YouandTheTarot

  The tarot is embedded with optimism about the human potential. So when I guide clients about employment realities I remain positive. Or, that's what I assume. Some clients don't experience those recommendations as realities. Their mindset remains in what had been boom times for employees. They might perceive me as not at all positive.  At the top of the list for realities is that power - and power is very real - has shifted to employers. There may be little wiggle room on negotiating the rules such as RTO or the right to disconnect. Too much work? If you don't accept that so many others will. Small bonuses? You may have to downsize your lifestyle.  A biggie for the over-50 is changing expectations. I did not say lowering expectations. Research shows that earnings as well as promotions tend to decline in your 50s. What I recommend is shifting to focusing on other parts of your life for that sense of achievement. Start a small business, on the side? Develop a consuming ho...

"During COVID I was out of work for two years." This woman had piled on debt when jobless. She was distraught. This have never happened before. But eventually even she realized that she was saying this too often to too many people. Most of whom didn't care. That increased her shame: She was bearing her soul to what seemed to be the benign indifference of the universe.  Then, the Ah-Ha moment came: This confession of adversity wasn't moving the dial on reducing, then eliminating the debt. During unemployment there was the old living off credit cards.  That kind of situation is increasingly typical during this time of inflation and employment insecurity. Folks get stuck in ruminating about all their supposed earlier "mistakes" in everything from not grabbing the work available back then to wasting time embracing magical thinking that taking an expensive vacation would bring the needed new perspective.  Such a sticky mindset is depicted in the tarot by the Five...

The mystical tarot deck starts off with The Fool card. That sets the tone for the 78 card journey of self-awareness.  As we enter the reality of who we are we take on the risks of changing the paths we've been following. In medieval times The Fool was the most trusted member of the king's court. That's because The Fool kept royalty in reality. The rest of the court was preoccupied with pursuing their own agendas through the power of the king or simply sucking up. Of course, on a particular day the king might not be receptive to reality. The Fool could be banished to the tower or worse. Often life does exactly what the tarot does: Create a self-awareness that can't be ducked.  It was in prison that Richard Nixon's dirty-tricks lawyer Chuck Colson had a psychic shift. He envisioned the person he could be. And he decided to tell the world about it. He started his life over as a spiritual minister.  Post-prison Wall Street tycoon Michael Milken also started out on a ne...

 For years, before I conducted paid readings of the mystical tarot, I instructed writing at the Universities of Michigan, Pittsburgh and Connecticut. That's where I got down cold the principle I use in helping the suffering through the tarot: When revising, do small edits. In writing it's the revision of content. In life that could include revisions in relationships, behavior on the job or approach to wellness. American Buddhist nun Pema Chodron reinforces that wisdom of taking it slow. Her classic guide is the book "Start Where You Are."   The essence of successful change is this: Focus on a few things that will give you quick wins. For instance, instead of having the grandiose goal of being as socially skilled as Disney's Bob Iger, still-in-there as a politico Barack Obama or Paul Weiss law firm's Brad Karp, be determined to do only one thing better.  That could be to think before you speak. Pause a moment. What comes out might not be silver-tongued (at lea...

In these volatile times, shifts are happening abruptly.  Not too long ago psychic services, especially tarot readings, were high in demand. Mystical centers were opening up everywhere. Psychic phone lines were continually hiring. Folks hosting parties would have a tarot reader there for several hours. Then the momentum halted.  Here in this Arizona community about an hour from the border of Mexico three businesses providing a range of psychic services have shuttered. For a fourth I wonder how it can continue to keep going. For example, on Halloween there was only one client for a tarot reading and only four customers for the merchandise such as Wicca spell material. Fellow psychics in Maryland tell me there's a falloff in traffic in metaphysical retail. So, what is happening? Well, one factor is that we have entered the Year of Common Sense.  My own tarot reading practice is busy, both in-person and on a phone line, because this is known: The focus is pragmatic, not occul...

