🎙️85. Tarot as a Strategic & Intuitive Tool with Amelia Hruby

podcast

Sep 24

Written By Lyndsee Nielson

the spiritual 9-5 podcast transcript

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Episode Published on September 24, 2024

Transcript

Intro music 🎶

I believe that working can be one of the most spiritual paths that we walk.

Whether that work is turning your passion into a business, or sitting behind a desk for eight hours a day, or anywhere beyond and in between. And yet, we often take the way in which we show up to work for granted, even though it's where we spend the majority of our time.

Here on The Spiritual 9–5 Podcast, we talk about that. We talk about entrepreneurship, we talk about the 9 to 5, we talk about what it's like to be multi-passionate, and talented, and inspired, and also utterly demotivated.

We are here to support you in your work, whether your work is sacred to you, or just something that you do to get by. We are here to help you see and know yourself a little bit deeper, and to inspire you to show up no matter what it is that you find.

I'm your host, Marie Groover, and like you I am as multi-passionate as they come. I'm the founder of two businesses that are here to bring the soul back into the office. I, too, work a 9 to 5 in corporate tech.

I'm a surfer, a writer, a philosopher-artist, if you will, and I'm so excited to bring you this episode today. If you haven't, please leave the show a 5-star rating, and if this episode resonates, consider saving it and sharing it with someone you think it would resonate with too.

Intro music fades 🎶

Marie Groover: Hi, Amelia! Welcome.

Amelia Hruby: Hi, Marie. I'm thrilled to be here on the podcast!

MG: So excited to have you and have you again. We're in the middle of a Woo Woo at Work series, and I'm gonna be honest, originally, I was thinking…I was trying to think, how can I connect the dots of bringing tarot and the practice of tarot into the workplace selfishly for my own business marketing purposes

[both laugh]

And bringing the woo woo to work and kind of, you know, inspiring or catalyzing some thoughts in people in terms of bringing this in for a team building practice or kind of, you know, demystifying the stigma around it.

But actually, what I would really love to explore is your personal practice. And really a practice that has been supportive to you, and me, and to many people so that we can peel back the covers a little bit. And maybe inspire someone else, you know, if not into this practice itself, but inspire someone else in finding what is supportive for them regardless of, I don't know, stigma or whatever cultural thoughts exist. So yeah. So how do you feel about that?

AH: I think we can do both of those things. Because I feel like a lot of my personal journey into the tarot was a journey of kind of uncovering and releasing some of that stigma.

And I think that at this point, my approach to the cards is extremely compatible with any type of strategic or development or planning work. Even in a corporate setting, I think it, it could fit and be supportive in the same way that a tool like Design Thinking is supportive. Like, there are different ways we can bring the tarot in as a tool. So I'm excited to kind of dive in through all of these lenses today.

MG: Okay. Yeah. So then what was your intro to tarot? When did you find tarot, and what were some of the stigmas that you had to work through when coming to it?

AH: I don't remember, like, my first encounter with tarot as a concept or with the cards sort of as an image. I know obviously…or not obviously…I know that growing up, you know, I saw movies with witches and they would pull tarot cards, or I visited a friend in Louisiana once, and we went to New Orleans and had a psychic reading done. And I think that she pulled some tarot cards while we were there. And so I had this understanding of tarot as a magical tool for divination. By which I mean, like, as a tool that would help people see the future. Like, that's what I thought tarot was. And that was always a little, like, dubious and uncomfortable to me. I've, I've never quite been a person who believed other people could see the future necessarily. I softened on that a bit.

[both laugh]

But, but I will say from the outset that, like, I don't use tarot as a divination practice. I don't use it as a psychic practice personally. So that was my impression of tarot, you know, growing up in the nineties and early 2000s, watching movies like The Craft and things like that, you know, encountering psychics in these sorts of settings like New Orleans. And then somewhere around, like, 2015 is when I ordered my first deck, and I think that that is when I was seeing more tarot readers maybe on Instagram. I was following people like, you know, Sarah Gottesdiener of the Moon Studio and kind of just really drawn toward these beautiful cards. Like, it was almost then an aesthetic resonance. And I was like, this is really beautiful.

And I was in a period of my life where I just had a lot of questions that I could not figure out the answers to. The types of questions that don't really have an answer. Like, ‘What is my purpose? What should I be doing next?’ You know, these things where there's not a clear path or one specific answer. There's so many answers to what is your purpose, and you need a more, I think, I think, intuitive tool to help tap into that.

So, I was searching for these answers. I was feeling drawn toward the beauty of the tarot cards, and I ordered my first deck, actually, like, in a super not magical way. I was at a bar with friends. We were talking about it, and I got on Amazon and I just ordered a deck off Amazon at, like, 11 PM on a Wednesday night at the Whistler in Chicago. So [laughs] it's, like, very just, like, okay. I just need to try this out.

And I got that deck and I started working with it. I would ask questions. I'd pull cards. I'd open the little tiny book that came with it and read what they meant, and I journal about that and think about what they said. And that was really the beginning of my practice of, like, my actual working with the cards.

MG: Okay. What I really love is which we can come back to later, but you, you mentioned questions with no specific answers and how often it is more intuitive based tooling that helps us get to the root of where it is that we might be going, for example.

Also, I love this ordering of cards from a bar at 11 pm. [laughs] I love this because it's also it breaks the stigma too of tarot. Right? I remember for myself, you know, I moved to North Carolina when I was around 11 and became really good friends with this, woman, Andrea, this girl, Andrea, at the time we were girls. And her mom was a tarot reader. And so from that moment on, I was just exposed to it.

But she comes from a very, you know, Italian, folklore background where the practice is very much about lineage and like, you know, someone else seeing the magic in you and gifting you the cards and then teaching you the ways and it's very much passed down through generations. And so I thought it was like a magical party that I wasn't invited to, you know? And I thought that I didn't have access to it. And I remember yeah, that was kind of my intro, but I, but I was around it quite a lot.

And I grew up, you know, Andrea has always been very deep into, like, the esoteric, into the woo woo space. And so I was really comfortable with it, but I stayed kind of away from it, a little distance from it. And like you, I was really dubious. I was like, I don't know about this. I don't know. And then, yeah, later on in life, I, I was like, ‘Let's explore this.’ And so I love, I love how not magical, we could say, your experience was in just being like, I'm gonna just order. It's like a fuck it moment. You're like, fuck it. I'm just doing this. Right? At a bar with friends. I need a deck. Let's go.

AH: You know, I think you're really speaking to 2 different approaches to tarot. So I think we can see tarot within the folk magic tradition. You know, tarot, at its essence, is a deck of playing cards. It's using a deck of playing cards to understand, to answer a question about the present or the future or what or the past or whatever it might be. And from what I've read, it has roots going back to the mid 15th century. So this is a centuries long practice, and for many people, it does live within these folk magic traditions, which are often handed down and are about lineage and are about, you know, sharing and passing information and stories over time. And I think that that is really beautiful and sacred and something that I do want to uphold and respect.

