You know, I didn't even know there was a difference between ghosts and spirits. I figured they were words that meant the same thing. My niece, Kim, sent me some information from http://wiki.answers.com/ that shed some light on the subject. It still confuses me somewhat, but I thought I'd take this information that I read and relay it to you. Perhaps you can grasp it better than I can.
A ghost is a personality or a piece of a personality of someone who has passed that is left behind because there is something that is keeping them here. There are many possible reasons of why they would stay behind here are the most likely reasons - they don't know they have passed. This can happen if they were killed or died suddenly and usually tragically. They could have been a murder victim or even possibly died in an accident that happened suddenly. One haunting that I can think of to be a good example is the Villisca House haunting. In the Moore home at Villisca, Iowa, 8 people were brutally murdered in the middle of the night. The whole family, including two children that were staying the night with the Moore children were killed in their sleep with an axe. The man who killed them was never found, leaving this gruesome murder a mystery. The house is now said to be haunted by some of the victims of that tragic night.
Another reason a ghost might have stayed behind is because they feel an attachment to a place, object or even a person. If they are attached to a place, it could be because it was what they considered to be their home, or even just a place that they had their happiest moments in their life. If they're attached to an object it is usually an object that they held very dear to them. If it is a person they have an attachment to, it is usually because they have such a great love for that person. They may feel like that person still needs them. Or they just might not want to leave that person behind. An example of an attached haunting would possibly be the White House ghosts. Former presidents are said to still roam the halls of this great house. If you think about it being the President of the United States would most likely have been the happiest time of their lives and you most certainly would love for that to be your home I'm sure. I know I would have certainly loved to live there just from all the history that has taken place there.
Unfinished business could be another reason that a haunting could occur. The ghost might feel the need to continue so that something could be finished or taken care of before they will pass on. Winchester Mystery House comes to mind immediately for this one. Sarah L. Winchester wanted her home to be built with many odd things built into it. She hired carpenters to work on her home day and night. Construction would never cease on the home until her death. She was the widow of the inventor of The Winchester rifle, William Wert Winchester. After the deaths of her husband and daughter, she contacted a medium for guidance. This medium told her that the spirits of the victims of the Winchester rifle were wanting vengeance and the only way she could escape the curse that had befallen her husband and child was to build a home for herself and those spirits. She must continue to build or she would die as soon as the building stopped. In her home she had doors to nowhere, windows that were built to open up to a wall. There would be many entrances to a room, but only one exit. Stairs led to a ceiling and there were many other oddities. This house was definitely a mystery. Some of the carpenters worked on the home until their deaths. Their ghosts are said to still be working on the home. The noise of hammers sometimes will be heard and one phantom carpenter has been seen. He is supposedly there guarding the home and overlooking the construction still being done even in the afterlife. Sarah Winchester is even said to still be there.
Then there are the residual haunting. These are the hauntings that have no intelligence. These hauntings are like a recording that has been imprinted on the land or home in which it takes place at. They will happen at a certain time or date or just random. It will be almost like a scene that is the same all the time. It could also take place as noises or smells. The perfect example of this is the Civil War battlefields. Most of the hauntings that take place at these battlefields are sounds and smells of the ghastly war that took place on its grounds. Cannon and gun fire have been the main residual hauntings from the battlefields, but there are reports of fleeting apparitions of men who still seem to be fighting the war as if it were still going on around them.
Now this brings me to Spirits. Spirits are different from ghosts because they are not bound to this earth. Spirits are actually the passed on personalities of a living person. Spirits will come back for a time. They can come back for many reasons, but the most common is to tell a loved one a message or to help a loved one cross over. There have been many accounts from people of a loved one coming back to warn of impending danger, or simply to just let the loved one know that they are okay and happy. There is also a belief that they will come back to comfort a loved one who is dying and make the transition of death a little easier on them. Most spirits will return to where they came from after they have done what they came to do. There are many personal experiences and I can not thing of a famous instance of this although I'm sure there most likely is. One story I know of is a personal experience of my mothers. After the birth of her first child she was sitting in her room brushing her hair as she looked into a mirror. Suddenly, her face transformed into the face of her mothers, who had died when she was a young girl. As she stared into her mother's face, she got the overwhelming sense that her mother was proud of her. Her mother said nothing, just merely gave her that feeling. My mother really truly believed that that was a visit from her mother.
It would be nice to hear your views on this subject. Do you believe there is a difference between a ghost and a spirit? How would you translate the information above? It is a subject I might research furthermore later on. Anyways, that's all I got for now.
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