I’m happy to announce that I will be investigating the St. Albans Sanatorium with my team, the Association of Paranormal Study, tomorrow night. For several years, I’ve been fascinated with this location and the history behind it. Along with CORE, we will be joined by our Meetup members. Keep an eye on my Facebook pages like Alex Matsuo and my team’s Facebook page. Live tweets will also be sent from @alexmatsuo and @AssocParaStudy!
And next weekend, I will be heading to Charlotte, NC for ConCarolinas 2016, where I will be attending as a guest for the third year in a row! My schedule will be posted soon, and I can’t wait to see everyone!
I’ve been quiet for a while, mainly due to the fact that I’m working and writing a lot! As most of you know, I wrote a book about how to increase your writing speed and amount called, 10,000 Words. Well, last weekend I broke my own record and wrote 15,000 words. No, there won’t be a sequel to the original book. But it’s good to know that I can do it.
However, the question is, “Do I want to do that again?”
The answer is no! I worked for a total of 19 hours from 7am-2am. It wasn’t the greatest day ever, but I had procrastinated my work to a point where I had to get this done. I was able to keep my energy and focus up thanks to caffeine, having a good program on television for background noise, and lots of support from my boyfriend. I know if I have to do this again, I certainly can.
I take trips as my writing reward. Here’s me at the Battle of Yorktown!
Was I creating the most innovative content on the Internet? Nope. I was word vomiting and just getting it all out for the sake of getting it out. I edited my work after a good night’s sleep, a healthy meal, and a day to mentally recover so I could look at my content with rejuvenated eyes. My content of 15,000 words was far from ready to be turned in at the natural state it was in. So, be sure to edit as much as you can after you’ve gotten some rest! Also, if you do take a day to write, no matter what number ends up on the page, be sure to reward yourself!
That’s all for now. I’m going to be popping in more often, so get ready! 🙂
I have the honor of returning to RavenCon for the second year in a row! If you’re in Williamsburg, VA this weekend, please stop by the DoubleTree Hotel on Kingsmill Road!
Here is my complete schedule for the weekend:
Friday 4/29: 6 pm (Panel) Marketing & Branding for the Author / Room 8 7 pm (Opening Ceremony) Large Auditorium 8 pm (Reading) Room J 10 pm (Panel) How to Self-Publish on a Budget / Room F
Saturday 4/30: 10 am (Panel) Self-Publishing Doesn’t Mean Solo Publishing / Room E 1 pm (Signing) Dealers Room 5 pm (Panel) Podcasting / Room G 8 pm (Soapbox) Room J 11 pm (Panel) X-Files: The Truth is… ummm… Somewhere? / Room G
Sunday 5/1: 11 am (Panel) The Economics of Self-Publishing / Room 8
I’m currently in San Diego, CA right now to give “The Haunting of the Tenth Avenue Theater” a proper launch! Tonight at 7:30pm, I’ll be doing a signing at Mysterious Galaxy Bookstore and tomorrow night there will be a launch party at the site where the book takes place. You can still join the party and RSVP! The party tomorrow, October 24, 2015 starts at 8pm.
It’s been almost three years since I left my beloved Southern California home. It’s rather odd still to see a North Carolina license plate on my car and no longer having a valid California driver’s license. Everyday, I dream of heading back out west. But, at the same time, I’ve made some attachments in North Carolina. The Tar Heel State is starting to grow on me and feel more like home. I can certainly do things in NC that I’m not able to do in California, like be a part-time writer and work a full time job and still be able to pay my bills.
A few years ago, I would have said moving to Raleigh was the worst decision I ever made. But had the move not happened, I wouldn’t be where I am today. I wouldn’t have become the writer I am today, and I certainly wouldn’t be a published author. Crazy how the world works sometimes.
For the first time since I moved, I actually miss North Carolina. Perhaps it’s because Chris is there, but Raleigh has its own charm. I do hope to move back to California someday, or at least make some more visits. But for now, I guess I’ll just consider myself a bi-coastal transient still trying to find her place in this world.
