Have you ever felt a deep, unexplainable connection to a specific animal? In this profound conversation, I’m joined by indigenous teacher and author Shawn Leonard to explore the world of spirit totem animals. Shawn shares powerful indigenous wisdom, including the stunning story of how the polar bear spirit revealed itself as his protector through a series of undeniable synchronicities. We discuss how to discover your own spirit animals, the importance of cultural respect, and how these guides work alongside your angels to offer protection, strength, and profound messages. Learn how to recognize the signs and embrace a deeper connection to all your relations.

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Episode Highlights:

• Shawn’s incredible story of how the polar bear spirit totem revealed itself through a prophetic dream and then manifested in the physical world through a series of gifted claws, furs, and a full-sized pelt.
• The profound spirit message Shawn delivered for Julie, where her loved one validated a private moment involving socks, demonstrating the intimate and ongoing connection we share with spirit.
• An explanation of the indigenous concept of “All My Relations” and the Medicine Wheel, teaching us about our connection to all life stages, directions, and the animal nation.

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TRANSCRIPT:

[Julie Jancius] (0:00 – 1:38)

Hello friends, welcome to the Angels and Awakening podcast. I’m your host, Julie Jancius. If you love this podcast, please be our angel.

Ask a friend to listen, subscribe, rate us five stars, leave a positive review, and share a screenshot of this podcast on your Facebook or Instagram stories. So my dad passed away in 2015. We weren’t talking and it took a month for his family to track me down.

Before I ever knew he was gone, I started hearing from him in heaven. It consumed me. How is communication with the other side even possible?

I left my corporate gig, studied with spiritual teachers on every coast and worked with my angels to figure out the answers. Today, my mission is teaching you how to raise your vibration, shift your thoughts, trust your intuition, develop your unique spiritual gifts, and connect with your loved ones and angels on the other side. Friends, when you have these tools, life really does become heaven on earth.

Hello, beautiful souls. Welcome back to the Angels and Awakening podcast. I’m your host and author, Julie Jancis.

And friends, today we’re here with the author of Walking With Your Spirit Totem Animals, Sean Leonard. Welcome back to the show. Or actually, welcome to the show for the first time.

We’ve met before, though, at a conference a couple years ago. Welcome to the show, Sean. Yeah.

[Shawn Leonard] (1:38 – 1:41)

Where did we meet? Was it in Arizona? Nope.

[Julie Jancius] (1:41 – 1:42)

Tampa.

[Shawn Leonard] (1:42 – 1:53)

Tampa. No way. Okay.

That’s awesome. Well, it’s so nice to meet you and see you again. So thanks for having me on your podcast.

I’m really excited to be part of your audience and your teachings, etc.

[Julie Jancius] (1:53 – 3:00)

So I want to start just kind of by being direct, because I’m a white person, and I don’t want cultural appropriation. And you start to get nervous, I think, about just talking about certain topics. I like to just look at the world and spirituality as that oneness.

And I recently had on a woman who talks about the Japanese art of manifesting. And actually, the way that she sees manifesting is so much more to how the angels talk about manifesting. And I think that there’s just truth.

I don’t know if you’ve ever kind of watched the show The Good Place, but there’s this joke that they talk about in there where all the religions got about 5% right, except for this one guy who in college one night got a little too much of a certain substance in his body. And he guessed about 99% accuracy of how the other side is like. But is it okay for us to talk about spirit animals?

Oh, absolutely.

[Shawn Leonard] (3:00 – 3:28)

I’m indigenous. So I mean, it’s part of my life. It’s part of who I am.

Hence the book, Walking with Spirituanim Animals. And even though I am a status, mi’kmaq, indigenous person within Canada, I have other cultures within me as well. I have some Irish, some Scandinavian.

I mean, there’s a little mix of everything in here. But it’s my indigenous culture that really kind of comes through in my approach, the way I teach, the way I connect, where I feel I really feel connected to spirit.

[Julie Jancius] (3:29 – 3:57)

Starting from the basics, for those who aren’t familiar, I am familiar with Indian cultures and going to certain lands and seeing totem poles and animals. And that is the basis of my knowledge. So where do we begin in indigenous cultures with how did spirit animals become a thing?

And what does it really mean to the population?

[Shawn Leonard] (3:57 – 5:10)

Well, I feel, you know, pre-contact, I mean, throughout the world. I mean, we were all indigenous to the world somewhere, just so you know. I mean, it’s not that it’s only indigenous.

I’m indigenous person to Turtle Island, which is North America. And, you know, the animal nation was deeply connected to a diverse culture and not just indigenous people of Turtle Island. I mean, if you think about it, the Sami people of Europe are also indigenous, are very connected to the caribou, the Egyptian people.

You know, they have a mixture of even their spirituality between animal headed beings. And even their cats were very revered and very honored as part of their family. Right.

And if you go to the Hindu culture, you’ve got the elephant head of goddess. You know, there’s so many cross kind of cultural connection between the animal nation and the human nation. And even in Christianity and in your podcast is called Angels and Awakening.

Right. If you think about it, I mean, angels are a cross-cultural connection between humanity of sorts and the animal nation or the bird nation. Right.

So many people experience angels with wings or having wings and such. So there’s this kind of like cross-cultural connection that kind of transcends all beliefs and all cultures from the world.

[Julie Jancius] (5:10 – 5:33)

I’m so glad that you said that because I’ve met so many people along the way in doing this podcast for seven years who are, let’s say, from European descent, but feel a very, very strong connection to spirit animals. And so thank you for making it OK for all of us to just kind of have a sense of belonging to this.

[Shawn Leonard] (5:34 – 8:27)

Well, I mean, we’re drawn, I mean, most of us out in the world are, are, I mean, we’re connected to angels ourself like you and, but also we have this, you know, kind of a pet family that we have with us, you know? Oh yeah. And we look at them as family, like, you know, as our, and in indigenous culture, we see everything as being our relations.

