Spiritual Spotlight Series
Discover a world of healing, holistic, and spiritual modalities with the Spiritual Spotlight Series podcast. Every week, we introduce you to diverse spiritual practitioners, including psychics, energy healers, life coaches, spiritual thought leaders, and witches. Each episode offers inspiration and enlightenment through the unique journeys, experiences, and divine abilities of our guests. Perfect for those on a path to spiritual awakening, this podcast blends science and mysticism to expand your understanding of spirituality. Our mission is to open your eyes to the world around you, making complex concepts accessible and enlightening for anyone seeking spiritual growth. Whether you're new to spirituality or looking to deepen your knowledge, the Spiritual Spotlight Series is your go-to resource for awakening and transformation.
Spiritual Spotlight Series
Cultivating Mediumship: Sharon Farber's Journey from Sociology to Spirit Communication
Can anyone learn the art of mediumship, or is it an innate gift bestowed upon a select few?
Join us for a captivating episode with Sharon Farber, a seasoned medium, mentor, teacher, and author, who passionately argues that mediumship is a skill that can be developed with dedication and practice.
Sharon shares her journey from a background in sociology and massage therapy to becoming an evidential medium, offering a glimpse into the transformative moments that led her to this path.
In our conversation, Sharon recounts her experiences at the Arthur Finley College, often referred to as the "Hogwarts of mediumship," where she honed her skills amidst a supportive community and rigorous training.
She emphasizes the importance of providing concrete evidence in spirit communication and the joy of helping beginners achieve their first validated connections.
Sharon also offers personal anecdotes about the guidance she receives from the spirit world, making her narrative both relatable and inspiring for anyone interested in mediumship.
For those just starting out, Sharon provides invaluable advice on developing mediumship abilities, maintaining ethical boundaries, and distinguishing between mediumship and psychic readings.
She highlights the significance of consistent practice and the importance of not approaching strangers for readings.
Sharon's beginner classes, priced affordably and limited to small groups for personalized attention, offer a comprehensive foundation for aspiring mediums.
Tune in to discover more about Sharon's experiences and how you, too, can begin your mediumship journey under her expert guidance.
We hope you found the episode to be enlightening and insightful. Our goal is to create content that not only entertains but also helps you grow spiritually and connect with your inner self.
If you enjoyed listening to this episode, we would greatly appreciate it if you could take a moment to like, subscribe, and write a review. Your feedback is incredibly valuable to us and helps us to improve the quality of our content and reach a wider audience.
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Hello everyone, welcome to our Spiritual Spotlight Series. Today I am joined by Sharon Ferber. She's a medium, mentor, teacher and author of Choosing to be a Medium. Sharon, thank you so much for coming on Spiritual Spotlight Series. I'm so happy you're here.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Rachel. Thank you for inviting me. I'm happy to be here too.
Speaker 1:So, sharon, can you maybe share your background in sociology and massage therapy and maybe how that influenced your journey into mediumship?
Speaker 2:Well, I've always liked to help people and I thought I could do that with sociology and I did Old people Medicaid, things like that. But it wasn't that helpful.
Speaker 2:And then I still did. You ask about massage. I still do a little bit of massage. I have three clients left that I can't seem to let go of. One of them I've been massaging since 1988. Yes, 1988. That was much more helpful healing one-on-one, but so my intention has always been to help people and help with healing, and I guess that's how it's led me to this, which I feel is super healing and helpful Absolutely.
Speaker 1:So maybe what was the catalyst that made you decide to become a medium, and how did you initially overcome the skepticism around learning mediumship?
Speaker 2:That's a great question. I didn't even know anything about mediumship. I wasn't one of those mediums who saw spirit people since they were three years old. At about 14 years ago somebody invited me to a mediumship demonstration and I thought, oh well, that sounds interesting. Nothing, no burning passion to go. And it was amazing and I watched. It was a small group. There were, I think there were about 10 of us, and the medium got beautiful connections for everybody there, connected with my first born dog and a close friend, and I just saw how amazing it was. And then I invited her to come give mediumship demonstrations once a month at my healing, my massage center, and I got to see again how amazing it was and then I thought I want to do that.