Today is absolutely surreal. I never in a million years thought that I could become a published author. The whole concept is unbelievable, and I can’t tell you how extraordinarily lucky and blessed I am for this opportunity. Llewellyn Worldwide has been an absolute dream to write for, and I’m eternally grateful for this amazing opportunity that they have given me.
Of course, many people will wonder where I got the idea for the book. To be honest, the idea of an entire book dedicated to a haunted theater in the midst of a busy city was not new for me. It was an idea that I had been cooking in my mind for a few years now. The Tenth Avenue Arts Center is a beautiful location and has become quite the hub for the arts to cultivate. It is also home to quite a crew of ghosts who have found a home in the multiple stories, performing venues, galleries, and more.
I hope you will consider getting your own copy of The Haunting of the Tenth Avenue Theater and explore the stories and experiences that I and my team shared individually, and as a group. The publication is in perfect timing with the upcoming Halloween season, and is sure to be a wonderful addition to your ghost story collection.
To my friends who have been my cheerleaders and supporters, thank you so much! To my family who has carried me throughout the year, you mean more to me than you’ll ever know.
Finally, to my mother, who isn’t here on this Earth to celebrate with me, I hope I’ve made you proud. I miss you everyday, and this celebration is a collaboration of happiness and sadness as I feel your absence during this time.
Time to brag! My eyes are stinging from welling up with tears…
“The Haunting of the Tenth Avenue Theater” has already got some AMAZING reviews on Goodreads! Click here to read: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25773383-the-haunting-of-the-tenth-avenue-theater
“I am a big fan of ghost stories in many different varieties. Not only do I enjoy books, but I am also a fan of the different shows on television. I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I loved the way Matsuo walked you through her early experiences and into the story of the theater. Reading this book was like talking to a good friend. I felt as if I was beside her during her investigations and experiences. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes paranormal books.” – Lori Shafer
“I love a good ghost story. This one was amazing. I hope to someday be able to visit this location and see for myself.” – Jennie Schell
“This book was a fascinating look into an old building in Sand Diego, originally built in 1869 as a huge church . Over the years ,it has been divided and used for other groups and businesses . The author seems to have had paranormal type experiences happen to her, even as a small child. I’d like o ear more of her stories of those years in another book ! Anyhow, she is a theatre major ,so is big into that world, and got involved with the Tenth Avenue Arts Center , in which she was taking part in the plays . She began seeing small things out of the corner of her eye, then hearing small noises, etc . She found a small group of others interested in forming a research group, and they went into the building on several ghost hunting adventures .They had quite a bit of interesting activity happen to them during these investigations. They have heard rumors about who supposedly haunts the building( 3 main ghosts ), but had a difficult time linking any solid historical research with the building. That’s not to say the ghosts aren’t there, I guess it’s sometimes hard to find exact material that would match up date-wise to the rumors. This was a very interesting book for people interested in ghost hunting and paranormal stories . There are also several photos taken of the outside and inside of the building .” – Julie
On Monday, July 13th at 8pm ET/7pm CT, I have the honor of being a guest on The Paranormal Pride on The Paranormal King Radio Network, hosted by Denise Pridemore. Click on the image to be redirected to the Facebook event for more information.
I’m not an avid follower of Steve Huff, who runs Huff Paranormal. However, I do watch his stuff from time to time. I have to give the guy credit, as he has drawn a very large audience with his work and giving exposure to the paranormal field. He has made a name for himself specifically for the fact that he released a video of his communication attempts with Robin Williams, after the famous actor committed suicide. I’m not going to comment on that. This blog is specific to his published session where he tried to communicate with the late B.B. King, who passed away on May 14, 2015 in his sleep.
On May 15th, Huff posted a video where he tries to communicate with King, at the request of over 50 of his followers, per the screenshot below.
Steve Huff posts his session with BB King.