You know, we see everything as being relations. We are all relations. And we actually have a teaching in all indigenous cultures.

We say, all my relations. But in Mi’kmaq particularly, we say, which means all my relations and it’s honoring the connection between us, you know, grandfather, son, grandmother, moon, mother earth, you know, the water nation animals and creatures that swim within the water, the land creatures that crawl upon mother earth and the mineral nation and the insect nation that crawl within mother earth. There’s a connection between us all.

You know, and, and, and even we have a diverse ecosystem within the world. And without one, we could not survive. And we’re, we’re codependent on each other to coexist with on mother earth.

Otherwise, if you throw one at a balance, we’d all probably go extinct. But we, we rely on each other, not just for food and sustenance, but for friendship connection. And even like I say, spirit guidance, because we have, I feel like we have like spirit totem animals.

We have spirit power animals. And you were mentioning like, like totem poles, right? And that’s, that predominantly is like a West coast, indigenous peoples kind of practice, not so much on the East coast of Canada or Eastern United States.

But what is a totem pole? It’s like, there’s different types of poles. And I think people may be mistake different poles for, for a totem pole, but some are just welcoming poles.

And, and a community may put up a head eagle or something, or a person with their arms outstretched. You know, that’s literally just to, to welcome people to the community. But there are totem poles in relation to telling stories on, on the cedar tree that, which they are carved.

And there may be a story about the bear, the eagle and the wolf, et cetera. And how, you know, how they came together at a certain time. And also connects to people’s like, what you would call their clans.

Because, you know, for me as a Mi’kmaq person, I’m from the bear clan. Now, what, what does that mean exactly? Well, the bear clan, it means, well, pre-contact, we didn’t have last names.

So I was Shawn of the bear clan and you didn’t, you didn’t, you didn’t hook up with people in the bear clan. You, you made sure you hooked up people in the caribou clan, you know, just to, you know, just to, you know, keep your, your, your genealogy well and safe and stuff like that. So we kind of knew things like that.

So we didn’t, instead of having last names, we would embody the, the name of an animal in relation to who we were. So as we’ve connected now through, if you, if you think about this, have you ever seen like a powwow or anything like this? Yeah.

[Julie Jancius] (8:28 – 8:28)

Yeah.

[Shawn Leonard] (8:29 – 9:12)

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, if you get a chance, you should go attend one. They’re amazing.

Spiritual gatherings of people, you know, performing and practicing ceremony through song and dance. And it’s, it’s an amazing thing to be part of. And if you ever watch a powwow in a Mi’kmaq, we say, which means a gathering that you embody the people who are dancing or in the celebration or out there embodying, maybe the wolf, the bear or the, the prairie chicken, you know, et cetera.

And they’re doing dances to replicate and kind of unify you in the spirit of that animal in some sense in that celebration. So it’s, it’s really a big part of our culture, but not just, like I said, North American turtle Island, it’s, it transcends, you know, all cultures throughout the whole world.

[Julie Jancius] (9:14 – 10:35)

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That’s the T H E angel medium.com. Thank you again for supporting my work and the work of the angels. Now let’s get back to the show.

So where do you begin in starting to find what your spirit animal is?

[Shawn Leonard] (10:35 – 13:07)

Yeah, well, I think maybe most of us have some type of inkling, you know, that maybe there’s a certain animal that you felt drawn to throughout your life. And, uh, you know, we, I mean, we’re all connected. We’re all one.

Like we, uh, and in my book, walking with your spiritual animals, uh, I talk about the medicine wheel. Have you heard of the medicine wheel before? No.

Well, the medicine wheel is an indigenous teaching tool and there’s different teachings upon the wheel itself. And there’s a, there’s four directions, right? But there’s also four stages of life on the wheel and it’s a wheel and it has different colors.

And with on the wheel, you know, you have the Eastern direction, which, which is represented, um, by the color, um, um, yellow, right. But it also represents the Asian people of the world, you know, but also we have the Southern direction, which represents, you know, the, the indigenous or Indian people of the world, you know, reddish kind of brownish color. And then if you go to the West where the sun sets, you know, that’s where it’s darker.

And we have black people within the world, right. But also if you go North, we have the great white North, you know, predominantly most of Canada, I guess. And you have the Caucasian or the white people, whitish people, right.

But altogether we make one circle, right. And without each individual part of us, we couldn’t be whole. And with each direction, we, in the teaching, we talk about stages of life that we all go through.

So infancy, youth, adulthood to becoming elders, right. But I feel, uh, and this is something I teach in my book is that at different stages of our life, you know, depending on what you’re going through, what you’re facing, maybe when you were in your infancy stage of life, there, there was probably at least one or two animals that were connected to you, whether you were conscious of it or not, it could be, they were drawn to squirrels or rabbits or turtles or something, you know, and you really felt drawn or connected to it.

And, you know, this was like a family pet or something that you saw out in the zoo or out in nature and just felt very connected to, and maybe didn’t really know why. And then as you matured, maybe those animals would change, like from the youth part of your life to the adult stage, to the elder stage of life. And I’m not quite there yet, but I’m almost there.

I’m 53. And in indigenous culture, you know, when you become 55, you could be then respected as an elder in your community. But I feel all of us just independently, whether you’re indigenous or not, I feel like there’s different animals that guide us, protect us, watch over us or help us just like angels do.

[Julie Jancius] (13:07 – 13:07)

Yeah.

[Shawn Leonard] (13:08 – 13:29)

And I think there’s this kind of like, again, I think angels reference, represent that cross cultural connection between the animal and bird nation and humanity and how they kind of help and support us and protect us and keep us safe. But I’ve had some really profound dreams, you know, that really certain things have revealed themselves to me. And I’ll tell you about one of the dreams.

[Julie Jancius] (13:29 – 13:30)

I love it.

[Shawn Leonard] (13:30 – 14:25)

Yes. You know, my indigenous name is White Eagle Spirit Talker. And when I was given that name, the summer that I was given the name, I was in Newfoundland near my indigenous community where my mom was growing up and such.

