I had just come off an amazing teaching opportunity and experience at The Tarot School’s Readers Studio. I was gifted the chance to deliver a study group on Lenormand cartomancy.

My session was set for Saturday evening. The last night of the conference, right after the formal banquet (I wore a dress. And high heels. I looked hot. I digress). The conference may have been about tarot, but I had long sensed this shift in the metaphysical tide. I started learning and then creating Lenormand oracles because my clients had questions that I wasn’t able to satisfactorily answer with a tarot deck. Of course the tarot is like a religion to me (or at least as close as I’ll probably ever poke one with a long stick…) But when I read for people and they have questions about love, money, sex, work, their kids, their pets, their parents, many of them don’t want spiritual counseling. They have no interest in enlightenment. They just want hard answers and the Lenormand is perfect for that.

I had told the class that when I stated with the Lenormand deck, I was just getting comfortable with the term “psychic”. Because I don’t read your thoughts. I have no idea (or interest in knowing) what your deepest darkest desires are (I mean, I have this idea and I’ll probably figure it out anyway throughout the course of a reading… but seriously, if that shit just ran like a feed loop in my brain I’d have to cut my head off. Really.). I’m not a medium in the sense that I channel spirits. I’m actually pretty dubious of spirits (other than Greygoose and only with a dash of tonic, thanks). And to be honest sometimes I’m even sketchy on “the future” (as in, whether or not it actually even exists). There I said it. But for all practical purposes, I’ve come to accept that psychic is as psychic does and I do the psychic thing, ya know?

At the same time, I used to hate hate HATE the phrase “fortune telling”. I even had it on my website. “I am not a fortune teller.” What do fortune tellers do? They make hard predictions about the future. Like specific things. But again, I found myself at times, despite myself, making hard predictions about the future. And still I was resisting this delicious facet of my self because of the fear of being WRONG.

I’ve since come to the realization that the future, in terms of right and wrong, exists on a plane of consciousness that is both simultaneous, experience-able, and mutable. That is, the right fortune and the wrong fortune happen whether I predict it or not (and I typically do) – because YOU CHOOSE your fortune. You experience the fortune I predict or fail to predict because YOU CHOOSE your fortune. And you have the ability to change your fortune with or without me because this is YOUR CHOICE to do so.

You come to me, the fortune teller, for answers to questions that plague you. What I do, what my capacity is as a fortune teller, is to give answers. Those answers comfort you or disturb you into action or path.

I am a fortune teller. Want to know your future? It’s YOUR CHOICE.

That is so powerful.

My experience, in New York City, in the midnight hours outside the Laguardia Hotel Marriot, having a fantastic conversation about ROLLER DERBY with an enchanting lady from the Czech Republic, was that a man who specializes in public relations happened to overhear us talking. He and his partner approached us, interest piqued about the roller derby thing (have I mentioned it’s awesome?) and we proceeded to chat for an hour and a half about life, the universe, everything and public relations. Our realization was that we’re in the same business.

And then he read my cards. Literally. I handed him some postcards I had printed up of the new deck I’m working on, the Wicked Sibyl, and he looked at the cards, looked at me and told me my fortune.

And I have to share that with you, because it’s been a theme that’s popped up for me since last year, and because what he told me completely scared the shit out of me (and he was literally some random guy on the street). And I know that when I get frightened, that’s when it’s getting real for me. That’s when I stop playing and make actual propelling decisions. I get my cards read frequently and had been the victim (willing) of so many card readings over the course of the weekend – but none had shook me like his words did – and when I realized that the soul-shaking bits of his talk were in the possibilities that he was able to unfold for me in the universe, it was revealing. I realized I was standing in front of the Magician. Le Bateleur. Il Bagatto. The Magus. He was mesmerizing. Only in New York City. Only in the deepest hours of the evening. And only outside some shitty hotel next to the airport, right?

Do you want to know what he told me? I’ll give you a little nugget.

He told me I was powerful. And he told me that it was my choice to utilize it, or live in fear. And I know I’ve heard this before, the “you are such a strong woman” stuff that people blah blah blah. And Kate Courageous, in the capacity as my life coach last year (another Magician!) was practically spoon-feeding me “YOUR CHOICE” and I didn’t catch on. Why does it take some kind of random chance encounter to shift my focus? I suppose I’m a bit of a Pareidoliac, though everyone in my profession is. In the course of one conversation, my life shifted from “I am trying to make this work” to “I work it.”

