Enlightened Empaths

https://www.thegratefulmessenger.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/intuitive-thinking.jpgIn this episode Samantha and Denise are talking about how to really truly discern your psychic ability, how to overcome and recognize blocks and doubts, and more importantly, how to focus on how amazing and beautiful your life will look like when you do trust and develop and work with your intuition.

So many of us question whether it’s just wishful thinking or if there really is an intuitive connection happening. Based on the responses Samantha received at a recent workshop she was teaching, this episode explores these questions and many more. You may recognize some of your own questions and maybe even some hesitations you hold about connecting more fully with your own intuition!

For more information about Samantha’s upcoming weekend workshop at Edgar Cayce A.R.E: Psychic Development: The Divine Spark of Intuition

https://www.thegratefulmessenger.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/Headshot-scaled.jpegPlease join us in welcoming Jacqueline Diesing as our Share Your Light guest today! Jackie is a mixed-media artist and architect based in Detroit. She works with micron ink, watercolor pencils, and pastels. Her art contrasts the rigid lines of historical architecture with the softness of nature. Since 2017, her work has been exhibited in galleries, featured in publications, and sold in retail locations and online. She is a member of multiple juried artist directories and has been published in Painting Our World and Arts to Hearts Project’s 101 Art Book.

Jackie is also the author illustrator of her children’s book, Oma Lives in the Stars which was inspired by her mother and nephew. This beautiful book and our conversation today explores grief, family stories, signs from loved ones and how creative work can help children trust their intuition and talk about loss.

For more information about Jackie please visit: https://www.jacquelinediesing.com/

https://www.thegratefulmessenger.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/monthly-forecast-image.pngPlease join Denise and Samantha as they explore November’s astrological themes, from Scorpio-season reflection and relationship realignment to Sagittarius optimism complete with a Gemini full moon that may bring surprising conversations. For intuitive people, empaths, and highly sensitive people, it can be useful to approach the month as a time to slow down, discern what is truly yours to carry, and make space for deeper emotional clarity.

Stay tuned until the end when Denise does a monthly card reading for listeners and Samantha shares amazing insights into the crystal of the month, blue phantom quartz!

Pleashttps://www.thegratefulmessenger.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/image0.pnge join us in welcoming Liz O’Connor to this Share Your Light episode, where we showcase members of our listening audience who are finding a way to step more fully into their true Light to help others. Liz is an author, teacher, psychic development coach, and generational intuitive with over twenty years of experience working with the Tarot. She is the author of Navigating Your Shadow: An Intuitive Compass for Exploration and creator of The Crow Tarot YouTube channel. An avid Shadow Worker, Liz helps others explore their shadows, deepen their intuition, and live their purpose. Originally from New York, she now lives in the U.K. with her husband, kids, and two feline familiars.

Find her at http://www.ladycrow.net/ and on YouTube as The Crow Tarot.

You can also find Liz on Instagram @ _lady_crow

https://www.thegratefulmessenger.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/cultural-humility.pngWelcome back to the monthly episode where we share questions and comments from the Enlightened Empath community of listeners. This episode explores spiritual practices, healing techniques, and personal stories that deepen our understanding of energy, love, and transformation.

If you would like to submit a story or question for consideration in a future episode, please email : enlightenedempaths@gmail.com

For more information about Samantha and her offerings:https://samanthafey.com/

Denise, her offerings and services can be found: https://www.thegratefulmessenger.com/

https://www.thegratefulmessenger.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/third.jpgFor this spooky season, we share a not so spooky but more intriguing phenomenon known as 3rd Man Syndrome, where individuals in extreme situations sense a benevolent, unseen presence beside them, one that seems to guide them to safety.. The experience has been reported by polar explorers, high-altitude mountaineers, solo sailors, and disaster survivors for over a century. Most researchers view it as a remarkable coping response the brain produces under extraordinary stress.

Are they angels? Guides? Guardians? Join Samantha and Denise as they delve into historical stories, scientific insights, and spiritual perspectives that shed light on this mysterious experience.

Books Mentioned in this Episode:

The Third Man Factor by John Geiger

The Naked Mountain by Reinhold Messner

Touching the Void by Joe Simpson

Man in a Raft by Kenneth Cooke

They Flew by Carlos M.N.Eire

If you would like more information about Samantha and her offerings, please visit: https://samanthafey.com/

Denise’s services and offerings can be found at: https://www.thegratefulmessenger.com/

Welchttps://www.thegratefulmessenger.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/PXL_20260504_180119229.jpegome to another Share Your Light episode, where we showcase people who are following their heart and passion in order to be of service to others. Today’s guest, Kiersten, is an intuitive healer specializing in distance healing. She incorporates energy work, crystals, sacred drumming, moon cycles, pendulum, and the crystal grid in her practice. Drawing on her gifts, to identify troubled areas, and sending out healing energy.

