wheel of fortune – Sage Sips / TaoCraft Tarot

Welcome Back 2025 (part 2)

Sometimes you have to retreat a little bit in order to walk forward again on a better path.

Some years feel like more of the same. This is not one of those years.

2025 is still a welcome back of sorts – a welcome back to inevitable, unending change and a welcome back to TaoCraft. There is nothing wrong with retreating to familiar or comforting things in unprecedented times like these. It’s the right thing to do when mistakes have been made. Sometimes you have to retreat a little bit in order to change direction and walk forward again on a better path.

A pattern emerged from all of the readings I’ve been doing since mid November or so. The details were different and the message was unique to the individual but at the same time there was a similar thread of energy running through all of them. The series of readings taken as a whole was giving background context and clues to our shared energy environment.

Basically, the meta-message was 2025 was going to be a storm of turbulent energy followed by “a happy ending” with better times in 2026. Sure, that sounds like wishful thinking. Life has been ups and downs, good times and bad times since time immemorial. Even though it is only the first half of January, a better 2026 is a teeny-tiny glimmer of optimism so I’ll take it, wishful or not.

Change is key. Things can get worse if they change but by the same token things can only get better if they change. Imagine a bright colored dot on the side of a bicycle wheel. As the wheel turns, metaphorically moving forward through time, first the dot appears to move down toward the ground, but then it moves up again and the cycle repeats. It all goes back to Taoist philosophy which has always been a tremendous comfort and makes sense out of life for me. Hence the name TaoCraft. But we’ve already talked about that back in 2018 when I took up the name the first time.

There are a few other minor changes for 2025. This will be the first full year of reverting back to the TaoCraft Tarot name for the website, commissioned readings, and hopefully, for a Tarot how-to eBook. All things “Sage Words Tarot” have been allowed to expire. The best way to contact me is TaoCraftTarot@gmail.com or the contact form on the Ask Me Anything page. Members can add ko-fi DM to the list.

“A thought is powerful. The spoken word is more powerful, but the written word is the most powerful of all”
Sallie Christensen, author of “The Highest And Best”

The next change is putting live readings on hiatus. I’m a writer at heart. I want to focus on email readings, which are my specialty. Email lets me do my absolute best readings for you. #kofigoalchallenge

Recorded video readings are also available if you prefer to listen rather than read (random unrelated opinion: audio books count the same as reading physical paper books.) Speaking of books: email & recorded video Tarot readings are perfect for book lovers of every type. My Tarot is a reader’s reading.

The email / recorded format has a ton of advantages:

Convenient: no appointment needed, the reading comes to you instead of you going to it. Easy, secure PayPal checkout is just like ordering anything online.
Eco friendly: no travel, no gasoline used, we are using electricity that we would be using anyway for other email. This kind of reading has essential zero carbon footprint.
AFFORDABLE: my email Tarot prices haven’t changed in years. No physical location = cost savings that I pass along to you.
Private: You open the email in a place and time best for you. No one sees you travel to a psychic.

But to get back to the task at hand: here is a quick introduction to all things TaoCraft. After that, I’m dropping all the “marketing best practices” and crazy pants promotions, just as I’ve threatened to do in the past. I’m going to do what I do best – email readings and blog readings. If that doesn’t work – welp, I tried. We can leave these recommended “re-introduce yourself” posts for New Years.

On the other hand, if you like what you see and want a reading with me, great! Bring it! Let’s work together and make some magic!

“If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.”
Albert Einstein

Let’s start at the beginning and try to keep it all simple. My pen name is Sage. I read Tarot, write stuff and knit things. I’ve been working with Tarot, Oracle cards and intuition development since 1993. At first I read for myself & friends. In 2003 – ish a friend suggested that I read online, for which I am forever grateful. I did email Tarot readings for Keen, Advice Trader and AllExperts in the early 2000s. I’ve done literally hundreds of email readings. I stopped counting at 400 and that was around 2003. After that, I started professional Tarot readings with my own website Modern Oracle Tarot, with its Tarotbytes blog and the now defunct Quirk & Flotsam Etsy shop.

In 2018 I re-branded the whole thing to TaoCraft Tarot. In 2023 I wanted unleash the coffee lover in me and make full use of ko-fi’s “buy me a coffee” metaphor for support donations. So I switched again to Sage Words Tarot and the whole Sage Sips blog is Tarot in the time it takes to sip your coffee thing.

