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Hearing Voices After EVP Experiments

Brian Edwards said:
I guess as far as the danger goes, a distinction can be made in some sense between investigation and what I was doing when I was recording EVP which was straight up channeling.

Going into a location, doing some EVP sessions to see if you capture anything is one thing

what I was doing was channeling these unknown entities (I hesitate to say ghost or spirits because who really knows right?)

Of course I was all new to this at the time and my dumb ass didn't realize the difference between what I was doing and the things that I was seeing done during investigations on tv, youtube, etc....

Once I started capturing EVPs, I was hooked and I made doing recording sessions an almost nightly routine for about two months because it was getting to be very easy to hear these voices as the days went by.

I had reached the level where I was one on one communicating with them...in essence I was using EVP as a means of channeling.

I always hear talk about intent and positive vibes, etc.... I can assure you, my experience communicating with these entities was nothing but benevolent in the beginning, they did not seem threatening in any way, they seemed just as fascinated and eager to communicate with me as I was with them, everything was sunshine and rainbows in the beginning essentially, so I wasn't recording with a bad attitude or anything, if anything I became mesmerized by it all, and totally felt at ease

another thing I did, was fork out some money and bought an expensive set of headphones to hear some of the fainter voices better....BIG MISTAKE, it's honing into the lower levels of the noise that I think effected my hearing the most

the more I interacted with "them", the more we were becoming in tune to hearing one another, but of course they were deceiving me the whole time

once they had locked in on my perceptions somehow, they went from being "nice" to sinister very quickly and that's when I started hearing them outside of the recordings...so they struck when it was already too late for me, quitting EVP did nothing to fix the situation at that point, so I never saw it coming.

so using EVP as channeling where you're in prolonged communication with entities (of unknown origin - no matter what they claim) is far, far riskier than setting up a recorder and seeing if you get something, but obviously that could easily lead to the other......it's all about avoiding going down the rabbit hole

also, if you get into doing EVP at this level where it's become an obsession, location doesn't matter anymore, you've essentially lit yourself up as a beacon and there's a good chance you'll get the same result no matter where you are, either because you've already begun to attune yourself to hearing them or you'r being follwed by a particular group of entities

I did most of my EVP recordings in my home, but I also did them in other locations, hell, a few times I even did sessions while I was driving, just left the recording running beside me and listened when I got home just as a test, yeap...in my case I was hearing the same exact voices, so you can light yourself up to them like a beacon essentially
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Fascinating, thank you.
 
I wonder if that comes with training one's mind to hear more voices in less 'noise', until eventually you're hearing them in the innate noise of one's nervous system? The idea seems tenable irrespective of what we consider the origin of the voices to be.

Curiously, the few times when I tried hallucinogens, a notable effect was hearing white noise, assumed it was either background noise that the brain filters out, or the noise of the nerves carrying the audio signals, no idea really, but whatever it was, it's probably still there, just filtered out normally.
 
Discuss: Real, audible EVPs are everywhere. Muddy ones are everywhere. Many of them must be an audio version of paraedolia going on here. The brain fills in things that are seen and heard. It sure clouds the issue.
 
Coastaljames said:
I've always felt this. And EVP "videos" with subtitles guiding you as to what to hear always concern me...

But I find it all fascinating.
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That's the same conclusion that I've reached too.

I did an EVP session with an American researcher here in Stockholm. When we replayed the recordings, we heard "whispers". However, we wrote down independently what we heard. I heard voices speaking Swedish and he heard English.

When I questioned this, his response was "Well of course we heard different things. The spirits communicate in all languages simultaneously".:rolleyes:

This put the lid on it for me. Our brains are looking for patterns and my recent research into Sine Wave Speech patterns confirm all of this (for me). The danger with EVP is that it can act as a trigger for other auditory hallucinations leading to psychological damage and mental health issues.
 
Ringo said:
This put the lid on it for me. Our brains are looking for patterns and my recent research into Sine Wave Speech patterns confirm all of this (for me). The danger with EVP is that it can act as a trigger for other auditory hallucinations leading to psychological damage and mental health issues.
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^^this^^
 
of course, opinions are going to vary on this, but if you ever come across these accounts, (like some of the ones I posted on page one of this thread, not that they are common, but if you ever do) also keep an observant eye on the hallucinations themselves, the things that people are experiencing..... many people are experiencing the same thing, the voices are acting the same way in most of these cases, there's also mention of physical/bodily phenomenon in many cases (I know that in my own case, the voices are just the half of it).

just saying, before closing the book on it, keep an eye out for consistencies, such as you'll see in many of the accounts I posted, people are hearing these voices coming through various background sounds much of the time at an extreme level.......frequent ringing in the ears is common as well

or how when doing EVP, the voices at first are seemingly benign, even benevolent in nature, but then they switch and the voices become extremely harassing.

