Same (or better) reading as you would get in-person
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No appointment needed
It’s a learned skill.
And an internet meme.
James Bach, author of “Secrets of a Bucchaneer Scholar” once posted on social media that “People get defensive because they have something to defend.” It’s a normal, natural response and part of the learning process. After you read Tarot professionally for a while you learn not to take it personally. They’ll get over it. Or not. It’s up to them.
Sometimes the thing people are defending is something they actually need to change. Sometimes the “it” they are getting over is an honest answer that they didn’t want to hear. Nobody enjoys being called out on their s**t.
Sometimes being called out is exactly what we need.
As much as we enjoy indulging our confirmation bias, tempers flare when our biases are challenged instead.
As I read the cards, Tarot is usually a world of ideas, empowerment, encouragement, expanding horizons and gentle nudges. A little diplomacy goes a long, long way.
On the other hand, if subtle messages and gentle nudges are ignored, after a time our spirit guides (or however you think of these things) roll up their sleeves and break out the frying pan to the face method of communicating.
That’s the case here. Cups cards deal with emotions and close relationships. The emotion in question for the inverted four is moping and self-pity. There is no nonsense around the card today. Short, sweet and to the point, kind of like a caveman club over the head, the reversed four is telling us to stop moping, it’s time to move on. Wallowing in self-pity serves no one here. AKA …Knock it off!
Fire alarms aren’t quiet, subtle or diplomatic. They are loud and in your face and don’t care about feelings.
It isn’t fun for anyone when things get tense or feel confrontational. That’s never the intent of a Tarot reading. The intent is to shake us out of a stuck place or turn up the volume on a spirit message loud enough that we can finally hear it. The more important it is for us to hear a message, the more blunt, loud and direct the spirit message will become. A good Tarot reader can reflect that sense of urgency without being mean about it.
Even when spirit is telling it like it is, a little Tarot diplomacy (and humor) can go a long way.
Thanks so much for reading! Please follow the blog to get all of the latest posts direct to your inbox. See you at the next sip!
For the record, I wrote the bulk of this post yesterday, so no (private client from this morning) this isn’t directed at you. We all need a little bit of brutal honesty from the cards every now and then.
Ugh…forgot to set the thumbnail AGAIN. Sorry about that. Guess your choices are that half-covered one on the right, the Flippy one in the middle, or the normal one on the left.
Am thinking about doing next week’s CYC with the non-RWS oracle-like Alleyman’s Tarot cards. What do you think? Or would you prefer the classic Pamela Smith artwork for a while? Lenormand? Comments are open if you have an opinion or any questions at all.
Ace of Swords: Head rules heart this week. Listen to your emotions but try not to let them cloud your thinking. Decisive action is needed.
High Priestess: It may feel like other people may know more than you, but they don’t know more about you. Don’t sell yourself short. You are the absolute expert about you. You know best what you need even when what you need is help or guidance.
Judgement: The boat never moves forward if people on the boat are all rowing in different directions. Use clear-headed judgement combined with courage to put the most harmful people off the boat and onshore all together. The boat moves forward very slowly if there is no one left to help you row. Use clear-headed judgement combined with wisdom to be be as generous as you safely can with second chances.
Sage Sips is Tarot for your day in the time it takes to sip your coffee
From the Modern Oracle / TaoCraft Tarot archives, lightly edited to update links, fix a few typos, etc.
Q: Are Tarot cards demonic?
A: No.
Hell and demons are religious ideas, so religious people might give you a different answer. As I see it, religion and spirituality are totally different things (please see yesterday’s post about religion and Tarot) I believe that Tarot is a combination of science and spirituality with religion having no part in the process. No religion, no demons.
The scientific part has to do with resonance and vibration. Think of guitar strings. Pluck one string and it vibrates at a certain frequency and makes a certain note. Twang a different size string and you get a different note. If two separate strings are tuned to the same note, then you can play one string and the other vibrates too, making a similar sound along with the first one (resonance). Tarot cards are the guitar pick, not the note. The guitar string you choose and play sets the tone for Tarot experience you have and any resonant energies that come along with it. If you focus on the demon frequency, you have a bigger chance of resonating with a “demonic” experience. If you vibrate at the “guidance” note then that’s what you’ll get. The old adage of “you get out of it what you put into it” has a sort of literal truth here. Expect hellfire, and you might get it. Expect happy, and you might get that too.
