184. Saying Yes to the Whisper with the Fool
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In our journey around centering the "rainbows" of life, the things that we cherish, love, and adore, how can we navigate the discomfort that can bring up? The Fool can be an extraordinarily helpful and bolstering Anchor Card for the kinds of invitations that Ten of Cups brings to us, inviting us to listen to our wise inner whispers, to honor both the storms and the rainbows of life, and to develop more willingness to be with our most vulnerable, hopeful, loving feelings.
Air date:
February 11, 2022
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About the Episode
In today’s episode, we dive into the heart of The Fool, and I answer a listener's question about how to start a Tarot practice.
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Land Acknowledgement
Honoring and acknowledging that this podcast episode was recorded on the unceded land of The Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, currently called Portland, OR, with the deepest respect to the Kalapuya Tribe, Cowlitz Tribe, and Atfalati Tribe.
Please Note
CW Tags: trauma and death
The content in this episode contains references to trauma and death. We have done our best to identify difficult subject matter, but the labels may not be comprehensive for your personal needs. Please honor your knowing and proceed with necessary self-awareness and care.
Transcript
[Introduction]
[0:00:00]
Hello Loves, just a quick announcement before today's episode that my brand new offering, Rewilding our Intuition, is open for enrollment. Rewilding our Intuition is a self paced, pre-recorded audio course designed to assist folks in the initiatory process of opening to and trusting their wise inner voice.
If you have taken courses or classes or read books on intuitive or psychic development, and have not resonated with what was shared; if you really doubt that you're intuitive at all or that you have those gifts or those abilities; if you're longing and have been longing to deepen your trust and connection with your intuition, but aren't really sure how to do that; and/or feel fear or trepidation around intuition, working with your channel, and you'd like to work with a resource that honors those feelings, this offering is most definitely for you.
I believe that each and every one of us are born intuitive and we all have unique and special ways that we are meant to express that, live that out—and that it looks different for all of us. And this offering really centers that and values that and amplifies that. So if you're longing for a really affordable (Lindsay laughs) offering that is a really digestible, kind of foundational way to initiate or to start the process of your rewilding of your intuition, I think you might really like this offering. If you're wanting to lean in and celebrate your gifts, you’ll definitely find it there. Again, it's open for enrollment. You can check it out by going to the link on the show notes or to lindsaymack.com. Thanks so much for listening. I hope you love it.
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(Instrumental intro music)
[00:02:08]
Welcome to Tarot for the Wild Soul, a bi-monthly podcast that explores the Tarot through an inclusive, soul centered, trauma-informed perspective for growth, healing, and evolution. I'm your host, Lindsay Mack.
Hello, Wild Souls, and welcome to a new episode of the podcast. I'm so grateful to be connected with you, gathered with you, as always. Today, we are going to be diving into our supportive Anchor Card for our work with our card for the month of February, which is Ten of Cups.
I was really curious about this one. I knew that there were many different places where it could go and when I sort of cast and knew that Ten of Cups would be the card for February, I was very interested to see (Lindsay laughs), again, which card would come up as the supportive card. And indeed, this particular card changed a couple times until it really landed on this one. So I'm very excited to dive into it.
Our card today is The Fool and we're going to talk all about how The Fool… A. How to work with The Fool, B. How to work with it as an Anchor Card, C. How to kind of plug it into the work that we're doing around the theme for the month of February, which is “wonder”, and the work that we're doing inside of this container that we're in for the month with Ten of Cups. So I'm really, really excited. This is the first time that we've ever dedicated an entire episode to The Fool, which—on this podcast,—which I totally didn't know until I looked it up (Lindsay laughs). I was surprised. I was certain that we had but we haven't, and so yeah, I'm very excited to dive into that, and then we'll answer a listener question and we'll wrap up.
[0:04:11]
So, The Fool. Let's start with how we're working with The Fool in the context that we're working with it today. So two weeks ago, we dove into the medicine of February and we talked about how “wonder”, that word, was the theme for the month of February. And how wonder is so… such a different frequency, like a super different rhythm—than many of us are connected to, or connected with. We see it with children, we see it with, you know, in babies and we see it with animals, and with folks who are really present, but I know for myself, wonder is, it's something that I don't think they touch into all that often.
