Sun Goddess Tarot

Wednesday, 11 June 2014

Tarot Tip Tuesdays - Learn To Say No

Whether you are new to Tarot and in the throes of building a connection with your Tarot cards or an advanced Tarot reader diligently honing your Tarot reading skills, I am putting out a Tarot tip a week to help you to consistently make Tarot a part of your everyday life.

So here goes your Tarot Tip for this Tuesday:

If you are a newbie to Tarot reading, you would find yourself always on a lookout for opportunities to practice your reading on friends and family. You might even consider volunteering to be a free reader for credible Tarot-related sites and organizations like Biddy Tarot, Tarot Association Of The British Isles (TABI) and the Free Tarot Network. You might even be willing to provide a mini reading or 2 when randomly asked by strangers. Just be warned though that you might open yourself to a floodgate of recurring querants who might be totally dependent on the advice that your readings provide. You might also be faced with a huge volume of reading requests which you might not have the capacity to cope with. So here are some tips to help you say no when you are not able to cope with excessive amounts of Tarot reading requests.

Learn To Say No

When you feel exhausted or not grounded enough to take on more readings, please have the courage to say no. Tell them to contact you at a later date scheduled in a way which gives you enough time to ground yourself or have a good rest.

If the querant calls you incessantly for readings, even when you have already provided him or her with the advice that he or she needs, then do let him or her know that the best time to come back for a reading might be a month later.

If you are not able to take on anymore readings at that specific time, do direct your querants to other free Tarot reading services available at some of the reputable sites and organizations I had mentioned earlier.

Explain to your querant that you need time to recharge after completing a list of readings. This would only make you a better reader, ready to take on your querant’s issues once you have regained your energy.

You might want to set your boundaries upfront. Let your clients know what objectives you serve when you provide a reading and how soon later he or she could call you again for another follow-up reading.

Sometimes, it could be very encouraging when a querant tells you that your last reading for him or her had been spot on.and this might be used as a lead-in to garner more free readings from you within a short time frame. Yes, it is a confidence-booster but remember, the reading is not about you. It is all about the querant. To serve the querant better, you will need to assess if you are ready or if the timing is right for you to provide her with more readings following his or her last one.

Remember, you have the free will to say no when you feel that you are getting too many reading requests. Self care is so important so you will need to meditate and ground yourself regularly. Take breaks in between readings so that you can recharge yourself. By the way, I had also made the decision once to say no to a client who requested for another free reading just because previously, he was rude, obnoxious, and had no decency to even say thank you after I had delivered that reading to him. Yes, I have free will. If I think the querant’s energy is toxic and not worth my time, I would definitely stick to my guns and say no if you are not ready or not comfortable about doing a reading for someone.

May your Tarot cards provide you with a full deck of possibilities throughout your day.

If you like this blogpost, do follow my blog at http://sungoddesstarot.blogspot.com and LIKE my Facebook page at www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot

About The Writer:

The writer of this blog post is a marketeer by trade, and an intuitive reader by accident who deploys the combined modalities of a Tarot, Numerology and Astrology overlaid with her Clairvoyant and Clairsentient skills to deliver her readings with authenticity. She was awarded a Certified Professional Tarot Reader qualification from the Tarot Certification Board of America (TCBA) and is also a certified numerologist. She is currently running a consultancy based in Singapore called Sun Goddess Tarot, which provides confidential intuitive readings combining the metaphysical disciplines of Tarot, Numerology and Astrology via face to face and emails as well as readings at corporate and private events and workshops. A member of the American Tarot Association (ATA) and the Tarot Association of the British Isles (TABI), she is also a reader for the Free Tarot Network and mentors Tarot protégés on behalf of the American Tarot Association

Website: www.sungoddesstarot.com
Email: Joanna@sungoddesstarot.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot
Twitter: www.twitter.com/SunGoddessTarot

