Chatty Show!

0:17Speaker 1:Hello and welcome to Psychic Teachers. I'm your host, Deb Bowen.

0:21Speaker 2:And I'm Samantha Faye.

0:22Speaker 1:And we are so excited that you are with us this week. Samantha and I just have a lot of stuff that we want to share and talk with you about. Some of which are questions that we've gotten from you all about us. And we thought, well, okay, we'll tell you some more about us. And we're happy to do that. And we're also... committing to, at some point during the course of a month, telling you about a saint of the month and a goddess of the month. So, Samantha, would you like to start us off with telling us about the saint you've chosen to talk about?

0:59Speaker 2:Yes, I would. The saint I chose for this month is Saint Rita, and she is Saint Rita of Cassia. She lived from 1381 to 1457. She was an Italian Augustinian nun. who was renowned for her profound faith amidst a lot of really heavy stuff, a lot of life trials. And this earned her the title of the patron saint of lost causes and loneliness. Growing up, she wanted to be a nun, but her parents made her marry an older, awful man when she was just 12 years old. And of course, he did turn out to be a violent, abusive man. but St. Rita responded with patience and prayer.

1:46Speaker 2:She eventually even got him to convert, and then he was murdered by some of his enemies because I guess he was just a mean man to everyone. And then soon after, she had to endure the most terrible pain of all, the loss of her twin sons to illness. After losing her family in this terrible, terrible way and just feeling alone and bereft and only comforted by her faith, she kept trying to join a convent But they refused her because she was a widow and, you know, clearly not a virgin. But finally they relented and she entered the Augustinian convent in Cassia, where she experienced extraordinary mystical phenomenon.

2:26Speaker 2:Most notably, she received a partial stigmata in the form of a painful bleeding wound on her forehead from one of the thorns of Jesus's crown. So if you see depictions of her, often you'll see a little red mark on her forehead for that. During her life, lots of legendary signs accompanied her holiness, such as white bees surrounding her crib as an infant without harming her, or a dry wooden vine springing back to life and bearing fruit after she obediently watered it daily at her mother's instruction.

3:03Speaker 2:Shortly before her death, when a visiting relative asked if she wanted anything from her home, Rita asked for a rose and two figs. And her relative was like, I don't know how I'm going to do that because it's like the middle of winter. But the relative went home and she found a rose in full bloom and ripe figs on the frost-covered plants. So a lot of mystical, magical things happened like that around St.

3:28Speaker 1:Rita.

3:30Speaker 2:For her formal canonization in 1900 by Pope Leo XIII, the church officially verified key posthumous miracles granted through her intercession. Years ago, we did a show on how a saint becomes a saint, and it is really, really rigorous. They do have to prove these miracles occurred. So some of the miracles they were able to prove is the immediate healing of Elizabeth Bergamini, a young girl who was cured of impending smallpox-induced blindness after visiting St. Rita's site. There was also the sudden complete recovery of Cosimo Pellegrini from terminal chronic gastroenteritis. and the unexplainable sweet-smelling fragrance called the odor of sanctity that was emanating from her miraculously incorrupt body.

4:21Speaker 2:As some of you might know, a lot of Catholic saints, their body doesn't decay, and that's considered a sign of their saintliness. And her body still remains preserved in this way today. So today, believers reach out for her intercession by praying the Novena to St. Rita, lighting votive candles, offering roses on her feast day, which is May 22nd, or simply addressing her in quiet prayer during times of despair, heartbreak, or seemingly insurmountable hardships. She's also known to be the saint of feuding families. So if you're feeling a little alone this month, or as though you're facing an impossible situation, or if you've got some fighting going on in the family, you might want to think about calling out to Saint Rita.

5:07Speaker 1:I had read about St. Rita sometime years ago, and I knew the story about the bees. And I had understood that those bees really just followed her throughout her entire life. Was I wrong about that?

5:20Speaker 2:No, there's a lot of stories about the bees around her.

5:22Speaker 1:Okay, I thought that might be true. Those stories about those women, Rita and so many others, about how desperately they wanted to be nuns and cloistered and saved. and away from the world, just break your heart reading them, don't they?

5:41Speaker 2:They really do. They really, really do. But from everything you read about her, she just seems to have such a gentle, pure heart.

5:49Speaker 1:She really was a lovely person. There you go.

5:52Speaker 2:Who's our goddess of the month?

5:54Speaker 1:Our goddess of the month is Demeter. And I have chosen Demeter to talk about this month, partly because we're moving into harvest time. We're moving into Mabon, Mabon is also the autumnal equinox, to Samhain, which is on October 31st, and those are the second of the three harvest festivals this time of year in the northern hemisphere. And Demeter is the Greek goddess of grain. It is Demeter who gives us the connection to nature and the way in which we grow crops and harvest them and store them up for future for the winner. So that's Demeter's job.

6:39Speaker 1:Let me tell you just a little history about her, and then I'll tell you the story that is probably most associated with her. She was the second child born to Rhea and Cronos, the goddess and god, and the second to be swallowed by Cronos. Demeter was the fourth royal consort of Zeus, who was also her brother. She preceded Hera, who was Zeus' wife, who was the number seven and the last. Out of this union came Zeus and Demeter's only child, their daughter Persephone, with whom we most associate Demeter and her story.

7:22Speaker 2:Talk about trauma and wanting to get away and join a convent. First your dad swallows you.

7:27Speaker 1:Right.

7:28Speaker 2:And then your brother... You.

7:31Speaker 1:Marry your... Yeah, okay. There's a lot of that stuff that goes on in Greek and Roman mythology. And that's why it's important, I think, to remember that what's important about it is its symbolism, I think, in all of this. Yeah, so Demeter did not have an easy life. But she was very, very devoted to her daughter, Persephone, who was lovely, who was adventuresome, who was flirtatious. She was a lot of things, Persephone was. She was beautiful. And at some point, she is out, I think, bathing maybe by the river or lake. Anyway, she was outside alone. And she is abducted by Hades and taken to the underworld. Persephone is.