Speaker 2:The other catalyst was that I massaged a man who had pain in his chest which I believe is from his heart, and he had a daughter pass at age 11 in a hospital. She was in the hospital for undiagnosed abdominal pain and she died from a ruptured appendix in the hospital. And here's the man a year later with wondering why he has chest pain. Yeah, anyway, that was the catalyst of like we need more mediums, because if this man and his wife could see a medium they connect with a daughter. The daughter would explain how she's fine, it wasn't their fault, they shouldn't feel terrible for the rest of their lives. They're going to grieve for everybody, but they shouldn't feel like it was their fault. So that those two things I experienced mediumship, saw how amazing it was. Then I had this man and I thought I want to do that. And then I've heard hundreds and hundreds of times since then I've heard oh, I didn't think you could learn to be a medium, I thought you had to be born that way and I just said, well, we'll find out.
Speaker 2:And I read books and took classes and started giving practice readings and I got my first connection and I jumped up and down. I was like, oh my God, I can do it. And then I just have put all my, almost all of my passion and focus into developing to be the best medium I possibly can in the past, like 14 years Wow.
Speaker 1:I love that. So how did your training at the Arthur Finley College with various esteemed mediumship and shape your skills and approach to mediumship?
Speaker 2:Well, the school is amazing. That's what I went there in 2012 for the first time and I figured, well, if I'm going to study this, I might as well go to the best school there is. It's like the Harvard, or it's more like the Hogwarts of mediumship. I went there and I'm in a school, an old castle-like building, with a hundred people, a dozen mediumship teachers and 90 students or so, and realized that, yes, I'm meant to be doing this and it was incredible. At the school, they have training from like 930 in the morning till 930 at night. You also stay there and there's community and incredible teachers all on the same wavelength. For example, evidential mediumship. You need to have evidence. It's not like there's a I'm a grandma in the kitchen wearing an apron. Is that your grandma?
Speaker 2:No evidence and ethics and across the board belief that mediumship is healing and safe and that the spirit world is full of love and light. So it was a great place to start. I've done three more week sessions since then. I went back in 2014, 2017 and last December.
Speaker 1:I love that you have even though, like you've already gone to school that you continue to develop your skill and your craft and it's probably like under you know unwrapping more and more layers to your skills and your abilities. You brought up a good point about the type of mediums that there are. What kind of medium would you say that you are? Are you an evidential medium? A trans medium, like what? What would? What would you characterize yourself as?
Speaker 2:I used the title medium, but I'm definitely an evidential medium. Meaning all that means is that you provide enough evidence that people really know their spirit person there. So a trans medium. I've been studying trans for years now but I haven't quite got it yet. Mental mediumship is the vanilla most common mediumship, where you give a reading to a person or to a group of people and you talk in the third person. Usually I've got a tall man here and he's who recognizes this man where in trans mediumship you invite a spirit person to come so close you allow them to speak through you, and it's different like that.
Speaker 1:I will say that I did take a transmediumship course with Lisa Williams and it was fascinating and to have a spirit like sit on you and feel like and then you take over their characteristics. It's and I know you've experienced this. It's just for anyone that's learning to um wants to get into that. It's fascinating, like to feel that and to be like, taking on, like how they're drinking a coffee or smoking a cigarette or having a. You know, it's almost like channeling, but it's different. It's so much fun.
