EPISODE 067: Uncovering Intuition with Sheryl Wagner
Jun 30, 2022My guest today is a psychic, medium and teacher with some incredible life stories, she has often walked between two worlds, and she is one of those rare people who knows what death truly feels like. Having spent some time in the beauty, grace and harmony of the spirit world, it was strangely difficult for her to come back to life confined to her physical body. She’s here in the studio today to share just a little bit of her life story with us. And to help us learn how we can each find a greater understanding of our own life’s purpose.
This Week’s Episode
“We all have intuition, there’s no special skills required. Intuition is this wisdom, it’s you, it’s not this other force, it’s not this other thing that’s coming to you, it is you, it is the soul, it is within you. And it can really help us to live a life that is aligned and grounded in our own truth.” – Sheryl Wagner
Episode 67 Resources
Here are some resources referred to in Episode 067, which you may find helpful.
Sheryl Wagner – Website
Uncovering Intuition by Sheryl Wagner
About Psychic Matters Podcasts
Ann Théato, CSNUt, Psychic, Medium and Spiritual Tutor, investigates psychic development, mediumship techniques, and paranormal science, so that you can come to understand your own innate psychic ability and expand your knowledge, whilst learning to develop a curious mind.
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PM 067
My guest today is a psychic, medium and teacher with some incredible life stories, she has often walked between two worlds, and she is one of those rare people who knows what death truly feels like. Having spent some time in the beauty, grace and harmony of the spirit world, it was strangely difficult for her to come back to life confined to her physical body. She’s here in the studio today to share just a little bit of her life story with us. And to help us learn how we can each find a greater understanding of our own life’s purpose.
You’ll Learn
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Why we all have intuition
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Intuition comes from the soul within us
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What an NDE feels like
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How the spirit world speaks to us
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Why we sometimes feel we don’t fit in
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Why a highly sensitive person can suffer overwhelm
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Why the spirit world choose us
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How using your intuition will elevate you
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The qualities of a highly empathic person
TRANSCRIPT
Ann
Hello everyone, my name is Ann Théato and welcome to episode 67 of the Psychic Matters podcast.
Please do subscribe to the show on your favourite podcast listening platform, so you don’t miss any upcoming episodes and if you are enjoying this podcast, I would love it if you could leave me a written review on Apple podcasts or Podchaser. If you want to know how to leave a review – go to my website anntheato.com and look at the podcast tab and click on the link. Easy peasy.
This week I’ve been working away on my CSNUt lesson plans, for those who don’t know what CSNUt is, it’s a teaching course, run by the Spiritualists’ National Union, so I’ve been having fun putting those together and I’m off to teach my classes on 2 and 3 July up at a place called the Barbanell Centre which is in Stafford in the UK. It’s actually a sister facility to the Arthur Findlay College. I know you’ve all heard me talk a lot about the Arthur Findlay College, but the Barbanell Centre is also where it is at, and they run some fantastic courses. I’ve never actually been there, so I’m really looking forward to spending a weekend up there.
In other news, I’m still working away on my fully downloadable course, Super Psychic: Learn The 7 secrets to unlocking your psychic ability, where I’ll be teaching you step-by-step transformative techniques to unlock your powerful psychic intuition & understand how to integrate it fully, for fast-track results, in your everyday life and 1:1 readings. I want to show you how to eliminate fear, embrace your intuitive knowing, and step fully into your power, keeping it front and centre of your life. enabling you to 100% trust in your perceptions and live a life in which you can thrive and flourish.
I’ll be taking a very small selection of Beta students through the course initially, so if that is something that really interests you, please do email me: [email protected] and I’ll send you details about that at the end of the Summer.
Now then, please get ready to listen to this week’s episode which is all about uncovering your intuition.
Ann
My guest today is a psychic, medium and teacher with some incredible life stories, she has often walked between two worlds, and she is one of those rare people who knows what death truly feels like. Having spent some time in the beauty, grace and harmony of the spirit world, it was strangely difficult for her to come back to life confined to her physical body. She’s here in the studio today to share just a little bit of her life story with us. And to help us learn how we can each find a greater understanding of our own life’s purpose. Sheryl Wagner, welcome to Psychic Matters.
Sheryl
Oh, thank you, thank you so much.
Ann
It’s so lovely to see you, Sheryl, thank you so much for agreeing to be with us today. And it’s wonderful to have you here. We often read about people who have spiritual experiences where they can travel to the spirit world and spend a little bit of time there perhaps, either in a deep trance, or deep meditation sitting in the power or something like that. All of those different ways. And I know you speak of there being a vast difference between having a spiritual experience, as opposed to having a real near-death experience where death is actually involved. Can you share a little bit with us about that?
