Got Spirit?

[ActRaiserTheReturned]

So. Does anyone in here believe in spiritual gifts, either from the Occult or through religious things?
Seen anything like it take place? DO you have any thing you can do, or are involved in like this?

For instance, if you've ever parted the Red Sea, say so. If you've ever cast the level 9 Spell Meteor Swarm in real life, say so. (Humorous example, not serious).
I only used a couple of humorous examples to ask a serious question. Who here has seen or been involved the supernatural?

[mdk]

Once a dropped a piece of chalk while writing on a blackboard and it landed on its vertical axis. Basically statistically impossible -- like flipping a coin and having it come up 'other.'

I also have a superpower where I think of quotes or notable events or scenes from an episode of a TV show, and that episode will play within a day or two. When it happens it never fails, sort of like my ability to change red lights into green lights just by staring at them.

[Nevis]

My experience with it has been that is not generally (if ever) quite so sensory or material as fantasy often portrays such things to be-that is, that 'magic' is a lot more subtle or ethereal than people make it out to be.

I do point out the use of the word 'supernatural', though. I think there's no such thing as that, 'super', Latin for 'above', and natural, meaning 'above/superceding nature'. Magic and miracles, in my experience and view, is entirely natural-it deals with elements that aren't entirely physical though, such as the concept of aether and spirits.

Myself, I have thus far inane and unhelpful prophetic dreams months ahead of events. I'm extremely empathic and am more than usually sensitive to not-entirely-physical beings-that which are called angels, ghost and/or the Fair Folk. Aside from intuition, though, I haven't done much (that I'm aware of) nor have learned any 'techniques' or anything like that, though I haven't actually spent time seeking that out, either.

[Gwazi Magnum]

Just two days ago I took control of a ton of vines and spread them out over about an 80ft radius.
Me and some friends were travelling to this cave and these wolves attacked us, and almost none of us except this one friend of mine whose basically a giant robot fox is good at fighting close up. So I caught all the wolves in vines to prevent them from swarming us. Then I also shot fire from my hands to burn the wolves down while they were caught in the vines... Oh wait, that was D&D.

Well there's that one time my friend turned me invisible... I tore a vault door open, placed it back on and then said out loud "It was the wind". Oh wait, that's also D&D.

Basically what's I'm getting at here is that I don't believe in spiritual gift's and the like.
I think it's possible that someone is born with a gene that gives them a unique (if minor) characteristic, that's how evolution allows us to change over the generations.
But anything like that would do to genetic variance/chance, and not due to spiritual intervention or anything of the sort. And note when I say unique characteristic I mean stuff such as advanced hearing, sight, taste, maybe their brain works in a unique way or they have an insane amount of stamina. Maybe they have a sixth finger that gives them a better grip. But nothing out of fantasy or fiction like mind reading, fire bending, flying (within one generation/a handful of generations) etc.

[Brovo]

The only arguable supernatural thing that's ever happened in my life is when I nearly died and my mind in its last, delusional gasps for life conjured the image of a dead woman with raven's wings. She helped me stand up and before I knew it I was almost to safety.

I still wouldn't really conjure that one up to the supernatural, but then, I can't really explain it as anything but the last desperate attempt from my mind to make me want to live in that moment, and I have no idea why it chose a dead woman with raven's wings.

[ishtar]

Brovo said
The only arguable supernatural thing that's ever happened in my life is when I nearly died and my mind in its last, delusional gasps for life conjured the image of a dead woman with raven's wings. She helped me stand up and before I knew it I was almost to safety.I still wouldn't really conjure that one up to the supernatural, but then, I can't really explain it as anything but the last desperate attempt from my mind to make me want to live in that moment, and I have no idea why it chose a dead woman with raven's wings.

How did you know that it was a dead woman though? =o

[Brovo]

ishtar said
How did you know that it was a dead woman though? =o

Because I knew her. She had been dead for... Five years.

[ishtar]

Brovo said
Because I knew her. She had been dead for... Five years.

Oh wow.... o.o Must be some experience.

[Brovo]

ishtar said
Oh wow.... o.o Must be some experience.

The mind is a funny thing, that's for sure.

[Gwazi Magnum]

Brovo said
The mind is a funny thing, that's for sure.