8:24Speaker 1:And Demeter doesn't know where she is. She's been abducted. Demeter doesn't know what's happened to her. When Demeter discovers that Persephone is in the underworld, Hades, she wants her back. She wants Hades to give her daughter back to her. And, of course, Hades says no. So Demeter then begins to lay waste to the world. Instead of harvest, everything dries up, crops die, there is famine on the land. And the natural cycles of seasons ceases. And Demeter says, and they will not be back. People will die of starvation. The gods will lose their power. All these things will happen until I get my daughter back. Well, finally, Hades says, well, okay, but there's some rules that are going along with this.

9:22Speaker 1:So Demeter meets Hecate, another goddess, the goddess of the dark moon and the crossroads, who suggests that they go together to the god Helios, who's the god of the sun, to have him help them get Persephone away from Hades. Helios says, well, okay, I can help you with this, but really it's Hecate who raves the halls of the underworld to go and rescue Persephone from Hades. And Hades agrees to let Persephone go and gives her, I think it's five, I'm not sure I've got that number right, pomegranate seeds. And he says, but you must not eat any of them. You must not ingest any of these pomegranate seeds until you get above ground. Or if you do, You're going to end up needing to come back here every year. And there will be conditions on your release.

10:27Speaker 1:And the language of the original poem says that as Persephone is coming above ground, she is both led by and followed by Hecate. And she eats a pomegranate seed. And so when she gets above ground, there's this great rejoicing. Demeter is very happy to see her. However, she has broken the rule by which Hades has let her go. So now, Demeter's way of dealing with her anger about that is the changing of the seasons. And that's why we have winter. It's that Demeter says for part of the year, the land will lay waste in retaliation to what Hades did to Persephone's.

11:19Speaker 2:And that's when Persephone is in Hades with her husband.

11:24Speaker 1:And that's when she has to go back. That's right. Every year. That's exactly right. So this is a really interesting thing about this. This myth became the basis for the Eleusinian Mysteries, the most sacred and important religious rituals of ancient Greece for over 2,000 years. This worship was brought to an end in the 5th century by the destruction of this sanctuary, Demeter's sanctuary, at Eleusium by the invading Goths. So Persephone has her own story, and we can talk about her another time, but Demeter as the goddess of grain, as an earth goddess, is a mother goddess, of course. And so mythologically and art typically, Demeter gives us the whole concept of mothering, not necessarily that one is a mother, but one mothers. So it may be mothering children, it may be mothering four-legged folks, mothering the land, but it is all that comes with that archetype of being a mother and how we go through those years of maidenhood and moving into motherhood and then moving into perhaps empty nest world, and the transitions that we go through as women. Demeter personifies that.

12:52Speaker 2:And that's why he probably should have gone first, because that's why I chose St. Rita, because she had this loss of her children and experienced that sadness, which helped her faith. I find it so interesting that the pomegranate seeds and the punishment is very, very, very similar to the story of Adam and Eve eating the apple, which you know, most historians are like, yeah, apples didn't grow there. It was probably a pomegranate. So it's interesting to draw those parallels.

13:20Speaker 1:Absolutely true. So there we go.

13:22Speaker 2:Okay. So we've received a really lovely email from a listener basically asking us to kind of tell our whole life story. So Deb and I were like, all right, we're not going to answer all of this, but we are going to try to address some of her main questions that dealt with you know, how we got here and what are some of the ups and downs we've experienced with our psychic and spiritual practices. And she had a very important, lovely question about Deb's magical cat, Merlin.

13:57Speaker 2:So we're going to take our first very quick break. And when we come back, we'll dive right into all of that. Hey guys, just wanted to let you know that I've added a new guided meditation to my website called How to Cut Chords. This 30-minute meditation teaches you how to cut negative cords to a difficult person, situation, memory, or aspect of yourself you're hoping to change. You can learn more about it on my website or in this month's newsletter, which you can find on my sub stack.

14:27Speaker 2:And my friend and co-host Denise Carell and I have added a brand new video course called The Business of Being Spiritual. It includes seven teaching modules where we walk you through all sorts of things from charging money and networking to to handling taxes, and tips for sharing your work on a wider platform. If you go to SamanthaFay.com and click the Store tab, you'll find it under Video Classes. And finally, don't forget to check out my other podcast, Enlightened Empaths. We've started a new popular monthly feature called the Energy Forecast, where we cover all the metaphysical transitions and stuff heading your way each month. Hope you enjoy it. Okay, welcome back. So one of the questions that this listener sent us was, I would love to hear about your trials and errors of delving into psychic and spiritual practices over the years and how you found your way to who you are today. So that's a big question, isn't it?

15:27Speaker 1:It's huge. And, you know, I could write war and peace on this. Speaking of trials and errors, you want me to go first? You want to go first?

15:38Speaker 2:You could go first.

15:39Speaker 1:Okay. So... I grew up in a house where my mother would have never called herself psychic. She would have never used that language. And yet there were very clear moments in my growing up where my mother clearly was psychic. And I'll tell you a brief story about that. My grandfather, my mother's father, had a sister who died at about 101, I think she was. And so her daughter was, Ann Ann's daughter, was in her 80s. And on a Saturday afternoon, Mama was standing at the stove frying fish. I'll never forget this. It was frying fish. And this was back in the days when there was a phone on the wall in the kitchen. And Mama's frying fish. She's got a spatula in her hand. And she sort of starts.

16:37Speaker 1:I'm sitting at the table doing something. And she drops the spatula. She turns to the phone and walks towards it, and as she reaches for it, it begins to ring. So she reached for the phone before it rang. She took the receiver off the hook, and she did not say hello. She said, Etta, is she dead yet? And there was some silence and then some more conversation. She hung up the phone. She turned off the stove. She took the frying pan off the burner. She called to Daddy.

