What if the thing standing between you and divine light is your nervous system?

Trauma therapist Rachel Pfotenhauer has spent more than 25 years as a licensed professional counselor, and just as long as an intuitive channel. She didn’t start out in therapy. She started as a photographer documenting child labor and social injustice, which took her to Cambodia in the 1990s just as its borders opened. Survivors of the Khmer Rouge camps began sharing their stories with her, and they became her first clients. From there she worked with genocide trauma in Diné communities, then with children and teens, then in private practice. Her intuitive gifts opened after a psychic she found through a gas station brochure looked at her and said, “We’ve been trying to get you in here for six months.”

In this conversation, Rachel shares the near-death experience that changed everything. She left her body, traveled through a tunnel into a vast, soft-lit space, and felt completely unshackled. Her parents met her there. Her father told her to stop being dramatic because she wasn’t going anywhere. Her mother stroked her hair and told her to tell her body it was going to live. Rachel came back, and the back pain she had lived with for a year was gone the next morning. Recovery from the sepsis was another story: two years at the bottom of the nervous system ladder, in collapse.

Rachel now channels Earth, Sun, and the primordial divine feminine and masculine, and she brings that work into nervous system healing. She explains fight, flight, freeze, collapse, and fawn in plain language, and she makes a case that will stop a lot of listeners cold: much of what we call ambition, opportunity, and drive may actually be survival. Once the nervous system finds safety, she says, the body becomes a beacon of truth. Boundaries appear. Reactivity softens. And a quiet, physical sense of “I’m enough” moves in, the same feeling she met on the other side.

Sarah and Jane also talk with Rachel about the difference between grief and suffering, why so many sensitive and connected people feel exhausted right now, and what self-acceptance actually feels like in the body.

• Fawning is a survival strategy, not a personality trait. Putting everyone else’s needs first so you can feel safe can become as automatic as blinking, and noticing it is where change begins.
• Healthy boundaries and less reactivity are among the clearest signs that the nervous system is moving out of survival.
• Grief and suffering are not the same thing. Connecting with loved ones on the other side can help people set down the suffering while still allowing the grief to move.
• It is worth asking whether a goal comes from real desire or from the need to feel safe. Some passions fade when survival drops away, and the ones that return feel more aligned.
• Healing tends to oscillate. Feeling great, then feeling rough, then feeling great again is part of the process, not a sign of failure.
• Confidence and acceptance can look alike from the outside, but acceptance is quieter and doesn’t need anyone’s approval.
• Connecting with Earth can be as simple as putting your feet on the floor in the morning and saying hello.

• “The nervous system is the plug to the divine light.” (Rachel)
• “It might look like confidence, but it’s acceptance.” (Rachel)
• “When you get into safety, you’re a beacon of truth. Your body tells you the truth.” (Rachel)
• “You have to tell your body it’s going to live.” (Rachel, sharing her mother’s words from the other side)
• “I’m enough. Just as I am. Which is exactly what I felt on the other side.” (Rachel)

• Rachel’s website: vast-earth.com (free Earth connection meditation, group nervous system sessions, and individual sessions)
• NEW Session for nervous system healing coming up soon!
  • Session Dates Friday Group – 9:30 a.m. Pacific Time (Zoom) November 20. December 4, 11, 18 Saturday Group – 9:30 a.m. Pacific Time (Zoom) November 21 and December 5, 12, 19
• Rachel on Instagram: @vast_earth
• The Words Beneath Our Feet, Rachel’s channeled book from Earth (available on Amazon)
• Sun Raya, Rachel’s botanical perfume line: sunrayaperfumes.com
• Follow Medium Curious on Instagram: @mediumcuriouspod

Jane and Sarah celebrate the season of the thinning veil with a Halloween special built around a new story from beloved returning writer Rebecca Barry, a published author who was recently featured again in the New York Times.

Rebecca takes listeners through Halloween night in her village. She shadow-dances under the street lamps with her ten-year-old niece, wanders through a haunted house run by her friends from the coffee shop, and ends at an ancestor altar lit by candles, where she invites her mother and grandmothers to come sit at the table. In a tender second part, her cat writes her a letter describing everything she couldn’t see that night. Rebecca takes listeners through Halloween night in her village. She shadow-dances under the street lamps with her ten-year-old niece, wanders through a haunted house run by her friends from the coffee shop, and ends at an ancestor altar lit by candles, where she invites her mother and grandmothers to come sit at the table. In a tender second part, her cat writes her a letter describing everything she couldn’t see that night.

Afterward, Jane and Sarah talk about how our awareness might strengthen Spirit’s ability to reach us. They share stories of altar objects moving on a loved one’s birthday, and of a reading in which a spirit had Sarah speaking in a Canadian accent as evidence.

Then they share a wonderful story by Valerie Fowler called “Spirits of Halloween” - the story of a young girl who learns how to manage all of the hard and unusual elements of Halloween with the power of intention.

The episode closes with a replay of part of Jane’s first solo episode, a deep dive into Day of the Dead and how to build your own altar for the loved ones you miss.

Key takeaways

• Your loved ones in spirit are not only reachable on Halloween. Seasons like this one give us a shared moment to pay attention.
• An altar is a focused invitation. Photos, flowers, and their favorite drinks tell your people “this is for you.”
• The more we notice spirit, the more room we may be giving them to show up. The relationship can feel collaborative.
• Evidence can be playful. Humor, mannerisms, and old inside jokes are often how spirit proves it’s really them.
• Grief and joy can share the same night. Celebrating life is one way of honoring the dead.
• Sometimes the sign you’re longing for is already inside you, in your stories, your habits, and the way you see the world.

Quotes

• “What if everything in the universe thinks everything else is lucky?” (Rebecca Barry)
• “You don’t need a visitation because I’m in you.” (Rebecca Barry, from the cat’s letter)
• “The monsters really are your friends.” (Rebecca’s niece)
• “My mom said if the spirit comes around and you don’t want them, just say no and they flicker out” - Valerie Fowler
• “The more that we can sense spirit, we kind of empower them to do more.” (Sarah)
• “Your loved ones love you. We love you.” (Jane)

Links and resources

• Rebecca Barry: https://rebeccabarry.substack.com/
• Perdita Finn; Substack article
• Valerie Fowler on Facebook
• Medium Curious Collective: join at any tier to attend live spirit demonstrations on November 1 with Jane and Sarah
• Clair Club
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Medium Curious Website: MediumCurious

Jane’s Website: Jane Morgan Medium

Sarah’s Website: Sarah Rathke

Podcast Instagram: MediumCuriousPod (@mediumcuriouspod)