Speaker 2:I like to point out when I teach people about trance, is that not being possessed? They're not being no. That it's this beautiful communion yeah intentional union between the medium and the spirit person. Yeah, also, it's not like Hollywood and it's safe and wonderful like that, although some people who try it get a little freaked out having a spirit person so close.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, absolutely. I like that you also teach your students, which we'll get into. You know it's safe. You have consent, like it's a very safe practice as long as you have boundaries, energetic protections, and we'll definitely get more into that. So I want to jump into your book. Choosing to be a medium has been widely recognized. Can you tell us about the process of writing it and the impact that maybe it's had on its readers and she has for those that are on video? She's got this beautiful cover and I love it, and maybe tell us a little about the cover, because you did say there's a story behind it oh, it's um well about the book first back.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the important thing, the meat, the part that I wrote the book is because I already mentioned how many people questioned the possibility that you can learn to be a medium, and my, my mission is to let people know that you can develop mediumship. I teach with a. If I can do it, so can you idea? And the working title was how to become a medium when you're not born that way, or are you and the publishers? That's a bit long and they came up with this one. I'm like, ooh, I like it. The whole title is choosing to be a medium, experience and share the healing wonder of spirit communication. But I like the choosing to be me, choosing to be a medium. Well, there's the whole part about where I had a lot of support from the spirit world to write the book. I'm not somebody who goes on about my spirit guides. Oh, my spirit guides told me this or that, but it was kind of crazy. I'm not somebody who ever wanted to write a book or ever wrote much.
Speaker 2:I don't have a history of writing. The last time I wrote anything would probably be in college. Well, yeah, other than a well a few poems. But anyway, I thought there was a need for people to know that you don't have to be a third generation medium, you don't have to see spirit people spontaneously in order to learn how to do it. So I had a lot of support, guidance from the other side. They found me an agent, they found me a publisher. It was kind of crazy. That's kind of less likely than winning the lottery and so that all happened and I get to share my story. And just about the cover the publisher didn't want the same old covers with clouds and things, so they came up with this hard cover that looks like it should be the cover of a scrapbooking book. And through the whole rest of the process of writing the book, I'm like yep yep, I'll do that I'll do that Great idea.
Speaker 2:I'll do that until we got to the cover and I was like no, and had to explain why that wouldn't work. And then we ended up with this and I love this cover.
Speaker 1:It's a beautiful cover and you brought it up a couple of times that you know choosing to be a medium. You're right. Being a psychic being a medium, you don't have to be born into it. It is something that a craft can be learned. It takes dedication and I really respect the fact that you're giving you know accolades to the fact that you don't have to be born into it. I don't have to be a 17 generation. You know a healer to be a healer and have you, like maybe had encountered some people that are a little hesitant to believe that they can actually learn that.
Speaker 2:Oh, they're the best ones, the people who show up for my beginner class. I teach a five hour online beginner mediumship class, usually at least once a month, aside from in-person things and retreats and longer classes but that's the one where, a lot of the times, people oh well, I've been doing this, I've been doing that. I do tarot and I sometimes see spirit people and they want to learn how to use it intentionally. They work the boundaries. But there are the people who show up like, well, I read your book and it says that you can do it. I haven't done it, I'm a real beginner.
Speaker 2:Those are the exciting students and I get to watch them generally that day in the beginner class, give their first validated connection and watch their face light up. So that is my real passion. That people like can I do this, can I do that? And then, holding their hands, give them the guidance and support that I didn't receive when I wanted to learn and then watch them blossom and then some of them continue and continue to become just amazing mediums. I love that. It's very, very wonderful.
Speaker 1:It sounds like it's part of your soul's mission. You know, in the beginning you said that you noticed that there was a real need for mediums and the fact that you're developing and helping shape these beautiful mediums that you know can give transformational healing messages is so important and I like that you're part of that mission for giving healing.
Speaker 2:So you Fulfilling was the word I was looking for before, when I said wonderful.
Speaker 1:I love that.
Speaker 2:I can do more by training literally hundreds of other mediums who can go on, than just giving the amount of readings. I could do Absolutely.
Speaker 1:The ripple effect alone. You know it's. I love that. So you have a very hands on approach in your classes and retreats. Maybe what are some key elements you focus on to help your students develop their mediumship abilities?
Speaker 2:They need to do mediumship. There's one key thing you learn enough. So this is how it is, this is how you perceive, this is how you ground, prepare your intention, etc. Etc. Etc. But it's all about giving readings. Yeah, I had.