And indeed, it takes a lot of presence to be available for wonder, right? And that's sort of the same idea that Ten of Cups brings forward. So, Ten of Cups, we talked about, again, in the last episode is our card for the month of February and is so connected to this idea of wonder. Not in like a kind of a Pollyanna-ish way, but in a really radical way, in a way that I think is actually tremendous and potent and powerful, and can really bring forward a lot of medicine if we're kind of paying attention to it.
So the invitation in Soul Tarot for Ten of Cups isn't this sort of old paradigm interpretation—like we're going to get everything we want, there's perfect harmony, we have the love we've been wanting (Lindsay laughs), you know. It's actually an invitation to be available for the sweet, beautiful moments of life, no matter what's going on. Like there's always something to be fretting about, worrying about, anxious about, and I'm not downplaying that. These are very real concerns, especially if we've had a history of trauma or if we're really going through something where our nervous system’s kind of hijacked—very challenging to be available for the joy, for the beauty. We can see it, but feel like we can't really touch into it.
[0:06:45]
So Ten of Cups isn't so much about immediate effects. It's about—it's kind of a practice that we can dig into and start to marinate in over time. So that when we are in a moment, when we feel kind of a little distant from those rainbows of life, from those moments of awe and of beauty that kind of draw us into a very organic pause—the more we play with this invitation, the more available we’ll be to say yes to it when it sort of, again, organically pops up.
Because Ten of Cups isn't necessarily something I think we can… Like, I definitely think we can reach for that, like we can look around and just really be available to play with really seeing the full depth of the beauty that might be surrounding our area, or the outside, or a photo, or someone or something that we love and adore, or a moment where the light is really beautiful in an unexpected moment. Like all of those things are available to us a hundred percent, but again, it takes practice to notice them and to say yes to them.
So we're really working with this theme, again, of wonder and opening to something pretty different. I mean, already in 2022, you know, I knew and I spoke about this on The Threshold, like I knew that 2022 was going to be a little different in terms of the invitations it was bringing, but even so far with the cards that are being pulled, it's really clear that that's true, because this is really different than anything that I think I would have pulled for us, at least in the last two years, if not before.
[0:08:47]
So, yeah, lots of, lots of medicine. Now, what are some of the challenges of that card? Because certainly, the gifts are clear. The challenges are that it's hard to do this, it's hard. Ten of Cups, I believe, doesn't ever bypass the fact that life is really hard and challenging and painful, and that sometimes it just feels like there's absolutely nothing to engage in, or to appreciate, or just celebrate. So it can be an act of empowerment sometimes to be like, “I'm just miserable right now and like, I don't want to see the rainbows.” And that's totally fine. They'll always be available to us, if and when we want to engage with them. So that can be one thing.
The second thing that can come up is certainly grief and a feeling of like, “Whoa, what the fuck have I been missing here?” You know, the more we touch into wonderment, the more clear it usually becomes how disconnected we've been to it. So that can bring up a lot. But another really intense thing that Ten of Cups can also bring up is that it can start to dissolve some of our stories, and it can start to bring us a little closer to the stuff that is available to us, is in front of us, but we're not necessarily paying that much attention to it.
We're not necessarily… We might be stuck in an old pattern, we might be, you know, so we're not really here so much. And I think it also—and I'm not sure if this is a challenge or a gift of Ten of Cups, but I think it also asks that we make a choice. Like, are we going to be available to those rainbows? Can we, are we willing to be available to those rainbows, to those moments as a kind of a radical act of self tending and self-autonomy and of reaching for joy rather than happiness—which I feel are very different things, even when things are challenging and tough—or will we not?
[0:11:16]
And there's no wrong answer, but there—it does ask us to sort of bring in this element of choice. Like if the rainbow is there, whether we sort of open the window or go out of the house and really engage with it is up to us. So there's a lot here that also plugs into The Cups suit in general. I talked about this, you know, in our last episode, but The Cups are really about reclaiming permission. They are not connected to romantic love, but The Cups are rooted in—and that's true in Soul Tarot, not everywhere else—but The Cups are rooted in, I think, intuitive reclamation, trusting ourselves, our bodies, our timing. I think that they have to do with giving ourselves permission to take our time to move away from something, to say goodbye, to grieve. Really, every single Cups card has to do with choice. A choice that we're making for us, whether or not it's sort of convenient or inconvenient for another person, you know?
