tarot

“A Song A Week” Challenge: Monthly Recap 11 of 12

Kate Sloan

Song 45/52: “What If?”

Lyrics:

You treat me so much better than my last love
I clearly carry scars from every past love
And though you buy me roses and ask me to dance
I can’t trust this sweet romance

I’m just as scared as ever that I’ll fall
I’m unprepared to tear down this wall
And though you spoil me with affection almost every day
I can’t trust the words you say, ’cause…

Chorus:
What if it’s all a lie?
What if you leave me alone like they all do?
What if you make me cry?
What if you block me so I can’t even call you?
What if you, what if you, what if you do?

You had to turn your phone off for a work thing
I couldn’t help but think that you were flirting
And though I don’t believe every feeling I feel
I can’t trust your love is real, ’cause…

(repeat chorus)

I once read a story about some spies
Who had to infiltrate communities in disguise
They must’ve done pretty well, ’cause they got the intel
After years-long relationships built on lies
Oh, what a nasty surprise!

(repeat chorus)

 

Songwriting diary:

I pulled a couple tarot cards to inspire a song this week and they were the Knight of Cups (romance, charm, beauty, sentiment, expressiveness) and The Moon (illusion, fear, anxiety, intuition, uncertainty). This combination made me think about the recurrent fears I’ve had in most of my romantic relationships that my partner might only be pretending to be into me, whether because they’re just polite or because they’re planning something malicious. (This has never really turned out to be the case but probably stems from a traumatic experience I had in my teens where a mean girl “pretended” to ask me out and then revealed she’d essentially been trolling me for the lolz.)

I wrote a complete set of lyrics inspired by that card pull, and made an a cappella recording of how I heard the melody in my head while I was writing it. A couple days later, I sat down at the piano and worked out some suitable chords for the melody I’d been hearing, making some changes to it in the process.

The bridge section is referencing a real news story about undercover cops getting into relationships with activists under false pretences in order to spy on them. I talked about how this story fuelled my already-troubling delusions in this story on the Bawdy Storytelling podcast.

Song 46/52: “Sisyphus”

Lyrics:

Slow and steady wins the war
Don’t know what I’m fighting for
Moon is pink and sky is dark
Somehow, somewhere, lost the spark

Are you ever gonna hear my echoed words?
Are you ever gonna like the things you’ve heard?
Are you ever gonna love me, love me, love me, love me now?

Chorus:
I’m still so small; whose fault is this?
I swear I feel like Sisyphus
I yell and groan when I’m pushing the stone
Every day feels the same
Sisyphus – that is my name

History has much to say
On we who’d rather work than play
River man has lost his oar
Don’t know who I’m rowing for

Are you ever gonna borrow from the past?
Are you ever gonna do what I did last?
Are you ever gonna hear me, hear me, hear me, hear me now?

(repeat chorus)

Time has told me that there’s not much time
(Not much time, not much time)
It passes coldly, like I did mine
(I did fine, I did fine)
The conversation, the situation’s wrong
(It’s all wrong, it’s all wrong)
But I’ll be pushing until the hill is gone

(repeat chorus)

 

Songwriting diary:

Another tarot pull inspired this song: the cards were Strength (courage, determination, power, dedication) and the Eight of Pentacles (apprenticeship, repetitive tasks, skill development, hard work, “slow and steady wins the race”). This combination made me think about the myth of Sisyphus, who was cursed to roll a boulder up a hill over and over again forever.

I had been thinking about Sisyphus recently because I’d just finished reading a couple of books about Nick Drake, the British folk singer-songwriter who, like Van Gogh, was plagued by mental health issues and didn’t experience true commercial success until after he had already died tragically. Nick famously had a copy of Albert Camus’s The Myth of Sisyphus on his nightstand when he died, and many have theorized that he related to Sisyphus’s plight, seeing both his career and his mental health as a constant, grueling uphill battle.

I wrote some lyrics from Nick’s perspective, ruminating on his lack of success and calling forward to future listeners, begging them to hear him and to be influenced by him. (This did indeed happen; he’s widely considered a cult hero in the music world now and has been cited as an influence by huge artists like Norah Jones, REM, Beck, and Belle & Sebastian.)