Sheryl
Oh, yeah, absolutely. So, um, my experiences are really, really unique, because I’ve had both types of those experiences. So, in the book I talk about as a child having a sort of premonition of what was to come and the actual near-death experience. And then later having a really deep trance, just as you said, and having that experience of it, and a similar feeling. But when you have the near-death experience, it’s the body is dying. And so, there is all of this trauma, and really on different levels. And so, I feel like that is the main difference, the physical death is more traumatic, and it doesn’t really bring the same elated feelings as we might get in a trance, or we might get in a deep meditation, not to say that those experiences are less than, but I do feel like it’s important to know the difference. And I feel like that’s mostly going to be important to people that are survivors that have had near physical death experiences, and a way to really process that and give really the levity to that situation and be able to use that word, and have it mean, what it means, you know, it wasn’t easy for me to, I wasn’t able to say, near death experience for I think about 10 years, until after it happened. Even though I was told that by doctors and things, it was really hard for me to claim it. And it was, it was a struggle. And I do feel like it’s sort of a barometer of my own healing to the point where you know how people that annoy us, were sort of really good spiritual teachers. So, when I could feel that annoyance happening for me, when I will hear other people say, I’ve had a near death experience. And you know, it was really just something that happened from the comfort of their bed or something like that, you know, and it was amazing. But but me, you know, the human part of me, my ego would would kind of chime in and say, well, that’s not right. And I feel like for me, that was really a directive to, to be able to say that for myself, and to be able to ask for what I needed and the support I needed. So, I certainly don’t want to, you know, be the authority on what other people can call their experiences, because that’s not helpful to anyone. But for me, it bothered me. And so, it was a message to me that I had a lot of healing to do, and that I needed to look into what had happened deeper and process it in a deeper way.
Ann
Yeah, that’s really interesting about it was a personal lesson for you to learn from that. So maybe you could, if you feel comfortable to tell us a little bit about how that came about that NDE for you.
Sheryl
Oh, yeah. I mean, how it actually happened. Yeah, so it was in 2004. And I had a really traumatic birth experience with the birth of my first son. And I was really young. I was 22. And I had, you know, you know, no issue pregnancy was that, you know, no issues at all. And during the delivery, which was dramatic and its own, you know, a lot of people have these traumatic sort of deliveries. I have this rare condition, and it’s called HELP Syndrome. And I believe it stands for, I’m going to try. High blood pressure, elevated liver and low platelets. And so it’s basically the body is shutting down, your organs are failing. And so the only cure is to deliver the baby. And so they’re, you know, frantically trying to do that for hours. And because it was more complicated, because the cord wrapped around him, and he was in distress, and at the same time, I was having seizures, so eclampsia, and seizures, and found out much later that a lot of the pain in my chest that I was experiencing that made things more complicated was due to gallbladder attacks, if you can believe so like, just in addition. So, I ended up being back in the hospital only a few weeks later to get that sorted out, because it caused a lot of internal damage as well. And so while all that’s happening, and the body is shutting down, and seizures, I’m losing a lot of blood. And so that’s really where the doctor felt like the near-death experience comes in, because your organs are shutting down or failing, and you’ve lost so much blood, you just are at that place, you know. And so, for, you know, for me that experience, you know, trauma in the brain, it’s just not the same as a memory. And so, it took a long time to kind of come out and be processed.
Ann
I mean, it’s so traumatic to, when you speak about that, all those awful health conditions and that terrible situation that you found yourself in when we’re having purportedly the most, one of the most beautiful experiences we could have giving birth to a new soul here. It must have been absolutely awful for you; do you remember what it was like sort of not being in your body?
Sheryl
I do. And that is the part that I like to remember. Because it is such a stark difference. You know, I remember just being so uncomfortable. And you think that when you’re if you’re dying, and you’re going through all of that, there would be you know, you just would be in agony. But I would focus on certain things like I remember, my arms being tied down, I remember the nausea, and just my attention went between those sort of two complaints. And I remember just being really, really close to what I felt like was the end. And the baby my son was delivered, and then asking me to turn my head and look at him. And I did. And I at the time, remember thinking I can’t believe they are asking me to do this, I can’t believe that someone is asking me to turn my head because it took everything I had to just from right to left to rotate my head and look at him. And when I did look at him, I saw him and he looked healthy in this sort of bleary, you know, puddle of blankets. And my first thought was, I want to die. And and that’s very, that’s very big. So there’s lots of feelings that, you know I had in that moment, and that I had after that, you know, being a mother, a really young mother who was not prepared for this. And you think when you see your baby, you’re going to have so many thoughts and feelings, but I want to die is really not, that’s not one that we planned. But I remember that having that feeling. And then I closed my eyes. And I just left. And I just felt so amazing. I just felt like the sweetest surrender to be pulled underneath what felt like water. But I then felt myself leaving and to go above my body. And just the sweetest euphoric feeling there, there really isn’t anything else like it, and just watching what they were doing down below. And I was able to describe to my ex-husband who was in the room at the time, exactly what was happening, like various instruments and things. You’re looking at your body being taken apart. And and then that was all gone. And then And then I remember being in a very different place that felt. So, I was free from all of it. All of it.
Ann
Do you remember being joined by anybody? Or was it just the feeling of this beautiful sweetness and harmony?
Sheryl
Yeah, I was joined by people. And at the time, I didn’t have a great awareness of who they were, although they were familiar to me because I had said in the beginning, I had a sort of premonition of this experience. And I had met what I now considered to be a spirit guide. You know, someone that is with me on the other side, and he was there in the room with me and so I had that recognition, sort of just a feeling. But I also saw great grandparents of mine and in particular it was a great grandmother who was very frightening to me as a child because she had like progressed Alzheimer’s, and when I visited her, I was only about two or three years old. So, I was just sort of a very shy, quiet child anyway, so I was nervous to be around, so I didn’t understand. But when she was in this, like a sort of little white room, almost looked like a room off of the hospital, but above, and just all white, and very, very small, but I didn’t feel claustrophobic and so she was there, my great grandmother, but not seeming scary at all, just seeming, so lovely. And she looked older, she looked how I remembered her. But without that condition, you know, just sort of smiling at me. And it seemed like I was only there for a minute. But I didn’t come back into you know, this world and open my eyes for another 12 hours. So, the time, you know, time really is not what we think. And in my experience, it was very different.