And I walked across the beach. And when I was walking across the beaches there in a very remote area, I found three white tail eagle feathers. And I didn’t tell the elder.

And then I came home and we went into ceremony. And then he said, OK, Sean, and he went in a kind of a trance. And he says, Sean, from now on, your indigenous name is meant to be White Eagle Spirit Talker.

And I told him about finding the eagle feathers. So there’s a synchronicity there, right? And since then, I mean, other people have gifted me, you know, aspects of the eagle to carry with me as medicine or spiritual medicine so that I can use that medicine in life to help people heal or be well or find balance in life.

But sometimes they present themselves to you. And this one has to do with a polar bear.

[Julie Jancius] (14:25 – 14:34)

Oh, my gosh. I was going to talk about a polar bear because those are the two animals that I feel so connected to are lions and polar bears.

[Shawn Leonard] (14:34 – 14:39)

Well, there you go. So you probably have a very deep connection to those animals as spirit totems, right?

[Julie Jancius] (14:40 – 15:18)

Yeah. I went to the Lincoln Park Zoo when I was in my 20s and I saw a polar bear up close. I don’t remember ever seeing a polar bear before then, which is odd.

But the magnitude of when you get up close to them and just how enormous. And he came up so close to the edge of the glass and he got right up next to me. And I feel like he put his hand out and I put my hand out and it was just massive compared to my hand.

But I just, I felt it so deeply in my heart. So I can’t wait to hear what you have to say about polar bears.

[Shawn Leonard] (15:18 – 17:07)

Well, you’re going to love this because I had this dream and I do really feel like those are one of your totems. Absolutely. I feel they’re one of your totems that help a guy.

You can always call upon, you know, especially when you go through tough times of life that, you know, that you’re struggling because they had to endure and they still have to endure a lot through survival in the environment from which they’re surrounded by. Right. So they are strong, you know, probably one of the largest land mammal walking creatures there are other than elephants and other things.

But they’re definitely like right up there. And they have an enormous amount of like spiritual medicine that they can help you with. Because nobody in the spirit world is, nobody’s eating anybody or chasing anybody or anything like that.

That’s more of like an earth kind of primal survival thing that we have to do here in relation to kind of survive in different ways. Right. But in the spirit world, we’re all one.

We’re all connected. We’re all spirit. Right.

And we’re all each here having a human experience or an animal experience or a plant experience, etc. But in my dream, I was in this field. And in this field, it was like I was surrounded by the forest.

And I saw these seven shadows coming out of the woods. And I didn’t know who they were. And I felt that they wanted to do me some type of harm.

So I was running through this field as fast as I could because I wanted to get away from them. I didn’t know who they were. I just knew that they were people.

So I started running towards the trees on the other side of the field. And out of the field, seven polar bears came out of the woods. And I thought, how odd is this?

Because polar bears don’t even live in the forest anyway. Yeah. And I’m thinking, my God, now I only have to run these seven shadows of people.

But I have to run seven polar bears. And I’m like, I’m done for, right? So I start running towards the shadows.

And I run as fast as I can. And I realized I cannot run either.

[Julie Jancius] (17:07 – 17:08)

Mm-hmm.

[Shawn Leonard] (17:08 – 17:50)

So in the middle of the field, I had to kind of surrender. I got on my knees and I waited for the polar bear to come and eat me because I thought that was going to happen, right? And what happened was all seven polar bears ran past me.

And all the shadows that were there to kind of do me some type of harm that I did not know about at the time, all the polar bears would jump on a shadow and they would just disintegrate. They would just kind of disappear energetically. And then the polar bears turned around and they looked at me.

And then they merged into one bear. And then it was like he was imparting wisdom, just like your polar bear was imparting wisdom to you.

[Julie Jancius] (17:51 – 17:51)

Yeah.

[Shawn Leonard] (17:51 – 18:46)

And I woke up going, oh, my God, the polar bear wasn’t there to hurt me. The polar bear was there to help and protect me and keep me safe. Wow.

So I prayed, like we have ceremonies. I made an offering and I prayed to the great white bear and I said, you know, great white bear, if you’re meant to be with me and I’m meant to carry your medicine life, then I would like to have something that connects to me and you energetically, in a physical sense. And so I said, I would like to have one of your claws.

I don’t know how it’s going to come to me, but I would like to receive a claw. And then I put that out there and several months had gone by. And, you know, eventually I was kind of like thinking, well, maybe I should go on eBay and buy myself a cold blade of claw or something like that.

And then, of course, the voice of reason, my wife goes, that’s not what you asked for.

[Julie Jancius] (18:47 – 18:48)

Yeah, yeah.

[Shawn Leonard] (18:48 – 19:47)

Right. And she’s right. And, you know, and I even heard my ancestors, my spirit people say, you know, that’s not what you asked for.

So I said, OK, I’ll wait. And then another bit of time went by and I got a package in the mail. And it was from a lady from Newfoundland in Canada, province of Newfoundland.

And her name is Barbara Kemp Bishop. And she sent me a little note and I opened the note first. And she goes, I was just in northern Labrador and I met with some Inuk elders there.

And the elder, you know, that I went to his home and he in ceremony gifted me two polar bear claws. And he said, Barbara, this one is for you. But he said, there’s another person that is meant to carry this other one.

And you’ll you’ll know who this is meant to go to. So she went home and she said, well, I didn’t really have to think about it too long. Soon as I got home, I thought I should send this to Sean.

So I opened the box and this is the claw. So I carry that claw.

[Julie Jancius] (19:47 – 19:48)

Wow.

[Shawn Leonard] (19:48 – 19:54)

Yeah. So I carry that claw as a reminder of my sacred connection between me and the great white bear.

[Julie Jancius] (19:54 – 19:55)

Yeah.

[Shawn Leonard] (19:55 – 21:45)

And I come from the bear nation in my culture is my my my totem, et cetera. But now I feel very connected. Now, this is where it gets really cool.