That, as it turns out, was a miscalculation.

So Welcome Back. 2025 is a year of change; a change back to TaoCraft Tarot for private readings and book titles while keeping Sage Sips for the blog and ko-fi page.

To that end, the blogs will post 2-3 times per week and you can order a private email or video Tarot reading with me anytime, 24/7 – no appointment required.

The email reading comes to your mailbox as a .pdf or .docx attachment, usually within 24 hours . There might be some delays if you order on a US holiday, nights (US eastern time) or weekends. Video files are still too big for email attachments. If you order a video reading, you’ll get an email with a private link to your recording.

All of my readings generally have the same basic structure:

Photo or video of your real world cards
general pattern (the card layout as a whole, any initial psychic / intuitive impressions
Card-by-card discussion
Summary that recaps the layout as a whole plus adds in any other purely intuitive impressions. That often includes things like crystals, colors, aromatherapy – any random helpful detail.

There is some variation. One card readings are purely intuitive. Yes/no readings tend to have a more unstructured, tongue in cheek, lighthearted style.

For 2025 I am offering 4 layouts all of the time, no specials or seasonal changes except for Sage Sip Members (more on that later)

“Seasons” 5 card year ahead Tarot reading: ($30 non-memebers, $25 members) Start at any point in the year – birthdays, anniversary, holiday, new year – get one card guidance for each of the upcoming seasons plus one theme card for the entire year.
“TaoCraft” 5 card Tarot reading: ($30 non-members, $25 members) This is the updated version of the old Modern Oracle layout that I wrote in 2003. Cards show influences from the past, current energy environment, advice and cautions, best path ahead, alternative path if you so choose.
“Zombie Cat” 3 card yes or no: ($15 non-members, $10 members) Get a concise yes or no answer plus advice and intuitive impressions based on the individual three cards.
“Sage’s Sip” 1 card meditation: general intuitive advice or a focused follow-up to a recent larger layout ($5 non-members, FREE for members)

Sage Sips membership on Ko-fi is $5 per month and includes FREE 1 card email Tarot up to three per calendar month, discounts on larger layouts, exclusive content on the ko-fi members-only blog and random special offers.

This blog, social media, the YouTube channel, the public portion of the ko-fi blog are all free and non-monetized. Your Tarot message comes first, not an advertisers. Any ads you see benefit the platform and makes it free for me to use (a savings I pass along to you) All of this is supported by readers / listeners through the memberships, private readings and shop purchases.

All of my readings are commissioned, ephemeral folk art that is intended to inspire, empower, facilitate understanding, help creative problem solving, and boost your connection to your own spirituality & inner wisdom.

All of my policies are listed HERE.

“Tarot isn’t about what will happen in life. Tarot helps you figure out what to do when life happens.”
Sage Snow

Please note that these readings are about predicting the future, reading other people, medical or legal questions. Tarot doesn’t do these things very well. I don’t want to waste my time or your money when we can focus on the more helpful, uplifting stuff that Tarot is great at doing. This artwork is a hobby for me, not a business. I am as open and transparent with you as humanly possible, which is why I wrote the policies page. I only ask for compensation for my time and to help defray web hosting costs.

Thank you for hanging in with the longest post in a long time. I appreciate you! See you at the next sip!

Choose Your Card 10 June 2024

Private Readings by email / recorded video are OPEN, no appointment needed.

Three of Swords: The first step in healing a broken heart is acknowledging it exists. It’s ok not to be ok. You don’t have to be ok. You only need to be. Moment by moment, day by day it slowly gets better. Dharma Drum Mountain gives the best advice I’ve ever seen for dealing with heartache and problems.

Face it
Accept it (accept it is real, not that it is right – more on that later)
Deal with it
Let it go

Nine of Pentacles: It’s a good place. It’s a good day. It’s OK to be OK. You don’t have to be broken. You don’t have to be overjoyed. You might be (or be on the road to being) one of the lucky ones. At the same time, you don’t have to be anyone else’s savior either. You only need to be. The good things around you will take care of the rest.

The Wheel of Fortune: Up or down, we are all riding the same wheel. As the wheel of life turns, your direction up or down depends on which way you look. Shift your perspective and you are suddenly moving toward instead of away from and vice versa.

