a big wave of lack. I feel like stomping my feet, throwing a huge fit. "Gimme! Gimme!" I surf this tantrum for another few moments, watching many memories of similar deprivations and tantrums float by.

Gradually, the storm inside me begins to settle. The lack is gone. In its wake I can easily recognize many reasons why a new car, right now, isn't in my best interest. And better yet, I'm at peace with it.

Q: If a sustainable future means I won't get to have what I want, what'll be left?

In a sustainable future you'll still be able to have lots of things you want. But more important, you'll also be able to distinguish and let go of those wants that are part of the addictive cycle. Freed from that cycle, you'll have more time and energy for what really matters - relationships with loved ones, meaningful work, and the abiding joy that only comes from a life of passionate emotional connection.

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Unleashing the Power of Emotional Connection

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Welcome to my blog, Emotional Connection! I'm delighted that the blog premieres on Psychology Today just as my book on the same subject, The One Thing Holding You Back: Unleashing the Power of Emotional Connection, hits the stores.

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Post 7 - Reason For Belief: Patternicity 

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Post 7 - Reason For Belief: Patternicity 

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Definition:
Seeing different patterns in pictures or objects. Many people believe this occurs because people always try to find a connection to objects or pictures
Connection:
This photo demonstrates patternicity because even though this is a photo of an old bath tub, many people see a face within the object. (Ex. The hot/cold knobs are eyes, spout is a nose, and the overflow hole is seen as a mouth)

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Definition:
The Red Herring red flag is when an irrelevant piece of information or question is asked to try and distract you from the original topic or question.
Connection:
In the Image below, we can see the mother using a Red Herring. Her child originally asks for a toy, but the mother distracts the child's attention by imposing a question completely unrelated to the toy. The mother is hoping that the child will then forget all about the toy.

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Definition:
The Ancient Wisdom red flag is the thought that people of previous generation or ancient societies have more knowledge than people of current generations.
Connection:
The article below links to many examples of Ancient Wisdom. One example shown in the article is how the Mayas and Aztecs used to have bloody sacrificial rituals in order to please the gods. Normally these rituals were done to ask for something, Ex. In need of rain. Now people of modern day science now that there is nothing that can be done to force, or wish for rain.

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Over the centuries, historic texts have recorded a large number of rituals - magical or religious - some of which have been preserved in modified forms, while others remain only in obscure, old books. Yet others have been almost completely lost in the mists of time.

Rituals were usually designed to bring an individual something he was lacking, or to ease his day-to-day life. Native Americans, for example, are known for their rituals to call for rain, practiced during periods of drought. The Mayas and Aztecs practiced bloody rituals based on human sacrifice in order to appease the gods from the heavens and to gain abundance and prosperity. Voodoo priests carried out death-sending ceremonies under the patronage of Baron Samedi, a Loa (spirit) of Haitian voodoo. Everything related to death belonged to the domain of Baron Samedi who, as the god of death and resurrection, was able to shorten or to immediately end the life of the one upon whom he had been sent.

The Japanese had yin-yang priests called onmyouji, who practiced a vast number of magic rituals based on Feng Shui techniques borrowed from China. Scandinavians divined the future in runes, while the Romans sacrificed animals during ceremonies dedicated to the gods, and predicted the future according to the state of the organs of these animals. Thus, magic rituals have been grouped on domains such as divination, invocation of spirits, possession, necromancy and many others.
Sacrifice of a young boar in ancient Greece (tondo from an Attic red-figure cup, 510-500 BC, by the Epidromos Painter, collections of the Louvre). (public domain )
Thaumogenesis
Creation of a demon ( buffy.wikia.com)
As magic tries to offer man that which he cannot attain by natural means, it is not surprising that many ancient texts of magic try to propose solutions for the resurrection of loved ones who have passed away. There are many rituals which were believed to be able to bring the dead back to life. Still, even in magic, resurrecting the dead is seen as an unnatural act that can have serious consequences. Thus, not just resurrection techniques have filled the pages of numerous books of magic, but also the consequences of these rituals. Thaumogenesis is believed to be one such consequence.

Thaumogenesis refers to the process through which a demon is believed to be created by means of a resurrection technique. This means that when a resurrection spell is used, two holes are created and two spiritual entities may enter the world of the living, one of these entities being the spirit of the being that is to be resurrected and the second, an entity of demonic nature that is created in the process. In the case where there is exactly one hole that opens, residual demonic energy from the other dimension can cling on to the spiritual entity that is being summoned to cross over to the world of the living to be resurrected. When reaching the world of the living, the residual demonic energy can concentrate and result in the creation of a new demon.

After the resurrection spell is complete, the two entities that have crossed over are said to be linked on the level of existence, such that if the resurrected individual dies, then the new demon also disappears. In addition, it was believed that the existence of the new demon was temporary, meaning that the demon would cease to exist unless it managed to become materialized or killed the resurrected individual in order to break the link. Since resurrection spells deal with changing the natural order of things by means of undoing death, then Thaumogenesis can be seen here as an extreme natural consequence or as a debt that is to be paid.
Numerous rituals in the ancient past concern the shadow, once believed to be connected to the spirit. ( Thomas Leuthard / Flickr Featured image: A frog changes into a princess in the painting Tsarevna Frog ("The Frog Princess") by Viktor Vasnetsov ( public domain ) )
The Spirit Inseparably Linked to the Shadow

In the past, it was believed that the shadow of a living being was its soul or part of its soul. In many languages​​, the word for "shadow" also carries the meaning of "spirit". Thus, numerous practices and rituals have been developed in order to influence a being by means of its shadow. By acting magically on the shadow, one acts on the being in question. Everything that happens to a person's shadow is said to somehow be felt in the physical body. The shadow was seen as the soul of the person in its living manifestation and, when the shadow was not visible, it was believed that the soul had retreated inside the body to enter a temporary state of hibernation. When the shadow reappeared, it was believed that the soul came out of the body, gaining consistency.