Awesome. After that, I got a little I had another lady come to my house named Lori Curdo. And she says she does part time taxidermy in a local area here.

She’s also Mi’kmaq. And she said I was just working on a polar bear rug the other day. And there was one little piece left over.

And I thought I should gift it to you. You know, I feel like spirits telling me I should gift you this for your smudge bowl, for your your ceremonies, et cetera. And she goes, would you accept this?

I’m like, absolutely. I’ll accept this. Now, shortly after that, someone else called me and said, Sean, I know that you do help people with healing and messages from the spirit world, et cetera, as I have a show in Canada called Spirit Talker.

And season five is actually coming out in a few days. Amazing. And so anyway, she goes, I know you don’t do readings, but me and my mom could really use some help.

And we don’t we can’t afford to pay you. But, you know, I have this old polar bear in my closet. I thought that if I offered you this, you would do the session for me and my mom.

And he said, well, let me look at my calendar. I said, yeah, I think I can make that happen. And then shortly after that, somebody else gifted me another cloth.

Somebody else gifted me another and I just received this during the writing of the book. And I’ll hold it up for you. It’s an old, I think it’s a whale bone and it was done by Inuk people and it has polar bear fur for hair.

So it’s meant to be like a piece of art. But the last piece that I received, which is the most amazing and I’ll show you here in a minute. But I was writing my book, Walking With Your Spirit, Talking to Mammals.

[Julie Jancius] (21:45 – 21:45)

Yep.

[Shawn Leonard] (21:46 – 22:36)

And I received five parts of different bears. And this lady named Kelly Finnegan and her husband said, can we meet you for coffee? And I said, yes, I can meet you for coffee.

She goes, you know, my father-in-law, Kelly’s husband’s father had just passed away and he had something in his home that we don’t know what to do with it. He had, way back in the day, lived in the Northwest Territories and traded a sled that this Inuk person needed for this polar bear skin and fur with the head, the tails of the claws, you know, still connected. And he just passed away and we’re wondering if you would accept it.

And I said, I said, I absolutely would. So I’m going to show you, I’m just going to take you off for a second here.

[Julie Jancius] (22:36 – 22:36)

Yes.

[Shawn Leonard] (22:36 – 22:43)

And you can see beyond my lights, on my pool table, I have that bear.

[Julie Jancius] (22:44 – 22:47)

That’s over a pool table? That’s massive.

[Shawn Leonard] (22:48 – 23:41)

It’s a 10 foot pool table and he’s bigger than the pool table. Because there’s nowhere else I can’t put him on the wall. And I don’t really want to put him on the wall in the first place, because it’s not necessarily meant for like as a display of like trophy of sorts.

This is like a celebration of the animal. And when I need to connect to the bear and the spirit of the bear, I come down and I speak to him. If when I do ceremonies with other people, I will use him as a place for all of us to sit and his wisdom, his spirit will be with us during the ceremony.

So I’m honoring him. I’m honoring his spirit. I’m honoring his connection to me.

I mean, it’s horrible that, you know, that he had died as a result of, you know, you know, 50 or 60 years ago, you know, coming into a community. And unfortunately, they had to put him down. But I and the funny thing is, the dream that I had, remember?

[Julie Jancius] (23:41 – 23:42)

Yeah.

[Shawn Leonard] (23:42 – 23:55)

When I stare him in the eyes, it’s the same bear. Oh, my gosh. I recognized him and all these bears.

And I feel like they knew who I was.

[Julie Jancius] (23:55 – 23:58)

And did you see seven of them? Because you saw seven.

[Shawn Leonard] (24:00 – 24:02)

But I feel like one more.

[Julie Jancius] (24:02 – 24:08)

Yes, I do, too. I do, too. I feel like that’s going to, like, round everything out.

And that’s them.

[Shawn Leonard] (24:09 – 24:44)

Right. It is. It’s an aspect of all those bears that are walking with me and helping me.

So they revealed themselves to me in the most profound way that I that I can’t even describe. I mean, my life is a little strange as it is, but this is like amazing. And I just feel so blessed.

And, you know, I honor the animal nation. You know, I respect the animal nation. I love the animal nation.

And to have aspects of them in a cultural way for ceremony and spiritual practices. That’s how we as indigenous people celebrate the lives that these animals had once lived.

[Julie Jancius] (24:45 – 25:06)

Talk to me more about sacred ceremonies and powwows in general and celebrations. And, you know, we celebrate different in Western culture, celebrate birthdays, you know, Christmas, Halloween. How are celebrations used by indigenous cultures?

[Shawn Leonard] (25:07 – 26:03)

Well, many times during our ceremonies, we would work around the full moon. There was usually there’s 13 full moons throughout the year. Right.

And even with the turtle and I’ll show you a card, but it doesn’t really display the turtles back very much, but it’s it’s one of my Oracle card decks from Wisdom the Elders. But there’s turtle medicine and they bring truth. But they also hold time on their back.

And if you think about it, I mean, a turtle has, you know, 28 outer rings around the outside of his shell, which represents 28 days of the year. Or 28 days of the month. Sure.

Because we always believe that there were 13 months because of the 13 moons. So we always measure time within moons and cycles. But we also had celebrations not only around the moon time, right?

That is special and sacred, especially to women, because that’s a medicine that you carry in life. You carry the water of life and the ability to bring life into the physical world. So it’s a sacred time.

[Julie Jancius] (26:04 – 26:04)

Right.

[Shawn Leonard] (26:05 – 26:17)

But also through the solstices that we would have like big ceremonies and such like especially with the timing of this coming out. I mean, the winter solstice.

[Julie Jancius] (26:17 – 26:18)

Yeah.

[Shawn Leonard] (26:18 – 26:55)

You know, it’s a sacred time, especially of reflection, introspection. And we would often do different ceremonies like sweats and things like that, because it represents the womb of Mother Earth. And it’s like we go into kind of like heal and be well and to come back out into the world again, like, you know, through the healing process of the ceremony.