Given that 24 hours hadn’t even passed since the singer’s death, I had a moral issue with it. Given that I recently dealt with a devastating death myself, I found the timing to be extraordinarily distasteful. So, I let Huff know how I felt.
According to Steve Huff, my view of death is skewed and negative. My comment was not to defend the dead, but instead, speaking for the grieving. As paranormal investigators, we seem to forget that the dead were once living people. Regardless of how long ago they died, they left behind loved ones who mattered to them far more than what we matter to them. If the deceased had the choice to communicate with us, or their loved ones, I’ll take a gamble to say that they will gravitate towards their loved ones.
The grieving people left behind are the ones who are suffering. They are the ones screaming and crying at the loss of their precious family member who is no longer with them. No longer can they hug them in this world, tell them that they love them, hear their voices speaking to them. That void is devastatingly fresh after a loved one passes.
Sometimes, there is a difference in doing the right thing, and what the public wants. Sometimes the public doesn’t want you to do the right thing, but instead they want you to indulge their curiosities and needs. Feeding the beast isn’t always the right thing to do.
Perhaps my view on death is skewed and negative right now…and yeah, that is because my mother died less than 6 months ago. I miss her, and I would give anything to have her back with me. But that isn’t possible. If that makes my comment silly and irrelevant, so be it.
To Steve Huff (if you’re reading) and his defenders/fans, this is who I am speaking up for:
via www.nbcnews.com & John Locher/AP
How would Shirley King feel about Huff’s session with his Andre’s Box and SCD-1?
While I can’t speak for her, I can relate to Shirley King in this picture, as it has been me since January 30, 2015. I still scream and cry, even though almost four months have passed. When you have lost a parent, your rock and your foundations are gone. It is a pain that I wish on no one. But it is a pain that I wish more people have compassion and sympathy for. But in truth, I doubt that Shirley was even offered an option or a choice.
There is a certain decorum that we as a society follow after someone dies. Typically, people gather and come together to support the people left behind by the deceased. There is the process of grief that we all feel when we lose a loved one. Those who come together in support understand that there are cues to follow in terms of what the grieving are ready to endure. What that is can vary from making funeral arrangements to getting out of bed. Grief is a funny process that can leave you catatonic on some days. In connecting this with the paranormal, I feel that even if establishing communication could lead to the Holy Grail of data, the grieving needs to be considered.
I’m not going to question whether Huff really made contact with B.B. King, as I feel it is moot. It is the very action of trying to establish contact with a dead celebrity, and then post it for the public right away without any regard to the grieving. Just because someone was famous, doesn’t mean that they are fair game for continued exploitation after death for views or social media followers. They deserve better than that. Their living relatives that are left behind deserve better than that. These people are not research tools…they are human beings. I personally feel that if Huff was genuine in his actions, he would have privately contacted King’s family (or representatives) to let them deal as they decide on what to do with the data of THEIR deceased member of THEIR family.
In closing, that decision should not have been made for them.
The critically acclaimed actress Fiona Shaw also volunteered to have her brain scanned, where she would switch back and forth from “acting” in the MRI machine to doing static actions such as saying the ABC’s and counting numbers. The results were that while Shaw was acting, she was using a part of her brain that was responsible for visualization. This caused me to question whether this could also lead to the potential of having some sort of psychic abilities, or in the very least, develop empathic abilities since the very essence of acting is to emulate life and present different emotions with legitimacy. However, every actor hasn’t had his or her brain scanned. But based on the fact that Shaw is an extraordinary actress, the brain activity occurring during her performance may very be similar as to the brain activity of those who use the same performance process as Shaw. Given the success rate of the Ganzfeld by artistic people, it is interesting to consider that since the experiment is partially dependent on the send of images and video, the send creates their own visualizations in their mind and send it over to their fellow artist, who may use the same part of their brain.
