Why do you believe, advocates/skeptics?

I got somewhat into new age stuff in my early twenties, enjoying the comfort the position offered, and the sense that everything was as it should be, and all interlinked...that led to reading a number of new age books which claimed that quantum physics was in lockstep with new age belief, which was really comforting to me...that inspired me to start to learn physics, and I then began to realize that the new age folks were bending the ideas of the physics to fit their preferred narrative. Sadly, that pushed me to become a skeptic, as I felt so betrayed by the new age energy folks, and their willingness to play so fast and loose with the ideas from physics. I gobbled up books like "The Demon Haunted World" and "Science Friction" and became a hardcore materialist.

I then happened upon Alex's original forum at mind-energy-net, and watched from the sidelines as the skeptics battled the proponents over the questions of the scientific evidence for psi (both anecdotal and meta-analysis). This pushed me to actually engage with the science of psi, which I did, originally with massive skepticism. The more I read the papers and the books, and the more I read and examined the arguments Linda and Jay were having with Maaneli and Johann about the Ganzfeld, the more I became convinced that it was a debate worth having, from a scientific point if view. I know that those arguments were infuriating to many people, but to me they were the best thing about that forum. 

Johann's measured approach was a revelation to me, and was the thing that pushed me to really consider the evidence with as little bias as possible. I also appreciated Linda's participation. Uh, oh. I know that is a minority position, and I acknowledge that she was sometimes a pain and would definitely obfuscate in order to avoid losing an argument, but I think she was also very sharp and extremely capable of pointing out issues with proponent arguments. The fact that so few proponents would acknowledge when she was right and would simply resort to ad-hom attacks was really eye-opening to me. 

The following are the books that really helped me embrace the possibility that psi might be something more than wishful thinking:

Debating Psychic Experience: Human Potential or Human Illusion?
An Introduction to Parapsychology

Now I'm somewhere in the middle, leaning towards the proponent side. I think it's clear that psi has been demonstrated in the lab, at least by the standards of social science (though I wonder what that's worth in the end). I find the anecdotes very persuasive as a whole, but also slippery by themselves and hard to use as firm footing. Still searching...