17:11Speaker 1:And within 30 minutes, we were on the road to another town to go visit my mother's aunt, my great aunt, who was actively dying. And what I learned as we got in the car was when Mama asked Etta if she was dead, if Aunt Anne was dead, Etta said, no, she's waiting on you. So we got in the car. We went to see her. And she saw Mama. They talked. And then she died, just like that, pooped as dead. So that was not an unusual, really, occurrence in the world in which I grew up. My first experiences with some of this stuff was just a knowing, and I didn't know how I knew. But I knew when I was in high school, when friends were in trouble doing stuff they probably shouldn't have been doing and that sort of thing. I just, I knew about that sort of thing.

18:03Speaker 1:But it was not until I was in my early 20s and got interested in the paranormal, and had Gene and Joel in my world. And when the three of us began this exploration of metaphysics and psychic phenomenon, there was just no stopping us.

18:24Speaker 2:Wait, can we drill down on that, though? Because I don't know what the kickoff was for you three. I don't know what prompted that. Do you remember?

18:34Speaker 1:I do remember. I remember exactly what it was. So I was running this coffee house, and that's a whole other long story, but in any case, I was running this coffee house for a ministerial association. And there were two teenage girls that would come and frequent the coffee house. They were sisters. And the younger one, Kelly, said to me, you need to come meet our mom. Well, okay, I'm 20 years old, but all right. So I go over to this house with these two young girls and meet And when I knocked on the door, and when Jean answered the door, and I'd never met her, she looked at me and said, welcome home. And I'd never met this woman before. And of course, home and wherever Jean was came for the next 50 years. But they'd recently moved to the town I lived in. And one of the other kids, who was older a little bit, at that time, who hung out at the coffee house, was Joel.

19:36Speaker 1:And so... We all started kind of hanging out at Jean's house. Jean's daughter, Joel, me, you know.

19:42Speaker 2:Was she already into palm reading at that point?

19:45Speaker 1:Oh, yeah. She had been reading palms when she lived outside of Washington. She was also a yoga teacher. So there was that, palm reading. She was already reading palms. She was doing yoga. And she had also been with a group of people before she had come here of levitating tables and doing that sort of thing. And I can still remember the night that she and Joel and one of her daughters and I were sitting around this really heavy, heavy coffee table, and we lifted it with one finger each. At that same time, we were reading Ruth Montgomery's book, A Gift of Prophecy, about Jean Dixon, who predicted the death of Kennedy. And we were reading Edgar Cayce, And I don't even know what all else.

20:41Speaker 1:But Ruth Montgomery's book about Gene Dixon led us to study Arthur Ford and Madame Blavatsky and so many other folks. So that's how all of that began.

20:53Speaker 2:I watched such a good documentary last week on Netflix. Highly recommend it. I know it sounds boring, everybody, but it was really good. It was on Mike Wallace, you know, the 60 Minutes reporter and all the tough interviews he did and I didn't know he had this reputation for being kind of mean and hard hitting. And one of the things they highlighted was his very rude, mean interview with Shirley MacLaine. I was watching it and I was like, gosh, you know, just you don't remember what trailblazers these women and men who raised their hand and said, yes, I'm intuitive.

21:32Speaker 2:I'm psychic. I believe in past lives, what have you. it's almost hard today to remember the kind of vitriol and criticism and laughing and all of that that they went through. And Shirley MacLaine, I mean, come on, you know, Oscar winner, dancer, singer, Warren Beatty's sister, like the woman can do anything. And there Mike Wallace was eviscerating her.

21:58Speaker 1:Oh, but that happened to her all over.

22:01Speaker 2:All the time.

22:02Speaker 1:Absolutely. But you need to remember, that Shirley's first book was Don't Fall Off the Mountain, about her experience in Bhutan. And you've heard me talk about that book in relationship to Jean and her memorial service and so forth. Jean's book in relationship to her memorial service. But Shirley's book, Out on a Limb, came out in 1984. And Jean and Joel and I met in 1971. So we've been at all of this way before we got to Shirley. What Shirley did for us was gave us more resources, more books, and more fodder for how all of this was connected. That's what really gave us, you know. I mean, we were already collecting crystals by then. We'd already seen our first psychics back then. We were doing all of that in the 70s.

22:53Speaker 2:You know, our upbringings are very different and yet similar. Because you had this very intuitive mother who also... played the piano in her church every Sunday.

23:04Speaker 1:She did.

23:05Speaker 2:So you were getting all these different messages, right? Yeah. And it was very similar for me because I won't go through them again, but I had a lot of psychic experiences as a kid. And every time my parents would be like, oh, Samantha in her imagination, there she goes. Meanwhile, my mother is having all sorts of psychic Worries and experiences and insights constantly. I mean, I've told you guys about Petro, the blue bird she claimed followed us everywhere we went and reported back to her. I didn't know that was her psychic stuff. And I'd come home from school and she'd be like, Petro told me blah, blah, blah.

23:45Speaker 2:I mean, you guys, this carried on most of my life. I'm not kidding. I remember she would give my kids gifts from Petro. She taught her grandchildren about Petro. And there were so many moments where I'd be doing something I shouldn't be doing. Like, I don't know, maybe trying to buy alcohol when I was 17. And I would look around for that damn blue bird. Because she always knew. She always knew. She would talk about when she was little, it definitely traumatized her. Because, you know, back in those days, when a family member was dying, you would stand vigil.

24:23Speaker 2:And she talks about watching her grandmother take her last breath. And she was, she would very much, my mother was very much a dramatic actress and she'd do the deep breathing and how she inhaled and never exhaled. And it freaked my mom out. And she was a little girl and she went running outside of her grandmother's house and ran into her deceased grandfather who like kind of caught her as she was running. And he said, tell the family I've got her. It's all okay. And She had so many experiences. She had an out-of-body experience. And yet when I would tell her about all the psychic stuff I was picking up and all the ghosty things I was seeing, it was always my imagination. And I just, I never really understood that.

