The world became a turtle on its back when the pandemic was at its highest point in 2020. Even more so when cities began to go on “lock down.”

Streets and freeways became quieter with only the essential workers making their way to and from their jobs. Although the death rate was climbing, and everyone seemed to be doing their part, the living found ways to cope with the reality of being stuck at home.

Many seem to be creating new hobbies, such as baking bread, starting a Podcast, catching up on their favorite tv shows or movies.

But as people were making TikTok’s and vlogging about their life in the pandemic lock down, what was the afterlife up too?

Something we forget to think about is that the afterlife is still very much alive and was still wanting very much so to contact the living. Reports of the afterlife becoming restless started making their way into social media.

Paranormal activity which has been portrayed in many movies such as The Conjuring, Paranormal Activity, Ouija, and the list goes on, shows us the dark and scary side of what it could be like when contacting spirits. Televised shows like Ghost Hunters, Paranormal State, Paranormal Captured and many more that seem to show us what we think Paranormal activity may or may not be.

On November 2, 2021, Spectrum News 1 published an article titled, “Investigator Says Paranormal Calls Went Up During Pandemic” by Evan Sery. In an interview with Alex Matsuo a Paranormal Investigator from North Carolina, YouTuber and Author of One Bed Over: A Hospital Haunting, The Brave Mortal’s Guide to Ghost Hunting, The Haunting of the Tenth Avenue Theatre, More than Ghosts: A Guide to Working Residential Cases in the Paranormal Field, and The Haunted Actor,  Sery had this to say, “One Raleigh woman says she’s confident they exist in one form or another, and she says she’s hardly the only one who believes this.”

Alex Matsuo investigates at the City Cemetery of Raleigh, North Carolina. She has a strong belief in the afterlife and has been doing her own investigations to continue to gain knowledge and understanding of the afterlife by being on the forefront at night, “I had experiences…” she tells Sery,  “…when I was a kid, and then I had an intense experience when I was 19 or 20 years old.”

She goes on to say that those encounters and limited knowledge with spirits is what led her to doing what she set out to do today. Matsuo also mentions why she was getting in increase of clientele who had been experiencing paranormal activity in their homes while the lock down had taken place. She told Sery ““People [were] home more often than [they] used to being, so I think they were noticing more things happening,”

Matsuo didn’t seem to be too far off with her answer, on May 23, 2020, another article was published about the same subject.

CBS News Los Angeles which has been on the air since 1927, published in article titled,
“Reports of Paranormal Activity on The Rise During Coronavirus Stay-At-Home Orders” as seen on their website as well, www.cbsnews.com.

The article starts off by saying, “There has been an increase in the number of reports of possible hauntings at homes amid the pandemic lockdown. Believers say they have no way to keep themselves socially distanced from the spirit world and claim they have been subjected to an extra dose of paranormal activity during the coronavirus quarantine.”

With this type of news being published for the public during a pandemic, the very idea that the afterlife is looking to communicate could very well be possible.

However, reading further into the story I came across this, Paranormal investigators believe some are likely the “real deal”, but others have simpler explanations. ‘People are spending more time in their home and everything from the wood drying out … you’re getting popping sounds … because we are getting into the warmer months of the year,” said Jason Hawes, the host of “Ghost Nation”. J

ason Hawes, who is one of the founding members of T.A.P.S from the widely popular show GHOST HUNTERS, addresses the increasing cases of Paranormal Activity to be considered, self-paranoia, which seems to be a factor given the entire world was in a state of paranoia and the death rate increasing week after week due to the variant, COVID-19.

Also weighing in on his thoughts about this increase of paranormal activity with a slightly different opinion is John E.L. Tenney, a paranormal researcher and former host of televised program Ghost Stalkers.

On May 15th , 2020 Tenney told CBC Radio an interview that he was used to receiving two to five calls a month about possible paranormal activity happening in homes, but as soon as the pandemic took place those calls had increased to five to ten call a week.

“Everything from typical knocks and footsteps in the hallway, to some very new, strange occurrences, like people hearing whispered voices through their television sets or getting text messages from long deceased friends and relatives” he tells Carol Off, one of the Hosts of AS IT HAPPENS, Podcast.

“If we’re going to allow or believe that ghosts exist, then people are seeing an uptick of ghosts. They’re in a heightened emotional state. They’ve been sequestered. They’re spending time in their house, which they normally don’t do at certain hours. Most people are gone at work and so they’re not used to hearing the pops and creaks in their house normally. But if there are ghosts, perhaps they’ve had a ghost in their house all along and they’ve just never noticed that.”

So, could this have been the main reason why so many people were reporting paranormal activity in their homes? Perhaps Alex Matsuo experience was that of a child having an overactive imagination and that Jason Hawes of T.A.P.S was right in saying that with many people spending more time in their own homes, and the fear of Covid-19 has managed acclimate our minds into noticing more unexplainable experiences nd sounds in our homes.

However, the case stands, many people seemed to be experiencing more than usual paranormal happenings throughout the lock down.

In March of 2020, the world was placed on standby and in doing so it allowed our five senses, along with our spiritual side, mind, body, and soul, to open up and notice more among our own homes.

Lastly, in the CBC Radio article, Tenney states, “Perhaps the ghosts are getting bored too.”

This, and many others, could also be a factor as to why so many reports were coming in.

The afterlife was seeking attention just like many of us during the lock down.

Living or not, we were all looking to find a way to connect with the world that had been locked up.

The use of social media was in our grasps for the living, but for those beyond the beyond, making noises in our homes, catching  glimpse of something moving from the corner of our eyes, hearing a whisper of a voice form another part of the house, was the afterlife letting us know that they are still here and wanting to connect.