It was once believed that the spirit could leave the body for limited periods of time without causing the death of the individual, but this separation was dangerous. If someone intervened magically, that person could capture the soul and without its return to the body, the person would die. Other sorcerers could choose to work on the shadow in order to influence a particular person. As the suggestion to perform a certain action comes from within, acting on the shadow could mean acting on the spirit inside and determining the individual to do what the sorcerer wanted him to do in the first place, while thinking it was his own initiative. Following the same principle, some African tribes believed that a man could be killed by throwing a spear at his shadow, and dreams are seen as the unclear memories of the nocturnal journeys of the spirit.

By Valda Roric

References:

"Paranormal", L.V.B. Publishing

Aurora Inoan - "The Book of Occult Sciences" - Volume 1

Rene Louis - "Dictionary of Misteries"

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Forgotten Rituals and Magical Practices in Ancient History

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Over the centuries, historic texts have recorded a large number of rituals - magical or religious - some of which have been preserved in modified forms, while others remain only in obscure, old books. Yet others have been almost completely lost in the mists of time.

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Definition:
Appeal To Authority can be defined as the thought that because someone may be seen as an expert or may be knowledgeable in a certain field, that they can't be wrong. Ex. Kanye West just released a new pair of shoes, they must be the greatest shoes ever.
Connection:
The article below shows an example of Appeal To Authority. Famous rapper B.O.B along with many other celebrities seem to believe that the earth is flat. Sometimes because of the "power" celebrities have, many people start to question this themselves.

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Rapper B.o.B insists the world is flat and shares 'proof' on Twitter... as cosmologist Neil deGrasse Tyson tweets back about why he's wrong

He's got a new mixtape to promote but rapper B.o.B may not be doing himself many favors by launching into an hours-long Twitter rant about how the Earth is flat.

While he's definitely getting plenty of attention, it's for his apparent lack of scientific knowledge rather than for his attempts to resurrect his music career.

And even acclaimed astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson has waded in to try and educate B.o.B - real name Bobby Ray Simmons Jr. - about why his theory that we've been conned into thinking the world is round is flawed.

'A lot of people are turned off by the phrase 'flat earth' ... but there's no way u can see all the evidence and not know... grow up,' the hip hop artist wrote on his Twitter feed.

'You can regurgitate force fed information all day... still doesn't change physics,' he added.

The 27-year-old Georgia native then posted a series of photos which he claimed showed straight lines between distant points, not curves.

'No matter how high in elevation you are... the horizon is always eye level ... sorry cadets... I didn't wanna believe it either,' he tweeted.

This morning, he revealed a new rap titled 'Flatline,' about out how the horizon is a flat line.

'Globalists see me as a threat,' he says, before comparing himself to Malcom X.

Tyson, 57, a cosmologist and author, responded to an image the music producer posted to support his assertion that Polaris, that's visible above the North Pole, shouldn't be visible from anywhere in the southern hemisphere.

'@bobatl Polaris is gone by 1.5 deg S. Latitude. You've never been south of Earth's Equator, or if so, you've never looked up,' Tyson tweeted.

As for why the Manhattan skyline is visble from Bear Mountain 60 miles away, Tyson wrote: '@bobatl Earth's curve indeed blocks 150 (not 170) ft of Manhattan. But most buildings in midtown are waaay taller than that.'

Still, B.o.B wasn't ready to quit and continued his Twitter frenzy through Sundaynight and into Monday.

He went on to deride the idea that men had landed on the moon and that NASA wasn't, in fact, just part of a wider conspiracy.

'Since we now have household telescopes that can see the surface of the moon, fly to the moon and let us all see it ... @NASA @neiltyson,' the rapper wrote Monday.

'Show me a photo that NASA didn't take ... I'll wait,' he challenged, and Twitter uses obligingly responded with a string of space images taken by the Russian Space Agency, Space X and satellites.

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Rapper B.o.B insists the world is flat and shares 'proof' on Twitter

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He's got a new mixtape to promote but rapper B.o.B may not be doing himself many favors by launching into an hours-long Twitter rant about how the Earth is flat. While he's definitely getting plenty of attention, it's for his apparent lack of scientific knowledge rather than for his attempts to resurrect his music career.

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Definition:
The Confirmation Bias red flag means that people tend to listen or remember information that favours their belief or opinion. This basically means that people only choose to listen to what they want to hear.
Connection:
The image below is a great depiction of Confirmation Bias. Even though they are offering the truth, the people choose to believe in and go see the one that can reassure them of their thoughts/opinion, even if they may be incorrect.

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Definition:
Just because something is "All Natural", does not mean it is safe/healthy to use or consume. Ex. The "Doll’s eyes" plant can be found across eastern and northern North America. Although they are all natural, if eaten they can cause death.
Connection:
As shown in the image below, many beauty or skin care products may be toxic. Even though some may claim to be "All natural", it is a good idea to always check an ingredients list to make sure that the product wont cause any difficulties or irritations when using it.

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By: Ryan Scott - Durham College 2017