25:09Speaker 1:I was never told it was my imagination. I remember just, they were silent. I remember trying to explain my guide who stood then and stands now at the foot of my bed To my mother. I was trying to describe him to her. And I think she probably thought it was imagination because she probably thought I was reading about somebody that looked like that. But she never actually said that. She never actually said, oh, it's just your imagination. I think she just kind of thought I would grow out of it. Well, that didn't work. But he and I are still buddies, you know, all these years later. He still rolls his eyes at me all these years later.

25:54Speaker 2:Well, I think once we came to our own in our 20s and 30s and started to really recognize that this was a skill and ability that we had and we started to invest time into it and learning it and all of that, you and I definitely stayed in, I think you call it the broom closet, right? For a very, very long time. Very long time. It's only in the last, what would you say, since 2016, 17, that we started really coming out of that closet?

26:31Speaker 1:Probably so. I remember those many years where I did that fundraising tarot weekend at Halloween at that museum cultural center, and you would not have recognized me. I mean, I had on scarves and makeup, and I used a fake name. Because I couldn't do my day job and be a tarot reader, you know? Right. In my mind.

26:57Speaker 2:Well, I think in everyone's mind back then.

27:00Speaker 1:Yeah.

27:01Speaker 2:You know, it was very, very hard to come out and say that. And I felt as though it had to be a choice. I thought, I think you and I were both very well respected as teachers at our different colleges where we taught. And I think we worked really hard to cultivate that respect. And the thought of losing that by saying, I'm an intuitive, I read to row and I collect crystals. That was very frightening to me because I worked so hard and I really value my intellect. And all I know is back then for sure, you were not seen as a rational, intelligent person if you also did this work.

27:47Speaker 1:Would you agree? Absolutely. And part of that takes us right back to the ridicule that Shirley MacLaine got.

27:55Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly.

27:56Speaker 1:And it stayed, that ridicule continued. And in fact, I think it continues today.

28:02Speaker 2:In many ways it does.

28:04Speaker 1:I know that there are people in my world who just put up a hand and just pretend that those parts of me don't exist, even though they know about them.

28:13Speaker 2:I told you, I don't know if I told the listeners this, When Michael and I were having dinner with a bunch of people, there were like, I don't know, eight couples. And one of the wives was telling a story about an intuitive medium who came to some fundraiser she went to and how the intuitive medium was like spot on and amazing. And I can, you know, I'm sitting next to Michael and I can feel him like You know how you can tell he's about to say something and I'm like, do not, do not say what I do right now. Please do not say anything. And I'm just trying to will him to not say anything.

28:50Speaker 2:And then her husband turns to Michael and says, you don't believe in all that bunk, do you? And I was like, oh. And he just looked at him and he said, as a matter of fact, I do. And he left it at that. And I was like, oh my gosh, that's why I love you. And when we got back in the car, he was like, oh, that's what you mean.

29:08Speaker 1:Because he.

29:10Speaker 2:can't understand why I'm so private about what I do. But I think you have to have a foot in this world to understand the blatant ridicule people will still shower on you.

29:27Speaker 1:Absolutely, yes. The ridicule, the fear, the retribution, it's still there. It is still absolutely there. I am just appalled and terrified sometimes when I realize that there are folks who really do believe that their way of being in the world is the only way there is and that other folks should not exist.

29:53Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm right, you're wrong, that type of thinking.

29:56Speaker 1:Absolutely, it is. So let's move on from that because it's making me nervous. Okay. All right.

30:04Speaker 2:She also wants to know about what we're reading and what we notice on our walks. Are you reading anything spiritual right now?

30:13Speaker 1:I'm reading all sorts of stuff. I mean, you know, I have a different book in every room. Don't you? Same. Yeah. So I just finished rereading Democracy by Joan Didion. And that book takes place... It begins with nuclear atomic testing on atolls in the Pacific and ends sort of near the end of the Vietnam War. And it's a novel, a story of a senator's wife who is running for president and how she survives through the politics of all of that and through the family dynamics of it with a very strange family. So it's an interesting read. Anything by Joan Didion just mesmerizes me. I would love to be able to write like Joan Didion writes. She's fascinating.

31:07Speaker 1:I read her work with a pen and make notes about her writing style. I just got maybe a chapter more to read in an older book by Sue Monk Kidd that I've also read before, but it's been years ago. It's called The Invention of Wings. And it's a true story. I did not realize the first time I read it. This time I understand that I'm reading basically historical fiction about a family in Charleston with two daughters. Maybe they're three daughters, but they're two daughters who are close. One of whom is given for her 11th birthday, her own slave, who is her age. And the story of these two young girls... as they grow up and become who they are.

32:01Speaker 1:And this was in pre-Civil War, so 1820s, 1830s, so a long time before the Civil War. One of the women, the lead character who is white, becomes an abolitionist. She is a real person. And not only was she an abolitionist, of course, against slavery, but she also was one of the first people in the country to fight for women's rights and women's rights to vote. I found that was just amazing. And what happened to their relationship and how beautiful it was fictitiously because the young black girl died early, but Sue carries her life on through and they managed to be really good friends. And it was just a fascinating book to reread and to realize I was reading real people. And I had not realized that the first time I read it.

32:53Speaker 2:I know I'm going to read- liked and didn't like Lincoln at the Bardo?

32:58Speaker 1:I hated that book. I loved that book. Yeah.

33:02Speaker 2:Did you know Tom Hanks is starring in the movie?

33:04Speaker 1:Yes, I did.

33:06Speaker 2:Are we going to go see it?

33:08Speaker 1:I don't know if I can.

