Vanessa Codorniu answers the question:

What is the nicest thing a non-family member has ever done for you?

Thank you for that question. When you asked me that question, there are so many stories that come to mind and to heart, but there’s one that I feel really, really changed my life in so many different ways. I might even get emotional. I always teach my students that... or share with my students, of course, that we’re all intuitive, that we all have a connection to the Divine. And I tell them the importance of boundaries, and how many of us, when we were children, our little intuitive antenna may have popped out, maybe stronger or maybe more expansively than others because of the situations that we were living in. And so I share that because I went through that as well.

I was born in another country. I came here as a young child. I had to learn English. So the bootstrapping idea of being this independent person who had to do everything on their own was something that I very much grew up and grew into. As an older sister, I really was trained or expected to read my family’s mind, to support and change diapers, take care of kids from the age of nine or 10. And so I’m giving you this background because that’s where I was coming from. And being intuitive, I started reading at a young age. I realize now and realized later that I was very much focused on pleasing others, taking care of others, and wasn’t always choosing what was best for me.

In my twenties, I had moved out of my family home, even though my family was very, very upset about that because, you know, good Latina girls do not move out before you’re married. And so I moved out young at 21, completely on my own. They moved to another state and I wind up having this job on television that I was so excited about. I wound up working on a shopping network in the spirituality and wellness area. This was over 26 years ago, but it was very innovative, it was new. I was excited for what we were going to create.

While I was at that job, one of my dear friends started to feel very sick, wasn’t feeling well, and we had a couple of meetings with her family, where her family pressured me to move in with her. Now, I had a great little place in the Upper West Side in New York City that I had struggled to get and fought to get, got all on my own, and I gave in. I was talking about being someone who wanted to please others, take care of others at that time. And I wound up moving in against my own instinct, against my own intuition. And so I wound up moving in and left New York, left my beautiful apartment in the Upper West Side that I love so much with the little French windows.

And my friend was not just physically struggling... They’d convinced us, you’ll save money, you’ll get be able to do this, you’ll be able to do that. My friend actually took a turn for the worst and I found myself in a very not happy home situation where her mental... she started to have a mental illness. There were so many things that were beyond what I could manage and beyond what I could understand.

But again, as I was sharing, I was taught to be independent, to handle it on my own. So every night I’d be praying, “Please, I need support. I need help. What am I going to do? How am I going to handle this? I can’t afford to move out.” And one day I show up at my job that I love very much and my boss says to me, “I have to speak to you privately. Please come into my office.” Now I’m terrified. I’m like, Great. I left my apartment. I’m in this difficult living situation. I feel like I can’t ask for help. What am I going to do?"

And so I was really scared. I go into her office and I’m like, "Did I do something wrong? Am I going to get laid off? What’s going to happen to me?” And she closed the door and she’s like, “What I’m about to share with you is really out there. It’s really something that I can’t believe I’m about to share with you.” And I’m like, “Okay. What’s going to happen to me?” And she shared that for three consecutive nights, she was having these dreams where there were these women around the fire, and she said they were like priestesses, or curanderas, they were healers. And they kept saying, “Help Vanessa. Help Vanessa. Help Vanessa.”

And so she was blown away and she said, “Had it been one night, I would have ignored it.” She says, “But it was three nights.” And so, even though we haven’t communicated too much, she was a boss and there was distance between us, and I was a young shopper for the channel. She said to me, “Are you in any sort of trouble? Can I support you in any way?” She said, “I’m also a spiritual person and I have this feeling within you that you’re not telling anyone something’s going on.”

I burst into tears. I told her what was happening, that I had left the home that I loved to support a friend. And now I found myself in a situation where I didn’t know how to get out of it. And she said, “Done, done, done.” She goes, “I want you to move in. You’re going to be only with me maybe a month or two and find a new place. Everything will work out. I got this message from these dreams and Spirit, and I’m going to support you.”

And it shifted everything. I mean, I’m getting emotional as I think about it, because as I was sharing up until then, I wasn’t sharing how I felt. I didn’t ask for help. I thought my role as a healer, as an intuitive in the world was to help others all the time. And we know that we need that balance. It’s not just about giving. There is that law of giving, ayni in the Andean shamanism tradition, right? Give and receive, give and receive.

And what wound up happening is that she called an ex-boyfriend right there. They got a truck. She said, “How about tonight? Can we move you out tonight? Can you let her know? Can you do this?” And so immediately I called my roommate’s mother. I said, “I’m moving out. This is what’s been happening to me. I’m sorry. I need to go. Please help your daughter. This is what has to happen.” And that night we packed me up, we brought me into her home. And I asked her please not to share about this with anyone. And she didn’t. And within the month, I just casually mentioned to somebody in the office that I was moving without giving a lot of explanation. Still, I was very protective of myself at that time. Now I’ll tell you, I’ll you so much now. And I feel more at peace and more confident.

And what wound up happening is, within the month-and-a-half I found an apartment. She helped me move with her friends. And I came into work one day, and around my desk it was everything you would need to move in and have what you needed. There was toilet paper and there was tons of paper towels and a mop and a brush. And though it may seem, you’re thinking of a mop and a brush, but these are these items that when you’re a struggling young person in the city, made all the difference. There was a set of towels, a set of bedsheets. Basically, everyone in the office had come together to support me into being able to step into my new home.

And so that is something that I never forget, because I work with Spirit and Spirit guides me to support people. And this is where Spirit and humanity, like people around me, shared with me, We’ve got your back. It’s okay. You can be intuitive. You can be a healer, and you need to choose what’s right for you. And if you do choose what’s not great for you... and I look back on it, maybe it wasn’t great for me, but boy did it teach me something.

It taught me that even in the worst moments where I myself and my ego, I’m afraid to ask for support, that the message is going to go out there, that someone’s going to respond. And I just love this person so much because that month-and-a-half changed my life completely. I have never left a home again. I have never harmed myself by making a choice that I didn’t want to make because someone needed me or someone pressured me, and it just changed my life. And so, I’m so, so grateful that she heard the message and that my coworkers realized that I was in need. And without disrespect, with kindness, with love, they just stepped up to say, “We love you. And we’re here with you.”

Vanessa Codorniu is an acclaimed Argentine-American psychic medium with 27 years of experience that includes facilitating over 10,000 individual sessions. She is a Bruja and Latinx teacher of intuition and clinical hypnosis, with a focus on healing ancestral trauma/patterns. Vanessa started doing readings at age 16, after her family confirmed that she was accurately seeing and knowing things about people who had previously passed on. She guides seekers to break through fears and connect with the practical power of their intuition, so they can serve the world powerfully with their gifts.

Since the start of the COVID quarantine, Vanessa’s been dedicated to serving her bilingual (Spanish and English) global audience. She’s been hosting free healing circles weekly, and has virtually trained and certified nearly 250 new Reiki practitioners (for a "pay what you can" donation), and empowering therapists, first responders, nurses, EMTs, and parents with a therapeutic modality they can use to support their family, friends, and clients.

Vanessa is the founder of The School of the Healing Artes. She created her school to stand for diversity, inclusivity, and accessibility for underrepresented BIPOC communities, and hopes to continue supporting the next generation of leaders and healers for years to come. Listen for more on her podcast, The Biz Bruja Podcast.