To put it into spiritual terms, all you have to do for a demon-free reading is fill yourself with love and light, or ask for protection from some higher energy / protective power. An example might be the “patronus” in the Harry Potter books. Essentially, the shape of your inner light protects you. What shape would you want your inner light to take?
Here is a powerful image from Joy Star’s newsletter (used with permission.) Think of a house on a dark night. Imagine the house filled with cheery lights and a cozy fire in the fireplace. If you open the front door what happens? Does the outer dark come rushing in and extinguish the light, or does the light pour out of the open door and illuminate the dark? This isn’t saying that the dark doesn’t exist. It doesn’t mean that houses can’t lose power or that disasters don’t happen to people who “think positive” all the time. This is the real world. Dark and dangerous beings and things exist, in both the tangible and intangible realms. Of course bad stuff happens. But good stuff can happen too. Metaphorically speaking, if you turn on the lights before opening the door then you can look out into the night darkness coming in. Fear and superstition turns your lights out. When you are afraid or angry, then dark meets dark at the door.
The spirit world isn’t all sunshine and roses. Natural forces and negative energies from ill-intentioned people do exist. You can protect yourself on spiritual level the same as you protect yourself on a physical level. We put on a raincoat during a storm and stay out of dangerous places alone at night and do all sorts of things to try and stay as physically safe as we can be. Spiritually, energetically, one of the most important protections is simple intention. Intent is a very potent thing. Before you do any spiritual or energy work, very clearly set the clear intention that what you do is only for the highest and best for all concerned. Read, arm yourself with knowledge. Get advice, learn from other people’s experience in order to explore in safety. One of my favorite resources is Psychic Protection by Ted Andrews.
You have probably heard of the ‘spiritual law’ that “Like attracts like.” If you are hopeful, you may attract something inspirational. If you are afraid, you may attract something frightening.
By the same token, if you are genuinely afraid of the cards, then don’t deny or minimize that. It is what it is. If your religious beliefs are in conflict with Tarot readings, then simply find your guidance another way. From my side of things, In my experience, people who are conflicted about Tarot have a hard time hearing the guidance that is offered. Tarot is a great tool for learning, but it isn’t for everyone. If you are seriously worried that Tarot cards are demonic, “occult” or that you’ll burn in hell for having a reading…then you need to find the right kind of guidance for you. Why put that kind of stress on yourself? For Tarot to be helpful, you have to let go of something. Either let go of the religious notions of demons and evil in Tarot, or let go of Tarot as a way for guidance. Either is fine. There is no right or wrong way to find your guidance. These two, religion-induced fear and Tarot readings just don’t mix, like oil and water.
Tarot cards aren’t demonic. It’s WAY worse than that. Tarot cards are reflective. Tarot cards aren’t evil, they are a mirror showing you life’s harsh realities. Choose fear, see fear. Choose love, see love. Choose courage and compassion and see something beautiful.
My reading style is calm, reasonable, no-drama and never occult or scary. I’ve done more first-time readings than I can count. If you would like a safe, no judgement, religion-free way to try a Tarot reading, a five-card email reading is a good choice. Very private, very convenient, very affordable. Order HERE
I’ve done my fair share of social media doom scrolling and void screaming over the years. Oddly enough, social media can also be a source of inspiration. Especially if you can pull back and look at big picture trends within your individual feed (not the big platform-wide trending topics.)
Lately I’ve been seeing all the usual tensions between Easter and those of us raised in evangelical fundamentalism who get a little twitchy this time of year. Plus there is a presidential election this Fall here in the U.S. The very real dangers of Christion Nationalistism are (finally!) being recognized. I’ve added what I can on the side of church-state separation. One person called me a “bafflingly atheist Tarot reader.” Well, I am an atheist and I am a Tarot reader. I’ve been planning to write a post like this to un-baffle things a little bit.
Unsurprisingly, I follow a lot of Tarot readers on Threads and Instagram. We are in the business of provoking thoughts so when @pixiecurio (creator of the brilliant Light Seer’s Tarot deck! www.chris-anne.myshopify.com) outright asked for our thoughts about religion and spirituality, I knew it was time for this particular behind the scenes peek.
The root problem, as I see it, is when we use religion and spirituality interchangeably or think of them as being essentially the same thing.
They are not.
No matter how thin a coin may be, it still has two distinct and opposite sides. Both religion and spirituality deal with the intangible mysteries of human life. In that sense, they are part of the same coin, but they approach life’s mysteries in distinct and vastly different ways.
