Neuroplasticity . . . "is the process that involves adaptive structural and functional changes to the brain. (It is the ) ability of the nervous system to change its activity in response to intrinsic or extrinsic stimuli or reorganizing its structure, functions or connections after injuries, . . . such as trauma or brain injury."
.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK557811/
Not everyone sees ghosts, but those who do may not be crazy, they may be special; their brains may be more plastic or adaptive. A shaman might have been able to help Ortiz to find out why the ghost showed up. All good healers are in some way themselves wounded. Did Lance Corporal Ortiz have it in him to become a healer? We will never know.
A synchronicity: A few days before I read this article I posted a poem "For spirit's children", the last lines of which I will quote as a last word:
. . . Many children are dead
Many more will die
They are spirit's children now
No hardened room
In which to shelter
People
Are abandoning the land
Listen That is the sound of grief
They are saying
This very moment
No more wall of hands
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