Even with your choice, this is still a collective energy reading. You get to choose which card was for you, but the card’s message was still drawn from the larger, Zeitgeist, collective energy today.

Choosing to participate at all led you to the three descriptions together. If one of the other interpretations matches you better – that’s OK too!! The process still brought you to a message that resonates with you. That’s what really matters. Keep eyes and ears open and your right message will find you, one way or another.

Want a truly personalized, private, just-for-you reading? Email and recorded video readings are open now – no appointment needed, prices from $5 to $30 total cost, no hidden fees or per minute rates.

Email readings have a picture of your individual real-world card layout. Videos show your cards being drawn. No matter whether I type it or say it – you get the same reading and the same message. It makes no difference to the process if I say it to a mic, type it on a keyboard to tell you live on a phone call. The words are the same regardless of how the words get to you.

Want to give it a try? Order HERE

Speed – or not

TaoCraft Short Sip is Tarot for your day in the time it takes to sip from your coffee. U.S. readers: Private email Tarot readings open and available to purchase throughout the Memorial Day holiday weekend, no appointment needed.

Hi and welcome to TaoCraft Tarot blog and podcast. I’m glad you are here.

Today’s card is the Wheel of Fortune from the Alleyman’s Tarot deck. The image for this card is credited as the Besancon Tarot copyright BnF (the digital national library of France.) As I understand things, this is a popular eighteenth and nineteenth century deck very similar to the Marseille deck but with a few localized changes as it was printed in Switzerland and Germany. You don’t need to know all that sort of thing to be a good Tarot card reader, but I enjoy it. Call it what you will, be it academic discipline leftover from writing my dissertation, my need for a high level of professionalism in my Tarot practice or just plain getting brain-gasms at learning cool things.

In any case, The Wheel of Fortune is one of those with fairly consistent imagery and meanings across most Marseille based or RWS type Tarot decks. Its core meaning is that everything changes. This card is the nemesis of control freaks everywhere. It also reminds us of randomness, chance and fate.

Everything changes. It can change with speed. Or not.

A wheel is a very primal thing and a potent symbol. They have been around for a long, long time. We understand how they work. They symbolize change, forward progress, ease of movement. Wheels symbolize impermanence, reincarnation, while the circle shape symbolizes perfection for Buddhism, Hinduism and Jainism. In the context of Tarot, the wheel symbolizes all of these things, but with an emphasis on randomness, chance and fate. Think of carnival games, the TV game show or the scene from “Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome” where a spinning wheel sets the punishment for deal-breakers in Bartertown.

The only certainty is that the wheel will spin. Wheels move. Even if they don’t, there are changes and consequences as a result of the stillness and stagnation. Wheels always move, if not through space then certainly through time.

The Wheel reminds us to savor the good while we can and to hold on to persistent hope that things will improve (in other words, keep moving to the front door of your sanctuary – as the 5 of pentacles recently advised)

Everything changes, but we don’t know and can’t control how fast the wheel of fortune may spin.

Thank you for listening and reading. If you enjoy the blog-cast and the companion videos on YouTube please consider liking, following, & sharing them. Please also visit the TaoCraft Tarot page on ko-fi. Shop purchases, memberships and virtual coffees all contribute to creating this free to access Tarot content.

This episode was produced on May 27, 2020. Private email readings with the blog author are open and available for purchase on the blog website throughout the upcoming US Memorial day holiday weekend, with no appointment needed. Links are in the episode description for podcast listeners.

Comments are open on the blog. Your questions and comments are always welcome. See you at the next sip!

Cycles and Randomness

Welcome to TaoCraft Short Sip Tarot. I’m glad you are here. Take a sip of your favorite beverage and rest for a moment while we contemplate today’s Tarot card

Every Short Sip blog post has a video of the real world card draw for the day at the top. Cutting the deck before a Tarot reading is sort of traditional, so most days I’ll shuffle the deck three times then cut it randomly to get the card for these posts. Why three times? No reason. I’m just partial to 3 probably because of the School House Rock “Three is a Magic Number” back in the day. I don’t show the shuffle because YouTube shorts and Instagram reels are only a few seconds long. Plus shuffling off camera lets me film one handed which saves a ton of set up time. If you want polished professional media, I can’t help. If you want raw unedited real-world Tarot, then you are in the right place.

Today’s card is the Wheel of Fortune.

