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[/media-credit]Hey readers,
Welcome to the inaugural edition of “Dear Wizard.” I want to tell you what I’m doing here, and then I’m going to talk about the elephant that’s about to appear in the room.
So this is an intuitive advice column. (Cue the elephant.) It’s not an etiquette column, it’s not an ethics column, it’s not an advice column about the practical logistics of things. It’s a column where you bring me your most tender, sticky dilemmas, and I help illuminate the energetic patterns that are running that affect the situation. This is what I do for a living; I’m an intuitive reader, primarily clairsentient and a little clairvoyant. That means that when I consider your question, I get all kinds of physical sensations and visual and textural metaphors that clue me in about how things are going for you and what might help untangle your tangles. (My granny was clairvoyant, and her mom before her, and her grandmother before her, et cetera, in case you dig that kind of thing.) I frequently use Tarot cards as a tool, but not always. Sometimes the information just swings in without a filter. So sometimes I’ll refer to them and sometimes I won’t.
The most important thing for me to tell you is that I’m not doing predictions here. Guessing the future is not my work. (So don’t be asking me if you’re going to win the lottery. I don’t know. Or I kind of do: you probably won’t. Surprise!) What I do is help people get a peek at the underbelly of the present, and the potentials and pitfalls you’re working with right this minute. Think prescriptive rather than predictive, and you’re on the right track.
By the way, the column’s called “Dear Wizard” because I love wizards, and that’s just going to have to be reason enough. (To the left, wizard-haters. Everything you own in a box to the left.) (To the wizard lovers: WIZARDS. Am I right? Wizards. God bless.)
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[/media-credit]And now, the elephant.
Some of you almost certainly think this is all bullshit. Tarot cards, intuition…so vapid, so woo-woo. Crystal alert!
S’alright. Nobody needs to believe anything mystical here unless they feel like it. Think of me as a storyteller, making customized stories for the people who ask for them. If I’m using cards, it’s fine for pure coincidence to be the reason particular cards show up. I can’t prove any differently, myself, even if I have suspicions otherwise. I’ve just done this enough to know that good, appropriate stories tend to show up for the people who ask. I don’t care why that’s true, but it is true. And if I’m not using cards, if I’m just using what I know as my intuition, then as a storyteller I’m choosing to run with the pictures and feelings and sensations that first bubble up in me when I’m considering a question. I don’t care how they got there; I only care if they’re useful.
I find the Tarot to be an incredibly beautiful, helpful system myself and it deserves to have its cred dusted off/polished up. Since I’ll be using cards regularly, here’s a quick primer on what’s going on in a Tarot deck. Bookmark this baby, because I’m only doing this once:
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[/media-credit]The Tarot draws on rich, complex, ancient archetypes. There are two different sorts of cards: Major Arcana and Minor Arcana. (“Big Secrets” and “Little Secrets”, when you translate from Latin. I think that’s mighty pretty.) The Major Arcana cards carry heavier thematic weight in a reading. They’re the deeper soul lessons you’re learning, and it’s worth scanning your life to see where else their lessons might currently apply. The Minor Arcana cards–divided into four suits: Swords, Cups, Pentacles and Wands–deal with the day-to-day concerns that fall under the auspices of each suit. Swords address mental processes and strife; Cups are the realm of feeling and imagination; Pentacles have to do with earthy practicalities like money and health, and Wands describe the movement of energy. (Sometimes the energy in question is creative or sexual, and sometimes the card is a pure descriptor of how energy is moving.)
Good? Good. That’s a deck, quick and dirty. Now, no two readers are going to interpret a spread in the exact same way. You’re coming through me, here, with all my particular filters and tilts and biases. There isn’t one right interpretation; there’s the one you get, the Tina-flavored one I’m going to give you. Some people who read this and do Tarot might think HELL NO to a particular interpretation of mine. That’s cool, and it’s also irrelevant. I do it how I do it at my little cosmic taco stand.
I’m not a doomsayer and I don’t deliver spankings. Some readers get off on their own shocking bluntness. I like to deliver information and advice in a way that tastes kind of good, even if there’s medicine in it, because I don’t want you spitting it out. I want you to at least chew on it long enough to get some nutrients.
And no question is too heavy or too dumb. I only ask that your questions be sincere, not tossed-off, and about the things that really matter to you. The best questions, also, aren’t the yes-or-no, passive, will-this-one-thing-happen-or-won’t it questions. The questions I’m looking for are the ones where the questioner genuinely wants to figure out how to steer his or her ship. Active, searching questions. And in return I’ll give you the most thoughtful, truthful take I can, and I’m not going to judge you. I’ve made enough mistakes myself in the course of my life that it’d be awfully rich if I did.
Awfully rich.
So bring me what you’ve got. Bring me the stuff that’s eating away at you. Let’s see if we can buy you a little relief. Send your questions to wizard@seattlestar.net
Love,
Wizards-R-Us
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