That subtle reframing was the choice I had been pushing up against. And now I’ve been adequately disturbed into action.

The moral of my story – Your fortune is your choice. Stand in that power and move with it. Don’t let fear of being wrong dictate who you really are.

In my dream I’m standing next to you. You are one, but you are also infinite in your potential. Split, in an impossible moment beyond time, into all thought, all feeling, and all the action that you are capable of. This happens in every instant. In every now, now and NOW of your life, for the rest of your life, until your heart stops beating (and you go to another plane of existence, whatever that may look like).

In my dream, this is what your life looks like.

(except it’s kind of more like an infinite pile of dominoes infinitely crashing into each other – you get the idea I’m sure – it’s just really grand and awe-some and domino-ey; I just couldn’t find a stock photo to accurately convey all of that, you know, within my budget )

To divine is to surmise an indication of the future.

I do this with cards. Here’s how I think it works:

In my dream, the All-sight-me is having a nice chat with the All-sight-you. Our All-sight-selves live in this no-time realm. I imagine them with a nice diffused glow about them… We’re looking at this big old pile of dominoes together, getting a feel for which the One-sight-you (that’s the version that’s all fleshy and now and reading my blog) is going to knock over next in your infinite bumbling about this time-constrained plane we’re experiencing. All-sight-us throws down a sign to Insight-me. Insight-me (who is halfway between this no-time/time dichotomy and doesn’t glow as much…) says to One-sight-you, “Whoa! Stop! Let me talk to Insight-you, because that’s where we need to be figuring things out now.” So Insight-me talks to Insight-you in hopes of getting One-sight-you to stop from pushing over that next domino (or hell, push them all over! push push!). And of course, all of this divine chit-chat is happening with the back-of-the-mind understanding that you’re actually toppling all the dominoes at once, infinitely, forever, and that all potential decisions have already been decided and that the ultimate outcome was life, the Universe and everything.

Anyway, what this all boils down to is that you and I are having this conversation about a future you may potentially experience. But going beyond that, knowing how you’re likely to experience an event in the future is only useful if you’re intending or desiring a different course of action for the now.

I don’t read cards because I have it all figured out. People don’t come to me for a reading because they’re 100% satisfied with the lives they’re living (though that might be an interesting change of pace for me now and then!). They come because they want to stop indulging some habit, want to move beyond a hurdle, or go in a different direction completely.

Now, remember my domino thing? This is the point of my blog post today — you have to push it if you want to move it. Having an indication of future events is only useful if you’re actively participating in your present. You can continue to come to Insight-you for that divine line to All-sight — hoping for that window to a version of the self that dwells in happiness, but unless you’re in the game, fully, actively participating in your life, it will continue to be just a stack of blocks.

So my question, gentle reader, is, do you want to play?

May the bridges I burn light the way. by Mike Monteiro

It would be a terrible movie. The girl. The guy. They meet, fall in love. Everything is delightfully simple. They communicate well. They don’t lay blame. They don’t project their issues. They overcome molehills before they become mountains. They simply hold each other as withmates, companions and lovers, and live happily ever after.

Terrible plot. Who wants to see that right? Except I do. But not in the movies — in the lives of my clients, friends, and what the hell, even myself!

It’s the numero ono topic I read cards about. “I’d like to know about my relationship,” they start out. And okay, I really don’t mind. We all want to be in love and be loved back – it’s pretty universal. And I totally get it. But then so many of my wonderful clients are in sour relationships and I gotta admit, I cringe — it breaks my heart and deadens my soul when I hear an otherwise intelligent, independent woman say to me,

“It’s just been so hard, there’s been so much drama, it just HAS to be right. I work SO HARD for this relationship. He MUST be the one.”

These are women in pain, it’s palpable and I feel it. I’ve been there. It’s been awful and harrowing and I couldn’t stop the hurt even when I was both in the midst of it and aware of it from the outside.