Sunday, 1 June 2014

Tarot Tip Tuesdays - Pressure To Perform

So here goes your Tarot Tip for this Tuesday:

"All too frequently, anxiety crushes not only your spirit and your potential, but your ability to take care of your mind and body." ~ Jonathan Davidson and Henry Dreher, The Anxiety Book: Developing Strength in the Face of Fear

That 9 Of Swords Moment As A Pro Tarot Reader

A few weeks ago, after working with my intuitive coach, I came face to face with energies from the past that I needed to let go of. These stemmed from a single fear - the fear of rejection - that had inhibited my growth along my spiritual journey. Part of this fear of rejection, had sometimes put a lot of pressure on me to "perform" when I did face-to-face readings for clients. Yes it can happen to anyone regardless of experience or skills. I wrote a blogpost about my painful but necessary process of letting go so do let me know if my story resonates with you after you have read it. Being free from this fear, has allowed me to face my clients with a lot of confidence. Channeling for them had become effortless because I surrendered my trust to my guides without any fear of rejection. The insights I got from my Tarot cards also became much clearer.

So I thought to dedicate this tuesday's Tarot Tip to anxieties and blockages that you might get when you do face to face readings for clients. Many might not have a similar experience as I had whereby a past issue got in the way of my readings. However, I could imagine the fear and anxiety for some Tarot readers who could be "newish" to the experience of doing face to face readings. Have you ever experienced having sweaty palms, brow knitted in worry, an almost blank mind and the feeling of dread just before meeting a client? I had experienced all these when I first started out as a professional reader. Some of these fears and anxieties might be driven by the desire to be absolutely 100% accurate with the insights, the need to deliver a reading that was more compelling than the details behind the breaking news, the fear of dealing with a client's skepticism, or perhaps the fear of forgetting the meaning of the cards.

Frankly, fear and anxieties are so unproductive and can only serve to drain you off your energy which you can otherwise plough into delivering a more meaningful and authentic reading for your clients. The pressure to perform is all in your head.

“Anxiety is a thin stream of fear trickling through the mind. If encouraged, it cuts a channel into which all other thoughts are drained." ~ Arthur Somers Roche

Dealing With Tarot Reading Anxieties

Here are some ways to help you deal with that pressure to perform in front of your clients.

1) Remind yourself that you are not doing a Tarot reading to entertain or "perform" for a client. You are not a circus act. You are doing a Tarot reading to help guide your client to make the right decisions about his or her life.

2) Your insights will be accurate if you learn to trust your intuition. From my experience, intuition and the cards will never lie.

3) Meditate and ground yourself before and after a reading...ALWAYS. I cannot over emphasize this enough. Grounding yourself helps build a defense against negative energies that can drain you. It also helps calm your mind, refocus your thoughts and clear the "mental debris" enough to provide you with a clearer vision.

4) Slow your breath down as you do your reading. This will help give you space to think and feel the situation that your client is in, and the slower pace will also guide you to spend more time connecting the symbols and imagery within the cards to your client's situation. This also takes the pressure off memorizing the meanings of each card.

5) Be realistic and manage your own expectations. Your clients expect you to deliver authentic readings from the heart that aim to guide them through their issues, and that is your sole purpose as a Tarot reader. They are not expecting you to wave your wand to remove these issues for them. So do not be pressured by your own erroneous perception of what your purpose as a Tarot reader is.

6) Turn to the Tarot community for support whenever you feel anxious about face to face readings. The members of the Tarot community have thr collective experience to support and advise you. At some point in their Tarot careers, they were just like you,

7) If you are dealing with skeptics, remember to come from a place of love and compassion when you deal with them. They are possibly more anxious than you are because of the challenges that had driven them to call on you for advice in the first place,

8) When you do feel any blockages at any point during the reading, just slow down, and let the conversation with your client flow freely. You might get additional background information that could form a trigger to provide you with additional insights from the cards.