And if the actor’s visualization skills are stronger than the average person, perhaps it could be the reason why actors are more vulnerable. Actors and musicians are also able to channel in their emotions more efficiently so that they’re available during their performance or writing their own pieces. Could this vulnerability lead to a higher chance of having ghosts interact with these artists? I don’t think that it is a stretch to hypothesize that performance could be summoning these ghosts even those the performer has no intention of doing so. Or is it possible that the actor could be using that energy in creating their own ghosts so to speak? Like thoughtforms of characters? The actor has a much larger role in theatre hauntings than they expect.
Then we have the factoring in of the actual ghost hunts that are taking place. Ghost hunting really is a performance from the perspective of the ghosts are your audience members, and you are saying certain words and doing certain actions for the purpose of getting a response from the ghost, just as when the actor performs on stage, they are anticipating some kind of reaction from laughter to tears. But just as an actor can have a bad performance, the ghost hunter can have a bad investigation. Maybe the wrong questions were being asked, or the ghost hunter and the ghost just weren’t connecting. It can be hard to figure out exactly where the investigation went wrong. But there are things that the ghost hunter to do to ensure a smoother time, which includes doing your historical research as well as making a completely game plan of the events of the investigation.
Even in our day-to-day routine, we are in the midst of a performance until we are alone at home. In the same sense, ghosts are constantly in performance mode as well. Think about it. They might be unaware of the amount of energy they carry, and with the wrong movement, they could reveal their current state. Or if the ghost has a message to send, and is in desperate need to get the sender’s attention, the ghost may put on a performance to make sure that they are being listened.
On that note, will we ever reach a time where we will no longer expect a performance from ghosts and just allow them to talk? That will actually be my next communication experiment at the Tenth. No more expecting “yes” or “no” answers, but instead, just allowing them to talk. Once I approach an investigation in that way, collecting tangible evidence would be more difficult, unless I was able to obtain better equipment that was more sensitive and could play back the information that was collected.
The performance of ghost hunting places responsibility on both sides of the investigation relationship. It is a tug of war relationship between the ghost hunter and the ghost, as they continuously trade roles from performer to audience member, and then back again. However, unlike the ghost hunter, the deceased are forced to perform when requested by the ghost hunter. I almost want to imagine circus animals that are being chained to their cages while the ringleader cracks their whip to get them to perform. In some cases, the ghost hunter may threaten the presence with religious objects such as crosses or threaten to force the deceased to cross over to the other side. The investigation process, while this will be ironic for me to say, shouldn’t be a performance like this, but instead a mutual agreement to engage in conversation and finding the most productive method of establishing that communication. The need to impress or outdo other teams is primarily responsible for the circus-like spectacle since a team’s value seems to lie upon whether they can capture the best evidence or not. While evidence collection is important, it is being used for the wrong way. Which is probably another reason why we have so many people trying to pass off their photos of dust as evidence of a ghost, or why people are faking evidence so that they can get their 15-minutes of fame. It really is a shame, and it does nothing more than harm the research field for the paranormal, and it is the reason why this community has yet to find widespread respect.
Perhaps I am not one to talk since I was interviewed by public television about the Tenth Avenue Theater, but that opportunity came about unexpectedly, and I did not ask for the interview. The field right now is flooded with people who are using the paranormal to gain a celebrity status. Is it right? I don’t know. If I were to criticize it, I would also have to criticize those who use theatre to get famous as well. It is a hard line to tow indeed. As a believer in karma, and the mindset of “what goes around comes around”, I wonder what price we will have to pay for putting the deceased out there in the public eye and not only making them perform tricks, but forcing them to become entertainment for our own pleasure.