Ann
Oh, my goodness, it sounds unbelievable. Really an unbelievable experience. Did you ever go back since then? I mean, how many years? Is it since that happened to you, Sheryl?
Sheryl
Ah, well my son is going to be 18, so yeah, in the Fall. So, it’ll be 18 years in the Fall.
Ann
Wow. And in these last 18 years, have you ever gone back to that place where you visited your grandparents again, or you’ve seen some of the spirit guides again?
Sheryl
Yeah, I have, I do feel and like most mediums, I do have a way to visit with them, right, I have a sort of meeting place. And I can visit with them and have my like team team meetings and staff meetings and things like that. But what really stands out is when I began developing my trance work, and I was able to work with some really just brilliant teachers that I feel were both trauma informed and had an understanding of what I had gone through and could recognise it for some reason, I seem to just be really lucky to be with those right people that were able to explain to me what was going on. And I did have an experience. The second time I was at Arthur Findlay College and trance experience where the whole situation was explained to me. And I felt again, like I had the you know, breathing support on, I could sort of feel the breath coming in and out of me. And I could feel my guides there. And I could feel my great grandmother now that you mentioned it, she was there, just not speaking to me. And they were just explaining to me that, you know, I wasn’t alone, and that just telepathically so I don’t have the words. But my understanding was that the premonition that happened was somehow helping me. it was somehow familiar to me on a deeper subconscious level, like as a child to have had that beautiful visit with them in that white room, and then have that be something pleasant, it was almost like, I just feel really representative of the spirit world because they don’t want to scare us, you know, they don’t want to harm they want to help us. And so, I feel like that was a gift to me as a child. And then, you know, as a 22-year-old to have that familiarity. And then I was I think I was 37 or 38 years old; I wrote it in my book because it’s all sort of divided by about seven year or 14-year increments, which I find really interesting. And that whole experience was recapped for me. And really the message was that I wasn’t alone, and that it was for a bigger purpose.
Ann
That’s amazing. And you first had a premonition that this would happen to you when you were eight years old. Is that right?
Sheryl
Yeah, yeah, I think it was seven or eight years old. I just remember what like house we lived in. So, we moved a lot when I was a kid. But um, yeah, I had been walking around this room that I found really interesting in our home, we just moved into a new home and the thing that I liked about this room was that it was all white. So, it had like white carpet and white walls and it’s very sunny. And so, you know, all the light and the shadows coming in. And, you know, in retrospect, I had a lot of objective clairvoyance just sort of seeing things and those patterns in those walls and things that I would thought that I was making up because I have a very, you know, good imagination. And all of a sudden, I become aware of of a lady and I’m sort of just following her around the room for some reason, and just you know, assuming I’m making her up and then she said to me that she likes my pyjamas and then I thought I just got this feeling not bad feeling but intuition feeling of oh, what? You know, you’re really here and why would she like these pyjamas you know, they’re just like outer space pyjamas and they’re not anything. She’s wearing this like sort of flowy thing and I just thought that was strange. And then she encouraged me to keep following her and she told me to sit down in the corner of the room. And then the next thing I knew I was asleep. And I never slept as a child. Still, I cannot nap. It’s just not something I can do. I never napped as a baby. I hear about it all the time. My mom will tell you; I was not a napper. But I fell asleep for a long time, long enough that people were looking for me. And I was in I imagine, a deep sleep, because I just was in the house and didn’t hear anyone until my mom was sort of shaking me awake. And I just remember that feeling of being with the lady and being with some other people and that place that sort of light place, and not wanting to come back, being very angry to be shaken, awake. And then you know, of course, my mom decided I was sick, and I needed to go to bed for the rest of the day. And I couldn’t get back into it. I couldn’t you know, and then it was no naps again. So,
Ann
My goodness, it’s amazing that you, that it’s come every 14 years. Do you think there’s that’s it or think another 14 years is gonna go by and something else is going to happen?
Sheryl
I know well, I do make that joke. Because I’m you know, Ann, I’ve had sort of lots of revelations the last few years and, you know, I used to work in finance, I was a, you know, Finance Manager, and I worked in the car industry and for 17 years, and then I, you know, came out and you know, told people I’m I’m a medium and you know, and then I come out and told people I’m gay. And so, I sometimes joke like, maybe the next thing is, I’m going to tell people, I’m an alien from another planet. But if I do know, that would be fine, then I can let you know. And for I think I probably have another 11 years or so to go.
Ann
Oh, well, you’ve got a little while. So, you used to work in finance. So how did that come about? So where does the mediumship fit in? When did you, I mean, you had this experience when you were 22, and obviously, you must have been psychic and mediumisticly aware since a child, so when did you decide, you know what, I’ll go down the mediumship route and abandon the finance?