33:10Speaker 2:I thought you had said something like that. Yeah, it was very heavy.

33:13Speaker 1:Oh, it was hard. My cousin sent me that book and I read it. And Lincoln in the Bardo is the story of the nights that Lincoln went and sat with his dead son's body until it could be moved to burial in Illinois.

33:29Speaker 2:Which is why I haven't read it. I can't do that stuff. But I love Tom Hanks. Has he ever let you down?

33:35Speaker 1:No, he has not. But the style of the book is unique. I've never seen another book written in the style that this book is written. It's in these bizarre paragraph forms that are not paragraphs. It's really fascinating. And it is told through the eyes of the people who are dead in the cemetery, who observe Lincoln doing this. Wow.

34:00Speaker 2:Well, I'm going to share what I'm reading. It's a little bit different than yours, but we're going to take our last break. We'll be right back.

34:08Speaker 1:Hi, everybody. I wanted to let you know that I am working on some new courses coming up in the near future. But in the meantime, I'm also offering some other things that you might be interested in. For example, On my website, you can find links to numerology reports, animal guide reports, and e-booklets about gardening with the spirit of the plant kingdom, with working with moon energy, working with the major arcana and crystals. So take a look at my website, stevebowen.com. And while you're there on my website, I'd love it if you'd subscribe to my free sub stack and visit with Merlin's picture on my website homepage.

34:50Speaker 1:I think you'll like looking at him. Stebbowen.com. Thanks so much, everybody.

34:58Speaker 2:Okay, welcome back. So my book club this month chose a really good book. I love this one. It's called Honor, and it's by Thridi Amrigar. I hope I'm saying her name correctly. And it's about this journalist named Smita who has to return to India to cover a story that is... appalling it's a hindu woman marries a muslim man and so the hindu women's brothers burn her husband alive and try to do the same to her and it's about just the racism the prejudice that is still alive and well today and it's told through the eyes of this journalist who left india when she was i believe 13 or 14 and so she's coming back with an american perspective And it's about how she has to cover this story and how it changes her. It was so good.

35:54Speaker 2:I think you'd like it.

35:55Speaker 1:Interesting. And it's just that interesting that you and I have both been reading books about really racism in many ways. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

36:05Speaker 2:Really heavy stuff, but important stuff.

36:08Speaker 1:Well, it really is. Absolutely true.

36:09Speaker 2:And then, of course, I went to my library book sale.

36:12Speaker 1:Oh, of course you did. It's one of the reasons it's the most about living there.

36:17Speaker 2:They do it every July and then usually in the winter too. And I love to just make a beeline for the, they still have it marked a cult section, which just tickles me because that's how it used to be in Barnes and Noble in the 90s, remember?

36:30Speaker 1:Right, I do.

36:32Speaker 2:Cult. Now it's, I don't know, self-help or metaphysical. But anyway, our library still calls it a cult. And I like to find kind of random out-of-print books. And I got Crystal Healing Secrets by Brett Bravo. And it's pretty good. It's all about different crystals that work for chakras and how to use them in healing and layouts, how to use them to strengthen your intuition. And it's just interesting. I'm trying to open it to see when exactly it was written. I think it was in the 80s.

37:03Speaker 1:Do you know this person? Are you familiar with him?

37:05Speaker 2:No, I don't. It says in his bio that he's a famous psychic counselor and a California-based therapist.

37:14Speaker 1:I don't know who he is.

37:15Speaker 2:But I had not heard of him either. But it's a good read. And then, of course, I have this giant, giant book. I have two giant books by Colin Wilson. Occult History and Mysteries is the other one. I've read Mysteries. The occult one I'm making my way through. It's like the size of a Bible dip. So I try to read a chapter here and there. I love Colin Wilson. So if anyone hasn't heard of him, do check him out. He's just got such a Such a writer's, reporter's investigative approach to all of this stuff. And it's fun to watch the trajectory of his beliefs. You know, he's really honest.

37:55Speaker 2:Like when he started writing a cult, he did not believe in any of this stuff. But he says in the foreword, I had a family. I had to support my family. My writing projects had run out and I needed the money. And I just really respect that he said that. And he said, I didn't know what to think about all this stuff. My editor wanted me to research, but I have come away as mostly a believer. And it's just fun to read the book and you can feel him struggling. Like, I don't want to believe this.

38:26Speaker 2:Sounds really out there. However, because he goes to the people's homes and interviews them with all the weird stuff they say has happened to them. And he does his due diligence. So it's a heavy read, but it's a good read.

38:38Speaker 1:Isn't that interesting? Wow.

38:41Speaker 2:Yeah. Hmm.

38:42Speaker 1:Speaking of crystals, I just have to tell you real quickly. I woke up the other morning with, you know how when you wake up and there's this thought that's kind of like gossamer floating around you? And the thought was ISIS point. I thought, well, I have one of those. Probably have several, but I have one that I'm really close to. And I thought, okay, there is bound to be a reason here. While I was eating my bagel for breakfast, I dragged out, and to that I mean from my office to the kitchen, Melody, and was reading about Isis points in Melody. So I did do some Melody research and crystal work this week. And I pulled out my Isis point and cleaned it and charged it.

39:30Speaker 1:and have been meditating with it this week.

39:34Speaker 2:Are you meditating with your Isis point by staring into the Isis window or holding it to your third eye? How are you?

39:42Speaker 1:Both of those things as well as just holding it in my left hand to see what might be coming in from wherever.

39:50Speaker 2:I love that. See, an example of following your intuitive hunches.

39:53Speaker 1:There you go. So I'll let you know I'm making notes as stuff bubbles up.

39:58Speaker 2:I got this idea over the summer. I was like, you know what I would like to offer on my website is a mystery bracelet. And I was thinking like people could just order a mystery bracelet and then I would look at their name and I would just try to tune in and feel like, ooh, what bracelet could they use? So I started ordering a bunch of different beads from my supplier just so I could have different ones that are typically on my website. And what just came in the mail are calligraphy stone beads.