I hit a wall with this sometime last year. Had this realization about my life, my self, my soul, which was stifled and cold. It went like this: I woke up and realized that it was my life. My self. My soul that was on the line. That’s about all the control I can maintain over this physical world, and I was squandering it, trying to fit into this relationship that was about two sizes too small.

So I guess you’re wondering if I knew all along that my marriage wouldn’t last? Did I see it? Well, I can honestly tell you that I knew that my relationship was no longer serving me. That I was no longer growing in love, but rather, my ex and I had grown apart. I guess the real question becomes, if I would have known, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that my marriage would end, would that have changed the way I felt in the relationship? And the answer is probably not. I still would have fallen in love. I still would have gotten married. I would have said, Fuck you, Fate! This is awesome right now!

And you know what? While it lasted, it really was!

And then…

Have you ever read one of those “How to make your marriage/relationship work” books that go “You can totally change someone else!” No. Because you can’t. Further more, no one can change you. You can certainly change your standards, your values, your dreams or desires to better suit your significant other, but if you aren’t willing to do that and you’re still banging your head against the wall of love, honey, you’re just banging your head against a wall.

Here are some universal truths for you:

• You have a soul mate.
• If you look deeply enough, you have about 6.91 billion soul mates.
• No one is keeping you in an unsatisfying relationship except yourself (I’m not talking about abusive relationships here, if you are being abused physically, mentally or emotionally, please seek help! You deserve better!).
• You are not required by the Universe to love until it hurts. Or because it hurts. When you are blissfully happy, no one is going to look down on you for walking away from a past relationship.
• You can walk away. You can run away. You can even not look back.
• You’ll be a better person for it.

I used to be one of those romantics that went down with the ship. If I was in love, that was it! I was sunk. And after talking to hundreds of women (and hey, even a few men!) about their problems, I’ve come to the conclusion that all that attitude gets you is sunk. Better to paddle a kayak through the sea of love and oh baby, there are a lot of fish out there.

I’m not saying don’t fall in love. I’m not saying don’t fall head over heels in love. And I’m not saying that if you’re relationship is troubled it’s doomed. That’s the beauty of free-will. If it’s not in the cards, you’re free to fight against it or for it all you want. And that’s what I’m saying here — you decide all that fighting stuff. The power to fight and the power to say, nope, not gonna fight, are all in your hands.

And when you realize that, the Universe opens up to you and the answers to the “Should I stay, should I go” questions become decidedly clear.

I do have standards. Who I will read for, who I won’t. What I will read about, what I won’t. I’ve never read for men who were romantically interested in me. I don’t read for children or teenagers – only adults who are capable of taking personal responsibility for their choices and actions. I don’t read about medical conditions. I don’t like to read about legal matters, and to cover my bases now, I have to explain in plain English, that my readings are for entertainment only (imagine me spitting those words out). In the state of Ohio, I became an ordained minister of the Church of Universal Life (online) in order to provide “spiritual counseling”. I still have my certificate, that I printed out from the webpage (it even has the URL at the top), in a binder – just in case I’m ever hassled. In some states and counties, fortune telling, as they put it in the books, is completely illegal.

I read for myself all the time. This is probably the greatest benefit of reading cards – how you can use them for yourself. I don’t read compulsively on every decision I’m faced with. Instead I typically draw one to three cards a day, make some notes in my journal, and let myself be surprised by how Universe finds a way to place those cards in my path. Certain cards resonate with me so deeply. The Empress is the third card in the Major Arcana. She represents a feminine receptive energy, sensuality, sexuality, motherhood. She’s typically depicted as voluptuous or pregnant or surrounded by animals. Over the years I’ve connected with her raw sexual energy, her fertility and now, her store of womanly wisdom. I’m constantly amazed by the new lessons that the Empress teaches me. She’s a good friend of mine. I’ve even made photo-copies of that card from my favorite decks to tape to my bathroom mirror. She reminds me of the things I want to be and I’m grateful for her influence in my life.