Sheryl
Yeah, well, it really, I don’t feel like it was necessarily my choice, my conscious choice. You know, as a human, I feel like sometimes what the soul wants is just stronger. And so, I worked for my family, I worked for my family has business, a car dealership, and I struggled for a long time, I would say, when I was younger, to kind of find my place. I didn’t get diagnosed with ADHD until I was an adult. And so, I really didn’t know what was wrong with me. You know, I had lots of jobs in food service and things like that, I always felt like something was wrong with me. And once I got that diagnosis, I have been working for my family for a while and doing okay. But once I got that diagnosis, and I started to understand myself and treat myself as just a neurodivergent person, I was able to train to be Finance Manager. And really, again, just luck, our manager had walked out on a very busy sales weekend. And you know, the General Manager just was like, you need to go and do this, you know. And I’ve always been sort of ready to like jump into chaos and try. So, I did that, it was probably one of the most difficult things I’ve ever done. And I just, it was probably one of the most difficult things I’ve ever done to learn finance the way that I am. But I did learn it. And I became very good at it. And that was really the first time in my life that I felt that I was good at something. And I felt like I had a place. And I really clung to that more than anything, because it allowed me to sort of put my sensitivity away and put all the things about myself that I wasn’t ready to look at a way right. Like, I was married to a man at the time, and I was gay. So, I was already putting so many things away and struggling with an eating disorder and really, you know, using like substances and things like that just to cope, and really in survival mode and really not wanting to look at any of those deeper emotional aspects of me. And so, kind of putting the intuition away. And so, I worked there for years, years after that years after getting good at it. I worked there. And then things started happening that made it just too difficult, too difficult to push it away. I almost felt that I didn’t have a choice.
Ann
So, when you say things happening, what sort of things were happening.
Sheryl
Yeah, so one really big thing was my son was having a mental health crisis and I couldn’t be with him. He had to be hospitalised overnight and he was very young. And that started to trigger these deeper feelings, and I have PTSD, I’ve I’ve worked through. I had been working with therapists through the PTSD since then, because every year I would wake up on his birthday and I would smell the iodine, I would feel I was in the hospital, I would relive that flashbacks. And that was really difficult. And people that I worked with knew that they knew that October, it was hard for me and would be supportive. That was like sort of a one time I would have to explain, because that was just part of how I presented. And so when he started to struggle, I think that that, not being able to, feeling helpless, I think, really pushed me to look at these emotional parts of myself that I had been hiding. And I was in such a bad way physically, emotionally, mental health wise, you know, I really wasn’t eating, I remember thinking, I hope I don’t pass out while I’m driving home, you know, I really wasn’t taking care of myself. And I just was barely getting by I went; I remember had to leave work. Because I started having these panic attacks, I had a sense that I was falling out of an aeroplane. That’s how I felt, and I, going, having my sister take me to the ER, or take me to a doctor. And I would have to write down notes because I couldn’t even tell them what was happening. But I remember one time going in, having to have one of the notes say that I had just had walking pneumonia, you know, my son was in crisis and all I wanted to do was to go back to work, I just wanted them to give me something, you know, just like to give me this prescription or this magic, you know, trick that could just get me back into work and just focus so that I could do the one thing that I felt that I was good at. And so, I wouldn’t have to look at all of this. And of course, there isn’t anything that someone can do when we reach that point of burnout, where we’re not taking care of ourselves. Even if we look, we are, you know, I remember that same year applying for life insurance. And I was so relieved because I didn’t know what they would say, because I really, I knew I wasn’t healthy on some levels, but I had like ultra-preferred was our rate. And it was because I was thin. That was what it was, that was the only thing it could be based on because nothing else about me was healthy. And, and so just having to look at that. And I’ve just there isn’t anything that a doctor can tell you, you’ve got to make those changes. And when I, as soon as I started to, that’s when the mediumship kind of came just like crashing in, you know, they, they sort of I feel the spirit world, you know, they will take those opportunities, especially in the beginning when they’re trying to open it back up to, like, use that energy and kind of make a big impact. And so, I was just seeing things, hearing things. You know, it was constant.
Ann
And your son, how old? Was he at the time of his crisis?
Sheryl
I think he was 13.
Ann
Is he a spiritual young man? Does he have experiences himself?
Sheryl
Yeah, both my kids have had experiences, mediumship type experiences, yeah.
Ann
Yeah, it’s amazing. I mean, you’ve been through so much, but you couldn’t even speak the words of the trauma that your son was going through and you have to carry all your own trauma, it must have been just so difficult. So, you say mediumship comes crashing in how does that present itself to you then?