So what does all of that have to do with The Fool? Well, I think that The Fool is a remarkably helpful Anchor when we think about all of these themes. The Fool is one of those cards that is with us in every moment of life, in moments in life when we're really, I think, most of us not expecting it to be. The Fool is in every moment where we sort of wake up from what Tara Brach and many others call “the trance”. You know, if we're just sort of on autopilot, just sort of like running around, like lost in our stories, lost in sort of the illusion or delusion or, the heaviness, or the difficulty that we're moving through.
And by the way, that's totally valid, but we can feel the difference, right? Where we're experiencing that feeling but we're present. There's a wakefulness to it versus when we're just locked, (Lindsay laughs) locked away in worry and what could go wrong and what-ifs. The Fool is in any moment where there's sort of a startling, a gentle like, “whoa”, like an awakening—where we're aware of the fact that there's a dual experience happening.
[0:14:01]
And that's not, again, none of it's a problem. Not one of those things isn't the right thing to choose versus the wrong thing to choose. We're just talking about, you know—presence and the desire, or the journey, to try to be a little bit more connected than we might typically be, is not just something that is a platitude or an idea. When we're present to what's really going on within ourselves, we can be way more available to be of service to that, to tend to that, to not respond or react out of an unconscious place—which helps to not create more harm to ourselves and others.
Same thing: when we're really present, as present as we can be with our circumstances, with life—the more available we will be to make an impactful change if that is what is meant, the more available we will be to be present with anything that's asking for attention, and the more available we’ll be to offer love and nurturance.
So there is something so powerful about that. And the pull, you know, if we’re thinking about sort of the non-rainbows of life, the stormies—the pull of those storms is really strong, right? Like we have a biological, you know, there's a little bit of a biological advantage on behalf of the thinking mind and the brain to say, “I have to scan for everything that could go wrong here, that might go wrong, that is wrong.”
It takes a lot of repatterning, and a lot of awareness, and a lot of courage to be able to say, “Yes, all of that is here and is valid and might be true, and in this moment, all that there is, is this storm and this rainbow. Both are here, and I can offer my love and attention to both while choosing to be available to the gifts of the rainbow.”
[0:16:21]
And the more available we are to the gifts of the rainbow, that is to say, that which is really true for us, meaningful for us, beautiful for us, nurturing for us—the more we're available for that, ironically, the more we're able to tend to the parts of ourselves that feel stormy. So again, we're not bypassing the storms, we're actually making more space for them. We're not letting the storms drive the car of our lives, even if it means that we're reaching out for help when we need to or when we feel like we can't change drivers. (Lindsay laughs) You know, we’re just not able to touch in with that.
And I mentioned earlier that this is about, you know, maybe reaching for a sense of joy, or satisfaction, or presence rather than happiness. I don't think that we can choose to be happy. We're either happy or we're not, and that is okay. It's okay to not be happy. And we're not going for that feeling state necessarily, but we can go for a sense of awareness, of a reminder. We can go for a sense of tenderness, whatever it might be there.
Within that act of choosing, we have the crux of The Fool. The Fool is ruled by Uranus and is often spoken about—and it's not wrong that it's spoken about this way; this is true of The Fool too, it's just not all The Fool is. It's often spoken about as a leap, a leap into something new, the initiation of a new cycle. It's card zero in the Major Arcana.
[0:18:13]
So we're talking about being in The World and not being in The World, right? The journey hasn't officially begun. We're not in The Magician, we're not in card one yet. And we're not in The World anymore. We're somewhere in between. It's very much a kind of a womb space, a kind of a limbo space, a kind of a chrysalis space. And we are, we can think of it as a kind of a proverbial cliff, right? Where we're getting ready to leave where we’ve been for someplace, unforeseen, unknown.
So all of that isn't untrue about The Fool, but in Soul Tarot, we do tend to look at it and I tend to teach it a little differently, which is that when we have the perception of a leap, we have this idea that this is a conscious… almost—maybe you don't feel this way, but I sometimes do—performative act. Like we have to do something. It has to be visible, it has to be external. It's got to look like something or be measurable. Like a leap is a big thing.