The mind and human nature is conditioned/made to do a ton of crazy/unimaginable things when near death as a last attempt to live.
I can't speak from experience yet though, but there are ton's of stories of people doing extraordinary things or seeing extraordinary things.

[Brovo]

Magic Magnum said I can't speak from experience yet though,

I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but I hope you never have to. It's usually very unpleasant, very strange, very confusing... Yet at the same time... There's a sort of terrifying peace to it. There's just... A certain tiny fraction of you that doesn't really make it. Some naive, happy go lucky bit that just... Remains dead. Every time you try to summon it you merely summon the event that killed it, and that eery... Quiet feeling of... Nothingness. I can't even describe it, it's just... Empty space. No, not even empty, just... Blank. Expressionless. Less than monotone. It's still chilling to think about.

If this is even a fraction of what soldiers have to go through, I can understand why PTSD is so damned hard to deal with now.

[Gwazi Magnum]

Brovo said
I hope you don't take this the wrong way, but I hope you never have to. It's usually very unpleasant, very strange, very confusing... Yet at the same time... There's a sort of terrifying peace to it. There's just... A certain tiny fraction of you that doesn't really make it. Some naive, happy go lucky bit that just... Remains dead. Every time you try to summon it you merely summon the event that killed it, and that eery... Quiet feeling of... Nothingness. I can't even describe it, it's just... Empty space. No, not even empty, just... Blank. Expressionless. Less than monotone. It's still chilling to think about.If this is even a fraction of what soldiers have to go through, I can understand why PTSD is so damned hard to deal with now.

You hope I never have to experience dying in such a way!? O_O
FLHFNKJLFHFKJLAHFSLHK! How dare you hope I never die like that! :P

Honestly I'd have to be a total nut case to take that the wrong way.
Like I said, I've never have to experience being close to death before. But I've had experiences that gives me a basic understanding of what it's like to have a piece of you die in the moment, and trying to bring it back does like you say bring the moment back instead. For me I think it was largely the ability to simply trust most people and ability to simply be complacent/happy in emotion/feelings/love, now my logical side just fires up each time and goes "Nope, you will think rationally. No ignoring me and just relaxing you fool!".

This is probably not the same thing you're referring you, which is why I leave it as a basic understanding (Plus I think I worded that above part a bit poorly :/).
I think more in what I consider to be what me somewhat understanding those it took that emptiness, and replaced it with a sort of alternate behavior/defense mechanism in place of it. Then again, this is more cases such as loss of a loved one, relationship going real sour etc. Nothing like going through dying yourself, I can't honestly say if there really is a kind of alternate behavior/defense mechanism that would of triggered in such a case or not.

I simply somewhat relate to what it's like to have an experience that takes away a piece of you, may it simply leave it empty or find something else to replace it with.

[Protagonist]

Yes and no.
Surprisingly, I really don't believe very much in the supernatural per say. I prefer the term "Seemingly Supernatural". I mean, I think things that were once considered supernatural or are currently considered supernatural exist, but I also think that if we did more research (or were able to do more research), we might eventually understand the physical mechanics behind them. Angels turning out to be theocratic aliens that predate the universe would not surprise me in the slightest.

But as for obtaining gifts from seemingly supernatural forces: sometimes.
One thing to keep in mind is that faith is very, very empowering. It sounds corny, but sometimes the power to succeed was inside you all along, and all you needed was faith to unlock it.

In my opinion, seemingly supernatural forces do hand out power for various reasons, but not as a reward for anything. Rather, they hire human agents to go do things for them, and sometimes these things are of certain importance, so they use seemingly supernatural means to make sure they get done. Or just to show off every once in a while. For example, God led Moses to the red sea, and then split it apart. This was for 3 reasons: to cross it, to demonstrate the he is extraordinarily powerful, and to demonstrate that Moses is on his payroll and should be obeyed.

As for Near-Death-Experiences, I have a sort of neutral opinion on them. If somebody were killed and then resurrected, I do not think they would necessarily have memories of an afterlife, because the brain you use before death and after resurrection did not follow you to heaven. I'm not going to say there's flat out no-merit to near-death experiences when thinking about the afterlife, but I kind of doubt their usefulness.