Sheryl
Well, I remember, I hadn’t really heard of mediumship or medium. And I definitely knew that there was, you know, this other world that there was like the unseen world but the word mediumship I had never watched a medium. My great grandmother used to read the tea leaves, like that was really all my experience. But um, I was going to a therapist at the time. And I shared with her some some things and I said, you know, I feel like, I’ve had someone watching me, like, just like for decades, like just someone’s watching me. It’s like, you know, like, I’m on the Truman Show or something. And I said, do you know what I mean? And she said, no, I really don’t. And so, she said, you know, maybe in my loneliness, I had sort of made that up or invented that. And then I thought, okay, maybe. And I started sharing more and more with her because I started to hear things outside my mind, which quite scared me, you know, especially with my my son being hospitalised I thought okay, this is because of me. And now I’m hearing things. And I remember one time where I was so distraught and I was really praying to my grandmother who had passed a few years earlier, and asking her to please please help me, just help me. I just need help. I can’t, you know, I can’t do this alone. I need your help. And I heard very clearly outside my mind or in her voice. She said it’s going to be okay sweetheart. And I had forgot that she used to call me sweetheart because she herself had had Alzheimer’s and it had just been so long. But when I heard that it wasn’t just the words, it was that well, first, I had heard it outside my mind. So that was quite unbelievable. But I just knew, just hearing that I just knew that it was going to be okay. And so, I shared that with a therapist, and she suggested that I go and see a medium myself. And so I did. And that ended up being just a really affirming experience, once I saw how it worked, and sort of what another person was doing and how someone could, you know, communicate with past, you know, people and then just share their messages. I thought, okay, this is what’s happening, this is who I’m talking to. And it was, it became really clear to me after that, and then it just sort of like the floodgates open, you know, I started, people wouldn’t be coming in to do their finance paperwork. And they would take out photos of their loved ones and show them to me, not knowing, having no idea that I had that, you know, experience. I remember, one man came in, and he had a young son who passed, of a heart attack, and he was about in his 40s. And he took out a picture of this, this man, and I just felt like, we were having this conversation, I was like, this is too much, you know, now I’ve got to do your paperwork and try to sell you insurance. You know, it just wasn’t, it wasn’t the right fit anymore. And so I let them know that I was going to be you know, cutting back my hours more and more. And I still wanted to be around for my son more, right? Because I hadn’t been taking very good care of myself, and I hadn’t been around as much. And so I decided I was going to let our nanny go, and it was going to be home more. And once I let them know that I was given an ultimatum at some point. And it was that you need to either come back working like 60 hours a week, or you just can’t work here anymore. And so then that was really, really easy for me then because then it was like I didn’t have a choice. And so that’s when I left
Ann
An ultimatum is a great thing sometimes, isn’t it?
Sheryl
It is, yeah,
Ann
Draw a line in the sand, okay, this is my new direction, yeah, very good. Just going back a little bit, you know, of your loneliness. And it comes up time and again, in your book, which we haven’t mentioned. Well, you’ve mentioned your book, but let me mention it now officially, Uncovering Intuition, guidance, inspiration and exercises to unlock your inner wisdom by Sheryl Wagner. And this, how long has this book been in print, Sheryl?
Sheryl
I published it on February 8, which was my 40th birthday.
Ann
Congratulations. Oh, so it’s fairly new. It’s out this year?
Sheryl
Yeah.
Ann
Yeah. But you speak in that it’s such a beautiful book. And it’s so fascinating following your story and everything that’s happened to you. And one of the themes in it is this sort of loneliness, and this feeling of sort of not understanding where you fit in somehow. And you spoke earlier about ADHD. Now, I don’t know so much about ADHD, maybe some of the listeners don’t either. And you said you were a neurodivergent person, but I don’t know what that means, either. What, what how did that sort of manifest? Or how did that exhibit itself in your behaviour, or the way that you thought about the world?
Sheryl
Yeah, so ADHD is different for everyone. But I have the inattentive kind of ADHD. So, we tend to think about ADHD, especially, you know, when I was a kid as like boys that are kind of running around and bouncing off the wall or can’t sit still, and mine is very internal. So, it’s just thoughts that are not able to focus or control. And it means school really challenging for me, it made, you know, paying attention following through on tasks really challenging for me, and I just sort of always had a feeling of like, I have no idea what’s going on, you know, and I would, you know, show up and try and pay attention, but I really never knew what was going on, in my school and or like with friends, because you miss a lot. When you’re sort of distracted in your own mind, you miss a lot of social cues and things like that. And it becomes really difficult to just navigate that if you don’t have that information about yourself. And if teachers or parents don’t have that information about you, there’s not really like a lot of compassion. You know, for you, I can remember my mom being really upset in kindergarten, because my teacher, you know, would say things to me, like, why are you staring at me, like I have 10 heads, and I just had no idea what that meant. You know, I was just like, what, I don’t know, I’m trying to figure out what you’re saying, you know, or someone would be asking me a question. I just wouldn’t respond. And so I think that processing speed was part of it. And at the same time, you know, I am a sensitive person. I talk about being a highly sensitive person. I feel like that is important for people to look at themselves and I was definitely a sensitive kid, and I didn’t speak. And so, I didn’t speak a lot. And and all my childhood things and all the papers and things my mom has we were looking at them a couple of years ago. She’s like, I don’t remember you not talking. And I said, what do you mean? And she’s taking out all these notes. And it’s like, all these notes saying how I won’t speak, I won’t respond unless they force me to. And I do remember that. So, I never really got into the habit of relating to others, I think partly because I felt like I didn’t know how,
Ann
Yeah, I mean, it’s extraordinary. It’s just so extraordinary. So, all of these things have happened to you, you’ve had all these extraordinary experiences, and it makes you such a beautifully unique individual. How does that feed into the work that you’re doing now? As a medium?