I have mixed feelings about guided ghost tours that take place night after night. While I love the idea of having access to haunted locations and investigating, I often find that these tours are there for the specific purpose of entertaining people. So, in this case, the audience is the tourist. I do pay for my ticket to be a part of the ghost hunt, and I often find myself being the most experienced in the group, with the rest of the attendees borrowing equipment from the host team and going around ready to jump at the first sight of a ghost. I have distinctly mixed feelings because while I feel like it is a great opportunity to expose more people to the paranormal field, it is also subjecting the deceased to being performers, all the while the teams that are hosting these tour are proclaiming that they care about the ghosts. When these tours are happening year round and people are paying a good chunk of money to be a part of the experience, I find it comparable to running a circus and cracking the whip on the animals while saying you care about them under the same breath. I have also noticed that these ghost tours actually outnumber any historical research based tours. You can tell whether people would rather learn about history or be entertained, and so which direction is society heading?
It seems that we are at an impasse, both the living and the dead trapped in the world of continuous performances. Even in life, we perform all the time from our work duties, to tasks that need to be taken care of at home. With each changing social circle, our audiences change and thus, our performances change. I don’t act the same way at home as I do with I’m with my best friend at a bar enjoying a drink. In death, it should be our time to rest. But with the constant popularity of ghost hunting, it may be a while before the dead gets a hint of peace and quiet, or “rest in peace” so to speak. Is this what we have to look forward to after we die? It is a wonder why ghosts would even stick around and bother to communicate with the living world in the first place. What if the connection with the living world is worth being objectified and turned into a performer? Or perhaps, the messages from the other side are crucial enough to share that the living world needs to be an audience for these paranormal performers in order for them to receive these messages.
This is a two-part post about my studies into the relationship between performance and the act of ghost hunting.
A performance is typically defined as an event where there is someone who is presenting something, and there are a group of people observing. This definition of performance is not limited to only theatres or television and movies. A performance can take place at nearly any time of day at any kind of location. Performances can happen at school with the popular crowd, and they can happen at ghost hunts. Scholars have written thousands of book on performance studies and there are even degrees dedicated to the discipline. As a society that is ever growing and changing on a regular basis, there are so many different types of performances out there that appease almost every person out there. From traditional musicals that warm the heart, to the heart-wrenching dramas that influence someone to call their mother to tell them they love her, to the soul shattering avant-garde performance that makes you analyze what it means to be human….performance is an essential part of our existence that is necessary in order for us to survive and thrive.
Before we dive into the performance of ghost hunting, let us take a moment to consider the relationship between performance and spirituality. The earliest roots in theatre lie in ancient Greece in something called, “ritual reenactment”. Back before theatre and performance was established, the ancient Greeks wanted to honor the gods by telling stories of their greatness. This initially began as “oral tradition” where someone would dramatically tell stories of the gods, with an audience watching. The audience would then become performers themselves and spreading the stories around like wildfire. With ritual reenactment, these early performances including singing hymns and performing some kind of movement.
To keep this along the lines of being the abridged version, the villages and tribes began to compete with each other by adding costumes, live music, and written texts in their performances for the gods. One could argue that the original audiences were the gods, and the transition from performing for them to performing to fellow humans was one of the breakthrough moments in the creation of live theatre. Overall, theatre is a very spiritual experience, which the philosopher Aristotle argued that it was needed for the purposes of catharsis, meaning the purging of emotions. If you have ever cried during a movie, you had a cathartic experience. Catharsis was seen as a necessity for cleansing the soul.
With the thought in mind that theatre was originally intended to be spiritual and for the gods as a gift, is it a surprise that there are rumors about theatres being haunted in the first place. Some of my favorite cliché ghost stories come from the urban legend of haunted theatres from the spurned woman in white who lost her chance to be on the stage to the Macbeth curse causing shenanigans in each production, there is a strong connection there. Until the media came into existence with television and film, theatre was the vehicle for expressing society’s belief in the paranormal, and you can watch that belief evolve over time by just analyzing the plays from each time period.