And simultaneously, I think we can also see tarot as an archetypal, intuitive tool. And so many people within tarot will, you know, see the sorts of sets of Jungian archetypes and see a more, like, collective subconscious experience. So we can encounter it in that way. And I think that's more how I have approached it.

Because like you, I didn't have anyone who was, like, passing down the lineage of tarot to me. You know, my family definitely had, like, all of the Christianity had wiped the folk magic right out of them.

[laughs]

Even my Italian ancestors on my mom's side, like, that was all gone. We were just, like, non-magical Christians growing up. And so I think my, my entry then was through this more sort of, like, archetypal approach and intuitive approach and personal approach, and and that's how I've encountered the cards. But I I think both, we can still hold both as true and hold them both together.

MG: The archetypal approach, I feel like this is such a beautiful doorway into the woo woo in general. It's just beginning to look at archetypes because it's so user friendly and it doesn't have to be magical. You know, we can always we can see within these archetypes different elements of ourselves, and we can see ourselves embodying these different archetypes at different points in our lives.

And I think it's such a beautiful invitation to experience mmm different perspective as well. You said that you don't necessarily use tarot as divination or a psychic practice when you started. Okay. Two questions. When you started, did you, did you, like, experiment with that? And then the second one would be, how do you then use tarot? What does that look like?

AH: I think I would say that I have no interest in telling the future. I feel very at peace with not knowing. Maybe I didn't at the beginning, but but but at this point, it just feels unknowable, and I don't turn toward any tools to know what will happen. And so I, I don't think I've used tarot as a divination practice. I don't think I went to it as a divination practice.

In fact, you know, when I went to the cards in my twenties, I was just really struggling to figure out what was happening in that time of my life. And so I really went to it with a lot of confusion and anxiety around the present and wanting to untangle the present moment, and I think tarot was actually really supportive in that.

And in some sense, that's how I've continued to use the cards. And I think I would distinguish between divination and planning here. I think there's a sense of, like, asking a tool to tell us what will happen in the future, which feels a little more like divination or, like, future telling to me. And then there's, like, asking a tool to be like, ‘Okay. If I take this step, if I, you know, I'm thinking about this thing, like, what might come up? What might I encounter?’

And it's less about, like, what will happen. It's more about what energy might I be working with or, like, if I head this direction, or what's going on right now. I think that's where it really starts for me. Like, what's happening right now? And then I'm considering some steps and, like, what can I know about that?

So for me, at this stage, in my tarot practice, I think of tarot as these, like, archetypal mirrors. And every time I go to the tarot, I'm asking a question. And sometimes I'm asking a literal question, like, I don't know, ‘What's going on with me and this client right now?’

[laughs]

Or, like, ‘Why do I feel so frustrated in this project?’ Like, sometimes they're very, like, literal tactical questions, and sometimes there's actually, it's just the act of questioning itself. Like, I don't have a specific question in mind. I’m just inquiring with the cards about what's present, or what's past, present, and future, which is a common way of pulling 3 cards, one for the past, one for the present, one for the future.

And when I pull the cards, I inquire with myself, like, ‘Does this resonate? Does, does this feel right? Does it make sense?’ If the answer is yes, I can then, like, write and explore and think more about why. If the answer is no, then I get to ask myself, okay. This doesn't resonate. But does it feel like there might be something hidden for me in this that I'm, like, not really ready to face or that I'm not dealing with that I can uncover? And sometimes the answer is like, ‘Ugh yeah. That is underneath there. And I hadn't been thinking of it that way.’

Sometimes working with the tarot in that way, like, breaks up a story I'm telling myself and lets me see through it. Because often, I think we get really stuck in our thought patterns, and we get really attached to these stories we've been telling ourselves for a long time. Or stories that other people have told us about ourselves, or about life. And I think tarot can be really good at either mirroring back, like, ‘Yeah, that's the story,’ or, like, ‘No, you're not, like, we have to get underneath that.’ We have to see through that. We have to break that down. And then the third option is sometimes I look at a card and I'm like, that does not resonate. I don't think that's present at all. And I'm just gonna not deal with like, we're just gonna pull another one.

[laughs]

Like, sometimes I just put the card back and I pull another card out. And I think it's important too, like that can't be the first thing you do. Like, I don't think the purpose of tarot is to just, like, constantly be pulling cards that affirm what you're already thinking. I think that's what the archetypal mirroring is to me. It's like, kind of showing me something and allowing me to kind of bounce off of that. Look at that, see what resonates, see what doesn't, ask if there's something I'm not considering, and just consider new and different things.

And that's so helpful in our personal lives, but I also think, you know, as a small business owner or as an employee or someone leading a team, like, it can just be really helpful to, to me the tarot cards are just a way of having a totally different voice in the room. So that you can get other insight. And sometimes that insight will affirm what you already think is the case, and sometimes it will bring something totally new to the table. And then you can either, like, take that on or let it go. That's how I use the tarot now.

MG: Okay, this is incredible. What I'm hearing is a tool for self reflection and inquiry, which is a practice. I think self reflection, self awareness, inquiring into the self as a practice. And what's really cool about tarot and helpful about tarot, I find the same thing true in my own practice, is that when you have something else in front of you physically presenting itself to you, it forces you to look at that externally, but then also internally. Right? As you were mentioning the mirror. So it's literally a practice in questioning yourself. ‘Does this resonate? Where does this resonate? Where might this not resonate? Am I ignoring something that I, that I didn't realize I was ignoring? Is there something that I'm missing here? Is there a different story that I can operate in?’

And as you're saying this, I'm thinking about…because I, I use tarot and, you know, for myself, for my business, but also with my clients. And what an amazing, supportive tool for mindset work and deep belief work, for uncovering the subconscious, right? Of really, you know, even when I pull a card and I explain maybe an archetype behind the card or the way that I read a card for someone else, hearing them reflect back to me, whatever it is that they think or whatever it is that comes up within them, it illuminates the mental story. Right? It illuminates the subconscious or whatever it is that we're attaching to something outside of ourselves or something within ourselves.

So I think this is so beautiful. Yeah. This is so beautiful. And then when I think about this in terms of, you know, business ownership or showing up in our lives or leading a team–I love that you mentioned leading a team–it helps to hold you accountable. Right? Like the self reflection, the self inquiry helps to hold you accountable to something maybe greater than a story that you're holding onto, or something maybe greater than a desire that you have that you're attached to, or an outcome that you're attached to even.

Right? It helps to hold you accountable to something a little bit greater, which might be your team. It might be yourself. Right? So I think this is really cool.

AH: There's this funny way that self reflection actually isn't something I can do by myself. That's the mirror piece. It's like self reflection can't just be about going within and, like, only finding what you already have to say there. Like, we need something else to bounce off of, to use a mirror metaphor, like, of the light bouncing off the glass or to just, like, have that friction, like, to rub up against to be like, ‘Is this true about me? Is it not true about me? Am I this way? Am I not this way? Do I feel this way, but my actions are different?’ Like, we need the outer experience of the world to come in somehow in order to self reflect.