In addition to her online practice supporting human healing journeys, Kiersten also practices equine energy work and facilitates tailored group programs.

You can connect with Kiersten and schedule distance healing appointments on her website: https://www.innerknowinghealing.com/

As emphttps://www.thegratefulmessenger.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/mano-e-burattino.gifaths, we’ve learned to recognize gaslighting, manipulation, and other nefarious techniques people use to dim our light. But what about when that is happening in the workplace or in friendship groups? Today we’re talking about manipulation — the everyday kind that shows up at your desk, in your group chat, at your best friend’s dinner party. We’re going to talk about what it looks like, why groups are actually easier to manipulate than one-on-one relationships, and — most importantly — how to spot it before you’re three months deep into a dynamic that’s quietly rearranging your sense of reality

Recognizing what is happening is the first step in breaking free!

For more information about Samantha and her offerings: https://samanthafey.com/

To connect with Denise and her services:https://www.thegratefulmessenger.com/

https://www.thegratefulmessenger.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/MePups.webpIn this Share You Light episode, we welcome Nicole Harp! Nicole is an author, award-winning abstract artist, professional interspecies animal communicator, and graduate of Virginia Commonwealth University with a degree in design. Her work explores the intersection of art, energy, consciousness, and the profound connection between humans, animals, and the natural world. Through her soul paintings, Nicole intuitively translates the essence and energy of people, animals and spirit into visual form, creating artwork that invites deeper reflection and connection.

Nicole has felt a lifelong calling to understand and advocate for animals. As a professional animal communicator, she connects with animals of many species, both living and in spirit, sharing their perspectives, emotions, wisdom, and messages to help people see animals as sentient beings with their own thoughts, feelings and sovereignty. Her work is rooted in the belief that by deepening our understanding of animals, we ultimately deepen our understanding of ourselves and our relationship with the natural world.

She is the author of colors of Consciousness; Twenty-Five Soul Paintings, Volume 1 and the creator the Animal Truth Oracle, a 54-card deck written from the animals’ perspective. Nicole also teaches soul painting and animal communication, helping others move beyond the analytical mind and into intuitive, heart-centered connection.

Please contact Nicole at her website https://www.harpspace.org/ or Nicole@harpspace.org

For information about the upcoming Kickstarter for the Animal Truth Oracle Deck

And please follow her at Instagram@harpspace, on Facebook @Harpspace as well as on Substack

It’s time to take a peek and explore the astrological influences for October 2026, filled with retrogrades, new moons, and planetary shifts! Samantha and Denise share and discuss how these influences may impact personal growth, relationships, and self-care.

The Venus retrograde beginning in Scorpio on October 3rd and later returning to Libra, gives us the opportunity to look at issues around trust and emotional safety, reciprocity in relationships, potentially unfinished romantic and friendship issues. A good question for empaths: Am I taking care of other people at my own expense?

Communication may need a little more care and finesse. You may want to wait before sending emotionally charged messages, ask direct questions rather than assuming, and allowing conversations to unfold over time. The full moon in Taurus on October 26th emphasizes the body and physical stability. Regular meals and sleep, spending time outdoors, being aware of overstimulation, practicing breathwork and gentle movement could all be beneficial and help you self-regulate.

• Early October: Avoid rushing relationship decisions; watch for emotional escalation.
• Around October 10: Set intentions for balanced, mutual connections.
• Mid-month: Review personal boundaries and release outdated emotional roles.
• Late October: Communicate slowly, verify details, and prioritize physical grounding.

Please remember these are potential energies, you always have choice and free will. Hope you have a wonderful month of October!

Please join us in welcoming Amelia for this Share Your Light episode. Amelia shares her transformative journey through dreams, internal family systems, and creative expression, offering insights into healing childhood wounds and navigating midlife transitions with grace and self-awareness.

Through Artsy Partswork, Amelia offers IFS-informed peer support and dreamwork while focusing on the identity shifts that come with midlife. She believes our dreams and inner parts can invite us to become curious about who we are beneath the roles we’ve carried for years, while supportive friendships can give us the courage and companionship to discover who we’re becoming.