Spirituality is internal and moves from the inside out. Spirituality is our individual, direct experience of life’s mysteries and can be expressed but not taught. A spiritual teacher can lead you to the doorway, but only you can cross the threshold into direct experience and direct understanding. This internal experience directs external behaviors.
Religion is external and moves from the outside in. Religion is a group consensus about life’s intangible mysteries and is taught from one generation to another. The external behavior strives to direct the internal experience.
Rather than two sides of the same coin, I find it more helpful to think of religion and spirituality as two circles of a Venn diagram.
For some people, their group, cultural, external religion is also an expression of their sincere, individual, internal spirituality. In that case, their circles overlap a great deal. For others, like me, the circles don’t touch at all.
Tarot falls 100% within the circle of spirituality and not at all within the circle of religion. Tarot doesn’t touch religion unless there is already some degree of overlap in your individual, personal religion-spirituality Venn diagram.
The original Tarot images emerged in sixteenth century Europe where religious and cultural diversity was less common. The original Tarot decks are rife with Christian images and symbols because at that time, Catholicism was culturally and politically dominant. Their circles had a lot of overlap.
Here, now, the circles need not touch and are still perfectly valid. In 21st century America an atheist Tarot reader is both possible and understandable.
Centuries of use and practice have shown that Tarot is a tool for our spirituality – it is a mechanism that enables our individual understanding and experience. Tarot doesn’t tell you what to think or do. Tarot shows a world of possibilities, options, and guidance. Tarot only serves to enrich our internal understanding.
Tarot is a means of spiritual experience from the inside out, not a means to impose dogma from the outside in. Tarot does not make concrete predictions or impose anything from the outside.
Like Taoism and Buddhism, Tarot concerns itself with living human experience and doesn’t say anything one way or the other about any particular god or gods. Tarot works well with any religion, especially with modern, diverse (and sometimes abstract) Tarot decks.
In 30 years of reading Tarot and Oracle cards, both privately and publicly, I’ve never received the slightest hint of a message for or against any religion. There is never a sense of ‘this is the ultimate truth for everyone.’ Tarot is always individual. Tarot is always well within the realm of the spiritual.
If religion comes up in a private individual reading at all, it is emotional chicken soup. Sometimes the cards will remind the individual to take comfort in their chosen religious practices whatever they are.
With every passing year, religion has become increasingly radioactive as a public topic. I actively avoid religion and politics in my public collective energy Tarot readings. I want my work to be inclusive and compassionate – to the best of my ability I will not allow toxic energies into this blog, this website or any of my readings, even if it comes in the guise of religion.
Religion in the mainstream despises Tarot. Religion despises atheists.
Spirituality embraces both with open arms. There is nothing baffling about that at all.
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Sage Sips Blog is Tarot for your day in the time it takes to sip your coffee
YOU CHOOSE:
Your choices are everything. They are the cause that brings your future into effect. Tarot helps to guide those choices so you can make good ones.
Tarot doesn’t tell you what will happen in life. Tarot helps you figure out what to do when life happens.
Death: OF COURSE this is your eclipse day card. Eclipses symbolize change and transformation. That is exactly what the death card is about. Only an empty cup can be filled. Let the old and toxic go and welcome the new and better in.
Five of swords: The price of victory is too high. Is this really a hill worth dying on? Redefine your goals. Work toward a victory that makes sense. You don’t have to prove your point based on blind principle.
High Priestess: Magic and spirituality come only from within. Yes, it really is nothing more than the moon’s shadow. The magic and mystery is up to you to feel and find. music via youtube shorts Allyman’s Tarot Deck used with permission @publishinggoblin1072
Science is the best way humans have to learn about the physical world and navigate the public sphere. In the physical world and civic life reason is our ultimate guide.
Yet, the subjective inner world lies outside of science’s grasp. Psychology comes close. There are reasons that there is much overlap between the work of Carl Jung, Taoism and Tarot. Science and spirituality are two sides of humanity’s coin so to speak. Tarot can help us understand and navigate the inner, spiritual world as much as reason must guide us through the outer one.
I’m no expert.
NASA says there are 2-3 eclipses a year. There are various degrees of solar coverage, and they happen in wildly different spots all over the globe. Total eclipses are just one of several types (partial, annular etc). To have a total eclipse land in your front yard is, indeed, a once in a lifetime gift.