And I think that what I love about tarot and other tools is it allows that to happen, but because tarot is an archetypal tool, so we're dealing with these, like, larger stories about human experience, larger moments of human experience that have been captured in each card. It's a way of, like, bringing other people in to help me with my self reflection, without actually bringing a specific person in. Because sometimes that is actually not a good move. Right?

[laughs]

You know, if if I wanna, like, self reflect, I'm not gonna go to, like, I don't know, my mortal enemy and do that with them. Right? Like, they're not the person I'm trying to bounce off against.

And it may be, like, you know, your boss may not be the person you wanna do that with at any given time or, you know, your parents may not be the right person to go to to figure out, like, you know, how are you doing right now as an adult or something. Right? So we have to, like, I think, carefully select the partners that we choose for that.

Now a trusted therapist might be a great person to be a mirror in your self reflection. So I think other people can hold that role for us. But so many of us, I mean, it can be hard to find the right therapist. It can be hard to connect with a trusted friend we can do this work with. And the tarot cards are literally like a pocket sized thing that can always be there to support that self reflection, like, with someone else, to some extent, through the cards.

And this might be a nice moment just to say a little bit more about the cards if folks are listening and they're, like, really not familiar with tarot. So as I've mentioned, you know, tarot at its essence is like a deck of playing cards. And it has been around, this practice has been around since the mid 15th century. But I would say that, like, in to the contemporary Western society, the most common tarot deck would be the Rider Waite Smith deck, which was drawn and illustrated by Pamela Coleman Smith and released over a 100 years ago.

And it's composed of 78 cards. You have 22 cards in the major arcana, which is sort of like the trump of the deck, like the major cards. That's why it's called the major arcana. [laughs] The most potent archetypes is one way to think about it. And then you have 4 suits. So you have wands, swords, cups, and pentacles or coins, and those 4 suits map onto the 4 elements. So wands mapping onto fire, swords to air, cups to water, and coins to earth. And each suit has an ace 2 through 10 and then 4 court cards. So that's how we get to the 78 cards.

Every card depicts something different, but within the suits, you'll see commonality. Like, you'll see many wands, or wands in each card of that suit or swords in each card of that suit. And there are many ways to understand the journey of the major arcana, and we can link below. I've, like, collected many book lists of books to read about this because every professional tarot reader has their own understanding of how the cards come together. But, typically, I would say across many people, the major arcana is seen as similar to what we might call, like, the hero's journey.

It starts with the fool, which is the card for the number 0, and it ends with the world, which is number 21, and, you know, it takes us from this experience. You could see it as, like, from birth through death into the afterlife if you so choose. You don't have to see it that way. Again, I think the beauty of archetypes is they resonate with us with our human experience, but that doesn't mean that we will individually have every single one of those moments or experiences.

So, just to pause there and kind of recap, that's what the cards are. And I think that's why when I say, like, they're a way of bringing other people into your self reflection, it's because the cards depict human figures, and they depict moments in the hero's journey across our lifetime. And so we can find that. When we pull a card, we can kind of see if we're in a moment like that, if we're having an experience like that, or if we know someone who is, or if we have in the past and it's coming back. And it's just like a really, to me, like, supportive practice for self reflection and connection.

MG: Yeah. Oh, thank you for that breakdown. That was amazing. And I would love to link some resources below because, yeah, there are so many ways in which, you know, tarot can show us elements of ourselves or exactly what you're saying, experiences that we're going through, that maybe we realize we're going through or maybe we don't realize we're going through. Right?

And what I would add something, you know, a way in which tarot has been supportive for me has been that mirror, but it's also that it's a tangible, physical object that you can look at that can reflect back to you. Whereas I think what you're saying about self reflection is accurate, at least for me as well in that self reflection, it's not that it doesn't come naturally, but it's that something else typically has to spark or catalyze it for me. Right? It's like an argument or an experience at work or and then that even has been a practice where, you know, I think in my younger years, something would happen and I wouldn't reflect on me. Right? I'd be focused on what was going on outside of me.

Whereas I think when we start to enter into these practices with, with tarot, especially when we're practicing by ourselves, so not, you know, when we go to a reader, we still get that same benefit. But when we're practicing alone, when we're sitting alone in our bedroom, pulling cards and looking down at the cards, we're having a conversation with ourself. Right? And it's opening a dialogue that otherwise would never exist. And it's giving us access to, yeah, a part of us that we don't necessarily always attune to and that's invited all through just a physical thing.

And I think sometimes we need that physical thing, especially when we start to get into the woo woo, because I love tarot. Tarot was my introduction really to spirituality in the more kind of modern spirituality sense. You know, spirituality, I think I've always have been very spiritual, but in the sense of, you know, like the Akashic Records and looking at different tools and, like, the psychic world and, and things like that, where I think when you start to expand into these other tools, there's not really a physical element to them. So you have this constant, it's easy to have this constant questioning of, ‘Am I making this up? Am I crazy? What's going on here?’

Whereas with tarot, it's like a card that's in front of you, and you're like, ‘Oh, the Queen of Cups is here. [laughs] And this is what the Queen of Cups is saying.’ And I can see exactly how and where that is in my life right now or where I'm being invited into that right now. And I'm not, you know, accepting the invitation or where I'm resisting that right now or where, you know, I've never wanted to embody that or, or whatever the situation is.

Whereas I think when we, you know, even meditate. So if we take like the Akashic records or something [laughs] a little more like swirly, if we take that away and we just look at meditation, for example. And we're just entering the confines of our minds, you know, without anything physical, it can be a little harder. It can be more challenging. We can have questions. We can feel self doubt. We can be unsure. ‘Am I doing this right?’ Whereas even if we look at meditation and we enter, we bring in mantra or we bring in like Mala beads that we can physically touch. That just opens the door for a whole new experience that I think allows us to feel safe. It brings an element of lightness and an element of security where we don't have to question ourselves.

Like when you pull a card and, you know, like the Queen of Cups again, for example, when that shows up, there's no question you didn't make that up. That's not just something that's appearing in your mind. It's like, it's showing up, and now you get to interact with it.

AH: Yeah. I really appreciate that reflection. And it's, one thing I wanted to share is that I think when I came to tarot, it was so important to me because I needed to get out of my own head. I was a pro journaler. Like, I started journaling when I was, like, 9 years old. So I knew how to, like, write down a question and try to journal about it, but I was too stuck in my own head. I was too stuck in my own stories. I, like, couldn't get out.

And that goes back to that, like, sometimes you can't self reflect by yourself piece, and the tarot cards became this other thing. Like you said, like, it actually showed up. The Queen of Cups is there in front of you, and that was so useful for me. It's also, I think, why meditation for a long time didn't work for me, because I would sit down and I would just spin out on my own stories, and I couldn't find a way. I love physical objects like mala beads or something where you're it helps me, like, kind of stop that spiral. But I think the tarot was easier for me to approach in the beginning, like, than just trying to, like, sit and be quiet and still with myself. That really wasn't accessible to me for a long time, actually. And so I love that about the cards.