one of the people I met who started hearing voices after using a spirit box heard many of the same phrases from these voices that I was, one being "we lift you up to take you down"....not an everyday phrase there

there's little details in these accounts to keep an eye out for

the friendly voices seemingly never come out of the recordings and stay friendly... it's always sinister ones that abuse the hell out of people with personal criticisms and other harassment
 
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Brian Edwards said:
of course, opinions are going to vary on this, but if you ever come across these accounts, (like some of the ones I posted on page one of this thread, not that they are common, but if you ever do) also keep an observant eye on the hallucinations themselves, the things that people are experiencing..... many people are experiencing the same thing, the voices are acting the same way in most of these cases, there's also mention of physical/bodily phenomenon in many cases (I know that in my own case, the voices are just the half of it).

just saying, before closing the book on it, keep an eye out for consistencies, such as you'll see in many of the accounts I posted, people are hearing these voices coming through various background sounds much of the time at an extreme level.......frequent ringing in the ears is common as well

or how when doing EVP, the voices at first are seemingly benign, even benevolent in nature, but then they switch and the voices become extremely harassing.

one of the people I met who started hearing voices after using a spirit box heard many of the same phrases from these voices that I was, one being "we lift you up to take you down"....not an everyday phrase there

there's little details in these accounts to keep an eye out for

the friendly voices seemingly never come out of the recordings and stay friendly... it's always sinister ones that abuse the hell out of people with personal criticisms and other harassment
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I agree with what you're saying. I haven't closed the book on it as a genuine physical response/outcome. I have closed the book on it as regards a supernatural cause or paranormal phenomenon.

I believe these people hear voices and experience physical phenomenon which are very similar in nature. I believe that they are a physical response to a possible trauma, a form of mild psychosis induced by the repetitive nature of listening to white noise or even just a normal physical repsonse as their brain creates voices for them to hear (wish fulfilment which gets out of control).

I do think that they are genuine physical experiences. For example, if we put our collective fingers in very hot water, it will scald everyone but some may even blister. Peole with weaker or damaged skin will suffer the most. I think the same can be said for EVP. We can all "hear" something but some will then suffer an internal physical reaction to the process.

My viewpoint is that all of these voices are internal and are part of our psychological make-up. The varied phenomena are triggered or even created as a result of brain activity.
 
Brian Edwards said:
...it's always sinister ones that abuse the hell out of people with personal criticisms and other harassment
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Which is very akin to paranoid schizophrenia isn't it. In my limited but not insubstantial dealings with people afflicted by the terrible problem I have never heard of "the voices" being benevolent and supportive. Always- they are heavy on the personal criticism and personal abuse.
 
Brian Edwards said:
the friendly voices seemingly never come out of the recordings and stay friendly... it's always sinister ones that abuse the hell out of people with personal criticisms and other harassment
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I agree, although there were the occasional nice evps on the whole they were more often than not really quite threatening.
The only nice or gentle evp we captured at an old abbey was recorded towards the end of a particularly "active" investigation.
It simply said "God bless you all"
 
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The most impressive evps to me are the ones that are in context of either the surroundings or a question asked.
I rarely got any clear or interesting audio clips from leaving an audio device recording in a secure but unoccupied room.
 
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Coastaljames said:
Or you perceived it as saying "God bless you all". I think that's a really important way to talk about these things.
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I know what you're saying.
I use to submit my audio evidence to the group but would hesitate to label it "John says hello" or whatever because as soon as you do that it's very hard for anyone to hear it as anything other.
 
LittleAndyP said:
I know what you're saying.
I use to submit my audio evidence to the group but would hesitate to label it "John says hello" or whatever because as soon as you do that it's very hard for anyone to hear it as anything other.
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Indeed. Plus- everything we sense- even if it's just me talking to you is perceived by you as something. Just because you hear me say "hello", doesn't mean that's what I said.
 
Coastaljames said:
Indeed. Plus- everything we sense- even if it's just me talking to you is perceived by you as something. Just because you hear me say "hello", doesn't mean that's what I said.
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Here's a classic example, a while ago I was watching a documentary (not a paranormal one) and from the kitchen I heard someone clearly say my name in the living room.
I rewound the program to the exact point and it was simply the way someone had moved their arm across a table that sounded like "Andy" If I was on a vigil I'd have put my life on that being a genuine voice.
 
LittleAndyP said:
Here's a classic example, a while ago I was watching a documentary (not a paranormal one) and from the kitchen I heard someone clearly say my name in the living room.
I rewound the program to the exact point and it was simply the way someone had moved their arm across a table that sounded like "Andy" If I was on a vigil I'd have put my life on that being a genuine voice.
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Exactly. Respect to you for admitting it.
 
Coastaljames said:
Exactly. Respect to you for admitting it.
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I quit being involved in the paranormal because as far as audio is concerned virtually everything can be explained away.
We ask easy questions; are you male? Are you still here? Etc, etc.
These are yes and no answers and even a team member moving their feet or someone sighing can sound like a response.
 