Sheryl
Oh, yeah, that’s interesting. I feel like everyone that is doing mediumship is quite unique, don’t you find because it’s, we’re all all those experiences are so needed, right? Like when someone comes in, and I have a session with them to hold space for what for a variety of experiences, you know, to be able to recognise their experience, their pain, their loss, their loneliness, you know, to be able to hold space for that. I feel like that’s needed. And I have, you know, a great respect for people that do this work, because we really do need to have a certain amount of pain in life. And in order to, to be successful at it, you know, not to say we all have to have a near death experience or will have to have trauma. But I think that at different levels and mediumship, we have to have suffered, you know, we have we have resilience, and I feel that’s why, you know, I certainly don’t know what I feel. That’s why the spirit world choose us for this work, because we have life experience and understand and can hold compassion for others.
Ann
Yeah, I think a lot of mediums certainly have resilience that that’s a very good word.
Sheryl
Yes, they do, they do.
Ann
Yeah. goodness, yes. And in your book, in your fabulous, fantastic book, you talk a lot about using our intuition. Maybe you could say a little bit about that, how people might be able to use theirs.
Sheryl
Yeah, absolutely. Because we all have intuition. And so there really, there’s no special skills required. And I feel like sometimes people are afraid to acknowledge maybe things that they’re becoming aware of, or things that are happening to them, because there is a certain amount of stigma or fear around it, or like I don’t want to see anything bad happen, right? And I really just want people to know that intuition is, is this wisdom, it’s you, right? It’s not this other force, it’s not this other thing that’s coming to you, it is you it is the soul, it is within you, and we have access to this. And so, it might not always make sense to us what our intuition is directing us toward, but it’s always going to elevate us, it’s always going to take us where we need to go. And so, I just want everyone to know and to and to be empowered with it, and to know that they can develop their intuition and be so connected to their intuition on their own, you know, they don’t need me, they don’t need a book, they don’t even need a book, they don’t even need a teacher, those things are helpful. But ultimately, each one of us has intuition. And, and it can really help us to live a life that is aligned and grounded our own truth. And so that’s why that’s why I want to talk about intuition with people because we all have it, and I’m able to recognise it so strongly, and others, and sometimes they don’t recognise it in themselves.
Ann
Yeah, you say that, you know, in your book, you say society doesn’t value or appreciate our sensitivity?
Sheryl
Yeah, it’s so often I say to somebody, you know, I direct them to the highly sensitive person websites, Dr. Elaine Aaron, and she has a self-assessment where you can see if you’re a highly sensitive person, and I’ll say that to someone, and so often they sort of recoil, or I can feel they’re offended. And or I’ll say to someone, do you think of yourself as being sensitive? And they’ll say something like, well, I try not to think about that. And it’s like, your sensitivity is such a gift. And there is a small percentage of the population that is highly sensitive, and those of us are going to be more intuitive, because we’re especially in mediumship, if someone is practising in mediumship, we’re so sensitive that we’re sensitive of energy and the unseen world and so mediumship and intuition itself is a sensitivity and it also comes with other sensitivity. So, you know, you know, lots of mediums and I’m guessing I’m not the only one that sort of sensitive to loud noise or bright lights or lots of crowds. You know, we might like some of those things sometimes, but we have certain preferences. And I do feel like in being in this work, we get to know those preferences pretty quickly because our energy is our currency. Like, this is our work and how you know, we make a living. So, we need to make sure our energy is where it needs to be. And so, knowing what you’re sensitive to what’s really important, but yeah, I feel like as a society, you know, we don’t, we don’t value like feelings, as much as we value like facts and results. And I feel like in the future that will become more balanced as more people are awakening, and more people are understanding their own sensitivity as a gift, because people that are sensitive, are also going to have a greater depth of emotion, I feel. And so maybe that’s greater joy, you know, as well.
Ann
Yeah, I think that’s really lovely, and really relevant as well. And you also say in your book, that it’s not a life sentence to feel the emotions of other people, which I found really interesting line, because sometimes we think we’re so hypersensitive, how do we deal with it? You know, so talk perhaps a little bit about energy and where we found our boundaries?