I even read for other tarot readers. Thanks to the internet I’ve gotten to know many tarot readers all over the world and even form close friendships with a few. I read cards for them – partially out of professional courtesy, but also because I have a lot of guts. It can be intimidating to read for someone who is reading the cards in a completely different fashion as you’re throwing them on the table. And that’s part of the charm of tarot. Everyone has their own reading voice and style. Some readers claim to channel spirits. Some say they are psychic – in the very day-time television sense of the word. Others, like me, say that we’re just readers. That we’re energy consultants – and we open dialogues with the self that you might have otherwise shied away from.

Jan is another tarot reader. She works full-time in a dreadful retail position and does tarot consulting in her precious free time. She is one of my regular querents – often asking me for spiritual advice. She senses this great void in her life and longs for something to fill it up. Over the years I’ve been reading for her, we’ve worked on big questions she’s had – meaning of life kind of stuff. Her readings are typically intense, but incredibly satisfying for me – only because her attitude toward the cards is so open and she just loves to talk her way through one of my readings. It’s more fun when the sitter is engaged in the reading, asking questions and pointing out things in the cards I might have missed on my own. There’s no happier feeling for me than sitting over a spread of cards with a cup of coffee and a good friend with a soft, open heart.

Remember the girl from the beginning? The grad school question? There were five cards on the table, and I was pointing to each, in-between each and trying my best to figure out the cardinal directions from where I was sitting, as I explained to her what she might encounter if she chose one certain grad program over another. After I would finish up each one, she would smile and nod, her eyes bright and focused on the table. She didn’t say much while I was reading, just asking a few questions about the particulars of the cards. When I finished the reading, I let it sink in a few minutes while she continued her careful examination of the spread.

“Well, was it good?”

“Yes!” she smiled widely, “It was so good. It was so fun. It was… different than what I was expecting.”

Yes. The Universe usually is.

Energy is the other factor in what I do. I’m not a religious person and I find that my religious ideas are really irrelevant anyway. Tarot may be viewed as a spiritual practice – and indeed it is helpful to connect to ones high sense of self. But I do believe that any energy I use up, give off, is used up and given off by someone or something else. The energy is all connected. I call this the Universe. It’s sort of the force that compels me. And maybe that’s how the cards work. By tapping into that realm or dimension where we sense things on the elemental Universal energy level. I like to feel like I’m in touch with the Universe. Capital U.

I’ve never done the phone lines, but I’ve thought about it. After my kids were born, I was no longer comfortable having strangers come into my house for readings and getting out of the house became more and more impractical. Regular clients know my phone number and if I wasn’t able to arrange a meeting or phone call, I would read for them on chat or through email. The internet has changed everything (even psychic counseling!) and I regularly get referrals for my email readings. It’s a steady source of income, but I miss the cash I could bring in with face-to-face readings. Not to mention the energy exchange – it’s a bit of a rush when you’re right on.

I sat next to the chair by the front door for a good ten minutes. Waffling. I really wanted to go to the bar and hand the tender my card and say, Hey, hire me! But I didn’t want to go either. I was afraid I’d sit there most of the night by myself, feeling silly and out of place, afraid I’d lose the courage to talk to anyone — and yet I also felt the Universe nudging me out, gently. Here’s your purse, Universe said. Make sure you have some cash to buy a beer and leave a tip. Now put your boots on and go!

It was fortunate that a few old friends who I hadn’t seen in a long while happened to be there. It was doubly fortunate that the bar owner himself showed up. I worked up the courage to introduce myself when I noticed he was taking a break, drinking a beer at the bar.

He was really open to the idea of having me read there. He took my card and asked me all kinds of questions. He said he always thought it was interesting and his sister gets her cards read frequently. He said that he would think about it and put some feelers out to see if his customers would be interested in it.

When I got back to my table, a woman — friend of a friend, asked what I was doing. I told her how I read cards and wanted to start reading at the bar. She pursed her lips and said, “Uh, want to… practice… on me?”

I just shrugged and said, sure. Universe was in my bag, practically pulling my cards out before I even got my hands in. I put down five cards, met her eyes, and opened my mouth to speak.

Ten minutes later, she sat there quiet, lips parted — like the words wouldn’t materialize. Finally, she cried out, “It’s like you’ve known me my whole life!” grabbed her purse and started rifling through it. She pulled out a tiny wallet and shoved a wad of cash in my face. “Here! Take it! Please!! It’s all the cash I have.”

