Sage Sips Members on Ko-Fi get one free Tarot reading by email each calendar month, DM access, and exclusive content on the ko-fi blog. Click above for information or to join.
Membership is $5/month and includes one private Tarot reading by email each calendar month
The monthly readings are NOT automatic, but all you have to do is DM and ask.
I don’t read anyone without their prior consent, plus it helps me connect to your individual message when I see your question, topic or request for an open reading.
The tiny little sliver of my brain that tries to understand business and marketing and convince people to get their Tarot readings with me thinks that the name changes and re-branding and re-re-branding is…what’s that technical term? Bonkers. It’s bonkers.
Tarot is not a normal business and the best I can do is let you know I do affordable readings, email is my specialty, and I have very affordable prices. Especially for the no appointment needed email readings that are the best thing I do.
It’s true.
The more comfortable a psychic is as they work, the better psychic reading you get. When we are in a comfy happy place we can put all of our bandwidth on the reading and not have to worry about other details, like uncomfortable social silences while we listen to intuition / spirit, for example.
I don’t know what possessed me to make the switch to Sage Words Tarot except as a smoke screen to soften my political rhetoric (Christian nationalism is dangerous, vote for Harris/Walz on November 5) and maybe protect our privacy from said Christian evangelical white nationalists.
Vote as is your life and our democracy depends on it, because it does. That’s fact, not Tarot, not intuition.
Long story short – welcome back to TaoCraft.
One more change before we can settle in and get to some serious coffee sipping:
Zombie Cat Yes/No readings are 100% guaranteed to contain words and have a 50% chance of being dead wrong.
It’s almost that time of year.
Life and the squirrel rave have finally forced me to get a little organized and simplify for 2024
Short and sweet: I have THREE layouts and THREE prices all of the time
Modern Oracle (5 cards, $30)
Eclipse (3 cards, $15)
Sage’s Sip (1 card, $5)
BUT I have lots of other layouts that are only available seasonally by email only.
June 1, 2024 is the start of ZOMBIE CAT’S SUMMER SHAMBLE
June 1 to September 1 Zombie Cat Yes/No readings are $10 for members, $15 for non-members. This layout gives a yes or no answer to ANY question (see disclaimer) plus insights based on the three cards we use to get your yes/no answer. What follows is an actual reading, used with permission, but lightly edited to protect privacy. More about yes/no readings coming soon.
Witches Tarot by Ellen Dugan and Mark Evans copyright 2012 used with permission Llwellynpublishing.com
Q: I’ve been going through a lot lately. Things are changing fast and I’ve been learning so many things the hard way. Are things ever going to calm down?
A: Maybe but leaning yes.
My hunch is that it is actually more yes than maybe, but with the downside that it won’t kick in for a few more months yet. In my minds eye I see the dogs howling at the moon that you see on some many Moon cards. For some reason that says “dog days of summer” to me. Maybe this is pure projection on my part, because this time of year with the sun, heat and humidity makes my fur more gnarly than usual. It feels like the current energy pattern is going to hang around at least as long as the hot weather. “Things will turn with the weather, bluer skies and sweaters.” Knowing where you are, I’m remembering painting outside on a 80 degree November not so long ago. I’m thinking don’t hold your breath for any real relief until a serious, growing season ending, killing frost. Sort of a big harvest moon, October–December vibe. That would go along with the 4 of Wands, which is about foundations, and community celebrations.
The 4 of Wands also speaks to the new place to live. Yes, it will become foundational, in time. I ‘hear’ “make a house a home” plus something about grounding or earth…this is gonna sound more nuts than usual. I don’t know what the issues are around the new address, but it feels like the energy there needs both cleared and grounded, swept of a lingering funk that pre-dates you and rooted and grounded … settled if you will… on an energy level to make a way for more literal grounding and calming to manifest. This is weird, purely intuitive, and has no basis in science or tradition that I know of on a conscious level. I get the image of sprinkling a 50/50 mixture of salt and diatomacious earth….literally just by pinches at a time…along the baseboards, along the perimeter walls of the house. Don’t worry about inner walls, or specific rooms, just the walls that join the outside. No need to make a big mess, just a ceremonial line using little pinches and clear intention. Sage and smuding are too airy and ethereal. This calls for a tangible bam of something.