40:27Speaker 1:Oh, I have a calligraphy stone.

40:29Speaker 2:I just got one at the beginning of the summer and I really, really like it. I like the energy of it. And the beads are just beautiful.

40:37Speaker 1:It's on my writing altar.

40:39Speaker 2:Yes, as it should be.

40:40Speaker 1:Right.

40:42Speaker 2:You have a Chinese writing stone too, right? I do. Those two together are so good, plus sodalite on a writing altar.

40:50Speaker 1:Yeah, that sodalite egg you gave me is on that altar.

40:53Speaker 2:I love that. Okay, so finally our listener asked Deb, where's that question?

40:59Speaker 1:About Merlin.

41:01Speaker 2:Oh, yeah. So finally our listener said, also, Deb, we all know how important and special Merlin the magic cat was and is to you. He is such a handsome and wise-looking soul. I'm curious after he passed, did you ever welcome another furry companion into your life? So do you want to answer that or do you want to talk about some of the psychic communication between you and Merlin first?

41:26Speaker 1:I will answer both of those things. I can hear the other people story pretty quickly. Yes. After Merlin died, I had two other four-legged people and one of them was a lovely Tabby girl named Sadie, who was just about the sweetest person on the planet. Just kind, very gentle. Unless you were eating Oreos. And I don't know what Sadie's deal was, but she would have slit my throat for an Oreo. It was the weirdest thing. But other than that, she was very sweet.

42:01Speaker 2:That is weird. She would eat the Oreo?

42:03Speaker 1:I wouldn't let her eat the Oreo.

42:05Speaker 2:Right, but she would try to.

42:07Speaker 1:Yeah. I don't know what it was about Oreos.

42:10Speaker 2:I've never had a cat try to take human food from me.

42:13Speaker 1:Oh, Sadie wanted my Oreos. But she was a very nice and very kind and very sweet girl. The other cat's name was Eli. And Eli found me. And you know that list of questions that I always say I want to take with me when I die because I got questions when I give up. Yeah. One of them is why did I have Eli? Because Eli and I didn't know.

42:35Speaker 2:You had Eli when I met you. And I remember you were just like, oh, this cat.

42:39Speaker 1:We didn't like each other. He didn't like me. I didn't like him. But Eli was all black. And that is the person who is most likely to be killed in a shelter. And so I couldn't let him go. I mean, I couldn't do that to him. So we lived together for 14 years. And that's just kind of what we did. We just lived together. We would come and sit on the arm of the sofa next to me. I'd be reading. I'd reach over, and he would rub his head against my hand and want to be petted.

43:08Speaker 1:And then he'd bite the crap out of me. I'm like, well, what is up with this? I don't know why I had Eli, but I did. And then he got very sick very quickly with sudden onset diabetes and died very quickly when he was 14. But we lived together for a long time. So there was Sadie and there was Eli. And at the moment, I don't have any four-legged people with me. But my relationship with Merlin was beyond psychic. He was born mute. He could make a screeching sound every once in a while under extreme duress, but making normal cat sounds he couldn't do. So we learned, he taught me how to communicate with him through the way we talked, which is just the way I'm talking to you, and through our eye contact. And I... could look at his eyes and know what I needed, what he was trying to tell me. It was truly, truly just amazing.

44:14Speaker 1:And I will tell you, I could tell many stories about him. But when my landlady died and I had to move out of the apartment that he and I had lived in for many years, I had lived there for 17 years. I think he maybe came a year or so later. He was about 16, I guess, when we had to move. And so I started looking for another place to live. And it took me a while, I'm a little slow, but it took me a while to realize that I wasn't looking for a place to live.

44:49Speaker 1:I was looking for a place for Merlin to live. And I was going with him because one of the criteria, of course, was pets or no pets, right? And searching for a place to live. So I finally realized that I was looking for a place for Merlin to go. And I found this lovely place that I thought might be okay. And interestingly, the woman who had lived there and died in the bedroom a couple of weeks before had also lived in that apartment the same length of time I lived in the one I was moving away from.

45:22Speaker 1:So I go and look at the apartment, and I think, well, maybe, and it's okay for Merlin. So I go to the landlord, and I say, would you be willing to hold this apartment for another day And let me come over here tomorrow during lunch and just sit in the apartment. It was absolutely empty. And sort of figure out how my furniture would go in it and whatnot. And I will bring you back the key within an hour and let you know whether or not I'm going to take it.

45:52Speaker 1:And he said, okay. So I went home the next day from work, got Merlin. He and I went to the apartment. I had, I don't know, junk food, junk of lunch of some sort. I sat on the floor in the living room and I said, wander around and tell me what you think. I need to know whether or not this is okay for you. And he did. He wandered through the apartment and he came back and he sat down in front of me and he reached out a paw and patted my hand. And I looked in his eyes and I said, are you sure? And he nodded his head and I said, okay. And that's how Merlin and I moved.

46:34Speaker 2:What was the time he spoke?

46:37Speaker 1:The day I took him to be put to sleep.

46:39Speaker 2:Oh, gosh.

46:40Speaker 1:Okay, sorry.

46:41Speaker 2:I did not mean to bring that up.

46:42Speaker 1:That's okay. I, of course, could not do this. He had kidney failure. And I had begged the vet to do a kidney transplant. Merlin, at this point, was 18 and a half years old. And the vet said, you got to let him go. You can't do this. So Gene drove me to take him to the vet. And he's in my arms. And he's laying across my chest. He's got his forearms around my neck and his head on my shoulder. And he raises his head and he says, Mama. I thought Jean was going to run off the road.

47:23Speaker 1:I wish she were alive to verify that story. It's a true story.

47:26Speaker 2:Oh, I know it is. So it's so amazing to the testimony of love, the love you two shared.