After spending much of her life keeping parts of herself hidden, Amelia is now exploring what it means to be more visible, trust her own inner wisdom, and create spaces where women can say, “Me too.” Her approach isn’t about telling people what to believe. It’s about creating a safe, curious space to explore what they already sense within themselves.

For more information about Amelia and her offerings, please visit: https://www.artsypartswork.com/

It’s our monthly episode featuring stories, questions and comments from listeners in our Enlightened Empaths community! Please join us as we explore insights on intuition, dreams, environmental concerns, and personal growth.

If you would like to submit a question or story for a Community Connections episode, please email us: enlightenedempaths@gmail.com

For more information on Samantha’s services and upcoming events: https://samanthafey.com

Denise and her offerings are at: https://thegratefulmessenger.com

Melissa Ann Lester is an integrative healer, author, mentor, and teacher whose work weaves
transpersonal psychology, somatic practices, energy medicine, and earth-based wisdom.
Rooted in a holistic, trauma-informed approach, she supports others navigating moments of
unraveling, awakening, and deep transition as they reconnect with their inner wisdom and
return home to themselves.

Her own healing journey began with therapy as her entryway, and eventually she felt called to
be a witness and guide for others, serving as a Licensed Professional Counselor for more than
ten years. A series of spiritual initiations profoundly deepened her work, ultimately leading her
to answer a soul-led calling: releasing her clinical license to offer healing that integrates the full
spectrum of the human experience — mind, body, and spirit.

Melissa holds a Master of Science in Mental Health Counseling, is certified in Complementary
and Alternative Medicine, is an Usui Reiki Master, and draws from her studies in somatics and
earth-based wisdom. For now she walks alongside individuals in one-on-one work, with
seasonal programs and group offerings beginning to take shape. She lives in Decatur, Georgia,
with her husband and two cats, where she is happily surrounded by trees.

You can follow her writing in her monthly musings newsletter and find her at
http://www.melissaannlester.com and on Instagram at @melissaannlester.

Have you ever wondered if there was a way you could connect more fully with your own inner thoughts and programming in order to enhance your life? We all can by becoming more aware of the power of our subconscious mind!

The subconscious mind is the silent architect of our reality; it interprets symbols, stores every experience, and shapes our decisions long before our conscious mind catches up. When we have a clearer understanding of how it works, it gives us the ability to reprogram our inner world so we can make the life shifts we are ready to manifest.

Exercises to retrain the subconscious:

Mirror Exercise – speak to yourself in the second person. Your subconscious receives this as an instruction, a task to complete, rather than a wish. “You are successful” or “You are healthy, wealthy and happy.”

Gratitude Letter – Write a letter to yourself as though your goal has already happened. Use the present tense.

Symbolic Visualization Ritual

• Choose one goal.
• Identify three symbols that represent that goal.
• Spend 2 minutes visualizing each symbol in vivid detail.
• Repeat daily for 21 days.

The more you get to know your inner world, the more you are able to shine your own light more brightly!

For more information about Samantha and her offerings:https://samanthafey.com/

Denise and her services can be found at:https://www.thegratefulmessenger.com/

Please join us in welcoming Kristen O’Meara to the show today. Kristen is the mother of Austin, an adult on the autism spectrum. She has a master’s degree in counseling psychology and advanced certifications in mindfulness and intuitive development as well as extensive training in spiritual healing modalities. With raw honesty, Kristen shares her profound journey of healing and spiritual connection through channeling her son’s higher self, offering practical tools and insights for parents of children with autism and the reality of her journey.

Kristen began channeling her son Austin’s higher self in 2013 because Austin could not speak with her. Channeling became an integral part of her healing journey, redirecting her back to her soul and heart, and teaching her that we are all powerful souls embodied. Bridging her experiences with complex parenting, counseling work, and a sophisticated toolbox of healing techniques, her first book, The Healing Way, is the culmination of her life’s work.

The Healing Way by Kristen O’Meara

For more information about Kristen and her work, please visit: https://www.thespiritualcaregiver.com/

Kristen can also be found on Substack under thespiriualcaregiver.substack.

Here’s the shape of September, in one sentence: it’s a month of turning inward while the world asks you to engage outward.

There’s a cluster of retrograde planets active pretty much all month — Saturn, Neptune, and Pluto are already retrograde, and partway through the month, Uranus joins them. Four planets moving backward, astrologically, at the same time.