The Ace of Swords is associated with air. This feels a little more cautioning than reassuring / advising like the 4 of wands was. Swords and air have to do with intellect. Don’t overthink during this upcoming season, now through the end of the year in any case. This also would go along with the literal grounding / clearing house thing, as being needed to balance the airy creative energy.
The Ace of Swords also reminds me of something you said when we were talking about which deck you’d like to use for this. You were talking about being more “ethereal….like a good spiritual student” with the other deck, but went with this one because it was “bubbling up inside.” I warrant that listening to the stuff that bubbles up inside IS what it means to be a good spiritual student. It is easy to equate spirituality with ethereal, good with serene and so on. This card, this part of the yes/no reminds me of what we were saying yesterday, if it seems like life is beating on you…it is. And that is ok. It first of all is probably because Life knows you are badass enough to deal with it, and second of all, chaos and pains in the ass are just as spiritual as rainbows and unicorns. Remember that article you sent, and that Alan Watts quote? “You are a function of what the whole universe is doing just like a wave is a function of what the whole ocean is doing.”
In other words, don’t sweat it, you GOT this. The ocean of life, love and spirituality touch the great white shark the same as the angelfish. Rest will come in its time. Meanwhile, enjoy the swim. You wouldn’t be in the deep end if you couldn’t handle it. This is a chance to discover your inner orca, have a glass of wine, watch Shark Week on TV….that kind of thing. Recharge? Sure. You eat stress for breakfast. You got this.
The Ace of Wands continues in that vein with a more inward turn. Knowing that spirituality takes all forms, so does self-care. Like the human has said before about this card….carry a torch for yourself. Accept your passions and desires, strengths and weakness for what they are…both your increadable resiliancy and your sincere desire for a day off. Need a break? Take it! With gusto and passion! Tell it all to leave a message, and take a spa day. Which I guess takes us back to wine and shark week, but you get the idea. Let your passions shine, even if it is a passion for kicking things to the curb and carving out the peace and quiet you want. Want peace and quiet with burning passion! Or something like that.
So YES things will settle, but that process can be helped along. You have been answered “the hard way” because you can handle it. Rest hasn’t come yet because you still have a bit more to do. It may not feel like it, but you can keep on keeping on. Plus maybe this is a time to explore the gritty, gnarly, not–so-ethereal side of spirituality. Don’t ask me why, but Sam Elliot style movie characters come to mind…the grizzled antihero, Deadpool kind of thing. Not saying that you are that way, just that might be a good mental cosplay, a way to find a way to have a little fun with the chaos until the rest really does come, which it will, but later. Kind of like when the human let’s me come out and play and unleash a little Zombie snark on the world. It’s all just in good fun to get you through until that change in the literal and energetic weather.
Braaaiiiiinns!
Zombie Cat
Entertainment only. Zombies don’t exist and these readings don’t predict anything. Use with caution – the ideas here might change your perspective and improve your life choices.
Love and Romance Tarot Layout at a special introductory price for Valentine’s day
Over the years, I’ve done one card love & romance themed Tarot readings in the blog. I’ve collected all of those in an eBook in the shop. You can read them for free if you are willing to rummage around in the archives.
It’s pretty clear that the one card reading in the blog idea has run its course.
This year I wrote the “My Tarot Valentine” romance reading layout, inspired by the poetry collection Triquetra: The Dance of Worlds. The collection has three sections, the reading has three cards with similar themes. The three cards in this reading are:
The Inner World: personal growth, your relationship with yourself
The Outer World: the big picture, your relationship with life in general
The Dance of Worlds: Close interpersonal relationships – romance, marriage, family, children (whatever is top of mind for you when you seek the reading)
These readings are intensely personal and not at all well suited to a collective energy reading. I cant ever really bring myself to try. The overall structure is the same as with ALL of my email and video readings. It starts with a photo of your real world card layout plus general impressions, then it goes card by card and wraps up with a “psychic summary.” The summary is an opportunity to put any purely intuitive impressions that might connect to the cards – or not. Sometimes there are aromatherapy or crystal impressions that come through…
For example right now I’m getting the impression of rose scent (ugh…not my favorite) and clear quartz points. Why clear quartz and not the usual lovey-dovey rose quartz? I dunno. Maybe someone needs to think about making a connection to their higher selves to get through a hallmark holiday that jabs at their loneliness, or to better speak their love language to those already in their life. That’s for you to say if and how that random tidbit resonates with you
Since this kind of reading simply doesn’t translate well into blog content, these special My Tarot Valentine layouts are $5 OFF compared to all the other three card readings. Please try one today. You can purchase anytime, no appointment needed. Please allow 2-3 business days for delivery.
