When I was 19 years old, I was in college at Appalachian State University and was coming out of an especially difficult period with my clinical depression, which had affected my performance in school during my first semesters, along with undiagnosed ADHD. I’d also been exploring the edges of consciousness through psychedelics and other closely-related recreational activities. (I’ll leave that last part to your imagination.) This combination opened up the door for me to begin exploring healing work, which lead me to the local metaphysical center where I began meditating and researching different spiritual and holistic healing subjects. With these doorways of perception opening wide, my third eye also began to bloom open. For me, this meant that I started seeing souls who had passed over and other energies across the veil with my actual eyes. They would sometimes communicate with me telepathically and would also show up in my dreams with messages.

I was working at a well-known BBQ joint in the area when I had a defining experience that would affirm mediumship as a significant part of my life. It was February in the mountains and heavy snow had kept people from coming into the restaurant on one night in particular when just a few of us were working. The non-smoking section was downstairs near the kitchen and I was assigned to that area, which had been empty all night. Finally, a family of four came in the front door upstairs. I watched them come down the stairs, as I leaned against the 1970’s cigarette vending machine that was at the bottom of the staircase.

The family included a mother and father, a son who was around the age of five, and his sister, who was just at the age where she could descend the stairs semi-independently if she held onto her brother, which she did. We greeted each other, and the mother and son slid onto the long picnic table benches in the dining room. With no one else in the dining room, the daughter wandered around for a moment and slipped behind the corner into the hallway where the restrooms were. The father followed in her direction.

I approached the table to take their drink order. I asked the mother what she wanted to drink for her daughter. She froze. I froze. After an awkward silence, she said, “We don’t have a daughter.” Looking at me, her face seemed to turn white. Time slowed. I fumbled, “I’m so sorry, I thought…never mind. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Excuse me…” I turned away to go into the server area to prepare their drinks, but before I was out of sight, she blurted out, “We had a daughter, but she passed away.” I was confused, stunned, and just felt this sense of T.M.I. (too much information). I said I was sorry and tried to establish normalcy again.

When I returned with their beverages, the father was seated and the daughter was nowhere to be found. They ate their meal and I went behind the building and smoked half a pack of cigarettes (no, I don’t smoke anymore) while they ate, trying to reconcile the absolutely real and complete human I had seen next to her family. I could recount all the details of how she looked and what she was wearing.

I made a bold move and wrote a quick note on the back of their ticket: “I saw your daughter. I’m supposed to let you know that she’s with you and it’s a good thing.” I slid it onto their table and split, hiding out back again with the cooks, as they walked upstairs to pay their bill with the cashier and left. (Why did I hide? I was nineteen, and you never know how people’s religious or personal perspectives will influence their reaction to an experience like this, especially in the Bible Belt of the American South in the 1990’s.)

Fast forward to the month of May, just three months later:

I was waiting tables during a busy lunch shift when all the tourists had come to the mountains to ride their bikes down the Blue Ridge Parkway and enjoy the Spring flowers. A lady popped up out of her chair and approached me, “Are you Kendra?!” “Yes, I’m Kendall.” “I’m the mother who was in here that night when you left us a message on our ticket. I’ve come in here looking for you a couple times! Do you have time to come sit with us for a minute?” I did not have time, so they waited at their table for a long while until things slowed down. I didn’t know what to say to them. I had been having similar experiences since then, but still felt like a deer in headlights – new to all this, not yet confident, and kind of dramatic about it at 19.

When I sat down she said, “We just want you to know that the note you wrote us gives us so much comfort. We placed it on our bedroom mirror and look at it everyday when we’re getting ready.” She also said, “Just so you know, I was in a business meeting with a group of people shortly after we ate here that night, and a Native American man pulled me aside after the meeting and asked me if my daughter had passed away, because he said he saw her all over me during the meeting. I know she’s with me.”

This remains one of the most powerful medium experiences I’ve ever had.

I would go on to try to navigate my life as a “normal” person, and would sweep these “gifts” under the rug for over 15 years in my mostly unsuccessful attempt at normalcy. However, an awakening experience that happened just a few months after this one would keep the door of spiritual seeking open for me for the rest of my life. Studying yoga, bringing meditation back into life with greater intention in 2016, and meeting my former business partner, Debbie Chisholm, would turn the faucet of my intuition and medium abilities on full blast again. Answering the call to create Light House Spiritual Center was part of that flow.

Believe me, this is not an easy assignment! As you know, to whom much is given, much is required. I take my intuitive work very seriously and do it only for the purpose of facilitating growth and healing for others. I also think that it’s just one aspect of spiritual life, which is far more robust than this beautiful phenomena. But I have learned through experience that just one good reading can do what many months of therapy might. I accept the assignment.