The only mistaken EVP I found was from an overnight stay at a pub in Lancaster where the hangman would have a final drink before going to do his job. The legend states that those to be hanged would have a last drink there, but I am told that this was not the case and that it was for the hangman, who would have been given a coachman's glass.

What I initially perceived to be an unknown voice saying "get out" turned out different when listened to and analysed via a computer. It turned out to be a combination of the scraping of a chair on the floor and a dog barking in the distance. It took us a good length of time to discern this.
 
Although it's disappointing when you disprove things it also gives more gravitas to the clips that are harder to write off.
 
LittleAndyP said:
Although it's disappointing when you disprove things it also gives more gravitas to the clips that are harder to write off.
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And of course it's impossible to begin to prove something if you're not prepared to disprove things too :)
 
Coastaljames said:
And of course it's impossible to begin to prove something if you're not prepared to disprove things too :)
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That was the most frustrating aspect about being part of a group for me, everything became "paranormal" every sound, every light, drop or rise in temperature.
With regard to audio, I wasn't convinced - as many fellow team members were - that radio responses were a sign of activity. We had a really strong message over a radio at Newark Castle - too good to be true to be honest.
I really wanted to believe in something I just wasn't prepared to believe anything.
 
LittleAndyP said:
That was the most frustrating aspect about being part of a group for me, everything became "paranormal" every sound, every light, drop or rise in temperature.
With regard to audio, I wasn't convinced - as many fellow team members were - that radio responses were a sign of activity. We had a really strong message over a radio at Newark Castle - to good to be true to be honest.
I really wanted to believe in something I just wasn't prepared to believe anything.
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Good post.

Yes...I think, to put it very crudely, a Fortean approach sets the bar very, very high in a genuine bid for "truth". Accepting too little as "real" is infinitely better than accepting too much. At least that's how I see it.

Personally - there isn't much I'd write off as impossible...to say I'm open-minded is a colossal understatement. But...the evidence required for me to believe something is very stringent indeed. I find to be both extremely open-minded and extremely sceptical at the very same time is a comfortable place for me. I don't find them polar opposites.
 
I still have an interest in the paranormal but my expectations and beliefs have changed completely.
I don't know if initially I expected to see an hooded figure float through a wall or rattle it's chains but it soon became apparent that wasn't going to happen.
I believe part of us survives death and in the right circumstances it can be witnessed or recorded.
I think in most cases too that many groups have far too many members - all with fancy titles, it just makes holding vigils harder to control.
I would like to think I'd get back into being part of gathering evidence again but I'm a lot more sceptical than when I first started, I my case the more I went out on vigils the less I believed.
 
A question that came up on another thread: is anyone aware of any occasions on which the same EVP has been recorded on two (or more) separate devices? There are clearly people on this thread who are much more knowledgeable about EVP capture than me - is it usual practice to have multiple recorders running?
 
Krepostnoi said:
A question that came up on another thread: is anyone aware of any occasions on which the same EVP has been recorded on two (or more) separate devices? There are clearly people on this thread who are much more knowledgeable about EVP capture than me - is it usual practice to have multiple recorders running?
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I've had two devices recording in the same location (one static and the other I have with me all the time) and on numerous occasions one device will capture something and the other won't.
This obviously depends on the size of the room and where the device is placed.
There was one occasion when the team clearly heard a toy piano (trigger object) playing from the room next door but on playback later the piano playing was nowhere to be found.
 
We use at least 5 different recording devices to monitor and record ambient noise and at the very least 2 for each planned session. Add to that audio from videocameras and we could be up to 7 or 8 audio sources.

Although saying that it has now been over two years I think since I was last on an investigation. Our team has kind of drifted apart.
 
It became a bit overwhelming for me towards the end, listening through my two dictaphones as well as the usual two stationary ones the group leader would set up.
Listening through numerous hours of what was for the most part static was difficult.
In the end I couldn't hear anything, don't know if I'd lost my knack or just purely just lost interest.

A lot of groups drift apart, ours certainly did.
 
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I have always been interested in using a home made Faraday cage in which to place a recording device in. That way you could at least rule out electronic interference.
 
Spudrick68 said:
I have always been interested in using a home made Faraday cage in which to place a recording device in. That way you could at least rule out electronic interference.
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Good idea.

If you wanted to reduce electrical noise in general, keep things cool and also try to use a recording device that has a linear power supply rather than switched-mode.

Background noise in general is (as much as 3dB) lower in the early morning than later in the day, although I'm not sure whether that's RF clutter from other devices or a thermal thing.
 
Spudrick68 said:
I have always been interested in using a home made Faraday cage in which to place a recording device in. That way you could at least rule out electronic interference.
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I actually suggested banning all radios and mobile phones whilst on vigils but it never happened
 
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