And that is just the global perspective.
Open the perspective to the galaxy. Or the universe. How many planets have a moon that is just the right size at just the right distance in just the right orbit for a total eclipse to happen at all – ever? Somebody like Neil DeGrasse Tyson will have to answer that for us, but I’m guessing that it is mind blowingly, achingly rare. No one knows how many planets have intelligent life. How many places do both of those things converge. How many planets in the universe have eclipses like ours AND beings who can understand and appreciate them? Even if it’s not rare, it is a beautiful, powerful experience well worthy of every bit of hype and reverence it receives.
Yes, solar eclipses are just the shadow of the moon falling on parts of the earth. Period. Our internal subjective experience of this wonder of the Cosmos is where the magic resides with all the validity of science and shadows.
@SpiralSeaTarot on Threads, who shares my preference for smaller layouts, brought up the topic of a Solar Eclipse Tarot layout. I don’t know of any existing ones offhand, but it seems like an easy one to write.
I think the energy path reading that we do here all of the time could be adapted and amped up a little to meet the occasion.
Card 1: Waning Light
This card represents issues and energies that are fading away. This is something we are strongly advised to release once and for all. This is what must happen for our transformation, for life to progress to something better. The death card has turned up frequently lately in readings I’ve done and in social media posts by other well respected readers. Eclipses are traditionally associated with transformation and change. Change energy may be both ancient and a modern collective, but that doesn’t make it any less valid or powerful. Eclipses are a portal to change and this card hints at what must change for good and for all – or at least be put on the back burner for a good long while.
Card 2: Totality
The eclipse at totality looks like a portal to another dimension. This is a moment ripe for total communion with the spiritual experience of being a conscious human at this place and this time. Of every being in the entirety of the universe, you are here, now, witnessing this beautiful, unique thing. It can be, it must be, a moment of full presence.
In this layout, this card represents your spiritual guidance in this moment. This is what the universe most wants you to know. This can represent a moment of being your most powerful and profoundly authentic self. This represents your life path and life calling in this moment. This points to your portal, your connection to your highest and best.
Card 3: Emerging Light
This is hope and optimism and the other side of your powerful transformation. This is the thing to reach for, the thing to choose, the path most open to you. As the light of the sun returns, it spotlights the place to put your hopes and energies. It spotlights the path to take and direction to go. This card lights up the way and path forward.
Here is a solar eclipse reading for the collective, but I encourage you to get or do a reading for yourself. The profoundly spiritual is the profoundly individual.
Waning Light
Stop pushing. You don’t have to be in control. You don’t have to push and strive every moment. If you are content with the way things are, you’ve already won. If you aren’t happy, maybe you are courageously pursuing the wrong things. Hold up a moment. Is all of this frenetic action serving you, or some idealized purpose? Figure out what you really want. If you have it, great, call it a day. If not…charge in that new direction. If it is the right thing, you’ll get there without all the fuss and fury.
Totality
The essence of change is a new beginning.
The death card led us here. When you change what you do, what you think, how you live, how you show the world who you are, then the old thing, the old way, the old you essentially dies to this moment. BUT time – and you- continues. Moment slips into moment, and as the old slips away, the new emerges. Alan Watts famously said that “you are under no obligation to be the same person you were five minutes ago.” This eclipse is the perfect opportunity and excuse to make a change and let the new you make a grand entrance. Physically, in the real world, do what you need to do to be safe. For your inner world – this is your permission from the universe to begin to fearlessly be who you really are and always wanted to be. Do it! Now is the time! Let yourself be yourself, no matter how carefully you let the world in to your new beginning.
The way to your highest and best is to stop waiting, and simply begin.
Things don’t have to be perfect immediately, but they can never progress if you don’t start to move. They say it is the journey that matters, not the destination. For there to be a journey at all, you must take your first step.
Emerging Light
The new you is magic.
The knight of swords is active power. It is yang power. Now is the time for yin power. Magnets can be powerful. This is the time to attract. Draw your power and best life to you like a lightning rod. But that requires that you do your part. Working magic means working, albeit working smarter not harder.
To catch lightning in a bottle you have to brave a lot of storms.
If you want to attract attention, you have to let your light shine where people can see it
Transformation requires change – releasing and beginning.
It is circles and cycles within circles and cycles – just like the literal eclipse.