But we have all kinds of different ceremonies. But it’s connected to the earth and Mother Earth herself. And the timing of those things, you know, that when we would do these ceremonies, you’re deeply connected to Mother Earth herself, right?

[Julie Jancius] (26:55 – 26:55)

Yeah.

[Shawn Leonard] (26:56 – 29:01)

I mean, your cycles built upon it. It’s like there’s this natural circadian rhythm that we all have from day and light, from night and day to like the moon cycles and all that. We’re made of the stars that are all exist around us.

But that’s also created all things, you know, the animal nation, plant nation, the mineral nation, you know, the ocean creatures, the ocean itself. And there’s nothing that we’re separate from, because obviously we it shows it exemplifies itself through us and through our bodies, et cetera, especially women. So in indigenous culture, women were typically that the spiritual people, the medicine people, the wisdom carriers and, you know, the people that everybody went to to kind of learn things is because you had vast knowledge to kind of share with people.

But, you know, I think that, you know, it’s coming back more and more in relation to balance within all things. And we have a teaching in word in Mi’kmaq. And it’s not my teaching.

It’s Edwina Marshall and Albert Marshall. But and I believe that’s their name. They say, Ena Maktawak, which means two eyed seeing in Mi’kmaq.

And that means literally the cross connection between indigenous culture and beliefs and ideals to other ideals and other principles. And that, you know, if we if we think about life because we’re all connected, you know, that we need to kind of think about coming together and sharing wisdom and knowledge so that we can all approach things in a good way of life and have balance. And it’s not that one is right or science is right and spirits wrong.

It’s about a balance between two. Right. And I think that’s where we have to kind of like really think about life is about balance and, you know, connection.

And despite our countries or directions or colors or face or what have you, you know, we’re all still within this one world together. And it takes a you know, we’re all one human nation. And and I think that we’re coming back.

You know, I think our spirits are learning. I mean, look at us. We’re having a conversation.

Like, where do you live at, Julie?

[Julie Jancius] (29:02 – 29:04)

Right outside of Chicago in the summer.

[Shawn Leonard] (29:05 – 30:23)

I’m in Nova Scotia. We’re having a video conference and, you know, communicating different ideas and talking about, you know, spirit and spirit tournament, et cetera. I mean, this would have not been possible some years ago.

Right. Not in this format of this way that can that could be seen out in the world in such an amazing way that we are coming together as people. We are sharing ideas.

We are coming together to create balance and harmony within the world in a much better way. And it’s because of people like you and people that are out there that are helping bring ideas and new thought and spirit and the connection to all that together, the angels as well. And, you know, I think it’s amazing.

So I’m really grateful that even though we think that you would like to have these things, they are in the process of becoming all that now in in such a short time, you know, because I remember when I was so young, we didn’t have video conferencing. I had a VIC-20. I remember as my computer, first computer, for God’s sake, Commodore VIC-20.

Now look at us. We’re streaming and we have like desktops, laptops and computers in our freaking hand now. So it’s it’s amazing how far we’re coming so fast.

And I think our spirit is is catching up and people are watching shows like yours, Julie, because they’re looking for a greater truth. They’re looking for more meaning and purpose and connection to all things. And, you know, so I think that’s really amazing.

[Julie Jancius] (30:23 – 31:17)

Where do you start understanding the energy behind your spirit animal? I know that you’ve got a number of books. So maybe that’s in one book versus the others, because I see what you were saying earlier, where that animal kind of shifts over time.

I really felt this very strong connection when the movie The Lion King came out. It wasn’t just the movie itself. It was like, oh, my gosh, just I want to own a baby.

You know, like I just felt so connected to the lion animals and then the polar bears. And then as I’ve kind of come into spirituality, I’ve always had an affinity in my heart for Egypt, the pyramids, Egyptian culture. And it’s interesting because you mentioned cats, but I don’t feel that affinity towards cats.

I really feel it. Nothing wrong with cats.

[Shawn Leonard] (31:17 – 31:21)

You know, some people are dog people. Some people are cat people. Some people are turtle people.

[Julie Jancius] (31:21 – 31:34)

Yeah. But when you look at Isis, the goddess and just the wings that come out from her, I just feel totally connected, like from a past life to that energy.

[Shawn Leonard] (31:35 – 34:36)

Absolutely. I mean, I feel like we’ve all lived many lifetimes in many cultures, in many forms, in many ways, many sexes, I’m sure. And I feel like that’s just part of the greater sense of who we are.

And I feel like, again, like what you’re saying, I mean, I know I’ve had a past life in Egypt and I feel very connected to that culture as well. I like cats, but I don’t super love cats. Although I do have a few stories in my book about cats that have been really important in my life that I love amazingly and that have made their journey home to the spirit world.

And I know they’re still with me. But in regards to Egypt and Isis and the sun god Ra, et cetera, and all that, it’s like there’s this connection between light, source, humanity, and animal. And it’s still like a blending of things.

You know, we see all animals as our ancestors. Like, you know, we see Earth as our ancestor, right? We look at the rocks and we say, those are our grandfather rocks.

Because they’ve come before us, right? So we would see the animal nation very similar because, I mean, we as humanity have evolved here ourselves in certain ways, right? But the animals are continuing to evolve.

There’s a lot of animals that don’t even exist in the world anymore. And one of those animals that indigenous people are deeply connected to is like Sasquatch or Sasquatch, you know, or Sabae, you know. And we actually even have a teaching around him about, you know, because, you know, what medicine could he exemplify is honesty.

It’s because he, you know, he has to accept himself the way he is. And it’s a medicine that he teaches people because he’s so different, right? He’s so different from all the other creatures in the forest or all humanity, although there’s some connection between the two, right?

And, you know, he has to accept himself and be honest with who he is in life and approach life from that space. And that’s the medicine that he has to offer people. So some people are very drawn to even Sasquatch in life, you know, and maybe don’t know why.

