EP #21: What Mediumship Really Feels Like

What if the scariest part of death isn’t the moment itself, but how alone we think it will be? I sit down with Maurice Israel, a registered nurse, longtime hospice clinician, and psychic medium, to talk through the one claim that stopped me in my tracks: he says that in every death he witnessed, someone was there to greet the person on the other side.

We get practical and specific about what these words actually mean. Maurice breaks down intuition as a natural human signal, psychic ability as an “enhanced” way of reading and translating energy, and mental mediumship as connecting with loved ones who have crossed over. We also dig into the clairs like clairvoyance and clairsentience, how spirit communication can feel like a distinct vibration, and why training and attunement matter when you’re trying to separate your own thoughts from what you’re receiving.

Grief and healing run through everything. We talk about how mediumship can bring solace without forcing belief, what happens when a difficult or unwanted communicator comes forward, and why delivery and consent are essential when messages aren’t just “I love you.” Maurice also shares how structured bereavement support can look, including grief retreats with organizations like the Forever Family Foundation that bring together mediums, therapists, scientists, and research.

If you’re curious about mediumship, spirituality, afterlife communication, or grief healing and you want a grounded conversation instead of theatrics, this one is for you. Subscribe, share this with someone who needs comfort, and leave a review with your biggest question about intuition or the afterlife.

For more information or to book a session, visit:
🌐 Website: https://www.mediummaurice.com

📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/psychicmediummaurice

👍 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/psychicmediummaurice

Maurice is an evidential medium, teacher, and energy practitioner with over 20 years of experience offering private readings, group demonstrations, and spiritual development classes. 

Transcript

A Mind-Bending Hospice Observation

Speaker 1 0:00

Hi, in this episode, I got the opportunity to sit down with Maurice Israel. He's a psychic medium who I've known for many, many years and wanted to be able to share with you one of the things that blew my mind. At one point he shared something that went, it just stopped me in my tracks because he said that in every death he's witnessed, and he was a hospice nurse, there was always someone there to greet that person on the other side. He said he doesn't tell the families because it would freak them out. However, I was mind-blown. It was awesome to hear and to continue on with our conversation, but that stood out for me. If it's something that's interested you, you're interested in spirituality or some other type of energetic growth, this episode is gonna get you.

Speaker 0:50

Welcome to the Hemp Del Soul Podcast. All health, no high. Here's your host, Marilisa Lawless.

Speaker 1 1:04

Hello, hello, and welcome. Today we have a really amazing guest. I've been trying to get him on here for months, but he is so busy that it has been a challenge to get him scheduled. I would like to introduce you to a friend of mine who I love his work professionally, I love him personally, and I'm gonna let him introduce himself, Maurice Israel.

Speaker 2 1:27

Hi everyone, and I'm happy to finally be here with Mariliisa. It is true, it's been a while, but I'm looking forward to the podcast today, and let's see where this takes us.

Why Energy Healing Matters

Speaker 1 1:37

Okay. So, part of what you know I do as a trauma therapist is that because of the pharmaceutical industry, I started looking at all the energy healers and differences in how people heal. So, prior to referring people to pharmaceuticals, I look at all the different types of energy healing and different modalities in the world. And there's way too many for us to even get into, but you have a particular specialty that I truly like looking at, watching, hearing about, and learning about. So today I would like for you to just introduce yourself a little bit and talk about what you do as a mental medium, because that is your big calling in this world. So tell us a little bit about yourself.

Speaker 2 2:27

So I'm a registered nurse by trade. That is what I went to school and trained in. And through being a registered nurse and working in the hospital systems, I became very aware of energy healing, is where it all began, to be honest. I started working with things like Reiki and then working with some other modalities, which then over time became mediumship, I guess you could say. You could look at it that way, because my abilities just began to develop and come to the surface. And then through that, the I won't say the end result, but where I am now, the main thing that I work with is the mediumship within all the work that I do, whether it's healing or psychic work, regardless.