Speaker 2:I gave a beginner class and then, a few months later, one of the students asked for a one-on-one mentorship with me and I said so, um, and she's like I'm not progressing, I can't do it. I said how many practice readings did you do? And she said none. I said you can't sit alone in your bedroom, you can't just talk to your own people, because I can't practice mediumship with my dad or my grandma, because I know what they're like, I know everything about them.
Speaker 2:In order to develop, you need to give practice readings to other people whose loved ones you don't know. That's the hugest thing, because that's how you get information, and then the person you're giving the reading to says yes, yes, oh, my God, maybe they cry, and that's how you learn that you're really doing it. So the classes, the especially the retreats, the three day classes, it's a bit of a little bit of lecture and a lot of okay, you're going to work in pairs. We're going to work in a group, we're going to work in all these interesting, different ways to push you, challenge you, stretch you, but it's all about doing the work. Trying to learn mediumship without giving readings is like trying to learn to swim without going in water that is the best analogy, thank you, I love that.
Speaker 1:it's so true, though, because how many, how many people have you encountered that have learned these amazing healing modalities but yet they don't practice the art in which they just learned, and it's like, well, you can't be an energy healer and not give sessions Like you have to. You have to walk the talk Like you have to do it.
Speaker 2:I'm a. I'm a healer also. I'm a master of heal. I've been doing healing for 35 years. You can do healing on yourself, Of course it's not as profound.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I also like the validation, like you said, like seeing people when they're, when you train them and they're getting those ahas and building up their confidence and building up their skill set. You know we're not going to be 100 all the time, but you know, when you get that validation and it's like, yeah, I can do this.
Speaker 2:some days might be off, but most days I might be on, I have four online mediumship development circles and they're filled with my students and other random people and they come every week. Some people come to more than one and the whole thing it's 90 minutes of giving readings. Everybody has about 10 minutes to give a reading and they're just doing it again and again and again. I have people who've been sitting in my circle for four years.
Speaker 1:They just come every week. Now for your. You just brought up your mediumship development circles. Do they have to have taken your classes, or can anybody drop into those?
Speaker 2:Well, they're mostly full right Well right now I have one session open, wednesdays at noon. Otherwise they're usually full because I only take eight people For anybody who's had other training, beginners, people who are amazing mediums and just like to be in a supported practice, safe practice place. I love that there are a lot of cancellations this summer, so if anybody wanted to hop in and it's really reasonably priced, I love that.
Speaker 1:I love that. That's perfect. I love that you're offering a safe space also for people just to practice and work on their skills and for you as the mentor, to be like yeah, I think you're this is, you're going in the right direction here.
Speaker 2:Yep.
Speaker 1:I like that Validation is important. This is you're going the right direction here. Yep, I like that validation is important. Can you maybe describe a particularly memorable reading or demonstration that you did that reinforced your belief in mediumship and its healing powers? Each?
Speaker 2:people ask me that each reading, each demonstration read for reinforces that. So I can't, I'll just do. The last demo I did was Wednesday, was Tuesday, the most recent Tuesday we had, and it was just three people in person and I got connections to this person's. I don't exactly remember at the moment because I'm on the spot here, but I got validated people for two out of the three people and one of the women didn't have a lot of close people. She knew one of the friends that came through, oh, and she knew her grandma because her mom was there and the grandmother mother. So she knew her, but it was more about the mother.
Speaker 2:But anyway, she was saying I'm really lucky I don't have a lot of people in spirit. And this is towards the end and it's nice when you get a strong connection for everybody there and she's going on for the third time about you know well, I don't really have any close people in spirit. And then all of a sudden it's like, okay, I have this light tan colored dog for you. They remind me of a fox, there's kind of pointed ears, and I went on and on. She and her friend both start crying. So it doesn't have to be spirit people. Her dog came through this one on one love bond. How the dog was there for her, she was there for the dog. There was a cameo appearance from a German shepherd. Love that, and I saw a rabbit and I was like you know, I had a rabbit too.