Sheryl
Oh, yeah, boundaries. For anybody that I’m coaching or teaching or workshop, there’s always going to be part of boundaries in there, because we all need it, myself included, you know, finding those boundaries, managing that energy. And so yeah, the word empath I talked about in the book, and I love so many people that call themselves empath. But I don’t love the word because I do feel that it gets misrepresented and that it gets sort of thrown around as well, this is your diagnosis, or this is your condition, you’re an empath. And so, you’re going to feel everyone else’s feelings, and there’s nothing you can do about it. When really, you know, highly empathic people, of course, exist and I am one. However, you know, setting boundaries is the way that we can be empowered with that. So, I would say a couple of things that really can help if you are a highly empathic person or you consider yourself an empath we’ll use the word is to you know recognise, when you’re being pulled into someone else’s energy, like when your energetic boundaries are being blurred or violated. And so, you know, boundaries just being the space between us and another person, and then energetic boundaries being that energetic space. And so, a lot of times I see people without really knowing it is happening, just sort of getting wrapped up in someone else’s energy. And a couple of quick things you can do to counteract that, is to start to become aware of the differences between you and them. And so, this sounds really simple. But if I start to feel that I’m becoming energetically enmeshed with someone, all of a sudden, their problems are my problems, their feelings, or my feelings and things like that, I need to somehow break away from it. And so, what I could do is just take a minute, and notice, like the physical differences between myself and them, and so maybe I am sitting to the left, and they’re sitting to the right, maybe I have dark hair, and they have light hair, and just start noticing those differences. And that psychologically, will give us that separation. Also notice where they are in space, you know, like, you’re across the world for me, someone might be across the desk from me, but but noticing my space, noticing where I am. And I’ll really encourage anyone that’s dealing with that in the moment to take a moment and affirm yourself. And so for me, this would look like, you know, I’ll put my hand on my heart, take a breath, and just affirm myself, you know, maybe I say, like, I’m Sheryl, I’m sitting in my office, I’m recording this podcast, and just kind of reminding myself, if I have an old feeling from childhood, it’s coming up, I might remind myself, you know, you’re 40 years old, and affirm that and, and that that can really help that can really help to kind of start to make that immediate break where we recognise it. And then to take it a step further, identifying our feelings is really helpful. Because at that point, if we start to become sort of drawn into someone else’s energy, we probably really know how they feel, right? We know how they feel about every aspect of the situation, start to identify how you feel. And know you might be surprised, I myself, when I do that, it’s like, oh, I feel uncomfortable, but I didn’t realise that, you know, oh, I feel sort of annoyed. You know, and then we can start to start to identify our own feelings. And that can help to separate the energy and again, it’s not like a supernatural thing that’s occurring. It’s really energy and it’s a lot of it is psychological. And so of course, I believe in supernatural phenomena and mysticism, and I love it, but I just don’t think that we need to make every interactions supernatural, you know, people aren’t like, bad or wrong or taking our energy supernaturally, we are just empathic, and I feel like taking responsibility for that is empowering.
Ann
I think that’s beautiful. And you’ve taken responsibility for a lot of things in your life so far. I mean, you’re still very young, aren’t you just being 40 at the moment, but you’ve got these two children, you and your ex-husband are the best friends you say, still very, very close, which is a wonderful result, to have and a beautiful thing for a family going forward to keep things friendly, despite the fact that you’re not together. And you’ve identified your own new feelings of being gay and wanting to move in that direction with your partner. So how does it feel? One of the things you say in your book is the conscious and unconscious mind and the physical body and our truth all must be in alignment. So, are you feeling now at 40 perhaps a little bit more in alignment?
Sheryl
Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, it’s so freeing. And I, you know, I always knew I was gay, I think I didn’t have the words to describe this. And I wasn’t available. You know, I talked about in the book, some earlier trauma in sexual assault that happened to me when I was 14. And so, I wasn’t available to have healthy relationships, you know, and I got into quite a bit of trouble. I would say, you know, not not, you know, not blaming myself, but I really put myself in unsafe situations. After that, because of that, and I didn’t feel safe in romantic relationships, and ended up you know, being in an abusive relationship, and then meeting my ex-husband, who has always been a great friend to me. And he had been, you know, supportive. For years of we were going to eventually, you know, be friends and split. And that’s, yeah, that was really a big time for me, you know, coming out, because everyone close to me knew. And certainly, he knew, but coming out to the kids, you know, when they were teenagers, and coming out to my community, I don’t think I realised how much I needed that I really needed that. And once I did that, things just started opening up more. And then I started writing the book, and then I met my partner, Rachel, we’re getting married in November. And that just felt, the feeling of peace, the feeling of peace of being in that alignment. Finally, it’s just very freeing. It’s very freeing, you know, to be in your truth.
Ann
Yeah, that’s really beautiful. So, I think you’re a wonderful inspiration for a lot of people listening who maybe feel that there are ways in their life that they could align with their purpose or or listen to what is really happening for them and put themselves, move themselves forward in a way that is more beneficial, perhaps.
Sheryl
Yeah, absolutely. And I hope I hope that people do. I have a lot of people that I meet that share with me, you know, I really relate to this. And, and I feel like a lot of times, we don’t share certain parts of our story, we hold back certain parts of our story. And the more we can talk about these things, and give ourselves permission to be in our truth, to be in our alignment, to not worry about what others think about our life and our choices, even people who love us, because there’ll be plenty of people watching us do things that scare them that will be worried about us. And ultimately, you know, we need to claim the authority over our life. And the more that people can do that I feel like that creates a world where other people are willing to do that.
Ann
I think coming to see somebody like you, when we’re troubled and challenged in our life must be such a healing experience, because of everything that you’ve been through, and everything you can add to a session. So, what is it you’re offering Sheryl? If people wanted to have a one on one with you over zoom?
Sheryl
Oh, sure. Yeah. So right now, I offer intuitive readings, so or psychic readings, or mediumship readings. And so, I do sessions with people from all over the world through Zoom. And I also have an office where I live in Canton, Massachusetts, which is near Boston, so I have a nice in-person space as well. And I also teach a couple of weekly classes, one in person and one online and where we develop, you know, for someone that’s looking to develop mediumship, or or develop intuition.
Ann
Yeah. You’ve also on your website, got some beautiful, guided meditations. Talk to us about those.
Sheryl
Oh, yeah, thank you. I do have a guided meditation right now for anyone that purchases the book, actually, you get this guided meditation, and it’s to connect to your own energy. And I love the concept of that, connecting to our own energy even though it seems really simple. But I feel like the more we can do that connect to our own energy and understand our own energy, the more we can understand our intuition, and it sort of goes hand in hand. So yeah, I’m happy for people to go and check those out. And meditating, you know, for me is obviously part of my work and, and part of how I was able to write this book, but I feel like the first step is really understanding and knowing ourselves.