This special introductory price and the My Tarot Valentine layout both end 29 February 2024
The general plan is to learn about this Lenormand deck in the same way we recently explored the Publishing Goblin oracle dice and before that my new and much used Alleyman’s Tarot Deck.
There is no teacher quite like experience, especially when it comes to something as subjective and individual as intuition and oracles. The basic strategy over the coming weeks is that I’ll pull a random card (and post the draw on YouTube Shorts. I did that this week but the the technical glitch gremlins got to it)
After the random draw, we’ll read it purely intuitively based on the collective energy of the day – just like we read the collective energies for the week each Monday.
Then I’ll go to the guide book, which in this case is sparse, around a paragraph per card, and summarize what it says.
A word on guide books in general:
Use them as a tool, but not as an authority.
There is no dishonor in finding inspiration when you need it.
Guidebooks are great in situations like this to help you get comfortable with a new deck or technique. Guidebooks are essential when you are very first learning to read cards at all, like the DIY one card meditation readings you learn how to do in my book PeaceTarot.
Even after reading for 30 years, there are still times when I look at a card and get exactly nothing. Tarot readers are human and nobody is perfect. If you hit one of those I-got-nothin’ moments then it is perfectly fine to fall back on either a guidebook or a memorized “meaning” It will prime the pump so speak, and spark the intuition that you need for genuine reading that is of the energy of the moment.
Today’s card is The Dog.
The image on this particular deck is warm and sunny, and I associated it with all of the positive happy energies of the RWS major arcana card The Sun. Dogs are the essence of loyalty and friendship.
Clearly this is a good start for making friends with a new deck.
It has a sense of reciprocity today, too. “To make a friend, be a friend”
In the moment, it feels like making friends with this deck is going to be easy.
The guidebook doesn’t add much, just reiterates the “faithfulness and loyalty”
The guidebook isn’t much help in this little learning project we have going. I may just give the key words in the beginning and just give it an intuitive read from there.
Do you have any thoughts which would be more helpful to you? Comment if you like. Guidebook keywords at the beginning or end?
It’s interesting that the card is connected to the 10 of hearts. You can read the suit of hearts much as you would the suit of cups in the RWS decks. It is about emotion, happiness, closest inner circle relationships….like your closest friends.
PeaceTarot also teaches you how to use playing cards in place of Tarot cards to use the guidebook meanings in PeaceTarot if you prefer playing cards or if you don’t have access to a RWS style Tarot deck. 10 of hearts is equivalent to the 10 of cups, which has to do with happy family and happy (and loyal) relationships. It all fits.
If this card resonates for you today, it is a reminder to appreciate the friends and emotionally close people in your life. Tell them. Show them. Check in with them. Be a friend today.
If you are feeling friendless, befriend yourself. Just be patient and kind. It’s like playing fetch with your favorite doggo…throw some kindness out there and life will fetch it back sooner or later.
Thank you for reading. The short and sweet newsletter for this week will post on Thursday morning.
See you at the next sip!
Spooky Season Special:
Use the Ask Me Anything page to submit a yes/no question and get a Zombie Cat style Tarot reading answer in the blog!
All Zombie Cat readings are 100% guaranteed to contain words and have a 50% chance of being dead wrong.
entertainment only
Image: author photo of her purchased copy of Healing Light Lenormand by Christoher Butler copyright 2021 Lo Scarabeo srl, via Cigna 110, 10155 Torino, Italy. All rights reserved, used by permission.
In October 2018, I re-branded, re-launched and re-defined my Tarot work from the now thoroughly defunct Modern Oracle to my now beloved TaoCraft Tarot. I don’t know about you, but I am thoroughly enjoying the witchy-ness of it. That’s the ‘craft’ part of the name.
TaoCraft is, has been and always will be inspired by the three treasures of Taoism: Simplicity, honesty (authenticity) and kindness. That’s the Tao part of the name.