And I also think there's something too about the fact that they are beautiful. Like, there are so many tarot decks out there. You know, I've, I've referenced the Rider Waite Smith deck, which is considered kind of, like, the standard, I would say, in many communities. But it's not the only one. You know? And there are tarot decks that can speak to any aspect of your experience, any interest you have. You know? I have a pasta tarot deck. I have a cat tarot deck. Like, literally, anything you enjoy has probably been made into a tarot deck at this point!

And I think that for me, what felt unapproachable about tarot for a long time was I was like, there are so many cards. They have swords. They're like, dude, all this weird stuff. I don't understand. Like, the Rider Waite Smith deck, I didn't use that deck for the first 8 years of my practice. It felt very unapproachable to me. I was using these, like, gorgeous collage decks and the, I, we can also link some of my favorite decks below. Like, I have so many that I love and have used for a long time now and then eventually reencountered the Rider Waite Smith deck in my own time. But I think that there's just really something to the fact that there's your physical objects, they're beautiful, and you can kind of find them in your own flavor. You can find an aesthetic that really speaks to you.

And I think that sometimes we undervalue the importance of that beauty and that attraction and that, like, aesthetic quality of our spiritual experience. And I think especially when we're confronting the parts of life that are not beautiful, the parts that are hard and ugly and challenging–having a, a beautiful tool alongside us can make that feel more possible to navigate.

MG: So much yes. And, actually, that brings me back. My brain immediately comes back to when you first started practicing tarot, and even today, you said that ‘you used it as a tool for navigating the present when you were in these moments of confusion.’ And what I immediately think about is like, you know, this hits for me because the present can be so hard sometimes. Right? The discomfort of not knowing the discomfort of, you know, chaos around us, chaos within us.

I think you, talking about how in your head you were, that's so resonant with me. I spent so much time in my head. And then, you know, before I came into tarot, I was doing like mentoring and coaching and working with coaches and coaching other people, doing a lot of mindset work. Like later, years later, I came into somatics and being in the body. But before I came into really being in the body, it's just like, you can mindset your way out of something, but you can mindset your way right back into something else that's like judgmental and critical of yourself and hard.

[laughs]

And you know, what's beautiful, I think about tarot and I would love to explore as you navigate these confusing and difficult moments and bringing in the beauty of a deck, you know, just what that experience is like, because, man, the present can be really tough when we're in these moments of discomfort. And, you know, truly, I think part of the human experience is having these moments where we don't know what the fuck. We don't know what's going on. We don't know who we are. We lose touch with you know, and, and sometimes these are moments that last literally seconds, and sometimes they're moments that last weeks, months, years.

You know, at this point in my life, I've, I've now navigated full years where I've been like, ‘I don't really know what's happening, but I'm here.’ Yeah. And what's so cool about having something physical in front of you, at least for me, so I wanna hear this for you too, is that it immediately brings you back and it helps you to show up when you're uncomfortable and you don't wanna show up. You know?

AH: For me, so often I turn to the tarot when I'm like, ‘What do I do now?’ I think that's a question I just bring over and over and over again. And sometimes I just ask that question, and I'll pull some cards, or sometimes it's a little more, you know, I might ask, like, ‘How am I doing? What am I doing? What do I do next?’

If I'm feeling lost or confused or just unclear, you know, I think that my life has transformed a lot since I, you know, first started working with the tarot almost a decade ago now. And at that time, I really didn't know what I was doing. I didn't have a career path. I didn't have a partner that I was with. I didn't have a steady living situation. Like, every like, every single thing in my life was up in the air. And so I really went to tarot for, like, solace and support in, like, a very tangible way. I, like, did not know what to do.

And tarot didn't tell me what to do. I wanna be clear. Like, for me, I did not, like, pull the Queen of Cups and then go become a professional therapist, which is one way, I guess, you could read that card. Tarot did not tell me what to do. If anything, during that period, tarot just mirrored back to me what I was experiencing. I pulled the Hermit constantly. And I was living in my little studio apartment in Chicago just, like, going to grad school and coming home and, like, doing my thing and, like, I wanted a partnership. I wanted more friendships. I wanted so many things. Like, I was in a hermit era, and the tarot just kept showing up with that. Like, that's what it gave me.

I also pulled the Tower a lot during that period of time because it was a period when I, like, actually moved through, like, 3 or 4 very tumultuous, some toxic relationships pretty quickly. So it was, like, all crumbling down all the time, [laughs] and it just kept going up. And I was like, alright. This is just where I am.

So I share that to say, like, the tarot in those moments just reflected back to me what I kinda knew. I was like, well, I'm kind of on my own right now, and things are not really working out. Like, those were things I was experiencing, but, frankly, having that affirmed felt really supportive during that challenging period.

And what I love about working with the tarot long term is that now I can look back, and that's really how I see that era of my life is characterized by those cards. And this era of my life is characterized by different cards, and, and now I, I more actively choose cards to partner with and archetypes that I, I want to embody and that I'm working with actively instead of feeling like they're being kind of given to me or forced on me. That's been a big shift over my, you know, many years of practice.

But, yeah, I think there's something to tarot as a way of making sense of the present during a challenging time. But I also wanna say that that now that I am in this era where I don't things are not crumbling down all the time. You know, I'm, I'm married. I have a wonderful spouse. I have amazing friends. I have found my footing. You know, I still use tarot in much smaller instances of the question, ‘What do I do now?’ Right? Sometimes it's literally like, okay, ‘I cleared out my inbox. What should I work on?’ [laughs] I don't know. I like pull it, you know, I can just, like, have a fun moment with myself.

And it's not that the tarot card tells me what to do. It's just that it kinda, like, gets me away from my screen enough that I could be like, okay. Let me, like, reset, and I kind of know, like, that I can decide what to do. Or sometimes, you know, I, a project stalls, and I'm not quite sure what's going on, and I'll just pull a card or a few cards to try to connect with that. And, again, it's like, I have intuitions about why it's stalled, but I'm just curious what the cards will mirror back. You know, maybe I think it stalled because this project manager is a mess, and I'm like, chaos, and I can't do anything about that. And then I pull a card and it says, yep. That project manager's a mess.

Or maybe I pull a card and it's like, oh, your communication style is totally wacky here. Like, you haven't sent an email in 6 days. Maybe you should un-stall this project. Right? Whatever it is. So I think that that's also helpful. Like, it helps me kind of see what do I think is going on, and does this mirror affirm that or suggest something else?

MG: Mmmm I wanna come back to this because, because I love this, especially in terms of, you know, the question of, ‘I just cleaned my inbox out. What do I do next?’ How many moments do we have like that on a regular basis? I have this moment almost every single day. I finish something and I'm like, okay. Well, I have this list, but I don't really wanna do this list. Or what should I pick on this list? Or what's really more important?

Like, these moments of self prioritization or work prioritization where I'm just like, oh, I don't know if I feel like that. But, you know and I think sometimes we step away and we ask the question. It's like we're still being with the work and we get to be with the work in a different kind of way. And then we get to be inspired or, you know, lightened or maybe we get to be validated or we get to see something in a different perspective.