Watch the eclipse in person if you are able. Watch online if you can. If you are night side or far away – know that eclipses exist. Reach out with your intuition and imagination and know that its energy of transformation and magic exists for you too.
After all, you are an Earthling with the privilege of living on a planet where a total solar eclipse occurs.
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Q: How can you read me if we aren’t together?
A: The distance between us doesn’t matter because I’m not reading you, I’m reading energy or spirit to get guidance for you. Since that spirit energy comes from outside of physical space, our proximity within physical space doesn’t matter.
The words are the same whether I say them out loud, type them into an email or write them on paper. The only difference is the way in which you enjoy receiving your message, not in the message itself. Phone sessions tend to be social, light, chatty, friendly. Your questions are answered in the moment as we go along. Written or recorded readings are private, powerful and intense. Written words amplify the emotion and magick of the moment. All distance Tarot readings include a follow-up email to answer any questions you might have.
Want to sample a reading for free? The archives are free to explore with the search bar on the right of this page (scroll down on mobile) There are years of readings to browse. You might find your answer there, or at least you can see if we are a good match to work together on new, paid private reading for you.
Sage Sips is Tarot for your day in the time it takes to sip your coffee.
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CHOOSE your card from the snapshot above, then watch the video to reveal your card and get the reading in video description or below.
Strength: Never confuse blind fanaticism with strength. The strength you need requires a presence of mind and compassion not just brute physical endurance.
“Digger” Death: Change is not only inevitable, sometimes it is a relief. Bury that thing and walk away. Let it go.
“Bones” Death: Look for what lies beneath. Knowing the whole story can change your perspective, your feelings, your decisions. In other words, knowing the whole story changes everything.
Deck: Alleyman’s Tarot by Seven Dane Asmund used with permission
The Allbright by Annalise Jensen from the Alleyman’s Tarot Deck used with permission
Before looking at specific behind-the-scenes topics, last week we started at the very beginning. Why do Tarot at all? What’s the use of it?
I’m biased, of course. I’m a professional Tarot reader which means that I’ve earned money in exchange for my art and expertise. (I would very much like to continue – so please buy my readings!)
All kidding aside, Tarot has a great deal of inherent value. I’ve experienced the benefits of Tarot for myself as a client which is why I continued to practice and study enough to become a professional. Tarot has something to offer everyone regardless of your seat at the table; reader, client or do-it-yourself-er.
Tarot can
Reduce stress and ease difficult emotions
Give insight into specific problems
Encourage personal growth in general
Serve as spiritual expression
Inspire decisions
Break old thought-habits and encourage creative problem solving
Validate your intuition and empower you and your choices
Entertain: humor and playfulness are valuable in their own right, beyond the ability to relieve stress and lift emotions.
Every yang has its yin and vice versa. You’ll notice none of these have anything to do with predicting the future, which brings us to the other half of “why ask why?”
No reason. No need to ask why do a Tarot reading. Not at all.
Here we get back to the foundation benefit of Tarot: Freethought. Tarot empowers your thoughts, your intuition, your power, your choices and your reasons – even when there are none
Ask why.
Question anything a Tarot reader says or does that isn’t clear or comfortable for you. If a reader can’t stand up to a simple “why” then maybe that reader isn’t a good match for you. A good reader will either have a reasonable explanation of the Tarot process or they will have the courage and honesty to say that they don’t know or that there is no particular reason why.
There doesn’t have to be a reason for every single little thing in life, especially where things like aesthetics, intuition or spirituality are concerned. With Tarot, if you enjoy something, there doesn’t have to be a reason why. You can believe what you believe without explaining it to anyone. You don’t have to justify following your intuition. No one is judging you. Get a reading or do a reading for any reason you like or no reason at all.
That is why I always give people the option of asking a specific question, choosing a general topic or just leaving the reading wide open.
If you have a specific ‘why’ you want to get a reading – that’s great! We’ll look at the energy through that lens.
If you don’t have a specific idea in mind – that’s great! We’ll just follow the energy and see where it goes.
Yes, absolutely ask why. Always.
In Tarot, “just because” or “I just want to” or “it’ll be fun” are perfectly good answers.
Next up: Look for some members’ exclusive content over the weekend. Your Choice Tarot is planned for Monday. I’m trying something a little different with the YouTube upload and automatic captions – so let me apologize now for any boneheaded technical mistakes I might make. See you at the next sip!
Sage Sips / TaoCraft Tarot 
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