I was baptized in the Catholic Church as a newborn babe, and grew up living a “double life” - one where I attended Catholic School from K-8 and went to Mass on Sundays, and on the other hand, practiced our family’s creole tradition of Espiritismo Cruzado.

While it was strange growing up with a secret that had to be hidden from my classmates and teachers, I was blessed (and privileged) with parents who believed in questioning the Church, who acknowledged the presence of the spirit world, and who encouraged me to be my most fantastical self.

I have been a mystic for my entire life, casting spells, communicating with spirits and communing with nature are some of my earliest childhood memories. One of my mother’s favorite stories is of me at age 4, running back in the house after playing in my Nana’s garden, shouting to my mom “Mama! Mama! Tata Dios! Afuera!” In my limited four year old vernacular, I told my mama that Christ had appeared to me under my Nana’s apricot tree.

Throughout my adolescence, I experienced psychic and spiritual phenomena. During the witch resurgence of the 90s, I began reading and experimenting with the “socially acceptable” versions of mysticism via New Age Spirituality, and purchased my first tarot deck at the Bodhi Tree on Melrose (RIP!) and began playing with divination.

As a survivor of CSA, my teen years and early twenties were a blur of depression, drugs, and alcohol abuse. I spent those formative years drowning out the pain of my experiences—and the voices of my good spirits—in bottles of whiskey and bad decisions. I had disconnected myself from my spiritual roots, and I would openly tell people that I would be dead by 25.

Somewhere around 22, I had a profound experience. In the midst of a multi-day-bender, I found myself at a party in a suite at the historic Biltmore Hotel in downtown Los Angeles. I was approached by a young girl, who was asking me about myself, asking me why I was so sad. When a friend at the party asked me who I was talking to, I realized that I was speaking with a ghost. Her spirit followed me for days, and our time together reached its climax while I was sitting on a rooftop with a former lover, lost, hopeless, and she invited me to follow her off the edge.

It was in that moment that I realized I wanted to LIVE.

The road to recovery was strange—sometimes it felt like a slow struggle, and sometimes time felt like fleeting. By 24, I was married, a new mother, working hard in my career in apparel, and sober. With all these blessings, I still felt like I was drowning. I remember standing on the corner of 7th and Broadway, breaking down in tears, when I heard a voice whisper “Go to The Mother.” I went to my dad (light and progress to his soul), and he reminded me that Maria Caridad (my paternal family’s patron spirit) never left me, that Espiritismo never left me, no matter how hard I tried to forget who I was, who I am. I built my first personal boveda, connected to my first mentor, Tania Martinez, and never looked back.

Everyday since has been a miracle.

Listening to the guidance of my Good Spirits, I began reading tarot again, writing and sharing about mysticism again, and was surprised to see how well received this was by my friends and community. My work as a tarot reader organically evolved into mediumship, and eventually teaching and mentorship. In 2018, I left my last conventional job and took on spiritual work full time.

Now, I am so blessed to be a steward to the beautiful Mother of Mystics community. Blessed to have supported over a thousand people all across the globe through my services, teachings, and offerings. It’s funny when I reflect on my childhood…when other people wanted to be doctors and lawyers, I wanted to be a nun. I was so inspired by the deep lore of femme mystics in convents, studying spirituality and mysticism, serving their communities, caring for one another. Though I am certainly not a nun now (heehee), I do feel that I have fulfilled little me’s dreams of a life devoted to developing conscious, loving relationships The Spirits and to The Living.