I, I think that this is really powerful when it comes to our work. Also because when we're in this moment of grounding or footing, and then we're also working and we're building businesses or trying to get promoted at work or trying to motivate a team or whatever it is that we're doing, whatever our current goal is. Right? Sometimes we can take that way too seriously. And I think just stepping away for a second, just pulling a couple cards and being like, ‘What should I do?’ Can just lighten, like, what you're saying. It's fun. It can be fun.

And then we can feel inspired again, and then we don't have to be so serious. And then when we can be inspired and take something seriously, but not just be too rigid about it. Sometimes that's all we need to get the motion going. Right? Or sometimes what we need is to be like, oh, shit. I haven't sent email in 6 days, but I'm complaining about this project manager. Meanwhile, I am pretty sure I didn't even answer this question that they asked me. Like, [laughs] wait a second. This is stalled because of me.

[laughs]

But then even then you can laugh about it because it's not like the project managers saying anything to you. It's like you're almost saying it to yourself. Right? So then it doesn't have to be so you don't have to be so, like, down about it or critical about it. I think this is cool.

And what I also wanna kind of emphasize that you said is that often tarot doesn't tell you what to do, but it reflects back to you what you already know.

And so I love this so much because what I have found is that when I go to a reader, whether this reader is a tarot reader, a psychic reader, an Akashic Records reader, a Gene Keys reader, an astrology reader, a human design reader, if I do a discover insights, for example, like a personality test at work, if I go to any tool, the thing that will feel the most profound to me is never something that I've not heard before or not known before.

The thing that will feel the most profound to me and land in my body, the biggest, the hardest, the thing that's gonna hit the hardest is always something that I already knew deep down that maybe I've forgotten, or that maybe I've been ignoring, or that maybe I didn't want to admit. Right?

And the same thing is true of when I read for other people, when I work with other people, I, as a coach, even if I'm identifying patterns, even if I you know, I've been working with a couple of clients now for almost 3 years, and they'll send me voice notes and I'll listen to their voice notes. And then, you know, after working with someone for even a year, you start to to notice, like, patterns and seasons in their life, and you get to reflect that back to them. It's completely meaningless unless they already have an awareness of it on some level. Right? When I say, ‘Hey, I think I've noticed this thing, or I think I'm seeing this thing.’ Literally, it means nothing to them unless they already have awareness around it.

If they have awareness around it, they're gonna be like, ‘Oh, shit. You're right. Wow. I can, I can make a shift now’ or ‘Wow, thank you so much for sharing that with me.’ Same thing of when I'm reading for someone or I'm reading someone's astrology, always the things that resonate the most are the things that we already know.

And I think that this is so important because when we talk about tarot, even as divination, which neither one of us really practice tarot in that way, but even if we talk about tarot as divination, or when we think about tarot in general and we don't have experience with it, and we think about ‘psychic’ in general and we don't have experience with it, we are looking for someone or something else to tell us something that we don't already know. And I feel like that's just a fundamental mistake when we, you know, meet a tarot deck or when we go see a reader.

And I see this all the time, you know, when someone comes to me for a tarot reading or like an Akashic records reading or even a coaching session, sometimes people are looking for that. They're like, ‘Okay, tell me something I don't know; predict the future. Tell me what I'm thinking.’ Tell me blah, blah, blah. Right. ‘Tell me something that I'm not aware of.’ But, even if you pull a deck of tarot cards and, and something that you didn't previously see shows up or that you didn't know already, what I found is those things don't land and they don't move us because the things that move us, the things that resonate with us are things that we're already working with on some level consciously or subconsciously.

AH: I think that's so astute and profound, and I think it's also part of breaking down the stigma around tarot and other mystical tools. Because so often, the images that are presented to us societally, I'm specifically thinking about movies here–there was just this movie that came out this year called tarot, and it was, like, a horror film–and what happens in these movies, this is, like, so common, is that a tarot deck is found or presented, and somebody pulls the Death card, and somebody pulls the Tower card, like, all of these, you know, very striking, quote unquote scary cards, and then it predicts that they're gonna die or that they're gonna fall off a building or, like, it's so literal.

And, you know, I believe tarot can be very literal. I, I do think that can be the case. But I think that, like, what we see in those films and these these images are a sort of, like, this tool is presenting something you've never thought about, or it's presenting something fearful, or something you don't want to happen, or that you are hoping won't come to pass, but it's, like, confronting you.

And I think even the people I know, as you're saying, who practice tarot as a tool of divination or with a psychic capacity, they're not trying to show up and be like, here's 10 things that you never thought were gonna happen that are gonna happen, or let me tell you that you're actually gonna have breakfast for dinner tomorrow. What a surprise. Like, no one's saying that.

Like, even the people who are practicing divination and have, like, psychic capabilities with tarot, which, again, it's not me, but the folks who I respected and admire in those ways, like, that's not what they're doing. They're not trying to provide, like, a shock and awe, like, ‘You'll never guess this is gonna happen!’ They're tapping into your energetic currents, their sense of what guides are saying, etcetera, but it it's not that surprise me moment. It's not tell me something I don't know. It's tell me something I already deeply know, and perhaps need help uncovering.

Because what society does is dump all of these stories on top of what we already know. And some of them are about tarot. Right? Some of them are these, these films that we watch that scare us around these tools. But other of them are stories about what we should do in our life based on our gender, or based on where we grow up, or based on who our parents are, like, or based on, you know, the systemic inequalities around race or anything in our society. Like, all those are stories that are covering up the things that we already know, and I think that tarot is just one tool for starting to, like, break through those stories and, like, get back to what we know. And that, that's how I like to use the cards and what I love about the cards.

MG: That's so beautiful. That's so beautiful. And, yeah, it's, it's so…it's actually so simple. I think it's so simple. I love reading for people who don't know anything about tarot or who are a little bit nervous or apprehensive because then they're like, ‘Oh, that, like, wasn't weird at all. It was a conversation.’ [laughs] I'm like, ‘Yeah, because it's actually not weird. It's not weird at all.’

It's like we're just reflecting together. We're just reflecting together on some, on some archetypes, Right? On some things that could be happening or showing up in your life and why they might be happening or showing up in your life.

So let's talk about tarot and business. How do you use tarot with your business and how has it supported you, you know, in your journey as an entrepreneur and in running business and in working with people and growing?

AH: Yeah. So I've already shared some of the, like, day to day practices I have with tarot around, you know, if I'm at a moment between tasks and I want some input on what to do next or a break to just, like, step away and come back. If I'm not sure what's going on with a client or a project, I might pull some cards. Like, those are ways that I'll inquire with the tarot in my business.

But I think maybe something I haven't shared yet is that when I started my business, I selected 3 archetypes from the tarot that I wanted to embody in this business, like, 3 cards, I suppose, 3 images that I really wanted to kind of be and bring to through fruition through this process of running my business. And so for me, those cards were the Empress, the Queen of Pentacles, and the 9 of Pentacles.

They are images of pleasure and possibility, and also with the Queen of Pentacles, like, a real sense of connection to and being in flow with material resources. And I think that for me, personally, when I started my business, I had to do a lot of, you know, shadow work around money and uncovering these false stories I had inherited about money and about work and about the value of work and about charging for work.