There's so much turmoil in careers. No surprise, those in torment about what's going on in their workplace are coming to tarot readings. Mostly they want to deal with their regret about not going with Opportunity ABC or blowing Opportunity GHI. Currently they are miserable.  That feeling is displayed in the Five of Cups - the card of Spilled Milk. On their behalf I went to ChatGPT to find out what the collective wisdom might be. Well, the ChatGPT guidance was mostly cliche. (No competition from OpenAI for my tarot reading business.) The one piece that was useful is this: Set new goals. No matter the past, the present is always there for a fresh beginning.  For example, you might have backed off from starting your own online business, which would demand a lot of time, and stuck with a day job leading nowhere. That was because you live in a HCOL (high cost of living) area and can't take the risk of earning less, even temporarily. Also, you're aging. You hear that about ha...

  Romi goes by "she." That's because this AI device which fits in the palm of your hand delivers what is associated with women: understanding and caring. That's also what we tarot readers embed in our interactions with clients. Most come to us not for any great spiritual insight. They want a warm human connection who is doing deep listening.  Soon enough folks who check in regularly for tarot readings could connect the dots. They can derive from Romi what they usually take away from meeting with us. She has a range of facial expressions. She is programmed to ask about your day.   In the US Romi was rolled out at the 2025 Consumers Electronics Show in Las Vegas. However, currently she only provides companionship in Japanese. She was invented in Japan for nursing home residents to have access to this kind of interactional support.  As with all new technology, the price is steep. Retail she goes for about $580. There's also a monthly subscription fee of $12.  ...

Over the years lawyers have come to me for a tarot reading.  As you know, you come to a tarot reading because you're in pain, not to gush about how great life is.  For lawyers, the form of the distress ranges from the need to size up the force field in a courtroom to emotional upheaval after they had made a mistake. About the latter: The price of making a mistake could include a lawsuit against them for alleged malpractice or even losing their license.  But when it comes to their titles such as US Attorney or Judge of this or that - and losing them as the political winds change - they have been silent. No texts from them for a tarot reading. They could not be coming for tarot readings because they don't want to know. The issue is too big: In the American brand of capitalism we are our titles. Suppose with the incoming conservative Trump administration the liberal legals can't land another plum position? They certainly don't want to manifest that. No Title, No Happy Life...

  The first card in the Tarot deck is The Fool's card.  The symbolizes the very human need to take the risks of finding your own way. For so many reasons those who come to me for tarot readings even require "permission" to start on that journey of authentic self-discovery.  Essentially they feel that they "ought" to be putting all their attention and energy into traditional activities such as building a career, chasing after a love interest, being a caretaker and/or hitting the gym in a wellness program. Anything but an exploration of the self. So, in guiding them the next key card is the pause one. No surprise, that also means they are looking to me again to give permission for them to take the time to reflect. I trace this inability to invest in finding yourself to the curse of ambition. In working with lawyers, for example, I uncover that they were afraid to veer off from what they considered the path to financial security, influence and power. So they put of...

  "If  'that' went on at my company, the CEO would be out." That's what a client for a tarot reading veered off on a tangent to say about the film released today "Baby Girl."  The plot focuses on a masochistic office romance between tech founder and CEO Romy and an intern Samuel who torments her. The cruelty extends to his bringing to her party a date from the office. Romy falls apart.  Many reviewers stick with the meme of the age difference. But the romance is simply a vehicle about what it is to be human.  Enter Sigmund Freud, whom few critics mention. It was Freud who made explicit the fundamental self-destructiveness of humans.  Romy represents just the tip of the iceberg. Samuel could have been murdered by the husband Jacob. He is playing with fire. The daughter Isabel risks her committed relationship with lover Mary by a kissy flirtation with another women. Esme, Romy's assistant, risks being offed by attempting to blackmail the boss, which h...

"All he wants to do is play soccer and hang out with his friends. He needs to get a better job."  Versions of that is what I am hearing more and more in tarot readings from one party in a relationship about the other. The "other" is usually a male. But they can be a female. In addition, I'm hearing this sort of thing from parents of teenage children who can't attach to goals such as succeeding in academics or music or sports.   None of these are even trying.  This week The Wall Street Journal refers to that as the inability to grow up. And it assesses it as a generational problem.  Young people aren't taking on the traditional responsibilities of adulthood: building a career, settling into a stable relationship, becoming a respected citizen in a community. Essentially they have big ideas about what the American Dream should be and they have little or no hope of reaching it. Specifically, notes WSJ: "A sizable share of this generation is worse-off t...