Speaker 1 3:09

Can you describe what that is? What's the difference between psychic, medium, our intuition, just the things that we as we might know intuition, like our sixth sense, ESP, that kind of stuff is what we grew up hearing. But tell tell our audience what that actually is.

Training To Hear Spirit Clearly

Speaker 2 3:30

So intuition, everyone walking around has intuition. It's just something that you're naturally born with, and it's just those feelings that you get on a daily basis. Good, bad, I'm not sure about this, but those just those initial feelings that you get when you walk into different situations, when you meet new people, or just if you're thinking about a project or something, you're trying to get a feel is there's something good or something bad. We always get some type of feeling that serves as a gauge for us to let us know really if we're heading in the right direction or wrong direction. The challenge, though, is to learn to pay attention to those signs that we get and to follow them because they never lead us the wrong way if we pay attention to the initial feelings that we have. Now, when you look at your psychic ability, that's really what I look at as an enhancement of your intuition because it's the energy connecting with others, and then you're able to put what you're feeling, sensing, or being made aware of just really into words. And what you're feeling, is it good, is it bad? Do I feel something going on now, something going on later? But it's really just those things that we have to practice over time and work with. Many people look at psychic ability as a blending of energies of one person to another, is how they see it. Because you can look at someone's energy field, and based on the energy field, you can pick up information from them over time. But I really think it's much simpler than that because when you work with your intuition, you already begin to connect with people, you already begin to get a feeling. If you begin to put those feelings into words, you're beginning to work psychically because you're connecting with them energetically. So to me, it's not this huge puzzle that some teams think it is, or really fear. A lot of people fear it, to be honest. Um, it's much simpler than that. It's really just something that we're born with and we all have. Now, the mental mediumship takes it a step further. When we speak of mental mediumship, we're really talking about connection to the souls of those that have crossed over from this world to the spirit world to heaven, however, people want to refer to it as. And honestly, what happened was when it started to really show up for me, I did a lot of prayer work around it and things like that to make it okay for me to let go and just connect. And then I was, let's put it this way, I was so afraid of it. When I got my guidance where I was gonna go to learn and study about it, it wasn't even in this country. I left the country to go and study. That's where I was guided. Um, now, years later, after working with it for so many years and with so many people, you I've just found there's such a healing quality to working with it for people, they don't necessarily have to be like people that jump up and down and say, Oh, I'm a huge believer, but just someone who's open to the communication that's coming in from their loved ones or those that have passed over. Um, and just that for them to be open to it, because that's all it is. It's not about us be trying to convince anyone of anything. I'm just the instrument in between. I'm the one who's listening and feeling, and just saying, Well, I have this person here, I'd like to tell you this, or this, and I want to tell you this, and then I leave it with the recipient of the session, and they do with it as they please. It's not about trying to force anything on anyone, right?

Speaker 1 8:51

So you make it clear that you're the conduit, that you're not that how did you learn to differentiate your own thoughts and what you thought people might want to hear, and what you're actually, you know, messages that are actually originating from the spirit. How did you know the difference between, you know, okay, well, this is what they need to hear, and how did you know that this was spirit or that this was the relatives, friends, family that have been that are on the other side?

Speaker 2 9:22

Right, and that and that takes a little bit of training. I mean, sometimes in the beginning, especially when you start to get those thoughts that you know are just simply not yours, um, like I said, it wasn't come, I wasn't someone who was comfortable with this. I was someone who was very much like, okay, here voice, what is that? And I'm like in my head thinking to myself, yeah, I can't really tell too many people about this. And but then as it continued to grow, and then the spirit world became much more apparent in my life, like showing up, um, feeling like me actually being able to see them at times and becoming aware of them, being around me. Um, sometimes to someone who might be nearby and things like that. The real clarification really of the communication came through after I began to really study and work with it and began in you, and we do something called sitting in the power, and really that's just sitting to allow yourself to move into a place where your energy connects with those in the other world or spirit or to your soul, however, you want to see it, and what it helps you to do is to attune to the vibrations of those coming in. So the more that you attune, which really you're harmonizing through attunement, aren't you? So that you learn to work with the energy in this way, those in the other world that come in come in a different vibration. I mean, you have to think about it. If you have the lovely little grandmother who used to sit at home and bake cookies all day and like knit blankets and you run in the house and hug her, she's the quiet little lovely one, right? That everyone wants to be around, but she's got a nice, quiet, beautiful energy. But what if you have the crazy uncle who is like the one who like drank all weekend and partied and hung out, and that's a totally different energy. And as a medium, as you begin to work with the energy, you learn to attune to the energy of whoever's coming in. So you're able to work with the energy of someone nice and quiet, like the grandmother, or someone just over the top and outrageous, like some of the people that you know that's how they were on earth, so come in when they communicate with us. So it's amazing.

Speaker 1 11:22

So, do you do you think that they do that so that you can identify that hey, this is this is who it is that I have? Can you relate to this energy? Can you relate to this personality? I mean, is that part of how you connect with somebody that would be in front of you for a session?

Speaker 2 11:38

Absolutely, because the way you have to look at it is if I if I if the say that we're talking about the the one who parted the uncle or cousin who parted on the weekend, and I said, I have this this gentleman who comes in and he's sitting in a church pew and he's very quiet, and he's telling you like he loves you very much, and da-da-da. You're gonna look at me be like, I don't know who the heck that is. But that so they they differentiate through their experiences here on earth and through that level of consciousness which is connected to the soul when they cross over, those are the memories they bring back to us. That's the consciousness that we connect with, soul to soul, the reality of what they were living when they were here, because that's what those who are here would connect with. Because if you change your total and say, Well, there's something totally opposite, the person in front of you is like, okay, you don't know what you're talking about, and it would just go from there.

Speaker 1 12:32

So we have things like one of the things that would probably be more common verbiage that we've heard is like clairvoyant. Can you talk about how you see things or what that actually means to be clairvoyant or any of what we call the clairs? And how do you how do you see things? How do you hear things or for me personally?

Speaker 2 12:52

I see things rather clearly, almost like I'm seeing you, depending on what it is. So, say that I'm working with someone from the spirit world, every now and then I may get a glimpse of someone from spirit, but I don't see them as I'm seeing you as necessarily as solid as you. It's almost like a hologram in a sense, but the hologram is defined enough that I can make out things like hair color, sometimes eye color, sometimes the build of the person. And then with that, they also show you past memories. Like you may like I may see something about a time that you went with them down to the lake when everyone was fishing and everyone's jumping in and out of the water. Like they literally show us those scenes from their lives, times that people have in common. So, and a lot of people are very clairvoyant, they're able to see so much of what goes on, but the main clear that really works with these abilities really is the clear sentience. Okay, um they're feeling how they're feeling, and that is just most people that work with these types of abilities, whether psychic or mediumship, the feeling is the strongest faculty for the majority, if not all. Because one, they learn to interpret when someone's there or when someone's not, especially for mental mediumship, and then they learn to interpret things like personality, because like I said earlier, you you have to feel she's you know a lovely grandmother as opposed to like the chaotic, crazy partying cousin or uncle. Um feelings that we get to help us to understand and also to help us with our communication, and then you have to understand as well if you're communicating with someone from spirit from the other world, and someone else comes in, there's another feeling that would go to that person as well. But that's why it's important to in the early stages, if possible, to learn to work with those feelings and the attunement we talked about a bit earlier, just so you can kind of differentiate how one person feels to another.

Sharing Hard Messages With Care

Speaker 1 14:52

Right. How do you so part of this is about offering healing to people when they're in this grief place and trying to find connections when you're sitting with a person? You might see things that are going on in their own life, and someone from the spirit world is coming through to give them a warning or to give them things. How do you handle hearing things that might be not so like, oh, I love you, I miss you, and I'm good. How is it that you handle being able to say those things if you're seeing something or hearing or feeling something from the other world?