And I actually, in my filming of Spirit Talker, I think it was season four, I went to a community in Western British Columbia in Canada. And I met with some elders and people because I’m filming different episodes of my TV show. I get to go to different indigenous communities.

And I went to this community called Staelis, which their whole emblem for their community is Sasquatch. And when I met their people there and they took me for a little tour around the community, they have a place called the Sasquatch Trail. And they actually have some cave art or rock art or pictographs that predate connection to any European people that have, like, connections to Sabae or Bigfoot.

So it’s a creature that, you know, a land creature, earth creature that has existed upon Mother Earth at one point. Does it exist now? I feel like maybe sometimes people catch glimpses of them, but, you know, we all see spirit in different ways too, right?

Right. Some people see an angel, you know, and they feel guided or protected. And other people may see a polar bear and also feel guided and protected.

But I also feel Sasquatch shows up for some people sometimes.

[Julie Jancius] (34:37 – 34:46)

Interesting. There’s also a story by the people in Mount Everest that hike Mount Everest of a similar being that’s seen. Yeah.

[Shawn Leonard] (34:46 – 35:03)

Yeah. Because that’s kind of like an Asian version of, like, Sasquatch in itself. I mean, if you think about it within the world, you know, we have different colors of people within the world, right?

What’s the thing? There’s different colors or spectrums of, like, even that animal itself in the world, right?

[Julie Jancius] (35:03 – 35:04)

They’re similar.

[Shawn Leonard] (35:04 – 36:12)

They maybe have different color of fur, but they’re very similar in different environments, right? So I feel like there is a connection. I feel like they have been on Earth at some point.

And I feel like just as we as spirit people, you know, sometimes we may appear to people, right? Like your mom or your grandma might appear to you in a dream or you may see them walk in a room and you feel this, like, connection of love from them. You know, sometimes I feel like those ancient creatures like Sasquatch or Yeti, you know, might be seen within the world.

They’re never going to catch them. Because I feel like he’s kind of interdimensional. He’s kind of in between this world and the other.

And I feel like they show up sometimes. But I still, just like all spirit people, you know, our ancestors, the angels, you know, our guides, etc. on the other side, they show up sometimes to help us.

And I don’t think it’s strange for any other creature to show up too sometimes. We all come from the one source, you know, the source of creator. And we all fall upon that same energy, you know.

And, you know, I think we just have different ways of seeing things. But I think that, you know, within the world with their beliefs. But that’s OK.

You know, we’re starting to kind of see bigger than what we’ve seen before in relation to all things like this.

[Julie Jancius] (36:12 – 36:40)

I feel like when I get into oneness and connect with the angels, I don’t feel really inside my body like my body encapsulates me anymore. I just feel my energy very expansive in all directions. But I’m just wondering, when you get into a form of like oneness with nature, does it feel the same where you just feel your energy flowing more outside of your body in all things?

Or what is oneness in nature feel like to you?

[Shawn Leonard] (36:40 – 38:39)

Well, I have my own sacred space that I have just on my property. And there’s a little trail that goes through my property. And sometimes I go there and sit.

And actually, I just did a video on my Facebook and my Instagram. And I did the box opening for my book, Walking with Spirit Totem Animals there, because it’s a sacred space to me. And many times, I feel nature is very healing.

And I feel very grounded. And the trees are providing oxygen for me to breathe. And I just feel very oxygenated, very alive.

Green is a very powerful color in relation to healing. And just putting my feet on Mother Earth is very kind of supportive and holding me almost in a sense of life. So I feel this kind of oneness with all the creatures that are walking around me.

Sometimes a fox goes by or a raccoon. Or you may hear the crows or the blue jays or an eagle coming by every now and then. And I just love that.

I feel that. And I just feel this kind of oneness of connection. That I’m one with all things.

And I just feel this presence of mindfulness. And it’s a good place to receive messages. If sometimes maybe your loved one or your angels would speak to you and communicate a message, because you’ve created space.

Because I think when you get into spaces like this, it’s very meditative of sorts. And I think with spirit communication, because I’m a spirit talker. Some people may say a psychic medium, but I’m a spirit talker.

And that’s what we call ourselves in Indigenous culture. You have to learn to create space. An elder once told me that you have two ears to listen and one mouth to speak.

So you have to listen twice as much. And I think that goes for spirit. Because if we’re always talking and thinking or doing stuff that we never create space and moments of presence in sacred spaces, like the forest or a path or a sacred place that is to you, then it’s hard for sometimes your angels to come through and give you a message.

Because we have to learn to create kind of a stillness to receive.

[Julie Jancius] (38:40 – 38:40)

Yeah.

[Shawn Leonard] (38:41 – 38:54)

Because speaking a prayer or putting your words through ceremony out is like something that you’re putting out into the world. But when you listen and create stillness and peace, you’re creating space to receive things from spirit.

[Julie Jancius] (38:55 – 39:23)

When you talk about that and how you talk about Mother Earth supporting you, I feel like that’s so much more how we walk around in the physical place of heaven on the other side. I think there’s multiple different realms of heaven. But I do think that there’s a more physical space.

And we feel more that healthness all the time. I was wondering if you could show us how you bring through messages in your way if you have any messages for me.

[Shawn Leonard] (39:23 – 39:26)

Sure. I mean, is your mom in the past? Yes or no?

[Julie Jancius] (39:26 – 39:27)

No.

[Shawn Leonard] (39:27 – 39:29)

But you have a great mom in the past.

[Julie Jancius] (39:29 – 39:31)

And she was like my mom.

[Shawn Leonard] (39:31 – 39:40)

Yeah, because I feel like she’s a mom figure for you. For whatever reason, and I don’t know why, but I’m smelling burning matches, and I don’t know why. So why would I smell burning matches?

[Julie Jancius] (39:41 – 39:50)

You know what? I just saged the house the other day, and my husband and my daughter don’t like the sage that I bought. They like a different incense.