Speaker 2:Yes, I had a rabbit, but um so I just figured that was. What I want to do in a demonstration is touch everybody there yeah, if not everybody.
Speaker 2:If it's a larger demonstration, not everybody's going to get a reading, but my intention is to show the healing wonder of mediumship and touch everybody's hearts. So I just thought the last demo was yeah, you know well, if she doesn't have anybody really significant that she's desperate to hear from. But then they no one expected me to get ring through her dog and then to watch her friend crying too. That was really cool. As for individual readings, there's not really significant ones. They're all about people's children, parents, best friends, spouses and other loved ones in spirit. Several times I've given readings in demo and somebody's like okay, I have to leave now to go to the funeral or the funerals tomorrow. So sometimes it's like that.
Speaker 1:Do you ever? Do you ever recommend that people wait, or are you okay with giving a reading for somebody that just recently passed?
Speaker 2:I don't want to know anything about to me. So I don't generally get to have that conversation. They don't generally say so and so, just passed, Should I get a reading? Gotcha. But overall I say if you lost somebody super close to spouse, child, somebody super close, you might.
Speaker 2:It's good to wait a couple months, not because the spirit people can't come through the spirit people can come through immediately, but because if people are in profound grief the acute part and they're desperate and needy, they might not be as open and receptive to the reading as if they give themselves a little bit of time to heal. But some of those people get to make an appointment and I'm getting their mother and the mother has only been gone three and a half weeks and I get this beautiful thing. They told me at the end and I'm like, wow, okay, well, they were ready. Somebody who was like that mother comes through beautiful. She purchased a reading for her sister and kind of encouraged, pressured the sister to have it. The sister was not ready and that didn't go over well. So it's all about the embodied people and if they're ready.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, absolutely. So how do you balance your roles as a medium, mentor, teacher and healer, while also pursuing your passion for art?
Speaker 2:Art is gone. Art is the backstage. I'm lucky if I get to paint a painting once or twice a year. Wow, a couple of paintings I painted are sitting on my painting thing. They're not even matted or framed, so the painting is backstage. I don't do much healing, I just have a couple massage there, couple massage clients I can't get rid of.
Speaker 2:They won't mind me saying yeah, and I do some healing, but it's all about the mediumship. Yeah, giving things, teaching and mentorship that all blends in together perfectly. I wouldn't want to be giving five readings a day. That wouldn't be good for me. It's a great balance of teaching and giving readings and some demonstrations.
Speaker 1:So what advice do you give to individuals who are just beginning to explore their mediumship abilities and feel uncertain, maybe, about their potential?
Speaker 2:you can do it if you want to, if you want to put in the time, the energy and the passion, you can do it. I think that one of the most, one of the most harmful ideas from the you have to be born this way, people is that, oh well, actually everybody can learn to do it a little bit, but if you weren't born this way, if you don't have this gift, you'll never be really good. That's horrid, because that means even if you get your first connection and you realize you can do it, it's not like, oh my God, I'm going to pursue this. It's like, oh, they say, I'll never be good, it's terrible. So I want to over, I want to over. Anyway, I want to compensate for people who say that and say, if this is your passion, just do it. When people say you have kids who want to learn instruments, you don't say you don't have perfect pitch, you're not writing symphonies at the age of five, you're never going to be good at music, you shouldn't go to elementary school band, you shouldn't be in the high school band because you're not born that way. It's not this gift. That's terrible, isn't it? I don't know why people have this idea that with mediumship. You should have be born this way. So if you want to do it, do it, and then, like I said before, it's like beating a dead horse. You got to practice, practice, practice.
Speaker 2:Give readings. Give readings to people you don't know If you're giving readings to your best friend or your family, and you know the spirit people. That's harder. Give people. Give readings to people you don't know. And if people don't have anybody to give readings to. I have a Facebook group called mediumship and mediums, with 27,000 people now, and you can go on there and ask for volunteers to give readings to, and all you got to do is make sure you moderate the post quickly, because you'd have hundreds of people begging for readings. So there's no not to give readings when there's zoom and supply of people who for readings. So there's no not to give readings when they're zoom.