Sometimes leaps are very small or very internal. Sometimes they're humongous events, we all see them. Sometimes no one sees them but us or, you know, our intimate, closest few. But the idea of a leap, it takes a lot of physicality and the truth is with—I think with what I know of life so far, which is you know, admittedly not that much, I'm still really on my journey and really learning, but I often… what feels true to me, at least today in this moment, is that I find that what the pattern that typically presents itself is that I make an internal choice, an internal shift, and in time, there is a physical change.
[0:20:30]
So I think that there's something in the root system of the definition of The Fool that is wonderful, it's beautiful, it's valid to kind of take a leap into something new, but it doesn't quite land on the heart of it, because it's not always that way (Lindsay laughs).
And I've given enough readings to know, thousands in my time, that there are a lot of times where I've pulled The Fool and looked around really kind of like, like kind of hung out like a lynx in the snow, just like waiting and watching, and nothing's there. And that got me thinking about, well maybe there's something else to it and maybe if I start paying attention a little more, there could be something else about The Fool that reveals itself. And indeed, it started to.
So in Soul Tarot, how we look at The Fool, is that yes, we are on a kind of a precipice, we're on a kind of a cliff, whenever we are in this card, right? That doesn't mean that we have to leap. What happens in The Fool is that we start to discover that there actually has never been any ground underneath us in the first place.
The leap and the idea of the leap is true, and it's also kind of an illusion. It's an illusion of the thinking mind. The truth is that we are dual beings. We are dual beings who are always having a dual experience, always, always, always. The thinking mind wants the idea of ground versus groundlessness because it wants the idea, wants to understand that we're safe. And that's one of the ways that it can sort of calculate and evaluate that. It wants us to be in what's familiar, what's known, what's kind of… what has already been laid down, even if it's not satisfying, or in any way helpful (Lindsay laughs), like for real.
[0:22:42]
So the soul, which is really the truth of us, is never on the ground. The soul is constantly moving and yet rooted at the same time, and constantly evolving, constantly. The soul understands that like these bodies that we’re in that will eventually decay and pass over and die, we are also in a perpetual state of ground and groundlessness, and ground and groundlessness.
And the moment that we have an awareness or we touch in with The Fool, we have the opportunity to remember this duality. To remember the fact that The Fool doesn't represent some big, performative, external change. It can, but likely if that's true for you or if you're engaging with The Fool in some real external way, you've probably been doing internal work on this area or on the circumstance that you're in for a long time.
The truth is that we lose that idea. We remember, “I'm not going to be here forever. What am I saving this for? What am I (Lindsay laughs)...?” Like there are a million reasons to be playing it safe, to be careful, to say no to something. I do that all the time. I'm not advocating for recklessness with life, but The Fool is very much about tuning in with the whisper, saying yes to the whisper of that soul self, and very often because the soul really wants to evolve and the thinking mind really wants us to kind of stay where we are, there's a dissonance that happens.
[0:24:43]
And when we make the choice to say yes to that soul self, we immediately (Lindsay snaps) connect with The Fool. So anytime you have a moment, whether subtle or gigantic or anywhere on the spectrum in between, where you notice, “Oh, I'm feeling some contraction about this idea. My brain, my mind, doesn't like this (Lindsay laughs) like, this feels like a lot. And when I really sense into the spacious truth around it, I also feel that it's okay. I also feel that I'll have whatever I need. I also feel like whether it's okay or not, I have to try it.” Right? That's different from, “I gotta do this or someone will be mad at me. I gotta do this because I can't look bad. I have to do this because whatever, whatever.” Right? So there's something there that is very supportive to our Ten of Cups work, which is that when the rainbows come forward, we have this remarkable opportunity in saying yes to them to totally repattern the part of ourselves, the channel, that we're turning the volume up on.
When those moments arise with Ten of Cups, when we can recognize the mess like, “Whoa, this is a powerful opportunity to be right here.” Not where we’ve been, not with what is, not with our fantasy about what might be, but to be right here. I know for myself, there have been a couple times in my life where being right here has actually incentivized me to make some of the most important changes I've ever made.