I never ended up reading in the bar. It was too draining to be super-mom all day and super-tarot reader all night. But when you’re open to the gentle nudges of Universe, you find yourself in situations that are surprising, exciting and new.

In 1909 Sir Alfred Edward Waite released a deck he designed, commissioned by an artist named Pamela Coleman Smith. He designed the cards in the metaphysical tradition of the Golden Dawn Society (an esoteric club that was en vogue with the upper-middle classes of England and America) and Pixie illustrated them. The Rider publishing house printed the cards and the resulting deck, the Rider-Waite Tarot (now the Rider-Waite-Smith or Pamela Coleman Smith deck), has become the most popular and arguably the most accessible system of divination that the western world has known.

The first known use of tarrochi cards (a popular card game in Italy and France) for divination dates roughly back to 16th century France. The cards included twenty-two themed cards that became what is known as the Major Arcana and fifty-six pip cards that roughly correspond to a standard pack of playing cards (included was an extra court card for each suite – the page). Historically, the pips were plain – numbered with the suite – like playing card pips. That’s why Waite’s contribution to tarot was so revolutionary – he envisioned fully illustrated scenic pips that conveyed the card meaning using symbols that were relevant to the tradition of the Golden Dawn Society. Today there are thousands upon thousands of tarot decks that build on that tradition and apply wholly different symbols to mean more or less the same thing. The point being, if you can read a RWS deck, you can read 90% of the tarot packs you’ll find at any given metashop. Like vampires? There’s a tarot for you. Like fairies? The Renaissance? Romantic period? The novels of Jane Austen? Hello Kitty? There’s a tarot pack for you.

The Major cards are numbered zero through twenty-one. The Fool is zero. The World is twenty-one. The cards in-between represent sweeping themes and archetypes that make up human existence. The Minor Arcana cards in the suits of Cups, Wands, Pentacles and Swords (hearts, clubs, diamonds and spades, respectively), Ace through King, represent situations, events, actions and people that one might encounter in daily life.

Danielle sat on the floor in my living room, hand clutching a tissue, bent over a chest I used as a coffee-table. I was opposite her, pulling cards and passing them over the steady stream of curling incense smoke before they found their place on the woven scarf I used as a spread cloth. The cards weren’t good and her eyes were spilling over with tears. Turbulent court cards, Kings and Knights. She was in a troubled marriage. She had two small children at home and while she worked hard as a Realtor, she had little success in the downtrodden rural economy. She wanted desperately to leave her husband – had even considered an affair at one point, but feared his temper and the repercussions for her children. It wouldn’t matter, I told her, turning over the Page of Cups and then Eight of Swords. The Eight is illustrated with a bound and blindfolded woman, surrounded by eight swords. The cold wind whips her hair across her pallid face and the landscape is harsh and barren. He would be arrested, in jail soon enough. She exhaled loudly and burst into awkward laughter. I pursed my lips while she described his violent outbursts. He’d never hit her, she insisted. He’d never hurt the kids, but still… something fierce was building up inside him.

She called me the next morning to let me know that he’d been picked up by the cops overnight during a bar fight. She had packed her children up and moved them back in with her parents. She thanked me over and over again for the reading – for the insight it provided her and promised that she would be calling again, that she would tell all her friends about the amazing wonderful psychic she had met. I haven’t heard from her since.

I am not psychic. Not in the way it’s portrayed on television. A friend of mine once accused me of defrauding people – letting them believe I was seeing into their minds. It’s not like that though and I never represent myself in that way. My card says my name – followed by the words “Tarot Consultant.”

Anyone can read cards. Some of the best readings I’ve ever gotten were from people who had never seen a tarot pack before. I would put the cards in front of them and ask them to shuffle. Ask them to pull. Close your eyes. Tell me what you see in the cards. Tell me how it relates to me. Say the first thing that pops into your mind. Make it up if you have to.