Most importantly, just have fun when you do face to face readings and treat these sessions like a casual chit chat over tea with a friend. With time and experience, your 9 of Swords moments will gradually subside.

"Only man clogs his happiness with care, destroying what is, with thoughts of what may be." ~ John Dryden

May your Tarot cards provide you with a full deck of possibilities throughout your day.

If you like this blogpost, do follow my blog at http://sungoddesstarot.blogspot.com and LIKE my Facebook page at www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot

Tuesday, 27 May 2014

Happy New Moon In Gemini

Blessed New Moon! This new moon in Gemini promises to make you itch with mental restlessness as you embark on new projects or start nurturing new creative ideas or venture towards the beginning of a new job or new relationship. You will be embracing these with so much energy and enthusiasm, charging ahead in a gung-ho manner with numerous ideas and grand plans.

This week, many of my intuitive readings veered on clearing past relationship issues or dealing with an impasse in a current relationship. If you are experiencing either of these, do know that since Mars in Libra is direct now, this new moon in Gemini only serves to force you to go beyond that mental restlessness to actually doing something about it. Remember, if you want to move forward, you cannot just be all thinking and all talk, but you will need to take action too!

Now, this is where I have to inject a caution driven from my personal theme for this year that I keep harping about. Yes, BALANCE. You need balance. You see, Mercury is going retrograde in the next week. It will span from 7 June to 2 July. So, it might be worthwhile for you to set new intentions during this new moon to manifest your goals by lending them all the enthusiasm and energy that you have, yet navigate towards these goals with plans that come from balancing logical thought with an intuitive heart.

If you like this blogpost, do follow my blog at http://sungoddesstarot.blogspot.com and LIKE my Facebook page at www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot

About The Writer:

The writer of this blog post is a marketeer by trade and an intuitive reader by accident. She was awarded a Certified Professional Tarot Reader qualification from the Tarot Certification Board of America (TCBA) and is also a certified numerologist. She is currently running a consultancy based in Singapore called Sun Goddess Tarot, which provides confidential intuitive readings combining the metaphysical disciplines of Tarot, Numerology and Astrology overlaid with her Clairvoyant and Clairsentient skills via face to face and emails as well as readings at corporate and private events and workshops. A member of the American Tarot Association (ATA) and the Tarot Association of the British Isles (TABI), she is also a reader for the Free Tarot Network and mentors Tarot protégés on behalf of the American Tarot Association.

Website: www.sungoddesstarot.com
Email: Joanna@sungoddesstarot.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot

Twitter: www.twitter.com/SunGoddessTarot

Photo credit: Photo taken at Changi Beach, Singapore by David Ash, www.singaporemaven.com

Monday, 26 May 2014

Clear Cancel And Delete

Have you had the experience when you had just completed writing a long report for your boss filled with well-thought through plans and recommendations, or wrote a beautiful blog post charged with powerful heart-felt emotional energy, or wrote a long complaint letter to the authorities about what you would like to see improved within the community, then reviewed what you had written with the intention of sending the document through, only to go back to the paper to clear, cancel and delete, and start writing all over again?

That was what I did with the help of one of my intuitive coaches, Danielle Dove. I did it with past energies that no longer served me.

I Shared The Same Issues With My Clients

Over the years, the intuitive readings that I had done for my clients were focused on uncovering the root cause of their present issues and helping them let go of past energies that had significant impact on these issues. I was always filled with a mega sense of gratitude that the Universe had guided them my way so that I could serve my purpose when I worked with these clients.

However, I forgot that from time to time, even though we deployed every ounce of our positive energies to help others as lightworkers, we might have our own residual negative energies from the past that we might need to take care of. And that can only happen if and when we were made aware of it by someone slightly further removed from our day-to-day lives enough to lend an objective view to our issues.