Speaker 2:And absolutely supply of people who want readings. So that's so true Learn and if the teacher. If you go to a teacher and it doesn't work well, you take a class and it doesn't resonate. Find a better teacher, a teacher that resonates better with you.
Speaker 1:I totally agree. I totally agree. So how do you ensure ethical practices that maintain boundaries in your mediumship readings and in your teachings that I teach people don't approach strangers.
Speaker 2:Don't give readings to your hairdresser or your server at a restaurant, because approaching strangers, I believe, is unethical, invasive and inappropriate. And the rest is when you're giving readings Obviously come from your heart with the intention to heal. Don't take advantage of people. Don't pretend you're a medium when you're not a medium. Don't even say things like they're sorry for the spirit people if they're not sorry. Be sensitive and tactful. Don't call people junkies and drunks. You can say this person has an alcohol problem, this person has issues with addiction fine, don't all those kind of things. Be sensitive.
Speaker 2:If you get unborn babies, um, be sensitive about suicide. All those things I teach. It's not that hard, it's doing no harm, coming from a place of healing and learning how to be sensitive and supportive. It's also important for people to learn when they're doing mediumship and when they're doing psychic, because a lot of psychic people decide enhance their practice by developing mediumship also. But if you're giving a reading and you're connecting with a significant loved one, that's great and give evidence. But then if they go into psychic and start talking about the person and what they should do, they need to say this part is intuitive, this part psychic, as opposed to implying that your mother or spouse is telling you what to do in your life.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's a good piece of advice. I like that. It's like you need to distinguish between what type of reading you're giving, and I think it's also important that you brought it up. You need to be sensitive to the messages that you're delivering, Like is it going to heal the person that's sitting in front of you or is it going to create more harm? And are they ready to hear it?
Speaker 2:Right and never say anything that's going to cause stress or fear. With mediumship, you don't have to worry about that psychic stuff Like what if you think something bad is going to happen to somebody, because mediumship isn't about predicting the future or telling people what's going to happen. It's about connecting with their loved ones in spirit for the purpose of love and healing for both sides of life. I like that too. Less potential for harm, gotcha. As opposed to somebody telling somebody like oh, you'll never have kids, you're going to have an accident, somebody's going to die Horrific things that are going to create fear in people's lives, possibly make them focus on it and just possibly be self-fulfilling. So we don't do anything like that. Ethical, evidential mediums would never do anything like that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely, Absolutely. Before I ask you the last question, where is the best place for somebody who maybe wants to purchase your book, book one of your sessions, maybe jump into one of your classes a retreat what's the best place for them to go to?
Speaker 2:Sharonfarbernet wwwSharonFarbernet, and there from there you can see my classes, my mentorship, my readings, retreats, and you can get links to YouTube videos, tiktok videos, facebook and all that other stuff.
Speaker 1:I love it. I love it. So what is one piece of advice you would offer to our listeners who are interested in developing their own mediumship abilities but maybe unsure where to start?
Speaker 2:Make a beginner class and if you want to make sure it's an authentic ethical teacher, I teach them online pretty much every month and it's $89 for five hours with a maximum of 10 people and often they're smaller and you get the whole basics foundation and a chance for me to hold your hand while you give a reading towards the end.
Speaker 1:Wow, that's a really good deal.
Speaker 2:Because a lot of people when they're trying to learn about mediumship, they take classes and it's about angels and psychic and all this other kind of stuff into mediumship. So otherwise, if you're going to find a class, find out some. Find somebody who's going to teach you actual mediumship, not other things, if mediumship is what you want to learn.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. Thank you so much, Sharon, for coming to Spiritual Spotlight Series. It's been amazing to connect with you today. Thank you.
Speaker 2:Thank you, Rachel, for having me.