For an empath, this actually can be a relief, if you let it. So much of what exhausts us is the forward momentum of the world — the constant doing, deciding, producing, responding. A month with this many retrogrades is a month where the cosmic permission slip says: it’s okay to slow down. It’s okay to revisit. It’s okay to not have the answer yet.

But — and here’s the nuance — the inner planets, the fast-moving personal ones: the Sun, Mercury, Venus, and Mars, are all direct and quite active this month. So you’re going to feel this tug-of-war: parts of you wanting to reflect, rest, and go inward, while other parts of your life — conversations, relationships, decisions — are moving forward whether you’re ready or not.

If you take one thing from this whole episode, let it be this: you’re allowed to let your inner world move at retrograde speed even while your outer world moves at direct speed!

Empaths are often deeply connected to the animals they share their lives with, these are not merely pets but beloved friends, confidantes and family members. In this episode, we explore the soul connection many empaths feel with their pets, why in many ways it can feel easier than dealing with other people and also the reality of grieving the lose of a dear friend when they cross the Rainbow Bridge.

Books Mentioned in this Episode:

When Elephants Weep: The Emotional Lives of Animals by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson and Susan McCarthy

Honoring Our Animals: 365 Meditations for Healing after Pet Loss By Beth Bigler

The Grief Recovery Handbook by John W. James and Russell Friedman

Goodbye, Friend: Healing Wisdom for Anyone Who Has Ever Lost a Pet by Gary Kowalski

We’re back again with one of our favorite episodes to do each month, questions, comments and stories from our amazing Enlightened Empaths community!

If you would like to submit a story, have a comment or question, please email us: enlightenedempaths@gmail.com.

For more information about Samantha and her offerings: https://samanthafey.com

And to find out more about Denise and her services and offerings: https://thegratefulmessenger.com

Thank you for being part of our community!

Over the past few years, it has become very obvious that many of us are feeling a deep need to free ourselves and those in our lineage from past trauma, upset and limitations. In this episode, we explore the transformative power of ancestral healing and how it can unlock personal and spiritual growth.

We’re so excited to share some wonderful guests with you today as we offer a different approach with a round table conversation about ancestral healing and why it’s so important for many of us right now. Our guests today come from varied backgrounds and experiences, but all have had powerful insights and transformation since doing this healing work.

Rima has always been intuitive but took long detours in the worlds of academia and politics before coming home to working as an intuitive and medium. She lives on the east coast of Canada and you can find her at http://rimabythesea.com/

Julie is an intuitive healer and Family Constellation facilitator who helps people heal inherited family patterns, reconnect with themselves, and create lasting change through intuitive and ancestral healing practices. For more information about Julie and her services: https://www.intuitivehealingbyjulie.com/

Monica offers holistic support for spiritual and healing needs. She is a psychic medium who uses her intuitive abilities to bring information to clients seeking connection. She is an artisan offering crafted jewelry pieces that carry not just aesthetic beauty but also resonate with nature. To connect with Monica:monikajakiel.com

Beth is a certified death doula, shamanic healer and reiki practitioner. All modalities of her work focus on holistic healing, transformation, personal and spiritual development. Compassion and a calming presence offer guidance, emotional support and empowerment. For more about Beth and her services: http://beyondsentient.com

If you’re curious about going deeper with your own ancestral healing journey, please consider joining us for the upcoming class. For more information on dates and what is involved:Embracing the Present Through Healing the Past If you have any questions that aren’t addressed, please feel free to send me an email: denise@thegratefulmessenger.com

Today we’re talking about self-discovery through oracle cards with our guest Toni Savory — better known as The Card Geek — the creator of World Divination and one of the leading voices in traditional cartomancy. Toni has spent years studying Lenormand, Kipper, and Gypsy Cards across England, France, and Germany, including 15 years living near Munich, the birthplace of the original Kipper deck. Now based in Northern Ireland, she’s dedicated the last decade to researching these systems and teaching students around the world.

She’s the author of The Card Geek’s Guide to Kipper, Rainbow Kipper, Lustrous Lenormand, and Mastering the Tarot Tableau, and she’s known for helping readers reconnect with the roots of divination and unlock bold, predictive readings. Through World Divination, Toni guides people to read their own futures, navigate life’s crossroads, and step confidently into their path.

Today, we’re diving into her latest creation, The Four Selves Oracle Deck, and exploring how it helps readers understand the deeper layers of the self and transform their lives through intuitive insight.

For more information about Tori and her offerings, please visit: The Card Geek

And for more information about cartomancy and world divination, please visit: World Divination Association