I was filled with a mega sense of gratitude when the Universe blew Danielle my way, to do the same. She managed to help me uncover the root cause of my present issues, my blockages, fears and anxieties. I believed that when I managed to identify the root cause of these issues with her help, confront them with a measure of love and compassion, and then let them go with all the courage that I could muster, it made me a better lightworker. I saw myself in my clients with that extra dose of empathy so that I could better walk that journey along with them.

How My Past Energies Affected The Present

You see, I spent years helping others, and was oblivious to the signs of my own issues. I enjoyed channeling for others. It felt great when I could obtain the visions and the messages to help them. When it came to channeling for myself though, I was left with a complete blank in my mind’s eye. It frustrated me greatly when I felt that I could not connect clearly with my guides for myself.

Sometimes, I went through mood swings and blamed it on the fact that as a psychic empath, I was picking up on the energies of others around me. On good days, my readings for my clients were so easy. On days when I went into these odd mood swings, these reading sessions seemed to look like a 8^th grade concert performance. I would be hit with the anxiety to “perform” in front of my clients. I knew I needed help, but I was not sure how or what help I needed so Danielle came to the rescue.

She took me through a very emotionally-draining but much -needed exercise of going back to when I last felt angriest, saddest, anxious and lost. Then we went in deeper to look at myself then in that situation, through the eyes of my present self. I had to confront the situation, acknowledged how I felt then, embraced it with love and compassion and then I had to willingly let it all go.
After that exercise, I woke up to several facts that I did not realize were affecting me:

My past issues with my Mum after my divorce, though resolved on a physical plane, had actually left a residual sense of rejection within me. I was not aware of it because my current relationship with Mum is fabulous and we are very close. However, every time I came face to face with a challenge, a blockage or a delay in my work or personal life, I viewed it as a rejection of me.

That sense of rejection from that past incident, dictated how I conducted my relationship with my son presently. So the anger, sadness and sense of rejection surfaced whenever my son did or said something that reminded me of how it felt like to be rejected. Even something as simple as taking his dinner into his bedroom and shutting his door behind him, so that he could have his dinner in privacy and in front of his computer games, filled me with a sense of his rejecting for not wanting to have dinner with me.

Similarly, when I meditated and attempted to get into the zone enough to connect with my guides, I kept getting fuzzy images, sometimes nothing at all, or when I did meet my guides, I felt as if I was being questioned, “What are you doing here?” I viewed these blockages as a rejection from my guides.

When I met a difficult client who was close-minded and skeptical about my intuitive abilities, I would usually do more grounding to protect myself from his or her energy. However, the session might end up with my being left with a bitter taste in my mouth because I felt as if I was being rejected by the client.

I feared rejection. My fear of rejection, if left unchecked could have been the biggest obstacle to my ability to serve my purpose with 100% commitment.

Opening Myself To Change And Letting Go

I often tell my clients, “Be open to change and let go of whatever that no longer serves you.” With Danielle’s help, today I am able to tell myself that. When I visited Mom over the weekend, my heart rushed out to embrace her with love. I was more conscious of every effort she put into cooking my lunch, and twirling my hair into a little chignon so that stray strands of my long hair would not get in the way of my food. I celebrated her laughter at my jokes as if she was the only member of my audience. I was so grateful for the affection she showered on me when she turned my upturned t-shirt label at the nape of my neck inward and patted it back in place.

When Joel was busy with his homework, I hugged him and told him how much I loved him. I held him close at church during mass as if to say how much I appreciated him being there.

When I channeled my guides last night, I saw so clearly their faces in my mind’s eye. I saw the glow around their features, even to the detail of the glasses on one of my guides. I rejoiced and whispered my gratitude for their patience with me.

Last week, when I spoke to Danielle, she had asked me this question, “On the scale of 1-10, 10 representing the deepest feeling of rejection, how did you feel when you visited that place in the past when you felt rejected by your family?” My answer was a firm 8. Today, I asked myself the same question and my answer is a firm 0.

I have successfully cleared, cancelled and deleted what no longer served me and was committed to leaving behind that old Jo who had spent years fearing rejection, so that I could look forward to building a better relationship with my guides, and serving my soul purpose better.