[Shawn Leonard] (39:51 – 40:02)

I feel like that she’s with you with your ceremonies when you’re doing the cleansing or clearing and things like that. And that’s what she wants you to know, that she’s kind of like working with you and such. I feel like, did you get to see her before you passed, but you weren’t there when she passed?

[Julie Jancius] (40:02 – 40:12)

Yeah, I had an opportunity to go down the weekend before. And I chose to go see a friend. And I almost felt like that was a sole intention.

[Shawn Leonard] (40:12 – 40:14)

She knows, but she needed that space to go.

[Julie Jancius] (40:15 – 40:15)

Yeah, yeah.

[Shawn Leonard] (40:15 – 40:37)

She did. And I think that’s what she wants me to tell you. Is that you’ve been, for a long time, you thought about it, although you’re at peace with it, I know.

But she just wants to reaffirm and get across that she needed that space to make her journey. And I know that if you could have it back, you wouldn’t have gone or whatever. But it would have been harder for her to let go if you were there.

And it’s because she loves you so much.

[Julie Jancius] (40:37 – 40:47)

I feel that. I feel that very much, that because I didn’t go that weekend, that she was able to more easily cross over to the other side.

[Shawn Leonard] (40:47 – 40:53)

She was. What she also, I feel she’s telling me, is that you know and feel her around you very often.

[Julie Jancius] (40:53 – 40:55)

All the time. Yeah.

[Shawn Leonard] (40:55 – 41:02)

Now, this is something odd. And I don’t know why she’s bringing this up. So I’ll bring it up.

Why is she showing me socks for some reason, like special or kind of odd socks?

[Julie Jancius] (41:02 – 41:15)

Okay. So I have normally one set of socks that I wear all year long, except for I put them away this time of year. I just took out my new socks.

They’re like the big wool socks. And I have them on my feet right now.

[Shawn Leonard] (41:15 – 41:48)

Why they tell me odd things like this, is not to like scare you in any way, is that I am with you. I’m visiting you. I see that you just did this.

You know, this is something that, it’s something a lot of people don’t know about you, but it’s something she sees that you just did. And why they said this, because they are spending time with you. They’re visiting.

I mean, imagine with people that you love and when you’re on the other side, wouldn’t you want to visit and spend time with the people you care about? Of course you would, right? Off and on she’s going to visit.

And I think she’s grateful that you still think about her, remember her, speak to her and honor her where she is. So, you know, keep talking to her. She says, thank you.

[Julie Jancius] (41:49 – 42:12)

Oh, that’s amazing. Thank you so much for those messages, Sean. I really appreciate that.

The other question that Spirit’s having me ask you is on your show, you’ve had so many seasons. First, is there a place where people in America can watch the show, even though it’s in Canada? And second, I know you have some favorite stories, just moments on the show and just healing moments or your favorite moments.

Tell us some of those.

[Shawn Leonard] (42:12 – 45:55)

If you want to watch the show, there’s a couple of places in the U.S. you can watch season one. Season one can be watched on Next Level Soul TV, but it also can be watched on another app called Fossum. And I think that season one is on there and that’s freely available to watch.

I think Fossum is a free app that you can watch season one. There’s season five coming out. And if you get that, there’s an app within Canada for the network that I’m on, it’s called aptnlumi.ca. I’d say, you know, one of my favorite was with connection. There’s so many connections I made because I did like a lot of readings for every community that I went to. And there was like, everything is reciprocal because, you know, I would go to communities, learn from elders and learn about culture. But in return, I would help people within the community heal by connecting to people in the spirit world.

And this is in season one too. It’s Acadia First Nation. So if you get to watch it, you’ll get to see it.

And I was in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, which is the province from which I live in, which is like a state in Canada. And in Yarmouth, I’m connecting to this young lady in Acadia First Nation. And it’s a live audience.

I’m doing a live audience reading and something very awkward had come through for a mother. And this mother was in the audience and I’m reading and I’m connecting to her daughter. She told me her name.

She told me how she passed. I know what she looked like. I’m seeing how she appears.

And, you know, she was showing me that she lost a lot of weight. You know, she was very small in frame, et cetera. And I knew she had like breast cancer that went to her lungs, et cetera.

Something she showed me was really kind of uncomfortable for me. For whatever reason, here I am in front of an audience. I’m talking to a mom.

This is very sensitive. This lady takes off her shirt and is standing in a bra only. And then her bra, her bosoms get bigger.

I’m like, this is odd. I’m like, what? I mean, I was like, what do I do with this?

What producers are pulling this out? Yeah. What do I do with this?

I’m like, you know, I’m like, you can see, obviously, during the filming, I’m struggling with the fact that I don’t know how to deal with this. So I’m like, you know what? I have to say something here.

This means something and I don’t know what it means. And I want to say, you know, first of all, I don’t mean you any disrespect, I said to the mom, but your daughter really wants me to stress something and I’m not quite sure what it means, but I’m just going to tell you. And, you know, please forgive me.

I don’t mean you any disrespect if I’m wrong. And I showed her and I told her what I saw. And she just, she went from crying to laughing and going, oh my God.

And then this other lady that was with her stood up and it was her sister, this young girl’s sister. She goes, holy crap, this is really her. And she says, you don’t, nobody knows this, but me and her two sisters, the mom said.

At the funeral home, after my daughter died, because she was very small in frame, she always complained about the size of her bosoms. In the back room before the service, we brought a new bra and we put it on her and we stuffed it. So we were going to send her the spirit with bigger bosoms.

And we dressed her back up. And then we put her, when she came out in the front of the church, you know, for the service, you know, we were sad, but we were kind of like almost laughing among each other. And we know that she would love this, but we never told anybody.

And it’s just between us and her two sisters that know this. And it was like, after the session, I got to meet her and the sisters in person. One of the sisters or her other daughter said, we haven’t seen mom laugh or smile like this in so long.

And it was like, you saw like a year and a half to two years of grief, just kind of evaporate in a second. And it was, she was just like, she knew it was her daughter and there was no doubt that nobody could know this, except them. And it was just a profound moment and I’ll never forget it because it’s, you know, sometimes we don’t expect the things that spirit’s going to show us, but we have to trust, right?