I suppose that the title of this article can be misleading, as it is not an article on how to perform a paranormal investigation or ghost hunt, there are enough of those books out there on the market. Instead, it is a venture into a theory that theatre people, whether they are actors, tenant, directors, dancers, etc. they are inadvertently capturing the attention of the ghosts and causing a performance from both the living and the dead. Artistic people are interesting enough on their own, and I would not be surprised if a ghost chose to attempt communication with an artistic person over someone whose not. I will say that artists are very open-minded to the world around. Could they be lifting a psychic wall around them and making them more vulnerable to having some sort of communication with the other side? If you were dead, and you couldn’t find a way to communicate with the living, and you found someone who could hear you, wouldn’t you do whatever you could muster up to catch their attention? The answer is probably yes. But this isn’t a performance. That is the lost seeking out a solution. When the situation is reversed, and there is someone trying to communicate with a deceased person, the ghost isn’t able to communicate in the way that they used to in life, so they have to pull out the dramatic displays in order to get their point across. I would imagine that this is an extremely frustrating endeavor.
The most obvious example of performances in ghost hunting is in paranormal reality shows that became increasingly popular in the early 21st century. It is a far cry from ritual reenactment and the once cathartic experience that was the performance space. I think perhaps the reason why for this widespread popularity was the fact that the paranormal is an unknown area of knowledge. You can’t get a college degree in paranormal studies and many people who do come forward with experiences in the public eye are portrayed as being insane and not to be taken seriously. At the end of the day, these production companies need to make money. You make money by drawing in an audience, and you keep that audience by continuing to make your show entertaining. I won’t say that the “paratainment” business has sullied the investigation field, but instead, has brought exposure to the paranormal and hopefully making people more open-minded about the existence of ghosts. In the last ten years, there has also been a dramatic rise in the number of ghost tours at numerous haunted locations, where a group of people will go ghost hunting for a night while locked in a building with a guide. The paranormal reached a new height when it came to monetizing the potential interactions with the dead, which many people pay big money for. But because the factor of money is now included in the experience, I have to wonder if along with tickets being paid, if there was an expectation of goods to be delivered (such as a paranormal experience). In turn, does this turn ghosts into entertainers? And if so, what does this mean for the ghosts at the Tenth should Jeff decide to move forward with the guided ghost tours?
I would like to say that my investigations and research into the building have not subjected the ghosts into being put into a situation where they are being asked to perform tricks, since I don’t expect them to ever perform for me. If they choose not to communicate, while I may be disappointed, I acknowledge that it is their right to not talk. But another researcher from the outside looking in may have a different opinion. Where is that fine line between requesting communication and asking the ghosts to essentially perform tricks? I suppose that it is all in the eye of the beholder and the ghosts that are being placed in that situation. If you were to ask me what my long-term goal was for the Tenth, it would be that someday the most prestigious researchers in the paranormal and psychic phenomenon visit the Tenth. It would be great to be able to secure the building for a weekend (at the very least) and let these researchers loose in the building and see what comes of it.
Performers, in terms of actors, dancers, musicians, and artists, seem to be completely different people compared to business professionals or those who don’t consider themselves to be artistically minded. For example, let us go back to the Ganzfeld experiment, which is the sensory deprivation experiment that leads to the altered state of consciousness. There was a study conducted in 1992 where the American Society for Psychical Research used twenty of the most gifted students from the Julliard School in New York City and put them through the sender-receiver experiment. The results were extraordinary because there was a success rate of 50%, which was double the success expectation rate. The facilitators of the experiment, Charles Honorton and Marilyn Schlitz then used eight musicians for the remainder of the experiment. Six out of the eight students either had direct hits or a 75% success rate. Again, these are extraordinary results. The theory behind this success rate was due to the participants; especially the musicians have a dissociated state of mind. Very much like meditation, being dissociated is very much like the feeling of being on autopilot and disconnecting from the outside word. According to John G. Kruth, the executive director of the Rhine Research Center, jazz musicians who often improvise their music will go into this state as they play, channeling the environment around them as they make up their own tune. What would happen if we allowed a bunch of actors to go in and ghost hunt for a night? What kind of results would come up from the night? If we go by the results of the study of the Julliard students and the Ganzfeld experiment, it seems as though there could be potential of a productive interaction with the ghosts.