47:33Speaker 1:One more quick story about him and then I'll shut up. So I have had one blind date in my life. And this fella comes to pick me up and he was a friend of a friend kind of thing. And so I invite him in and he's sitting in the living room and I said I needed to finish getting dressed. And so I fixed him a drink and sit here, have a seat and I'll be right back out. And I go back into the bedroom. And I'm fluffing and doing what you do, you know. And I come back to the doorway that separates the hallway to the bedroom to the living room. And Merlin is standing in that doorway with his legs spread eagle and his claws dug into the carpet. And I looked at him and I said, what are you doing? And he looked up at me and he said, you're not going. I'm like, wait a minute, I'm not going. Now this is, we're doing this non-verbally, right?

48:34Speaker 1:He said, nope, you cannot go out with this guy. So I said to him, okay, I'll take care of this, all right. So I walked into the living room and I said to the fellow, I am just as sorry as I can be, but I can't go. I apologize. How did he take it? And he left. And I'm thinking, that was probably one of the craziest things I've ever done. Well, it wasn't. I found out later that he had been accused of being violent to his last girlfriend.

49:09Speaker 2:And Merlin knew it.

49:10Speaker 1:And Merlin knew it. He says, you aren't going.

49:16Speaker 2:That's amazing. And didn't you hear from him after he passed, Miss? many times?

49:20Speaker 1:Oh, many, many times. Many times. He would come and jump on the bed. But he loved to ride. I mean, he was very happy. We had a camper back in those days. And he and I would go camping. He was sitting in the camper with me. He sailed on my boat with me.

49:38Speaker 2:Just amazing.

49:39Speaker 1:He truly was a magic cat. Yes.

49:41Speaker 2:And they call those soul connections. Yeah.

49:45Speaker 1:And I say this often. One of the reasons that I don't mind the idea of being on the other side is I truly believe in that rainbow bridge. And I know I will hold him in my arms again. Yes, you will.

50:00Speaker 2:I had a cool thing happen at the Edgar Cayce thing I was teaching at over the summer. So I have a cat now who's Sabrina. Yeah. She sounds a lot like your Eli, but I love Sabrina. She's just a little different and quirky. And she's mainly black and she has some white on her face and some white on her paws. But before, well, actually before and during her, I had another cat named Lance who was all black with one little white like thumbprint on his chest. And Lance was a cool cat.

50:32Speaker 1:I remember Lance.

50:34Speaker 2:He was really, he was just cool. He had other cat friends, which I'd never seen before. And they would all hang out in my driveway. And they were all black cats. So we called them the Black Cat Club. And Lance, my daughter's car was usually in the driveway. And then my car and my other daughter's car was in the garage. And he would lay atop the hood of her car like the king of the Black Cat Club. And the other three black cats would just be splayed across my driveway. And they were just all as cool as could be. And I just loved him. So, so much.

51:07Speaker 2:And anyway, so I'm presenting at Edgar Cayce. And when I'm done, this woman came up to me and she said, did you have a mostly all black cat? And she said, the whole time you're talking, there's a black cat weaving around your feet. And I said, oh, I said, well, I do have a black cat who has like white on her face and white on her paws and She said, no, no, no, this cat has crossed over, and he's all black with one little white mark on his chest. And I was like, oh, my gosh, that's Lance. And I just loved that he was still popping in to say hello.

51:41Speaker 1:Oh, I think that's wonderful. I remember Lance. I do, a lot. And, you know, if we're going to talk about our four-legged spirit folks, then certainly we need to talk about Lily and maybe Gretchen.

51:54Speaker 2:But they are all my little soul pets. You know, you just, you love all of your four-legged friends and some of them you just bond with a little bit more. And for me, that was definitely Lily. And she had that intuitive connection, I believe, with all of us, not just me. So it was nice because my kids were just as close to her as I was. And she was just so fiercely protective of all of us. the one story that always breaks my heart, my first husband had, we had a boat and, you know, then he had the brain injury, which meant he forgot a lot of stuff.

52:36Speaker 2:So we're all out on the boat as a family. And he's like, okay, you guys can hop off and go to that Island. I'm going to drop anchor and, you know, clean up and I'll be there. So we just jump off the boat and we swim to the little Island. And then he follows suit in a minute and Lily's playing. She loves the beach and We're collecting seashells and all of that stuff. And then I look and the boat is floating away.

53:00Speaker 1:Oh, dear.

53:01Speaker 2:And I'm like, did you forget to drop the anchor?

53:03Speaker 1:Oh, yeah.

53:04Speaker 2:Oh, my gosh, I did. And the waves are coming in. Like, you know how weather here can change on a dime. It suddenly gets very, very wavy and windy. And he's swimming to go grab the rope and anchor the boat. But it's, you know, it's not a big boat, but it's not a small boat. And I'm like, you know what? He's going to need some help. So I said to my little girls, you guys stay here. Watch Lily. Don't move. We'll be right back. And I dive into the ocean and I'm swimming after Mike so that I can help him pull the boat and get the anchor in and all of that stuff. And I hear my girl screaming my name and I'm like, oh no, what now? And I turn around. There is my, now Lily is a little tiny Yorkie. She weighed about nine pounds.

53:49Speaker 1:I can see her.

53:51Speaker 2:She had dived into that ocean and the waves are coming after her one after the other and her little black and brown head keeps popping up and she is just swimming with all her might to come and help me. And I just burst into laughter and tears and I swam back and I scooped her up in my arms and I'm holding her with one arm and I'm trying to swim and, you know, we get the boat anchored and all of that. But that was just her love for us. She just Didn't think about herself. She dove into the stormy waters to help her mommy. And that's just who she always was.

54:27Speaker 1:Do you remember the day that you and Lily and Tori and I were on the beach? Remember that day?

54:32Speaker 2:Yeah, that was a great day.