And we have to work with it, even if we don’t understand it. So we do our best. And that’s what I do.

[Julie Jancius] (45:56 – 46:18)

Oh, amazing. And there is something that happens when you get something so unique, like the socks or the matches or this, that there’s just a peace that comes over you and you feel that deeper connection with them. And you’re so amazing at this.

How is your spirit animal different from your spirit totem animal?

[Shawn Leonard] (46:19 – 46:29)

In my culture, we have what we call clans. Totems are something unique that even though I’m from the bear clan, I didn’t know that it was my totem. And then so totems will kind of reveal themselves.

[Julie Jancius] (46:29 – 46:30)

Okay.

[Shawn Leonard] (46:30 – 48:20)

And throughout my life, the eagle, the buffalo was actually the first medicine that I got. In filming season four of Spirit Talker, I went to Sioux Valley, Dakota Nation in Winnipeg or outside of Winnipeg in Manitoba. And I met a group of buffalo that the community was raising.

And in the herd, there’s 16 white buffaloes, which is very kind of like amazing in itself. They’re like one in millions of a white buffalo being born. And there’s a whole prophecy in indigenous culture about the white buffalo calf woman.

And it’s about taking care of mother earth, which I wrote about in my book. One of the elders there instructed me to tie a prayer tie and pray for his people in his community and talk to creator and ask for good things for them. So I did and I prayed my tie.

And one of the buffaloes, the white buffaloes come and stood and stare me in the eye. And then he come and put his head on my prayer tie. And I knew he was like infusing wisdom with me.

And I knew that he was hearing my prayer. And from that moment, I felt this intense connection to the white buffalo. And I knew that was also one of my totems.

So, you know, in time, you know, special circumstances, I mean, if you’re engaged with, you know, the world and, you know, really connected and open and invite, you know, those totems to kind of reveal themselves to you, they will in some unique way. There’ll be something that like the polar bear for you at the zoo, where you put your hand on and you put his paw on your hand. There’s a connection there that transcends understanding.

You just know somehow you and this bear are connected. And so those are totem animals. Those are your spirit totem animals.

And some of them may be power totem animals, like protection when you’re going through stuff. And that’s when I’m going through difficult things. That’s when I call upon the white bear to help me, the polar bear to help me through this situation, to give me the strength, the endurance, the determination, the courage to face what I need to when I’m going through difficult times.

[Julie Jancius] (48:20 – 48:46)

So when I get into readings, I can see a U shape behind people’s heads of their angels, guides, and loved ones. And sometimes their pets are there as well. But now we can call forward their spirit animals as well.

And that’s just so beautiful and see them as part of our group on the other side. Sean, thank you so much for being here. Thank you for your wisdom.

Tell everybody where they can find you, your books and everything.

[Shawn Leonard] (48:46 – 49:30)

Well, you can go to my website, Sean hyphen, like the middle line, S-H-A-W-N hyphen Leonard, L-E-O-N-A-R-D.com. And all my books are there. There’s like, if you click on the links for Spirit Talker, because I have another book called Spirit Talker.

This is my first Hay-Ho’s published book. This is my latest Spirit Talker book, which comes out October 21st. And I also have a Wisdom of the Elders Oracle Card deck, which has a lot of animal medicines and connections.

We actually, the seven grandfather teachings are in here in relation to the animals that I spoke about and such. But yeah, and I’m working on a new book for Hay-Ho’s too. Thank you if you visit my site and thank you for allowing any of the wisdom that I’ve shared today or even through the Hay-Ho’s published material to reach you and come into your life.

So thank you.

[Julie Jancius] (49:30 – 53:00)

Thank you, Shawn, for being who you are and doing what you do. You’re so amazing. Friends, I need your help reaching as many people as possible.

If you’d like to support this podcast and help us spread more hope to the world, please book a session with me, join my angel membership, or take my angel Reiki school. What’s the difference? If you’d like to know what messages your angels and loved ones have for you, you’ll want to book a session with me.

The angel membership is all about your own personal spiritual healing. The membership takes you on a spiritual journey that teaches you how to create your own heaven on earth. And the angel Reiki school is for those who want to get certified in mediumship, angel messages, and energy healing all at once.

These are three ways you can help us share a message of hope and love with more people than ever before. Register for one or all three at theangelmedium.com. That’s theangelmedium.com.

Now let’s pray together. As we do, I want you to pray in a way where you feel as though everything you want for yourself and the world has already come true. And you’re giving thanks.

Why? Because this is the best way to manifest. So let’s begin.

God, universe source, thank you. We’re so grateful that you’ve blessed this world with calm and peace for all. This calm and peace has spread like ripples, soothing the hearts of every soul.

Thank you for opening our hearts to abundance, allowing each of us to live our most authentic life, and helping us to create our own heaven on earth. We thank you for the love and deep heart-to-heart connection that surrounds us every day in our relationships. We thank you for the abundance of health and aliveness we feel radiating from every cell in our and our families’ bodies.

Thank you for the gift of walking this life with us and guiding us every step of the way through your messages. We hear you through our own intuition and we feel you walking right by our sides and we overflow with gratitude. Thank you for financial abundance and abundance of opportunities and miracles and blessings and prosperity in every way.

We know that you want us to succeed so that we can show others how you want them to succeed too. Thank you for the boundless love, kindness, empathy, and compassion that binds us all together. Thank you for the laughter, fun moments of pure delight that fill us every day, especially today.

God, universe source, thank you for blessing us beyond measure and allowing us to use our souls, gifts, talents, skills, and abilities to serve the world. We love you. I love you.

And in this we pray. Amen. Friends, we’re working on some pretty major things over here.

And if you wouldn’t mind saying a little prayer that these things come to fruition if they’re God’s will, we’d so appreciate it. And please add a little prayer in for any specific thing you need right now too. Have a beautiful blessed day.