10 of Swords

This evening, I picked up the 10 of Swords from my Radiant Rider Waite Tarot deck and meditated on it. I was so glad that my eyes went straight for the rising sun beyond the horizon, and took in the calmness of the clear blue sea within the card image. The card seemed to assure me that the darkness would soon be dispelled, once I had stopped focusing on the 10 swords left stuck behind the man’s back. However, like the exercise Danielle did with me earlier, I acknowledged the presence of the 10 swords and embraced them with love and gratitude for the lessons they taught me. I imagined myself lying there with these swords in my back and began to pull them out one by one:

My divorce 15 years ago after an unhappy marriage,
The friends who took sides against me after the divorce,
My family’s rejection of me because divorce was “uncatholic”,
My inability to spend more time with a sickly granddad because the family did not welcome me into their home,
My struggles as a single mother,
Years of financial uncertainty,
Years of emotional instability, moving from home to home, bad boyfriends to worse boyfriends,
Discovering the infidelities of my fiancé,
The incessant fights with an ex-boss who did not respect me or my work
The skepticism of my friends and some clients in my intuitive gifts when I first set up my consultancy Sun Goddess Tarot

The swords came out clean, and I visualized clean, green earth energy healing the wounds the swords had left behind my back. I was able to get on my feet, and walk towards the sunshine in the horizon without the weight of these burdens on my back.

I believed that my guides were always there with me but they were just waiting for me to be ready to approach them from a space of love. I saw them clearly for the first time last night when I channeled and acknowledged their glowing presence with my prayers of gratitude.

I am now ready to work closely with my guides to get my clients through their past issues. So are you ready and willing to let go of your past that no longer serve you positively?

Twitter: www.twitter.com/SunGoddessTarot

10 of Swords from the Radiant Rider Waite Tarot deck updated by Virginijus Poshkus

Sunday, 25 May 2014

Tarot Tip Tuesdays - No Excuses For Lack Of Practice

So here goes your Tarot Tip for this Tuesday:

You could invest a lot of money and time in picking up tons of esoteric knowledge but ultimately, the litmus test for your ability to read confidently is just practice. Lots of practice. One of the complaints I often got from Tarot students was that they have not got enough friends to practice Tarot reading wth, so here are ideas for you to create more practice opportunities for yourself beyond reading for family and friends.

Reading For Self

Of course there are just so many issues you could have in a day to spur you to pick your deck up to gift it a good shuffle. However, beyond doing Tarot reading to obtain advice when you face a specific challenge, you could also shuffle the Tarot cards each morning to obtain a generic advice that could help you navigate your day ahead at the office. Perhaps you might want to pick a Tarot card of the day to guide your day in the morning and then when you are just about to prepare to get to bed, do a review of your day and write into your journal, what significance that specific card might have had for what you had experienced that day. Something I often like to do myself, is to pick a card each weekend to what might be my biggest obstacle I could face in the coming week that could prevent me from getting to my goals. Then I would cast a spread to uncover how I could manage that obstacle. A particular spread could go like that:

1) What could I do for myself to deal with that obstacle?

2) What external help or resource would I require to deal with that obstacle?

3) What might the outcome be when I deploy all means to deal with that obstacle?

4) If I cannot effect the outcome in the way I desire it to be, what advice can the cards provide for me to move forward?

Reading For Others

Another good source of practice beyond your family, friends and even yourself, is to volunteer as a reader for others. There are several ways you can do this:

1) Approach a charity organization to offer your services as a volunteer Tarot reader for any of its fund-raising events it might have throughout the year. It could be quite useful if that charity organization is aware that it could call on you whenever they organize a charity fair or bazaar for example,

2) TABI (The Tarot Associstion Of the British Isles), FTN (the Free Tarot Network) and Biddy Tarot are often looking for volunteer Tarot readers to read for free on their respective forum or website. Being a volunteer reader is quite fun but the reading requests could get voluminous so you are advised to pace yourself, and do a lot of self care.