So, like, I was really…and worthiness, I was digging all of that up, and I wanted the Queen of Pentacles there as my guide for no, I can actually have this, like, a deep proficiency and flow with money. And the 9 of Pentacles is this reminder of, like, and it can be pleasurable, and it can serve my beautiful garden that I'm growing. And then the Empress being this, like, image of, you know, a power that is softer, a way that mastery can be unruly in and of itself. I think in the Empress's garden, all of these images take place in gardens. [laughs] So, you know, thinking of my business as a garden at the time.

So I think that that's a way that I also like to work with the tarot is sometimes like, what we've discussed kind of in the majority of this conversation is how tarot can break up stories within us. But once you have a familiarity with the cards, and once you know more about the archetypes, then you can actively select ones that you want to work with, and they can become ways of, to some extent, like trying on a different way of being. And like I just said, like, sometimes that can be really healing.

I needed to do that shadow work. I needed to heal those worthiness wounds so that I could be successful in business and self employment. And embodying the Queen of Pentacles helped me do that, and that has been really supportive. You know? It kind of lets me say, like, ‘I want to be more like this.’ Like, we do that so often. Right? Like, I wanna be more like this. It could be a person. It could be a fictional figure. It could just be, like, me 2.0. Like, I wanna be this type of person.

Well, sometimes you can just plug a tarot archetype in there. Like, I wanna be this type of person. I wanna be the Queen of Pentacles. And you could work with that. And it can be really amazing. So, like, I pull, I have many tarot decks, and I, like, pulled the Queen of Pentacles out of all of them and looked at different images and then, like, wore certain garments of clothing based on some of those and, like, thought about different ways I would go about my day. Like, I'd ask myself all the time, like, ‘What would the queen of pentacles do? What would she have for breakfast? How would she take her lunch break?’ Whatever. It feels a little silly.

But, again, it's that, like, breaking up that, like, monotony of being stuck in the stories we're telling about ourselves, the way we go through our day, and just trying something else out. And that that's, like, been my favorite way of working with tarot in my business so far.

MG: I don't think this is silly, actually. I think this is genius on so many way, in so many ways. So tarot and these archetypes can be guides for us literally, figuratively. This is beautiful. There's a book that I have somewhere. It's, it's called “How to Be an Astronaut.” I can't remember the person who wrote the book, but he is an astronaut. I, I will find it.

So, there was a man who decided when he was 6 years old, when I think he watched, like, the moon landing. And quietly in his mind, he said, I wanna be an astronaut one day. And he didn't tell anybody. And so this is like a memoir of basically his success. He was Canadian actually. And he, from this moment on in his life, what a wise little child this man was. He lived his life as if he were already an astronaut. So he would ask himself, ‘What would an astronaut eat for breakfast? Would an astronaut do their homework or go play outside? How would an astronaut work out?’ You know, ‘What would an astronaut wear? How would an astronaut be thinking about this problem?’ Literally just training himself. Right?

And then eventually, of course, he becomes a freaking astronaut. Like, what would an astronaut study? Blah, blah, blah. So he becomes a freaking astronaut. On top of that, he's Canadian. He ended up being an astronaut for NASA and he ended up going into space multiple times. And so this is why I say, I don't think that this is silly because I think that when we, you know, align our words, our thoughts, our actions, our feelings with what it is that we seek to become, we become it, regardless of what that is. And I say this because, and he talks about this a bit in the book and he doesn't explicitly say this, but I thought this was so, such a beautiful example of practiced embodiment because the odds of becoming an astronaut are so small. Right? Slim.

And he knew this! Even as a 6 year old, he was like, I'm probably not gonna be an astronaut. But if I were an astronaut, ‘What would I eat?’ Right? ‘If I were an astronaut, how much water would I drink every day? If I were an astronaut, how would I move my body?’ You know, just these questions. And I think, I think that allowing ourselves to experiment with and see what happens when we do practice something that we desire, practice being something that we desire, it's such a powerful tool for showing us how actually adaptable we are. How moldable we are. How capable we are.

You know, because I think about business and just the importance of doing all the money work. Oh, man. It's so underrated. I know everybody talks about this and then you start your own business and you think you think you get to this point, you're like, ‘Oh, I need to do this money work,’ but, like, you, like, you need to do the money work. Right?

Like, we all have this, like, [laughs] these, like, money stories and, like, and, and these things that hold us back. And even just the thoughts of, you know, having a thought like, ‘Oh, I could never start my own business’ or, ‘Oh, I could never charge x dollars for a service’ or, ‘Oh, I could never blah blah blah or, oh, that seems too hard.’

It's like when you, when you pull a card, or when you choose a card and you say, I want to embody this archetype, you then automatically have to say no to all of those thoughts that come up and you have to say, ‘Cool. Thank you, thoughts. But I'm practicing holding these other thoughts right now,’ which, like, these thoughts can simultaneously be here. And so instead I have to practice saying like, ‘Yeah, maybe I don't feel like eating pears for breakfast’ or whatever the, the answer is. But if I were the 9 of Pentacles, this is what I would eat. So I'm going to eat that.

And maybe I don't feel like blah, blah, blah right now. But if I were the 9 of Pentacles, this is what I would do. So I'm going to do it. And it allows you to experiment with trying on a new archetype, or a new identity, or a new way of being also without attachment or without strings attached, because you don't have to identify with that. Right? You don't have to say I am going to be this way or, or, you know, worthy of having X. Even though you are, and you can be whatever you want to be. But instead you can say I'm embodying the 9 of Pentacles today.

And like, sure, it sounds maybe a little silly and a little childish, but I don't think it is at all. I think it's really wise. It's such a beautiful, profound tool and catalyst to show us that we can really change, and embody and have and be the things that we desire and the things that we seek and that it's, it is possible for us.

And I'm not saying that in a way like, I, I absolutely don't want to say that in a way of like, no matter who you are, where you are, where you come from, where your circumstance, anything is possible. I'm not, I'm absolutely not saying that, but I am saying that there is power in choosing the narrative that we want to live in, and showing up in the ways that we wanna show up in, and we always have a choice about that. And I think that's just such a, such a beautiful practice that you have, and that you had as you started your business. Yeah.

AH: Yeah. I love this astronaut example. What a great triumph of [laughs] living into the life that you want to have. I feel like, so I learned this practice first from Michelle Pellizzon and Holisticism. And I also just wanna add here that something I love specifically about working with tarot archetypes is that they are very specific, but they're also expansive. And I think that, like, there's something so beautiful in the astronaut example. And, also, when we use archetypes that are professions or, like, careers in the world, they can be very limiting. I'm actually not sure they're expansive. They're specific, but they're constricted or restrictive.

And I think that with tarot, they're specific but expansive. There are so many ways to be the Queen of Pentacles, and you get to decide what that means. Like, you get to determine that. So it can be this way of, like, unearthing that for yourself. And as you were sharing, I was thinking about, like, the leap I was trying to make in my life. I was trying to transform myself from someone who was not a business owner into someone who was a business owner, a successful business owner. I didn't wanna, like, you know, start and, like, totally, you know, go bankrupt in a day or whatever.