In the spirit of simplicity (and transparency) I’ve given up on all the cutesy pants sales, promotions, special offers and giveaways. I’m an expert, experienced Tarot reader, and I’m letting my work do the talking.
11/12 of the time, all you’ll see is the members-only discounts in the shop because, well, that’s a benefit of membership.
But also in the spirit of celebration and gratitude, every October I create some sort of special offer or discount that is open to everyone to say thank you for reading the blogs, listening to the podcast and being a part of the Tarot community at large.
This year, all one card Short Sip private readings by email are only $1 (regularly $5). Anyone can get the reduced price. If you use the readings/commissions menu you can send your questions and purchase the reading all in one PayPal secured transaction. If you grab the one in the shop, please email your question to me here at TaoCraftTarot@gmail.com. If I don’t hear from you, I’ll just do an open reading. When we work by email, you get the EXACT same words and message that you would get face to face, but no appointment is needed. You can’t beat these readings for privacy, convenience or price.
Seriously, you can get a reading from a person with 30 years of Tarot experience for one dollar. No scam, no fees, no nothing except me interpreting a card for you.
As you may have read / heard on the blog the other day, one card readings for an individual are a different animal than the broad topic short sips we do on the blog & podcast. They are very personalized.
And, as you probably already know, Tarot readings are customized, inspirational, spiritual guidance folk art, not predictions for the future and not for medical questions.
I hope you’ll join me in a reading. I hope you’ll keep reading the blog and / or listening to the podcast. No matter what, I wish you a happy, healthy, fun, and prosperous years-to-come.
Members only newsletter and learn to read Tarot “turnover” exercise is up for this week: HERE
I put the planned schedule for Fall on my personal blog, Sage & Stuff. Now we just need to see how long this one holds up before this squirrel rave that we call life blows everything up.
The content on the other blog is going to be different from this one moving forward, so you are all more than welcome to follow both. In fact, I kind of hope you will.
Memberships are available on ko-fi if you would like to access the Tarot Turnover intuition builder exercises. There are two levels of membership available:
Get your seat at the Tarot Table for $5 per month and get:
pathway 3 card Tarot reading every month on the members only ko-fi blog
newsletter – also on the ko-fi blog
weekly bts and Tarot card reading practice with the weekend “Tarot Turnover” posts
Special offers and giveaways – current offer is 60% off Zombie Cat yes/no readings when purchased through the ko-fi shop.
Be a Patron of the Tarot Arts for $10 per month and get
all Tarot Table benefits
PLUS individual, private, one card meditation readings to your email upon request up to 3 per calendar month.
Here is the Big announcement:
TaoCraft Tarot shop is now exclusively on ko-fi.
This will help me keep prices the same for the rest of this year, at least.
My readings are some of the most affordable going, anyway. I charge a flat rate per total reading, not per minute. Compare my roughly hour long 7 card readings at $40 to the $50 to $75 to $90 some other psychics charge for as little as 30 minutes. Granted, I’ll be holding the line on time a little more strictly than I have in the past, but this would be an out and out bargain at half of the time for a reading from someone with 30 years of Tarot reading experience.
There are a few new pages here. I’ll let you browse the new Reiki and How To Find a Trustworthy Psychic (excerpt from the upcoming TaoCraft: Portfolio) pages at your leisure.
Have a great week…see you Monday – Friday for Short Sip Tarot posts & podcasts!
Next weekend? Really? Well that month escalated fast.
Just a quick reminder that Zombie Cat yes/no readings are $5 off for only one more week before the price goes back to abnormal.
Zombie Cat yes/no readings used to be seasonal, but they are available year-round now on the “Special Layouts” section of the no-appointment email readings page.
What makes them “Zombie Cat” readings? They are written with fictional cartoon alter-ego Zombie Cat’s tongue in what’s left of his cheek mildly snarky dad joke level sense of humor . He’s a zombie. He’s a cat. He doesn’t care about how predictions do or don’t work. Zombie Cat doesn’t care about disclaimers (they still apply – ZC just doesn’t give a rat’s patootie about them) Ask ANYTHING. No promises it will be an answer you want to hear. Want a prediction? He’ll give it to you. It just might be dead wrong.
In other words, they are perfect fun for Halloween.
Sage Sips / TaoCraft Tarot 
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