3) Another fun way you could get some practice time is to read for high-profile situations that you might come across in the news. This could be news about a celebrity break-up, an economic debate, a governmental election, or news about a missing person. I do caution you to do readings like these only as a form of practice and in private as I am a firm believer of doing a reading only with the expressed permission of another person that you are reading for.

There are numerous ways to pack in more practice opportunities to hone your Tarot reading skills. Now all you need is to commit to spending some time to do so everyday.

May your Tarot cards provide you with a full deck of possibilities throughout your day.

If you like this blogpost, do follow my blog at http://sungoddesstarot.blogspot.com and LIKE my Facebook page at www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot

About The Writer:

The writer of this blog post is a marketeer by trade, and a tarot card reader by accident. She was awarded a Certified Professional Tarot Reader qualification from the Tarot Certification Board of America (TCBA) and is also a certified numerologist. She is currently running a Tarot consultancy based in Singapore called Sun Goddess Tarot, which provides confidential intuitive readings combining the metaphysical disciplines of Tarot, Numerology and Astrology via face to face and emails as well as readings at corporate and private events and workshops. A member of the American Tarot Association (ATA) and the Tarot Association of the British Isles (TABI), she is also a reader for the Free Tarot Network and mentors Tarot protégés on behalf of the American Tarot Association

Website: www.sungoddesstarot.com
Email: Joanna@sungoddesstarot.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot
Twitter: www.twitter.com/SunGoddessTarot

Tuesday, 20 May 2014

I Do What I Do Best Because I Am Who I Am

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’ Actually, who are you not to be?” ~ Marianne Williamson, Return to Love

Discovering A Common Pattern In My Readings

I often swap tips and stories with fellow intuitives and felt so inadequate that they seemed to be able to connect with their guides so clearly, but it was much harder for me as I might lose my focus due to other images coming into my mind. So, I started analyzing all the readings I had done in the last few months using a combination of channeling and my Tarot cards. There seemed to be a common technique I noticed that I had used in the readings, starting each reading by connecting with my clients' chakras, going into visioning, automatic writing and then Tarot cards for validation. There was also a common theme to these readings. I noticed that within all of them. I had connected to past energies very strongly and these past energies had a significant impact in my clients' present circumstances and potentially future outcomes. An example of a reading like this can be found here.

Working With Past Energies To Support Healing Work

One of my intuitive coaches, Karina Ladet, comforted me during my moments of self-doubt by reminding me that each intuitive reader was different in their skills, abilities and techniques and she felt that one of my gifts was to help clients with their present issues by uncovering past issues that they had to release. So she wanted me to acknowledge that gift, nurture and hone it to sharpen these skills.

First Channeling Session For Marianne

I had the opportunity to do so with a client Marianne. Please note that I have changed her name in this blog post to protect her privacy. I worked on her healing process for some weeks. When I started channeling for Marianne, I was not given any background to any issues she might have had then. After I got into deep meditation to ground myself, I ran my hands around my chakra points to connect with hers, and found her throat chakra so tight that it was choking me. It was as if she was trying to express herself but could not do so. Her crown and third eye chakras were brilliant that I was able to connect with the white light just above these chakras. Of course they were, she was a fellow intuitive and I knew these chakras were opened and she was, on her own, also trying to connect with her higher self. That was when 2 people appeared in my vision holding on to a door as if to open it, but I also saw a child clinging onto her right thigh, as if she was demanding for attention. At that point, my heart and solar plexus tightened and I felt a cord attached to both these chakras, causing a lot of anxiety and fears.

Nothing Is Ever What It Seems

As I had seen a child in my vision, I asked Marianne if she had lost a child before and she admitted that she had suffered a miscarriage. I then deduced straight away that the cord of anxiety was caused by her experience of that miscarriage and her worries about whether she could have more babies in the future. I wished I had remembered then that an ex-boss and friend once told me, "nothing is ever what it seems."