[0:26:33]
Because in being right here, I've realized, “I’m fucking miserable, (Lindsay laughs) you know, and I don't want to live like this anymore.” Or, “I really need help. I'm going to get help.” Or, “I do not want to be in this friendship, in this relationship.” And when I'm somewhere other than the moment, I'm not as aware of it. And every time I come home to the moment, whether the moment is really, really hard to face or really just so beautiful—and see sometimes even that's really hard to face—but because when we're really present with what's beautiful, then we engage with the fear of losing it.
But when we're connected with that, we have just, again, a glorious opportunity. Any time we're doing that, we're in touch with our soul self. We're in touch with our intuition. Intuition is not linear, it's not a… Most of what intuition is framed around, or gets framed around, is very mind/ego-centered—like it needs to be kind of a perform-on-command kind of thing.
There are times when our intuition, most of the time, gets our attention, or our body gets our attention—when some part of us opens and we're called to pay attention to that. We're called to acknowledge the whispers. Opening to the rainbows in Ten of Cups is the same thing as opening to the whispers in The Fool, because The Fool is a whisper. It is. So is intuition. So is the soul self.
[0:28:17]
The thinking mind is very loud, and thank goodness it is because it needs to get our attention about dangerous situations. And, you know, when we were like all living in the woods, predators, and, you know, we needed those instincts to be like maximum volume, and sometimes we're in situations in life where we still need that. And there are moments even if that's necessary—depending on what we're doing or where we live or circumstances, where it isn't, where it's not necessary—where that huge cacophonous volume is not actually what's aligned.
And the more that we can connect with, again, this deep soul knowing within us, every time we connect, we turn the volume up on it. And every time we tune in with either of these cards, we come back to the fact that this life is not forever. Nothing is guaranteed. No one in our life is guaranteed to be with us the whole ride through.
There is inevitably going to be a moment where one kind of rainbow in our lives will never come again, where we won't ever really be able to be with our cat or dog or pet in the same way, where our children will grow up. We won't be able to gaze at their little sleeping faces. It will be different. And that's the same thing with our partners, with our friends, with our beloved family members, even with us, right?
If you've ever had the experience of looking in the mirror and going, “Oh my god, like, wow, this body has changed and maybe that's not a problem.” It isn't a problem. We’re all aging and that's okay, (Lindsay laughs) you know. But yeah, it's not, this is not permanent, seems like life is just stretching out endlessly and then all of a sudden, you know, things change.
[0:30:28]
So The Fool is a phenomenal Anchor for this because it reminds us that we can make really, really powerful choices all the time that root us into this. And that, you know, I think for myself anyway, part of the reason that Ten of Cups and The Fool are so bonded and create such a beautiful harmony together is that both can bring up really big feelings of vulnerability, like, “Oh my God, I don't want to feel dumb or foolish for like centering the rainbows of life. I don't want to love too much. Like, what if I'm too much? I don't want to be. I don't want to love too deeply because I don't want to lose, you know, I don't want to lose out on this person, or this creature, or this thing, or this opportunity. So why be present with it?”
When it's actually the opposite. The more present we are, the more it just opens our ability to love and really be with ourselves and with whatever we're cherishing, kind of no matter what happens. So The Fool is really our opportunity to kind of blossom in groundlessness, you know. And the card itself is really the invitation that we'll drop in when there's some opportunity to upgrade. There's always going to be like a jolt of discomfort in those moments.
We’re not necessarily meant to be comfortable, just in terms of like this larger picture. Obviously, in our day to day, my prayer is that we all have the opportunity to be comfortable, nourished, fed, whole, loved. That's not what I'm talking about. I know not everyone has that, but that's the prayer and the wish and the birthright that I think we all deserve. Meaning just, we didn't come to have a soul experience to necessarily be comfortable and in fact, to wish for that is really missing out on quite a lot.
[0:32:41]
So there is an awareness that leaving the ground of what we've known is a part of an initiation, of evolutionary growth. And The Fool isn't some special moment. It's every moment. It's really intimate. And it does really kind of plug us into this idea of choice in the same way that Ten of Cups does. Like what are we centering? What are we available for? What are we making space for? Are we making space only for the storms, only for the what-ifs, only for what could be because we're afraid of really opening our hearts? Are we willing to like, crack the door open slightly when those rainbows show up, as fleeting as they might be, to really be available to the medicine that they have to offer us?
It's the same idea with The Fool. The Fool is… Anytime we work with this energy, it's really hard because we don't have any guarantee, right? So if we have a real strong whisper in The Fool, like if we're aware that the ground, or the illusion, or the belief system is kind of dissolving and that a new journey is beginning, based on our willingness to say yes to whatever is presenting itself in that moment—there's no guarantee.
So the thinking mind in both cases, with both of these cards, really can kick up a lot of dust because it wants to keep us safe. It doesn't want us hurt. It doesn't want us in anything that's like… it doesn't trust too much. So it's a pretty huge, again, act of faith and pretty huge sea change anytime we engage with either of these cards.
[0:34:43]
And I think the more we work with The Fool, the more those Ten of Cups moments amplify, and vice versa. So as you continue to travel through this month, through this time in your life, I… Yeah, I invite you to really continue to get curious about how The Fool might be showing up for you, your relationship with it, how it’s shown up for you before. Yeah, just to continue to get really, really open to the gifts that it may have for you and likely are bringing you. So thank you so much for being available for this lesson. I hope that it nourished and served you. I hope it continues to serve you.
So this is a question. We have our listener question and then we'll wrap up from here. From Anonymous, and Anonymous asks,
“Hi, I felt a curiosity about starting to read Tarot for others, but don't know how to begin. I wonder what your personal journey was in making the first steps in reading for others. How did you put yourself out there and make it possible to find clients?”
So I'll start with, being as you asked about me personally, now keep in mind, this is all pre-pandemic, obviously (Lindsay laughs), like years ago. I started reading when I was like twelve or thirteen for me, and read for the kids in my school—middle school, high school, and college. Kind of whenever anyone wanted a reading, I'd give them one.
[0:36:28]
And professionally, though, I said a very random yes to a gig in a store in Brooklyn and totally fell in love with doing it in a more kind of structured professional environment. And just went kind of balls-to-the-wall on it. I was fully in, very committed. I asked the store if they'd be willing to, like, have me. They were like, “Yes, whenever, whenever you want.”
And so I used that as an opportunity to really practice, and made many goofs, and (Lindsay laughs), like, had a lot of like really awkward readings where I kind of didn't really know what to say to the person because I was so nervous, or they hated my reading. And I think that kind of practice is sort of invaluable, actually. Not necessarily in a store, but in our formative days and formative times, years, and my practice naturally opened from there.
I moved from that store to a wellness space, from a wellness space to my own home. And then had a million bookings, (Lindsay laughs) like so I don't, I don't think that's everyone's journey, by the way. But there was something in me, like I knew immediately, like, “I want to quit my job and do this.” And I don't know whether or not, like I have… I don't know. I do have an ambition in me, and always have when I was a performer and, you know, that it's not a competitive streak, it's just ambitious.
When I set my mind on something, I try to do everything I can do to do it. And it was really hard, and it brought up a lot of discomfort and a lot of fear that I'd never be able to and none of that ever really stopped me from showing up and trying anyway.
[0:38:33]
But there was a natural progression. I started kind of small. And then the practice progressed, and I just followed it. Like there were more people, my readings got longer very naturally. I started to want to go a little deeper. I really didn't want to share a cut with anyone, of my earnings—and so working out of my home. Now, I imagine some people are still working out of spaces, but online is probably, like, I was doing online for a long, long time before even the pandemic so…
Really, I think putting yourself out there, there is no kind of way to do it. It will be different for everyone. The other thing that I wanted to share before I pivot and center your, like, the first part of your question, which is just like how does one do this, is that I did a lot of offering on Instagram. So I did daily pulls. I did… I offered thoughts about cards.
There was a lot of service on Instagram, which I think is different now because of the algorithm, but back in like whenever that was, 2015. Yeah, I think so. Wow, that was forever ago. Back in 2015, it was a lot easier to do that and there were a lot fewer people doing it, so I think maybe that's something. I don’t know?