54:34Speaker 1:It was a great day. That was so much fun. Lily was a lovely dog person, y'all. She really was.

54:40Speaker 2:She was. And she has come back to visit. She mainly visits Chloe. Chloe dreams about her a lot. Oh, yeah. And they're doing really wonderful things, which is cool because we had an animal intuitive on the show so long ago. I can't remember her name. I know people are going to email me. Please don't because I don't remember her name, but she was lovely. And after we had stopped recording, she said, you have a little dog that's really close to your youngest and she visits her in her dreams.

55:16Speaker 2:And I was like, oh, okay. I just thought that was really neat. And I told Chloe, she was, I don't know, seven. And she was like, oh my gosh, I do often dream that Lily and I are climbing through the woods or up a mountain. And that still apparently continues.

55:29Speaker 1:Oh, fine. I know.

55:31Speaker 2:I still have Sabrina, but I have not welcomed another four-legged family member into my heart. And I don't plan to.

55:38Speaker 1:I live in a position where I really can't have another four-legged person. But if that changes, if that should change, I figure, as old as I am, I have time for one more four-legged person in my life. And I already tell you what that person is going to look like. Y'all don't send me anybody. I can't do it, okay? But I know what this person will look like, and I know the name. And I want a male cat. And I want a kitten, but it needs to have really, really, really, really long hair. Because Merlin was really, really, really long-haired and gray. But I want a yellow kitten. yellow, yellow, yellow, long, long, long-haired male kitten whose name will be Aslan from the Narnia Chronicles.

56:25Speaker 2:Oh, like the lion. Oh, I love that.

56:27Speaker 1:I want an Aslan in my world.

56:29Speaker 2:Do you love to vacuum twice a day?

56:32Speaker 1:No, but for Aslan, I would figure out how to do that. Merlin and I worked that out pretty well. It was okay. He liked to be brushed. He loved to be brushed. If I had put the brush in my hand, he was right there. And he would brush himself. I would just hold the brush still and he would move.

56:52Speaker 2:I think it's so wonderful to look back at all of the four-legged friends you've invited into your heart and think about what they taught you.

57:03Speaker 1:Oh, absolutely.

57:04Speaker 2:You know, because I think every pet that we bring into our family, our lives... They teach each of us something that's even Eli taught you a lot of patience.

57:14Speaker 1:He did.

57:18Speaker 2:I mean, I think it's great to look at what maybe what comfort and joy we brought them, but I love to look at what they bring to each family member and how they help their other, the other pets in the home. Cause I mean, you know, you asked about Gretchen and when we rescued Gretchen, she was dropped off at an all kill shelter with her puppies and her puppies didn't make it. And she was so depressed that they gave her a stuffed animal. And so she would walk around with that stuffed animal all the time because she wanted to be a mommy and it broke my heart. So of course we, I drove five hours to get Gretchen, big, big Doberman with a heart of gold.

58:00Speaker 2:And we bring her home to the family and I can't stand people who are prejudiced against large dogs who are supposed to be violent if anyone's ever had a Doberman I've had two and they are the sweetest darn dogs ever so Gretchen comes into our home and I mean my mom oh my god she was like how can you bring a rescued Doberman with these little baby girls around you know she's gonna kill you all in her sleep could not have been less true she was so so sweet and she had her little stuffy and she carried it with her everywhere and about I don't know, 18 months, two years later was when Lily came into her life and she looked like a baby Doberman. We're both black and tan, right? And Gretchen never touched her little stuffed animal again. And she took Lily under her wing and the two of them were inseparable until Gretchen had to cross the rainbow bridge. And I think about what Lily taught her And I think about what Gretchen taught Lily, because Lily was, she was the runt of her litter. That's why she walked into my life. the woman but there was like a breeder in town and I had a client who was working you know to

59:16Speaker 2:kind of not shut down breeders but to instruct them if you know what I mean and this one lady was like well I can't do anything with this she's the runt of the and she had a hernia and she needed surgery and And so she was just going to drop her off at a shelter. And my client happened to mention it. And I was like, I'll take her. And that's how Lily just kind of landed in her lap. And I think because of all of that, she was shy and a little skittish. And Gretchen really taught her to be confident and a little bossy boots. But she healed Gretchen's heart.

59:54Speaker 1:Isn't that lovely? Isn't that sweet?

59:56Speaker 2:All right, we need to end on a happier note.

59:59Speaker 1:I'm just going to tell you, his mom died when his eyes were still closed. And that's how I got him. And I worked for the most wonderful people who I could bring him to work with me every day. So he spent his first six weeks on my shoulder drinking goat's milk out of a baby bottle, like a toy bottle, you know. And I think that's one of the reasons we were so incredibly bonded, just like what you did with Lily. And how wonderful it was.

1:00:27Speaker 2:I love that, you know. I think the beautiful thing about our four-legged friends is they really do teach us about unconditional love.

1:00:36Speaker 1:They really do. They really do. Okay, dear.

1:00:40Speaker 2:Thank you to our listener for sending in these thought-provoking questions, and we hope you enjoyed listening to us kind of rattle on. We'll be back with you next week with a new show. We're going to be covering lots of fun things. We have some wonderful guests coming up. We have a paranormal news show. And then, of course... Before you know it, we're going to be in October and Samantha and maybe Deb are going to bring you some really scary, spooky shows. Until then, we hope you have a wonderful, happy, loving, magical week. Remember, as always, to be the light for yourself and others.

1:01:17Speaker 1:Take care, everyone.

1:01:24Speaker 2:Thank you for listening to Psychic Teachers, your podcast for seekers, lightworkers, mystics, and magical thinkers. If you like the show, please tell a friend or leave us a review wherever you listen to your podcast. For more information, check out our Facebook page, Psychic Teachers, or our websites, SamanthaFay.com and DebBowen.com. Thanks for listening and have a great week.