Then as I continued my visioning work, I saw a hill and I kept gasping for air. As a psychic empath, I thought that I was assuming Marianne's anxieties and her efforts to cope with her grief. So I told her, " I think I see a hill and perhaps you need to go sit there for awhile to meditate and release your anxiety and grief." She nodded in agreement to that advice and I then proceeded to visualize myself helping her to cut the cords from her solar plexus and heart chakras. I was also guided by my messages that I had to do a grounding meditation, draw up the healing energy from the earth in my visualization and then sent Marianne that healing light.

Marianne left that session happy and we both felt that we had addressed her issues. Nothing is ever what it seems.

Second Channeling Session For Marianne

2 weeks later, she called on me again. She was clearly in despair and she said, " I feel I am not to able to manifest abundance. I feel a lot of anxieties about not being able to have another child. Maybe it is because I don't deserve it." I chided her for such negative thinking but it struck me that this depression, was not a new problem. She had been there before numerous times and her negativity seemed to be haunting her again due to an unresolved issue. So I decided to channel for her again. This time, I ventured to go back a little further, and go in a little deeper.

During my second channeling session with Marianne, I saw a few images and proceeded to write them down. The first image was that of a child lying on the floor holding on to her long skirt as if she was throwing a tantrum. It was as if the child was reacting to not getting what she wanted from her parent. However, while in the last channeling session, I had seen the child from a 3rd person's viewpoint, now, I seem to be seeing the adult from the child's viewpoint. It occurred to me suddenly that I was looking at the adult from Marianne's eyes. The child was actually Marianne! Wow! The second image was that of the child's face welded into Marianne's heart like it was branded onto her chest. My heart and solar plexus chakras tightened again, reflecting Marianne's own fears and anxieties. She was clinging on to a burden of pain, fear and anxiety in her heart. I thought I had cut those cords! The third image was of Marianne lying down and resting, as if she was recuperating from a battle. The fourth image was of a lady who turned her back away from me to walk into the light. I interpreted it as a message telling her to surrender to the light of the Universe. I felt a burning in my throat chakra at that point and it was telling me there were things she wanted to express but she could not. My right neck and right back of head hurt too, as if she was carrying a past burden of disappointment or guilt.

Right On The Button

The lightbulb in my head just went off. I realized that after 2 channeling sessions, the real issue Marianne was suffering from was her clinging to past disappointments or guilt that had occurred during her childhood. This was a recurring issue that haunted her and because he had not sought closure, she could not let go of the past, and consequently, she was not able to be healed.

With that conclusion, I then proceeded to draw my Tarot cards to validate my findings. I picked the 6 of Swords, 7 of Swords, the 6 of Cups reversed and the Sun reversed. The cards validated my interpretation of the messages I got from these visions. I saw a story unfolding in my head, like a video playing a home movie. Marianne was clinging on to a past disappointment when the family went through a divorce and her father left her mother and her due to his infidelities. As a child, Marianne felt so much guilt about not being able to do anything to help the situation and worse, her mother had to struggle through that single motherhood to try to bring little Marianne up on her own. As she was unable to cope with providing for Marianne, the little girl was sent to a government-funded childcare facility. Marianne suffered depression as a result. That child in my vision in both channeling sessions, really was Marianne trying to deal with her past of growing up in a broken home.

The Healing For Marianne

With this insight, I advised Marianne to do a healing meditation together with me. On my part, I went deep into meditation and visualised myself cutting the final cords to her "inner child". On her part, she went deep into meditation where she sat with her "inner child" for a while to acknowledge its presence, and all the feelings of hurt and disappointment. In her visualisation process, she embraced her "inner child", and offered it love and healing. She visualised herself going through a photo album with her "inner child". That photo album was filled with pages of her childhood photos. Then after embracing her "inner child" and letting the past hurts dissipate in both their tears, she saw her "inner child" walk away and disappearing across a hill. I remembered that in the first channeling session, I saw that hill. Now I realised what that hill had symbolised.

