What's This Book Gonna Teach & Who's the Author Anyway?
This work is a digest of a lifetime's study of the Tarot and the systems that are expressed through it: astrology, numerology, the Tree of Life, the I Ching, eastern philosophies and metaphysics in general.
The book is meant to serve your need and desire to use the Tarot cards meaningfully as soon as you have the deck in your possession.
In this chapter I will give you two simple card setups that you can use daily, or when a situation arises that drives you into a frenzy.
The last chapters will include two in-depth card spreads to employ when you feel you have a firm grasp on the meaning of the entire deck.
The first section devotes a chapter to each of the 78 cards comprising the Tarot Deck: the 22 Major Arcana and the 56 Minor Arcana.
The second section explains how to relate the cards to each other in a spread, what it means, for instance, to have a "positive" card next to a "negative" one. Of course, all the negatives in the Tarot are merely manure to help you grow gorgeous orchids and nutritious carrots.
That's the way I treat the Tarot: it is for your growth, for your progress on the Path of Aware Living, and a reading represents Travel Plans, or, instructions in Gardening.
I have been studying astrology since I was 6 years old. Truly. My mother was a film actress back in the '30's, and astrology was her avocation.
Metaphysics has always been my study. I began learning about the Tarot in 1956. But I wasn't a bookworm.
I lived a very full life, with many diverse experiences. I have been a secretary, a waitress, a model, a call-girl, a mother, a wife, a performance artist, a radio newsperson, a disc jockey.
I've written three books and published two: The Hate Factory (Dell, 1982) and Dear Writer in the Window (Penguin, 1992) -- you can see examples of the latter on this website.
Metaphysics helped me to understand and learn from all these experiences. Now I'm in my crone years, at this writing 63 years old, and have the luxury of reviewing my life's work and play, and transmitting what I've assimilated.
Since 1986, I've been a "professional" guide, doing readings that combine astrology and the Tarot, for clients first met during their travels to Santa Fe, New Mexico, where I live.
Many of them now take readings over the phone, and refer me to their friends who are visiting Santa Fe. I worked publicly in several Santa Fe restaurants for nearly a decade, doing mini Tarot and astrology readings.
This not only gathered clients, it was a post-graduate course in interpreting these two symbolic languages. Now, I do only in-depth readings, privately, in my studio.
If you find that you're curious to know more details and history of the Tarot than this fast and easy treatise provides, visit your local metaphysical bookstore and browse the Tarot section.
So much has been written on the subject that you'll have no trouble finding something to quench your particular thirst.
Use your intuition as you look through the books. Pick the one that appeals to you. I don't have to tell you of this, of course, it's just a reminder to trust yourself.
I list at the end a few tomes that have been important to me through the decades. However, I learned most from using the cards, for myself at first, for friends as I got braver, then for the public.
That was a really brave step, to put aside the book, throw my blanket down on the boardwalk in Venice Beach, California, and read for strangers.
I learned on that day that the cards are a story that tell themselves -- once you've spent time listening.
Here is the first simple card setup. It's definitely simple: One Card a Day. Yep, just one card to begin with. It's always necessary to focus, to put your mind to the task of asking for and receiving a message.
So find your serene place, geographically and mentally. Shuffle your deck. Shuffle as long as you like, and use that shuffling to consider what you want to receive a message about.
Maybe you just want some general wisdom, or maybe you wonder what you need to know to understand your love life, or your next career move.
But while you're shuffling, find your question. Then cut the deck into three piles, and restack them into one.