But I think that it's a combination here, right? If you really want to read Tarot for others, I would say, just start. And start with people that feel like, safe for you. Start with people that feel like they're not going to be kind of critical, who will be available to really respect you and listen to you, even though you might be in your formative times.
[0:40:46]
To put it out there, to just say, “You know, if anyone is needing some nourishment, some… like if anyone really feels called to a reading, this is what I'm offering right now.” Give yourself an opportunity to play with different things, like play with written readings, play with fifteen-minute readings, play with online, play with in-person, like, whatever you feel safe doing right now, knowing that it will change a million times because so many parts of our Tarot practice evolve over time.
There really is no one way to do it. I don't know if like, my journey is accessible for people right now. I don't even think it would be accessible for me. I don't think I'd want to do it right now. So you have to really want to do it. That's kind of the, like, the odd piece of advice here. Like, you have to, there has to be a desire in your heart to want to do it, I think.
So whether that means that you are showing up at your local shop and really just cool with like giving one reading in six hours, because you're just happy to be there, or you have like a couple blocks a week where people are popping in with you, or you're doing it over the phone, or whatever it might be. Really, like the best way is to just put it out there. And if people are interested, they will let you know. And if nobody is interested right now, you totally don't have to take that personally.
[0:42:23]
There were so many times where like, no one cared and that was fine with me. It was okay. You know, I really, it took me a little while but eventually I really trusted like if there's no one to read for like, there's no one to read for. I also have myself. I might be able to channel that into some way of serving collectively.
I also think like, what is your kind of contribution to, like, what do you have to say? What's your message? How do you feel about the Tarot? Like, how does it help you? I think that's also so powerful to tell people. Because I had already had such a long history personally with Tarot and with my own practice, it was really… I loved being able to share with people what Tarot meant to me, and how it helped me, and ways that I would discover little new things about kind of living the practice that might be useful for them.
So I don't know if this was a very useful answer to your question, but you did ask about my own history so I wanted to share that (Lindsay laughs), knowing that that won't be necessarily how you'll do it, or how I would even advocate for other people to do it. It's just my story. But yeah, I would say just like, put yourself out there in whatever way makes sense to you, in whatever way feels right, just for the joy of it.
That's always been my thing, is like just for the joy of doing it, to have the chance to practice, and to see it as a really sacred coming together, a really sacred opportunity. And don't worry so much about like, doing it for money, doing it professionally, like just really let yourself get super, super, super rooted. And understand that the more you evolve in it, the more discomfort is going to come up. That's just sort of a part of the process.
[0:44:39]
There's always thinking mind-stuff about our practices. I just don't think most people talk about that. There's such a projection of like total confidence and like, “Oh my god, I'm all booked out,” when I don't really think that's true for everyone, but I really don't need to worry about that at all. (Lindsay laughs) You just need to do your thing.
So yeah, I would say like, literally looking at your life right now, in what—how do you connect with people? Like, how do you connect with people? How can you connect with people? Like that wellness shop that I stopped in that was randomly looking for a Tarot reader for the store—I had never been in that before. It was not something that I was accustomed to really doing, but I kind of thought, “I want to try.” You know, so is there a way for you to put yourself slightly out of your comfort zone and say yes to something, if it pops up?
So yeah, I don't know if that's useful to you, I don't think there's an ABC at all. And I think if you can give yourself permission to go really light, really gently, in a really mellow way, I think that could also be such a gift to yourself. I hope that this helps and I'm wishing you all the luck on this journey. It's an exciting thing.
I think even just realizing that we want to read for other people is so exciting. And also don't get discouraged, because there were a million places and people that I reached out to, to give readings at or whatever, and they didn't even care. You know, they didn't even like respond to my email. (Lindsay laughs) So that's okay. You know, like you don't—it doesn't have anything to do with you.
So I promise you, promise, promise, promise, if you can just open to the joy of kind of “being in the exchange of reading”, things will start to warm and cook, and they will start guiding you in directions that you maybe couldn't have anticipated. Just be willing to let your practice kind of show you where it wants to go. So for what that's worth, I hope it helps.
Thank you so much for listening to this, Wild Souls. I love all of you, and until we connect at the next episode, please take exquisite care of yourselves.
[0:47:23]