I think that part of what I do is just opening a dialogue. The images in the cards immediately bring to mind specific situations that nearly everyone has gone through. Seeing those trigger memories that we connect with our current situations. Sometimes just being reminded of lessons we’ve learned in the past is enough to help us solve the problems ahead of us. It’s also helpful, when we’ve exhausted all rational means of problem-solving, to look at something from a completely irrational angle. Try something crazy to break out of the rut we’ve found ourselves in. Get a tarot reading. How irrational is that? Once we begin to see our small problems as part of a larger human experience, they feel more manageable. That’s all I do. I facilitate the irrational.

And then there’s the part where I’m just really good at reading people’s intentions. It’s not hard, when you’ve spent enough time talking to someone, to guess how their current actions are going to influence future decisions. Perhaps that is the talent I actually possess. I don’t like to call it cold reading – because that makes it sound like something deceitful. I don’t look for personal queues and predict that a tall, dark stranger whose first name begins with T will come into your life the second week of February. Maybe I’m just not that good. Instead, I see a Knight of Swords and I suggest that the energy is ripe for an intense encounter with someone who will impress you with sharp opinions, quick wit and high energy. Does it happen? I don’t know. It has happened for me though – when I know what to look for, I see it. I guess that’s part of the trick too, right? But what does it say about our human minds – that we’re susceptible to this kind of suggestion? Maybe we were meant to be suggested to, that’s all I’m saying.

She was chewing on her lip, which was distracting. “I don’t even know what to ask,”” she said, her thick Southern accent rolling in her blushed cheeks.  “I’m so nervous! Can you tell?”

“Just a little,” I winked. “You don’t have to be nervous though. I’ll be gentle.”

“It’s not you I’m worried about.” She pointed to the small brown pouch next to my beer, “It’s those.”

I shrugged, “Just paper. Ink. Pretty pictures.”

“Not exactly!” She laughed, then drummed her fingers together. “What kinds of things can they tell me?”

I pulled the deck from the bag and waved it around while I spoke, “They can tell you anything. Big things. Small things. Universal truths. Potty jokes.

“It’s like this, you can ask anything you want – or nothing at all. Most people ask for nothing in particular, but actually want to know something specific. I guess they assume the Universe is as invested in their personal desires as they are. It’s kind of annoying.”

“I see.”

I went on, “Ninety-nine percent of the people I read for want to know about love. It’s something base inside us. No one wants to be alone. If you want to know about your love life, I’m happy to tell you. But don’t try to trick me. The Universe doesn’t like that.” I picked up my cards and started to shuffle, hand over hand at first. Fan and then bridge. “And neither do I.”

She watched me shuffle for a moment, lost in the sound of the rifling cards, “No, I thought about it. I want to know where I should go to grad school.”

“That’s a good question,” I agreed. I gathered the cards in my left hand and took a deep breath.

I don’t remember how I felt — probably a thrill of danger, of mystery — when I found my first tarot pack at a garage sale when I was thirteen. I hid them under my bed from my mother. She found them of course. She urged me not to touch them anymore – that they were tools of the devil and that it would only bring me bad luck. I remember her trying to rationally explain her irrational fears – broaching the subject matter-of-factly, holding the cards out in her hand at arms length. And yet, she never made me get rid of them, never demanded I throw them out or burn them. She simply dropped them on my bed and backed out of my room. I’m not sure she ever looked under my bed again.

So I kept them. At first it was out of the wonder of disobedience. I have always been fascinated by metaphysical things – ouija boards, crystals, psychic readings. I loved watching the television psychic shows, partly because the possibility of people possessing those kinds of talents excited me, but also because I wanted to see them trip up. The history of American spiritualism is fascinating and full of bizarre fraudulence and I was and am smart enough to realize this. I always secretly hoped I’d get hit in the head one day though and wake up with some kind of gift to see into the dark corners of someone else’s life.

That never happened. Instead I read a book on how to read the cards, learned the symbols and what they meant. Did a few readings for myself, for my friends. It was surprising, very much so, how they worked. It surprised me. It made me feel awake and connected to the Universe. And when I was in my mid-twenties, the barrage of sitters I had forced me to put a dollar value on what I was doing. I went “pro” – if you want to call it that. But I still don’t hear people’s thoughts. I still don’t see into the dark corners of anyone’s life – unless they let me. And usually, when I’m shuffling and pulling cards, talking, pointing, explaining and yes, even guessing, they do.