Not that that would happen. But in my worst stories about it, that's what was gonna happen. [laughs] So, like, I think that when we're moving through thresholds in our life, maybe we underestimate how we are trying to transform who we are. I was transforming my identity in that process. It may seem as simple as filing some paperwork with the state, but, like, I was really trying to do this internal heavy lifting of becoming a business owner, and I, it was hard. Like, it was a labor that I was going through, and the money work was a huge part of that.

But so was, like, trusting myself that I could hold a structure that was bigger than anything I ever had, that I can lead people. You know? I think about this when people get promoted from, like, a team member to a manager, we act like it's just like cool cool cool. You did it. [laughs] You actually have to become a totally different person! Like, you have to do a, a total transformation!

And I think that when we're doing that, when you're becoming a manager, like, what are all of our cultural associations with that career? They're not so great in my experience. You know? Like, especially, like, a middle manager. Like, that's like a has a horrible connotation.

So you can't look to that archetype. It's not astronaut. Like, who wants to live their life being like, ‘What would a middle manager do?’ [laughs] What would a middle like, nobody wants that. Or, like, that's not very appealing to me. I don't think even to people who love being managers in the middle of a corporate hierarchy, they're not thinking that way.

But what I think you can do like, same with me, when I was becoming a business owner, like, I joined the local Chamber of Commerce. And let me tell you, I don't wanna be a business owner like any of those people. That was not for me.

So what tarot did was give me this, like, I wanna be a business owner like the Queen of Pentacles. Like, that's what I got to ground in. Like, I, I, I saw the transformation I was making, but I picked this archetype as, like, the way I was gonna embody that. And that was so helpful for me. So, I don't know. You can be a middle manager like the Empress. Like, what a fun, interesting, nourishing way to do that. You can be a corporate leader like the 9 of Swords. You'd be, like, the sharpest, smartest one of the bunch. Right?

Like, I think there's a way of, like, when we're stepping into these professions or just societal roles that are so baked in with hierarchy and, like, things, just connotations that don't appeal to us. We can bring in archetypes like the tarot to help us do them in our own way, but to provide that still that, like, archetypal shift of, like, ‘Okay, I'm gonna be like this now.’ And that was just so supportive for, for me in my journey as a self employed person and, frankly, as a human being.

MG: How profound! And how what a way to make the mundane so much more magical. You're cracking me up because like, no. Yeah. No one's like my dream is to be a middle manager. Right? Like, even, even when you wanna go into it. Because I remember when I was at Microsoft, I just so wanted to be a people manager for my first couple of years there. I just so wanted to manage people and be a people manager. And I'm I'm like, I'm like, what was so appeal…I mean, what was appealing about that is supporting other people. Right? Supporting other people and being seen in the role.

But / and, you're so right that when you start to think about, you know, what would a manager do? There are a lot of stories and like conditionalities that have been given to us about how a manager ought to behave. And, and you make this really great point that once you get promoted from individual contributor to manager, yeah, there's like this paper shift. There's like this external acknowledgement. But the work of becoming a manager and a good leader and supporting your people and actually enabling people, that's a lot of deep inner work. And that is a total transformation. The way that you show up at work changes, and it's not a facade.

And I think the, the like downfall or maybe like an opportunity area that exists in so many corporations and businesses today is that a lot of people who shift from individual contributor to manager fake it. It is a performance. There's not an embodiment, like the internal work of actually changing who it is that you are, how it is that you show up, a lot of the time that doesn't work. And that's because so much of what has been presented to us about managers is this performance. It is this facade.

And I love this so much because I think if we don't have good examples of good leaders accessible to us, it's hard to become that. Right? And it's hard to see ourselves becoming that. It's hard to desire that.

And I think what you're saying about the tarot, it does it invites us into this different way of embodying leadership and embodying management or embodying nourishment for other people or embodying values or intelligence, you know, and the ways that we might want to show up and lead.

I remember when I was at Microsoft, I had a manager who was just an incredible leader. She was a woman. She, she was the first female leader that I worked with that really led in like a feminine embodiment versus like, you know, a lot of times people talk about women in leadership and what they mean by that is training women to be like men in leadership. [laughs] Training women to lead a very particular way. Whereas feminine leadership is a very different style. It's an, it's a different way of being. It's an embodiment. Right?

And I remember. Up until I had worked with her. I always thought I want to be a leader. I want to be a manager. I want to be like this. And so I'm going to embody these qualities that I see required. And then I saw her in action. And I just remember those meeting that we were in and there was like a heated moment. And she was like, I remember she was like water in this meeting.

And, and it was like the most beautiful thing because, because I don't even know how she did it, but, like, all of a sudden everyone had consensus and it was like in favor of her original ask. And I was like, well, I literally was like, that was magical! [laughs] I have never witnessed anything like this before. Usually, it's like people butting heads. The loudest person wins.

But she was so soft and gentle and fierce, and it was so powerful that from that moment on, I was like, that's how I want to lead. That's how I want to show up. And I think about, honestly, I think about the Empress quite a lot when I think about leadership and like feminine embodiment and feminine leadership and stepping into these roles in a way that feels nourishing to us. And in ways that require us to work through, exactly what we said, to work through a lot of shit that other people have, you know, that that society, that, you know, culture, that corporate story, that training, for quite frankly, has taught us to, to internalize.

So I really like this idea, homework for anyone listening, whether you're a business owner or, you know, a 9-to-5er, or you bartend, or whatever it is that you do with your life. Homework would be maybe to, it doesn't have to be taro, but maybe to land on an archetype of something that you really admire and just practice that for a week and just see what would it be like? What would it look like? What it feel like? What would it taste like? What would it smell like, what would I eat, how would I feel when I wake up, what would the first thing I do, what how would I take my coffee if I were to embody this thing and just see what happens because what a beautiful practice.

AH: And you can do it in so many ways. Yeah. You can use the tarot archetype. You can think about a fictional figure from a book or a movie that you love, you can imagine someone who you know or have encountered, although sometimes there can be downsides to choosing people you actually know to try to embody.

But you can also just be like, you know, this way of changing your life is taught by, like, productivity coaches everywhere. They say things like, if you wanna be a person who runs at 6 AM every morning, how can every decision you make be made by a person who runs at 6 AM in the morning? Right? Like, this we're I'm talking about it through the lens of, like, embodying tarot archetypes, which sounds mystical, and magical, and woo woo to use your words. But, like, people teach this in the most, like, secular boring ways ever. I mean, not that there's anything wrong with being a person who runs at 6 o'clock in the morning every day.

But, like, I think that the method is approachable from any way you like. And I love to use the tarot because, as I shared, it, like, brings that extra expansive quality. And I think that that gets to what you said too, Marie, about performance. Because so often when people want to, like, be a better leader, they're like, well, I will do the Steve Jobs thing. I'll just dress like Steve Jobs, and that'll make me a better leader. But there's not enough in that, like, style decision to actually go deeper into the inner work of it.