Ann
So how do people find you? What’s your website, and how do they purchase your book?
Sheryl
So, my website is www.SherylWagnermedium.com, Sheryl with an S. And my book is on the website if you’d like a signed copy, and if you’d like to get a download of the meditation instantly sent to you, you can buy it on my website. If you would like to just order it online. You can get it through any online store. All of the major booksellers have my book,
Ann
And you offer Tarot mentorship and trance mentorship. Could you tell us a little bit about that, what what might be coming up for people in that regard?
Sheryl
Yeah, absolutely. I do offer Tarot mentorship. That’s one of my favourite things to teach. I love the Tarot. There is a chapter in the book about tarot, it’s so fun for me to teach and be able to support others and kind of most of the clients I’ve had are people that are like ready to go and work with the public and just kind of wanting that, that last, like validation or confirmation or maybe having some blocks with it. And so, I love mentoring people with Tarot, I’ve also helped, you know, quite a few beginners to just start the process. Because again, I feel like it’s like intuition, we can be afraid of it. But Tarot is for everyone go, if you want a tarot deck, go and buy it, please, and just start using it for yourself. It’s just a nice reflective tool to work with and to get to know yourself and your intuition better. And I also offer trance mentorship to students that I already work with. That way I can, you know, kind of know where they’re at, in a psychological state, you know, I’m not a therapist at all. But just knowing that someone has support because trance is deeper work, and it’s transformative. And I feel like that’s something I don’t offer lightly. But I do encourage people to look into it and find someone you know, a teacher or mentor someone that can help guide them. Through that work. I’ve been very lucky to have that in my life. So, I do offer that to students that I know that I’ve worked with
Ann
Fabulous, and I’ll put all those links in the show notes for this episode, so people can find them easily and find you on the internet. Sheryl, what’s next for you coming up this year? Obviously, you’re doing your readings continually and you’re teaching. You’ve got your young boy still I know he’s 18. He’s a he’s a grown man now. But he’ll be off to university and there’s still some parenting to be done there. What else is coming up for you? What are your plans?
Sheryl
Yeah, well, I am doing these classes online, I’ve been working through the book. And so, we’ve had these nice intuitive groups meet online. And so, we’ve just finished the chapter on energetic boundaries. And next month, we’ll be doing a class on being in alignment. And these intuition development exercises. And this is a really nice group that’s come together, it’s the kind of group that you can join or jump into any time. So, you don’t have to sign up for a long period of time. I’m not usually a fan of that I like people to kind of be able to drop in and then go if they need to. I’m going to be travelling for a lot of June, Rachel and I are taking like an early honeymoon. And before the wedding, you don’t want to wait. And but when I get back, I’m gonna resume coaching. I have a couple of coaching clients I’ll start with and just to be honest, the the last couple of years with the book and everything I just want to be in my life. I just you know, I’m trying to kind of put myself not on a timeout, but like a mini timeout, and not really launch anything big and just, just answer the calls that that really you know, that really come to me. I am teaching one online workshop this summer about demonstrating mediumship that will be in person. But besides that, I just want to be in my life and take the opportunities that come to me and have some time to you know, embody everything.
Ann
Yeah, they sound like really, really good plans. Let’s face it, Sheryl, you’ve had enough excitement in your life you don’t need any more high drama, right?
Sheryl
No, no, I don’t. I don’t.
Ann
It’s been so lovely. Thank you so much for sharing a little bit about yourself and the work that you’re doing out there. It just sounds like you’re such a beautifully sensitive worker for spirit and for people here in the physical world. You truly have a foot in both worlds. And thank you so much, Sheryl, for joining us today.
Ann
Well, that was Psychic Medium, Sheryl Wagner. Please do go and buy her book Uncovering Intuition and if you buy it directly from Sheryl’s website, you will get a beautiful meditation as well.
Thank you for listening to Psychic Matters – for those who are interested in Mediumship, you might consider coming along on a Tuesday for a free event – it’s free, it happens every single Tuesday throughout the year – it’s called the Mediumship Hour and it takes place online from 7pm UK to 8pm. Just jump on Zoom – joining details are under Events on my website – I work with one other medium, either Lesley Malone or Tyrone Cusack and sometimes we have surprise guests too, and we work for one hour to bring through messages of love and guidance from your loved ones in the spirit realms. We’d love to see you there.
Once again if you want to pick up details for that event, the Zoom link, etc., go to my website www.anntheato.com and you can pick up the Zoom link by clicking on the Events tab, and if you want to pick up the show notes for this episode, go to the podcast tab, and click on the podcast page. You will see Sheryl’s beautiful photograph up there, so click on that, and it will take you to the show notes for this episode, which includes a full transcript and all the resources that have been mentioned and there will be a link there which will take you directly to Sheryl’s book.
Have a fabulous couple of weeks everyone. Don’t forget what Sheryl said, that your intuition is the soul of you – the wisdom within – and we all have access to it. So do remember to listen to your intuition this week and begin to live a life that is ever more in alignment with your soul’s purpose.
My name is Ann Théato and thank you for listening to Psychic Matters.