How an Eagle woman went from skeptical journalist to evidential medium

If you had told Jennifer Alsever a decade or more ago that she would be talking to dead people, she would have looked at you like you had four heads.

After all, the Eagle resident spent decades writing novels and working as a curious but skeptical journalist for publications like Fortune, CNNMoney.com and The New York Times. 

Yet on Thursday at 6 p.m., Alsever will host an author talk at the Bookworm of Edwards to celebrate her sixth book, “Tapped In: 31 Stories That Will Change How You Think About Intuition, Connection and the Afterlife.” She will discuss her personal shift to become a professional medium, Reiki healer and author, and how it’s possible for everyone to go on a journey to heal, grow, connect and tap into something greater than themselves. 

“Tapped In” features the stories of celebrated names such as Suzanne Giesemann, Anita Moorjani, and Eben Alexander, three of the world’s most prominent contemporary figures in the study of consciousness, spiritual awakening, and life after death. The book also tells the stories of everyday people, including a police detective, a corporate executive, an artist and a retail clerk who share near-death experiences, profound grief, illnesses or experiences they couldn’t explain. Each tells a story of transformation, as well as their lessons learned on healing, grief, life, the afterlife, connection and consciousness. No two stories are the same, but a theme of interconnectedness is woven throughout.

“It’s like a field guide for your own journey, or like having 31 mentors in your back pocket,” Alsever said. The book’s inspirational stories, advice, habits and perspectives — and the unique design — allow readers to reframe their own struggles and chart their own spiritual, but not necessarily religious, path. “There is no single way.” 

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The Bookworm event on Thursday will include a Q & A with Alsever, as well as Eagle medium and meditation coach Becky Hesseltine and Avon Reiki and shamanic healer Dana Theresa, both of whom are featured in the book. She invites attendees to bring their own questions and stories about grief, healing, consciousness, mediumship, energy, and the afterlife.

As a longtime journalist, Alsever often asked why as she wrote about entrepreneurship, venture capital and innovation for some of the nation’s largest publications. The same was true when it came to the mysteries of the world, though for years she relegated them to the realm of fiction. One of her novels, “Extraordinary Lies,“ is a fictional tale based on the real psychic testing at the Stanford Research Institute in the early 1970s. 

In 2020, the same year that novel was published, Alsever had a Reiki session and was blown away by the experience. Reiki is a Japanese energy healing that, according to studies, can help with pain, insomnia, anxiety and overall well-being. She’d been struggling with anxiety and limiting beliefs, and Reiki began to excavate those blocks and to restore her inner balance.

Ever the curious journalist, Alsever wanted to know how Reiki worked, so she went on to study with Theresa and ultimately achieved the highest level of Reiki training. 

“It turns out, Reiki is the gateway to intuition,” Alsever said. “It changed my life.”

During her training, Alsever was falling asleep one night when she felt the presence of her late mother-in-law, Sylvia, who had died the previous year.

“I just felt it was her and started having a conversation with her in my head,” Alsever said. “She gave me a message for her daughter and then told me to ‘ask about the dogs.'” 

Alsever thought the last request was odd and questioned whether the experience was real as she drifted off to sleep. The next day, she passed on the message to her sister-in-law, Mary, and sent a follow-up text asking about her dogs.

“Mary said, ‘One of them is in the doggie ICU; how did you know?'” Alsever recalled. “I thought, ‘What? Your dead mother told me!'”

Now, Alsever wanted to know how communication with the dead worked, so she sought out friend and neighbor Hesseltine about joining her mediumship class. 

“The sessions aren’t just, ‘Hey, your grandma says hi.’ It’s more like, your grandma smoked five packs a day, rode a horse to church and takes responsibility for calling you dirty names. It’s verifiable information about your deceased loved one so you know without a doubt they are there,” Alsever said.  

Five years and countless spiritual and mediumistic experiences later, Alsever joined VerySoul.com as a verified professional evidential medium and now offers Reiki and mediumistic sessions at her new Eagle studio, Jennifer Alsever Intuitive Healing.

“This whole experience sent me on a spiritual journey, where I shed a lot of old beliefs and patterns, and began to perceive myself, others, this world and beyond so much differently,” she said. “It has given me a lot of peace.”

She decided to write “Tapped In” in late 2024 after seeing the book “Tools of Titans,” by podcaster Tim Ferriss, sitting on her coffee table. It includes interviews with billionaires, entrepreneurs and elite athletes about their stories, lessons learned, advice and habits. 

“I thought, ‘Why do we have books on material success but not spiritual success?'” “Tapped In”, she said, is that book. 

“‘Tapped In’ is being released during a messy time where people are hitting record levels of burnout, loneliness and depression. People are seeking something more from life,” said Alsever. “And there is more.”

“Tapped In” has received endorsements from Giesemann, the internationally recognized author, teacher and medium, and the late P.M.H. Atwater, the author of 27 books, including “The Big Book of Near-Death Experiences.”

Alsever said she wants the book to be an invitation to anyone curious, seeking or struggling. She said it doesn’t take being a medium to tap into something greater, whether it’s consciousness, our inner knowing or an ongoing relationship with dead family members or friends.

“I wanted to make the unseen world accessible,” Alsever said. “We all have this ability to heal, grow, connect and follow our intuition. By doing so, we can find more meaning in life, more peace and more flow. We can find this sense of magic.”