And I think that when we're working with a more expansive archetype, it just opens up the deeper work that we can do there as opposed to simply performing. Because I think performance is a part of it. Like, in, in some degree, when I am becoming embodying this tarot archetype, I'm performing a little bit. Like, I may not feel like I've got this, and I have to just act like I've got this, you know, in many instances.

But I think that we then have to invite ourselves into that deeper questioning, and that's what I like about bringing tarot in here. Like, there's some so there's so much more to being the Queen of Pentacles in my experience than to being a person who runs every morning. Like, there's just so many more layers and levels that I can unpack and keep going deeper and deeper and deeper there for myself.

MG: I agree. I so agree that picking, you know, a role or a career or even, you know, person who runs every day at 6 AM. I think these things can be great to maybe inject rapid change and catalyze, like, maybe new habits. Right? And I think when we work with more expansive archetypes, they allow us also to be ourselves and also to inquire within ourselves. Right?

Because I think about, you know, if I wanna be somebody who runs every day at 6 AM or if I wanna be somebody who…it's like there's a rigidity that exists there that forces you into a performance or a way of being that might not be nourishing to you. Whereas if you're just like, you know, I wanna be the Queen of Pentacles. I wanna embody the Queen of Pentacles. You still get to be you. You know?

Like, you still get to nourish yourself and support yourself. And in fact, that's something I would argue that the Queen of Pentacles is doing consistently is that self nourishment and self support. And so you get to reflect on, yeah, your thoughts and your feelings. And there's an element, I think, of critical thinking and self reflection that comes with choosing an archetype that is expansive, maybe a little bit magical, versus an archetype that is very rigid. Because if you pick an archetype that is rigid, say “astronaut,” nothing wrong with that at all, or say “middle manager,” then you almost feel like you have a checklist of things to do. And then you force yourself into that checklist versus allowing yourself to move through the world differently.

And that's, that's different. Right? Like if you want to, I don't know, run every day at 6 AM, you can force that, or you can create a life in which that's really nourishing and exciting for you. Right? Or you can approach it in a way that feels really good to your body. And and like, what one one of those 2 is gonna be more sustainable. And I would say, like, the nourishing one is more sustainable. Right? Like, the expansive one is more more sustainable versus, like, forcing yourself into a rigid pathway or checklist or way of being. At some point, you're just like, ‘Man, I can't anymore.’ Right? Like, at some point, you're just gonna be like, ‘Fuck running.’ [laughs] Like, but like ‘F this’ or like or ‘I did the half marathon. I'm done now.’ And then you fall off. Right?

Whereas I think when we embody something that allows us to grow and expand, we can sustain it, and we do get to grow and expand. And we get to change in a way that feels really good, but also really authentic. How beautiful. Ah, Amelia, you're amazing. I feel like I could talk to you for, like, 4 straight hours.

AH: I think last time we recorded, we did record for, like, 2 hours. I remember it became 2 episodes.

[both laugh]

MG: Yes. Yes. You're right. What are you working on right now? What would you like to invite people into in your world?

AH: Yeah. So we've had this whole long conversation about tarot, but tarot is actually a personal practice for me, not a professional one. Or like I use it in my professional life, but I am not a tarot reader or teacher as some folks might expect.

I did just finish creating a tarot podcast. So as part of my personal practice over the past two and a half years, I was recording a 5 to 10 minute episode about every card in the tarot. So folks can listen to that. It's called My Tiny Tarot Practice. You can find it anywhere that you get your podcasts.

And when I finished that project just a few weeks ago now, I compiled the edited transcripts of all the episodes into this wonderful, like, digital zine that people can purchase if they would like just some PDF to refer to about the cards. And so you can find that through the podcast as well. It's tiny tarot.transistor.fm, where that will be, or we can link we'll link to it in the shownotes.

I think if you love this conversation and you want to learn more about tarot, that's where I would send you to connect with my interpretations of the cards, but, also, I would really encourage you to head to the book list that we'll share below because that's where I share, you know, the readers that I'm learning from, the people who do work in tarot interpret tarot professionally.

People like Rachel Pollack and Jessa Crispin and Jessica Dore and Maria Minnis and Sarah Gottesdiener. And, like, I'm reading their books and working with the cards over the past, you know, almost 10 years is how I shaped my interpretation. So I'd love to send you their way as well.

And then in terms of what I'm doing now, I run a podcast studio called Softer Sounds, and I host another podcast called Off the Grid that's all about leaving social media and is for folks who are self employed or small business owners or anyone who wants to share their work and their life without social media. So you can find that anywhere you get your podcasts.

And I think really all of that is just on my personal website, ameliahruby.com. So you can head there if you wanna explore anything that I'm up to, past, present, or future.

MG: Thank you so much. You are amazing. And if, if you guys do not know, Amelia's podcast studio is the backbone of this podcast! So I have to, like, double thank her. I have to double thank you. And I would highly recommend as well.

I know if you're here, you probably are interested in Off the Grid. Highly recommend listening to that podcast. It's amazing. If you're curious about leaving social media and what that might look like, if you're curious about starting a business, but you don't wanna be on social media, I think that's such a common one. Definitely check it out if you have a podcast. If you're curious about starting a podcast, if you wanna learn about podcasts, definitely recommend that.

And, yeah, I'll echo the tarot work as well because it's all, it's all just so good. And I'm just so honored and so grateful to know you and to have met you and to get to work with you. Yeah. Thank you.

AH: Thank you so much for having me. It's always a joy to be on a show that the studio edits. It's like a little secret treat that I get to have that's not so secret. But, yeah, thank you. Thank you again for this conversation and for every conversation that you have. I hope that it really serves folks and supports them in being a little more woo woo at work.

Outro music 🎶

Thank you so much for listening to The Spiritual 9-5 Podcast. I'm your host, Marie Groover, and I am beyond honored that you are here.

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Until next time, big love.

Outro music fades 🎶

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Shownotes

Today we continue our Woo Woo at Work series with a deep and thoughtful conversation about tarot with Amelia Hruby.

Amelia is a writer, educator and podcaster with a PhD in philosophy. She is the founder of Softer Sounds (the feminist podcast studio that produces this podcast!). And she’s also the host of my tiny tarot practice, a podcast exploring each card of the tarot with a tiny <10min episode.

Together, Marie and Amelia discuss how tarot is a supportive tool for self-reflection and a powerful method for strategic planning. Along the way, they unravel the many ways that these cards can bring us closer to our purpose and transform our lives professionally and otherwise.

So whether you’ve never held a tarot deck or you pull from one regularly, this episode will deepen and expand your approach to using the cards at work or in any other setting.

Learn more about Amelia at ameliahruby.com and find the many books and decks she recommends on her curated bookshelf.

Chapters:

04:00 Cultural impressions & stigma around the tarot

08:00 Tarot as folk magic vs tarot as archetypal practice

11:00 How Amelia works with the tarot in her business

27:00 Tarot decks as beautiful objects

30:45 “What do I do now?”

34:00 Ways to use tarot in your workday

40:00 How to calm your fears about tarot

43:00 Tarot for archetypal embodiment + strategic planning

47:30 An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth

52:30 Tarot cards as professional archetypes