The Wheel card has two threads of meaning. It can point to the cycles of life, the normal ebbs and flows like the tide. Or it can speak to the utter randomness life can have, like the game show or the trial scene from Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome. The two can connect, as paradoxical as that seems.

This card … and sometimes the Tower card …. can point to perspective as an answer to a dilemma. What seems like a random bolt from the blue can start to make sense if you look at it with a larger perspective and as a piece of bigger puzzle.

Or in this case, the seemingly random things might be part of a much larger cycle. It’s akin to comets. They used to be seen as random harbingers of doom. But now we understand that they are ice chunks that are sometimes one time fly-bys, and sometimes have such large orbits that their cycles near the sun were beyond human notice.

Some things are just random. Cycles and patterns, when we can find them, are comforting. Maybe that is why our brains are hard wired to find them. Those tendencies are a part of us, so why not use them if it can help us learn, grow and cope? What patterns and cycles have you been seeing? If a seemingly random problem has crossed your path, maybe it would help solve it if you widen your perspective and look to larger, longer cycles in life.

Thank you so much for reading, listening and watching today. The “buy me a coffee” virtual tip jar, Tarot Table memberships on ko-fi and a portion of private readings purchased through this website all support the creation of this free-for-everyone Tarot content. I appreciate any support you can spare including likes, subs, and shares.

See you at the next sip!

Comments are open: Ask me anything! All (reasonable, non-spam) questions will be answered in the blog & podcast. Let me know what kind of Tarot/intuition/psychic behind-the-scenes/Reiki content you’d like to see, and we’ll create something for you.

Plan 21

I have a theory.

You have to HAVE a plan before life, circumstances and general random crap can blow it all to pieces. Life can get pretty Darwinian sometimes. Adapt or die. But you have to have something TO adapt. You have to be in the water before you can go with the flow. Plan/adapt, yang/yin: I doubt anyone is surprised to see me go kind of Taoist with all of this.

My original plan lasted all the way through 9 am yesterday. So step one is declare time and calendars to be merely arbitrary (they are) and just roll all of this out now instead of a nice, neat Monday morning. This is my general game plan for 2021, subject to change. Everything is, subject to change that is.

Video/blog combos twice per week: YouChoose week ahead on the weekend (or early Monday morning) and Today’s tarot on Wednesdays
One card Tarot readings on the blog other days as often as possible, with longer reads sprinkled in as the inspiration (or reader questions) hit.
No more cutesy pants marketing promotions. The prices are very affordable and the quality of the readings are high. What I offer is a solid value as it is. I’m good at this. I love doing this. I’m here to help. Let’s do some Tarot together.
20% of the proceeds from all one card distance Tarot readings by e-mail will be donated to the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank throughout the year.
No more seasonal shenanigans. All the readings I do are available all of the time. You can find a price and layout to fit any budget, mood or question, all on the home page.
Announcements weekly in the youchoose posts, or in the blog / Twitter for emergencies/cancellations
Expect delays nights, weekends and U.S. holidays.
In-person sessions and parties will remain closed until the Halloween season 2021
Comments and social media are OPEN. Talk to me people! Let me know the kind of content you like, don’t like and want to see and I can, you know, adapt. (comments are still curated and spam is still obliterated in a blinding flash of hellfire)

That being said, let’s DO this thing.

The energy IS different than it was last year. I still get the mental image of the U.S. map with lot’s of little tornadoes all over it, but they are fading. I also get a dry, windy ‘aftermath’ feeling, like a scene from a disaster movie, with a feeling like coming out of the storm shelter with a rock in the pit of your stomach as you see the damage, and start to process what just happened and that it was just as bad as it seemed. Or maybe that is just my gut twisting when I hear how many people traveled over the holidays. We’ve turned a sort of corner, but now comes damage assessment, realizing the losses, and the first inklings of the beginnings of the beginning of recovery. Don’t put away your chaps just yet. There is still plenty of Mad Max style dystopian post apocalyptic energy out there. They aren’t kidding. It is probably going to be a dark-energy winter, at least locally (U.S. vs global) Spring and summer have that ‘aftermath’ feel. I feel pretty optimistic about Fall, although I usually do since it is far and away my favorite time of year.

Nature is adapting, but it is also cycles. No new forward looking new year planning is complete without a little retrospective. Thank you all for reading, following, commenting, liking and making this all worth doing. I’m grateful.