The Healing For Me

This reading for Marianne, was a tremendous eye opener that affirmed Karina's very wise advice that I should focus on honing my skills in working on past energies to support my clients' journeys through their respective healing process.

I often questioned my intuitive abilities, and turned the messages and visions I got in my mind's eye around for umpteen times, then ended up not communicating these messages and visions at all out of fear that I might be wrong. However, Karina's advice had gotten me to approach Marianne's reading from a different perspective. This had helped uncovered the root cause of the issue and opened the right door for us to work on her healing process.

A big takeaway for me from Karina's advice and my reading for Marianne, was the need to have the courage to love myself and trust in my intuitive gifts without the need for validation. Thanks to these ladies, I was reminded that I do what I do best because I am who I am.

"A Woman in harmony with her spirit is like a river flowing. She goes where she will without pretense and arrives at her destination prepared to be herself and only herself." ~ Maya Angelou

If you like this blogpost, do follow my blog at http://sungoddesstarot.blogspot.com and LIKE my Facebook page at www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot

Twitter: www.twitter.com/SunGoddessTarot

Photo Credit: Joel Lee, East Coast Beach, Singapore

Saturday, 17 May 2014

Tarot Tip Tuesdays - The Devil Is A Scary Card

So here goes your Tarot Tip for this Tuesday:

I was working with one of my Tarot protégés yesterday, practicing some new spreads when she picked the Devil and felt so uncomfortable with it that she struggled with the interpretation of the card as a result. Much of the fear was caused by how she was taught to view the Devil from her religious upbringing. She confessed that that was one card she would put aside and not read with it when she picked it in a spread. She went ahead instead to pick other cards, choosing to ignore the Devil. She jokingly called the card, "It whose name should not be mentioned."

When I first started out as a new and inexperienced Tarot reader, I too was uncomfortable with a couple of cards. One was the Devil. The image of the Devil in a lot of Tarot decks often appeared quite scary. It did not help that my Catholic upbringing saw me reading books about how scarily evil the Devil was. Today, the only deck where the Devil is portrayed in a more colorful and less scary manner is the one in Barbara Moore's Tarot deck, Book of Shadows Volume 2 So Below. The Devil in that deck is represented by the image of a sundae!

This was what I did to overcome the discomfort. I meditated on the Devil card. You can use the same method with any other cards in the deck that you are uncomfortable with.

When I meditated on a Tarot card, I visualized myself “walking” into the cards to have a “conversation” with the images in the cards.

Meditating On The Devil Card

I used The Devil card from the Radiant Rider Waite Tarot deck. When I meditated on The Devil, I acknowledged my fear and discomfort. This would force me to look at the details around me when I "walked into the card" and I looked at them in an objective manner. By stepping back and viewing the image objectively, I realized it was not a scary card once I focused on the significance of the details of the imagery. The Devil card made me question my intent a lot whenever I arrived at his doorstep. He would remind me of the folly of being too attached or obsessed with material gains, and forced me to confront my fears by opening my mind to other options in my life if my attachments to certain things start to do my head in. He’s a bit of a cool dude though quite ugly. First I ventured to talk to the 2 people in chains, but I hear a distressed mutter, "What do I do? What do I do?" I then asked the Devil in that card, “Why have you captured these 2 people? Can’t you let them go?” He replied me quite calmly, “It may be a short leash Joanna, but their collars are loosely fastened. They have the free choice to remove these chains and leave if they want to.” Cool, ugly but wise too.

Over the years, it became one of my favorite cards.

May your Tarot cards provide you with a full deck of possibilities throughout your day.

If you like this blogpost, do follow my blog at http://sungoddesstarot.blogspot.com and LIKE my Facebook page at www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot