In this deeply personal Sunday Solo, Sarah shares something she has been unpacking for most of her adult life: what happens when the spiritual framework you were raised in stops fitting who you are, and what you find when you finally give yourself permission to look beyond it.

Sarah grew up immersed in faith. Church was community, church was family, church was the lens through which everything was understood. There was genuine beauty in it: the hymns, the stories, the practice of prayer, the feeling of being held by something larger than yourself. And there were also questions, lots of them, that a sensitive and curious kid couldn't quite make fit. Questions she eventually stopped asking, until life made her start again.

She traces a journey that will feel familiar to a lot of listeners: leaving organized religion behind in college, finding her footing in the material world, becoming a parent and reaching back toward the big questions, and then being confronted by loss. The death of her best friend's six-year-old son, her own child's best friend, was the moment she could no longer stay comfortable in a purely material worldview. Sarah went down the mediumship rabbit-hole looking for answers.

Along the way, Sarah reflects on her mother's sustaining faith, the compassion she found for her parents as she understood why they made the choices they did, and an unexpected encounter with the late Rachel Held Evans during meditation.

This episode isn't about leaving faith behind. It's about what happens when you stop outsourcing your spiritual knowing to someone else's rulebook and start trusting the one that lives inside you. If you've ever felt like your beliefs needed to evolve but weren't sure you had permission, this one's for you.

Key Takeaways

• Faith is not a fixed target. It evolves with every experience we have and holding space for that evolution is not a crisis of faith. It's an expression of it.
• The spiritual practices we absorb in childhood can be more resilient than we think. Prayer, presence, the sense of being connected to something larger; those things don't have to be thrown out with the framework they came in. They just may need a new container.
• You cannot pass on a spiritual awakening. That kind of knowing has to be lived firsthand. The most loving thing anyone can do is create the conditions for someone else to find their own way there.
• Grief has a way of reopening the questions we thought we'd put to rest. Sometimes the losses we can't make sense of are exactly what leads us toward a deeper truth about consciousness, connection, and what continues.
• Spiritual gatekeeping, the idea that you need more credentials, more permission, more of someone else's approval to trust your own experience, is worth examining closely. Your direct relationship with the Divine is valid on its own terms.
• The ultimate litmus test for any belief, rule, or framework: does it move you toward love, or toward fear? That question belongs to you. And you get to apply it to everything.

Direct Quotes

"Faith and spirituality aren't a fixed target. They're fluid. They change with everything we experience."

"I don't think you can pass on a spiritual awakening. That kind of knowing has to be lived. It has to be yours."

Links and Resources

• Rachel Held Evans
• On Being with Krista Tippett — episode with Jeff Chu on Rachel Held Evans
• Medium Curious episode: Spiritual Rules — Which Ones Do We Actually Need

Explore the Intuition & Mediumship Course: https://www.mediumcurious.com

Book a reading with Jane Morgan https://www.janemorganmedium.com/

Book a reading with Sarah Rathke https://www.sarahrathke.com/

Jane's Substack: https://janemorgan.substack.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mediumcuriouspod/

Where we're going? We don't need Rules!

Sarah and Jane talk story about the spiritual rules we were handed — and the ones we actually need. Sarah comes prepared with a list (both parents are Virgos, so obviously she has a list), and together she and Jane move through the rules worth following and the ones worth leaving behind.

At the top of the list: energy sovereignty. You are responsible for your own energy, full stop. Protecting your energetic field isn't selfish — it's a requirement. From there, the conversation opens up into the golden rule, do no harm, the ethics of making predictions in readings, and the importance of self-care for those in service-based work.

On the flip side, Sarah and Jane unpack the rules we don't need anymore: dogma, fear-based thinking, spiritual gatekeeping, and the belief that suffering is proof of dedication. They talk about the permission-slip trap — always needing one more certificate, one more credential — and why the Akashic Records episode cracked something open for Sarah around trusting her own access.

The episode lands somewhere expansive: if a rule makes you feel smaller, it's probably not yours to follow. If it comes from love and opens something up in you, it's worth keeping. Simple, but not easy — and exactly why they keep showing up to talk about it.

Key Takeaways

• Energy sovereignty is non-negotiable. You are responsible for your own energetic and emotional state — and protecting that field is an act of kindness to yourself and everyone around you.
• "Do no harm" isn't just a platitude — it's a real ethical standard for anyone doing intuitive or healing work. Making fear-based predictions, issuing warnings of doom, or weaponizing someone's hope is harmful. Full stop.
• The golden rule includes you. Spiritual people often pour endlessly into others while running on empty. Caring for yourself isn't a distraction from your purpose — it's the foundation of it.
• Dogma is the rule that tells you to stop questioning. Any belief system — spiritual or otherwise — that demands you shut down your curiosity is worth examining.
• There is no spiritual hierarchy. The gatekeeping is crumbling. You don't need another permission slip to trust your own access to the Divine.
• The deepest rule might be the simplest one: if it makes you feel expansive, it's worth following. If it makes you feel smaller, it isn't.

Quotes

"Protecting your own energy field isn't selfish. It's a responsibility." — Sarah

"I didn't come all this way — coming out as a medium — to be put in a box." — Sarah

"Your guidance is provided by you. It does not have to be other-provided." — Jane

Links and Resources

Episode mentioned: Tammy Tocheniuk (Episode 97)

Episode mentioned: Dr. Linda Howe / Akashic Records episode

Medium Curious’ Website: https://www.mediumcurious.com

Explore the Intuition & Mediumship Course: https://www.mediumcurious.com

Book a reading with Jane Morgan https://www.janemorganmedium.com/

Book a reading with Sarah Rathke https://www.sarahrathke.com/

Jane's Substack: https://janemorgan.substack.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mediumcuriouspod/