Speaker 2 15:26

I think everything's about how we say what we say. Because even with I mean, even with communication from the sphere, well, think about it, you could have someone who's like, oh my god, I have someone here, and they jump up in the air and they're very dramatic and you scare the heck out of the person you're working with. Um, but because they come, because they really don't come through to us like that, to be honest. They come through in a way which is usually very calming, but it makes us aware that they're there. Now, do they sometimes give someone a heads up about things or um an idea that something may be going on? Absolutely. But we just have to be very aware of how we say what we say, because you may say to someone, you know, I have someone here like your your grandmother may be here with me, but she's making me where there's an issue in the house. And I know that if you are paying attention to like the foundation at the back of the home, there's a leak with water, things like they tell us all kinds of things. Okay, because once they leave this world and come back, they're around us all the time, essentially, especially when we think of them. Um, but they but I I really feel from my own experience, it's it's really just to provide us with the guidance, the wisdom, and the love that most of us are missing, and then absolutely the healing part is the biggest part of all of this that we're working with, right?

Speaker 1 16:43

So it are there programs that you work with? I mean, the Forever Family Foundation, is that one?

Speaker 2 16:50

I'm with a I'm with a group that's really amazing. Um, it's a not-for-profit group, okay, that works really with grief. And what they do is to become a medium with them, they have a pretty extensive, challenging certification process.

Speaker 1 17:11

Okay.

Speaker 2 17:12

And um and you have to go through this process to become one of their griefs. But the thing that's beautiful about this organization is that not only are there mediums working with the organization in regard to healing, but you also have therapists and scientists and research. And the thing that's lovely is the gentleman at the top, um, Mr. Bob Ginsberg, the one who created it along with his wife. Um, absolutely lovely to work with. They want nothing but the best for everyone that comes into contact with them in the organization. And the grief retreats that we do, because it's a combination of everything, um, everybody gets something. Like when you see people walk in at the beginning of the weekend so heavy and so down and so distraught, and then you see the difference, and then when they leave, you know that a shift is taking place. So whether they got something from the therapeutic side, whether they got something from learning about more of the research, whether they got something from the medium, because multiple mediums work these events, like there are usually at least four of us. Oh yeah, so we so they wrote the people who are there as attendees will rotate through with the mediums as well, in addition to the other parts of the program that have been set up with the therapists and the researchers, and we all do sessions with them. So, what will happen is say that I'm in one group of like 15 or 16 people, I'll just sit and go quiet and do like a small gallery. And whoever comes in and connects with me from spirit, I find to them within the room, provide them with the feedback, provide them with what's going on. I mean, just amazing stuff. And we have one coming up that's gonna be in the near future, which it's healing for parents only. So it's just gonna yes, so that's gonna be a little bit intense, um, but lovely just the same because the healing hopefully will just be amazing during the weekend.

Speaker 1 19:11

I was gonna say that's probably the toughest group to work with is parents who've lost children, but yeah, of course, because I mean, I mean, like anything else in life, most parents just never have a thought of losing their children, or that's the last thing that you'd ever want to happen.

Speaker 2 19:28

So the grief that is connected to that, I just think it's unfounded in so many ways. And working through that on a daily basis, which you know, any type of grief you have, especially with loss, the journey is ongoing. It's not a journey, it's not a journey that you say, Oh, I'm suffering today and tomorrow I'll be okay. No, it's about how we work with to make things a bit more bearable.

Pets In Spirit And Unwanted Visitors

Speaker 1 19:53

So, behind it all, it sounds as if mediumship is really just an opportunity to offer solace to people that are here still living in this world, and whatever their relationship was, whether they were able to finish or heal or say goodbye. It sounds like this offers them an opportunity then to even further their own healing to process their grief. Is there are there other parts of mediumship that aren't about spirit that aren't about connecting to specific people? Do you ever connect with dogs or pets or anything like that?

Speaker 2 20:31

Well, animals do have souls. I won't say that that's my specialty, but I will say that sometimes during a session, an animal, a loved one's animal, a pet that was loved by the family, does come through and you you are available, you're aware of them coming into the session, and you just communicate that to the person who's there. Because I have to say to you, sometimes people love their animals more than they love people around them.

Speaker 1 20:58

Yes, very true, and and it it's it's a huge loss for some people to have lost their pets. Do you ever actually do you actually see spirit? Do you you said it's like a hologram, but are there ever ones that come in that you that people they don't want to hear from these people? They don't want to, you know, they didn't like them very much on this side, they don't want to hear from them on the other side. How do you handle that kind of whoo? I don't want to hear that.

Speaker 2 21:34

It does happen from time to time. Like I do gallery work where I'll do work um locally here, especially right now. And what does that mean? What that means is that I set up sessions where I'll invite people to come to the galleries. We'll set up a specific evening, we rent a space. Um, people pay to come for an evening to just see if someone if their loved one may come in or come through.

Speaker 1 21:55

Got it.

Speaker 2 21:56

Um, and yes, some people do sometimes. That's happened a few times. Where you start off something and you say to someone, Well, I have a lady here, she I feel like she's your mom, and the person will look at you and say, I hated my mother, I don't want to hear from her. And it and it does happen from time to time. Um, the way personally, the way I handle it is, well, you know, would you give me a moment just to see what she wants to communicate to you? Is that okay? I said, because you know, holding on to things like anger and not allowing forgiveness to take place really is like poison within your own body. It does nothing but hurt harm you in the long run. So would you be open to just hearing her message and then I'll just move on and allow them to see if I can get them to at least open to that communication? Because you know that the more we hold on to hatred, the more we hold on to those past experiences that were damaging to us, they somehow usually come back and harm us in some way, whether it's physical, emotional, they do hold us back. So, but all we can do is our best as a medium. You can only do your best and offer to them what we are to do, and then if they're open to it, we give the message and maybe a few pieces of information to validate and then keep moving on.

Speaker 1 23:10

How do you obviously people that reach out to you have some belief in what you do? What do you say to people that are like their friend dragged them in to see you, but they don't believe any of this stuff, and you're this is all you know, woo-hoo, you know, woo-woo, craziness. How do how do you how do you convert people, so to speak? To to like, well, though, this is real, and is it? I mean, people that really have no clue what this is, and they are the doubting Thomas of the world.

Speaker 2 23:46

I don't try to first off, my goal is never to convert anybody. I never look at this as that as much as I believe in it. It's like anything else. Everyone has a choice as to what they're going to be open to or not open to. All I would say to people, especially when they come to the galleries, because you have people that are avid believers, and then you have others that are we're dragged there a lot of times. But the communication itself is what opens them up or not, depending upon where they are in their journey. Because they're just certain things that there is no way I could ever know about someone's loved one that I've just met you, like I've just met you. How would I know how she did it? How would I connect it to her? How would I know her favorite places to go? How would I know what you do with her towards the end of her life, you know, to assist her or to be with her? So there are just certain things that there's no way I could, so it's it's up to them if they're open and they're on that part of their journey where they're like, you know what, there's a possibility this could be real, and they open up, that's fine. If not, all I can do is communicate what I'm receiving, right? Place love and healing, and just keep it moving.

Hospice Deathbed Moments And Being Met

Speaker 1 24:54

And then I think that that's the really the most important piece that is that whatever you do, you're coming from a place of love. Absolutely, and that offering healing to people is the most important part of this journey. There's enough suffering in the world, so trying to alleviate one's suffering, as you started, you'd said you were in hospice, you got to see both sides, you got to see somebody transitioning, you got to deal with the families and their grieved. And it sounds as if your journey has always been to offer some peace to people.

Family Signs, How To Reach Maurice

Speaker 2 25:26

Yeah, because you know, the unfortunate part with hospice, I'll say to you, is when I did hospice for over 20 years, and for a part of that time, I was um management in the units, running units, and still at the bedside, and I was at bedside for a lot of that time as well. And the thing that's unfortunate for me was that within that situation, you can't share with people sometimes what you're seeing. Because I think in some ways it would help some people, right? Because a lot of people have this belief that, you know, when you die, you're gone. Now, as a medium at a at the bedside in a hospice witnessing what's going on, I'm seeing the family member or family members in the room. I'm aware of the person, the spirit or soul of the person up and out of the body already. I'm aware of others in the room coming to get them because no one ever leaves without someone coming to meet them. That's one thing I determined when I was there. Every single death that I witnessed, another spirit, someone was there with them to greet them and take them aside. But the thing is, when you're open like that, the spirit world tries to come to you. And I had a few times where I have them trying to communicate with me, and I'm like thinking, I I really can't do this here because I can't tell them that right now. I'm so sorry, but I can't do that. And that's the part for people that would be the believers, that is a bit of a shame that this is not something that's more mainstream and accepted. But it's just such a there's just such a a wide variance of believers and not believers, and then if you start doing something like this, like who's certified to do it and at a level that they're gonna do it right, as opposed to some who just get a glimpse of something. So I do understand a little bit of the doubt that comes into into the minds of people, but but just through the mediumship, like especially within hospice, you have a heightened sense of sensitivity. So even without the mediumship working necessarily, it's just about being in a place to connect with people on a level where they are during their time of grief and during their time of loss or anticipatory grief prior to loss. So, I mean, it's all in the end, it's all tough in its own way, yeah. Very healing.

Speaker 1 27:45

As we I I was curious, have you could you share a story even about having your own experiences with family coming to you? I mean, does that randomly happen to you where a family member of your own would just come through and have a message for you?

Speaker 2 28:04

I have a few family members, especially I have one grandmother who is very strong with me a lot. And she was that way with me on earth as well. I lost her when I was very young, but she was very much someone full of love, very giving, but very much like, you're doing it wrong, she tells you doing it wrong. And even now on earth, there are times when I might be in the midst of something or doing something, and I'll get that feeling of her being right beside me. And I'm like, and I can just get that feeling like no, okay, got it, got it. But they do come through if you sit and take the time to open up to them. Because I have some uncles in the other world as well that I've opened up to and asked them to step close, and I'm aware of the communication, I'm aware of the connection of them being around me when I allow myself to be open to them. And and I just really believe that, you know, those that loved us, I honestly believe that they spend more time around us than we think, but because so many people are either unaware or not open to the possibility, they don't allow them to come in to assist them the way that they could, because they they really would still assist and help them with things here on the yeah.

Speaker 1 29:20

So if someone wanted to, as we wrap up, if someone wanted to reach out to you, how would they find you? The best way is probably a website, your email, your tell me how people can find you.

Speaker 2 29:35

And that's just www.mediummaurice.com, my name, dot com. And through that, they can email me, they can find out services offer, they can find out about the event like that event I have coming up with Forever Family. I have a gallery coming up in June as well, June 27th in Deerfield. Everything's on there, pretty much, all the classes I teach. I mean, I just I enjoy what I do at this point, so it's amazing.

Speaker 1 30:05

That is wonderful, and I'm really glad that you were able to fit me into your tight schedule. I know you are in high demand these days.

Speaker 2 30:12

It's all good. It's a pleasure to be here with you, Marilisa.

Speaker 1 30:16

Awesome. So I want to thank you very much for stepping in, and we will see where this goes. But looking forward to the next demonstration that you do in June, they are always fun to go to. And um, I just love watching people go, oh yeah, I can yes, I can take that. And then getting more and more specific. So it's it is it's a lot of fun to watch. Um, and it's always interesting to see who it is that comes through. And I'm always amazed at the details with which you're able to identify the people or help them identify who it is that's talking to you. So thank you very much for your time and energy. I appreciate you. I love you. I am so glad we did this. So I will talk with you soon.

Speaker 2 31:02

All right, then thank you so much for the opportunity today. I really appreciate it.

Speaker 31:06

All right. Thank you for listening to the Hemp Del Soul Podcast. Explore our wide range of organic products at hempdelsoul.com. That's H E M P D E L S O U L dot com. Or contact nine five four eight five four one zero three nine.