YouandTheTarot

  The Hulu documentary “Victoria’s Secret: Angels and Demons” presents a comprehensive chronicle of what, after an amazing rise, brought down that innovator in female intimate garments. Later, of course, there had been brand extensions into other products. That documentary, plus the resilience of the negative impacts of The Jeffery Epstein Factor, likely helped trigger the current restructuring of the corporation. In the process,  160 managers have lost their jobs . Does Victoria’s Secret have a comeback in its DNA? I am not optimistic. The world has changed too much. All this is a two-fold warning to executives: 1) Be cautious about who’s on your network and 2) anticipate how what you’re up-to will play out on a documentary. Yes, documentaries are a power tool for eliciting change. Book exposes are not where it’s at anymore. It’s the visual. That’s why the prospects for reform of Wall Street aren’t too rosy for the expose due out at the end of August — “Bully Market.” It’s by...

 It was a rare flashback to Loretta Lynch's June 2016 meeting on the tarmac at Phoenix airport with Bill Clionton. At the time she had been US Attorney General. Former US President Clinton was still a force in politics. His wife Hillary Clinton was running for the US Presidency and was being investigated for her use of email when US Secretary of State. The optics made that get-together a scandal. But the media, which determines who has made a comeback from whatever and who hasn't, has not covered that for years. The exception is the docudrama  "The Comey Rule"  about the rise and fall of former FBI Director James Comey. As many recall, US President, Donald Trump fired Comey. On Netflix since 2021 the film has a snippet about the tarmac meeting. Lynch is positioned as a tarnished brand. Overall, though, the media has allowed Lynch to rebrand. She is a woman of color.  That reset has happened in private practice. Wisely, she took the off-ramp from government service. H...

 In April 2021, The New York Times published a major feature article on how the mystical Tarot is a tool for self-awareness.  Like traditional forms of psychotherapy those 78 cards in the Tarot deck open the door to deep introspection. Essentially they clear the way for human beings to connect with the unconscious or, as it is sometimes called, the subconscious. How the unconscious shapes decision-making and behavior had been the breakthrough finding of Sigmund Freud. That NYT coverage gave the occult industry, which includes Tarot reading services, legitimacy. As a recent article in Vanity Fair confirms, that line of work has long been viewed with, at best, skepticism and, at worst, with an eye toward punishment.  IBISWorld documents that psychic services in the US is a $2 billion sector. In it 98,074 businesses operate and 90,833 are employed. Even small towns like Sierra Vista, Arizona, have metaphysical shops such as Strega . The provides not only psychic readers b...

 In The New Yorker interview with Isaac Chotiner, iconic defense lawyer Alan Dershowitz laments that he is being shunned on Martha's Vineyard. What especially troubles him is that the Chilmark Library in that resort area hasn't invited him, as it usually does, to deliver a talk.  Dershowitz believes he is being socially shut out because of those he has chosen to represent as clients. Yes, Donald Trump is among them. Essentially, he perceives himself as a victim of the cancel culture. That is the movement of sticking with one absolutist line of thought - and vilfying those who don't. But some of us absorbing that interview wonder if Dershowitz has become a social outcast because of how he comports himself. And, related to that, is he aware of how he is doing that.  For exactly that reason I offer Dershowitz a complimentary Tarot reading. In an article in April 2021, The New York Times saluted Tarot card readings as a useful tool for coming to self-awareness. Yes, it can t...

 It was the mid 1970s, the market for humanities college professors went poof. There was no sign of recovery, at least not during the timeframe in which we Ph.D. students should be getting our careers started.  Most of us hung around illusion too long befoe we eventually pulled the plug and cast ourselves into trying out other ways to make a living. I don't think any of us "moved on." Not in the sense of healing. After all the sunk costs included six years of our youth, jumping through hoops of qualifying examinations, living frugally, putting up with the arrogance and nastiness of those we thought could help us, and plans to do such important intellectual work. But a number of us did luck out and were able to leverage our communications skills in corporate communications and research ability into management consulting. That hasn't made much of a difference, though.The lump of pain hardened into permanent self-doubt. How could we who had been golden have stumbled into...

The client, usually one of those always-in-charge academics, leaned back as if shot. The Devil came up in our one-card pull Tarot reading. No matter what deck you are using The Devil card is, well, scary. This man believed in the Tarot.  "What do you see in this card?"  The client resisted taking a real look at the card. Usually I don't put out there a traditional interpretation of a card. There is so much ambiguity in each card. But this time I reached into what the ancients have declared the message of the Devil card to be. There was a psychic pull - almost a mandate from the universe - to align with the collective wisdom of the ages. "The Devil card captures the heavy hold something has on you." I waited.  "And you're the one who is allowing it." The humans in the Devil card are chained but in a way that they can remove the chains. Most often, the forms of enslavement include: Addictions of all types, from substances to work. Thought patterns su...

 Burning bridges is usually viewed through the lens of self-defeating behavior. No surprise, in the Bloomberg article by Sarah Green Carmichael on how to manage a rescinded-offer catastrophe, there is a warning not to burn bridges. That would be in the form of negative postings on social networks. That's the traditional career guidance. Like most conventional advice, it is highly flawed. In 2007, those who approached careers with absolute strictures assessed associate Aaron Charney as committing career suicide. That was by suing his law firm Sullivan & Cromwell for alleged bias about sexual orientation. There was no career suicide. S&C settled with Charney. After that he purchased a condo (more expensive than a coop) in Manhattan so we might assume it was a good deal for him. In addition, he landed another prestigious job in law.  In 2008, Paul Hastings associate Shinyung Oh has been fired. Explaining that she didn't want to exit on a stealth basis with her ta...