I threw in some references to Nick’s music throughout, including mentions of a “pink moon,” a “river man,” and the phrase “time has told me.” (Would strongly recommend clicking those links and listening to his music if you’re not already a Nick Drake convert; his songs are hypnotically beautiful and virtuosically played.) The line in the chorus, “Whose fault is this?” was also taken from a quote attributed to Nick by his producer Joe Boyd, as excerpted in Amanda Petrusich’s book Pink Moon (emphasis mine):

Boyd later described their brief interaction as grisly, telling the BBC: “His hair was dirty and he was unshaved and his fingernails were dirty and he was wearing a shabby coat. … He sat down and he immediately launched into this kind of tirade about his career, about money, and basically it was accusatory. And he said, ‘You told me I’m great, but nobody knows me. Nobody buys my records. I’m still living on handouts from the publishing company. I don’t understand. What’s wrong? Whose fault is this?’ And he was angry. And I tried to explain that there are no guarantees, that you can make a great record and sometimes it just doesn’t sell.”

Song 47/52: “Bad Girl”

Lyrics:

Late night, skin-tight dress gets caught on the
Windowsill mid-climb until it pulls
Free, like me, and off into the dark

My daddy is asleep; he doesn’t know
That he could not keep me dutiful
Doesn’t know I’m drinking in the park

Chorus:
I’m not a bad girl, I swear
Just want to let down my hair
When I’m a good girl by day
My other side just wants to play
And she gets carried away
She’s got a lot she wants to say

Beer and wine and kiss me in a tree
You are with the wildest part of me
Pulling you so close against my lips

Why do I feel so rebellious?
Wait, wait, strike that, no, don’t tell me, just
Block out all those questions with your kiss

(repeat chorus)

If I seem nervous
It’s ’cause I’m workin’
To be so perfect
When I feel worthless

If I seem stressed out
It’s ’cause I left out
All the realest parts of me
To be who they want me to be

(repeat chorus)

 

Songwriting diary:

Third tarot-inspired song in a row! I’ve been finding tarot cards really helpful lately because there is just an infinite number of topics I could potentially write songs about and it can be paralyzing to try to contemplate them all, so instead I pull two random tarot cards, meditate on their meanings, and write about whatever they remind me of.

For this one, I pulled The Emperor (authority, structure, a father figure, power, rules and regulations) and the Seven of Swords (betrayal, deception, getting away with something). That combo immediately made me think about teenagers rebelling against their parents, so I wrote these lyrics and then ended up putting them to music several days later when various other songwriting attempts that week didn’t produce results I felt were good enough.

While the verses of this song are about experiences I never actually had – sneaking out of the house unbeknownst to my parents to drink with friends in the park – I included some of my actual thoughts and feelings about the “good girl/bad girl” duality, something I’ve been discussing a bit in therapy lately. I have the phrase “good girl” tattooed on my thighs and even previously wrote a song called “Good Girl,” so it was interesting to explore the flipside of that goodness and how both of those girls exist within me.

Song 48/52: “Gun Control”

Lyrics:

Another shooting in the news today
Before the last one’s ink is dry
It’s getting old, getting so cliché
Everybody’s asking why

Why all they’ll give us is thoughts and prayers
Why it’s seeming like nobody cares
Give your local reps a ring
So they’ll get off their ass and do something

Chorus:
The devil wins – he’s on a roll
Let’s do him in with gun control
Use your conscience, search your soul
The time has come for gun control
Gun, gun, gun control (x3)
The time has come for gun control

It’s not as if the jury’s out
Read the stats; the facts don’t lie
I promise you can go without
So fewer kids will have to die

If I seem mad, it’s ’cause I am
‘Cause no one seems to give a damn
I feel unsafe at bars and malls
So give your local reps a call

(repeat chorus)

How many more lives will we have to lose?
How many more hearts will we break or bruise?
No amendment’s worth this pain
I feel like I’m going insane

(repeat chorus)

 

Songwriting diary:

I was going to bed one night, checked Twitter (never a good idea before sleep), saw that yet another mass shooting had occurred – there have been over 600 in the USA this year – and felt so angry and sad and despairing that I wrote some lyrics because I didn’t know what else to do with my feelings.

The following day, I grabbed a ukulele and set those words to music. The song was really simple musically so I felt it would be bolstered by some clips of politicians talking about gun control, which I edited in. I’ve long admired the powerful (and often hilarious) songs that people like Jonathan Mann and the Gregory Brothers can create with political clips, so it was an interesting challenge to take a crack at it myself.

Sometimes a Tarot Reading is Exactly What I Need…

Kate Sloan
All images in this post are courtesy of Tazia from Higher Self Tarot

When people ask me whether I “believe in tarot,” I don’t really know what to say. I’ve gotten tarot readings at some of the most critical times in my life, times that felt like a crossroads toward different potential versions of my future, and the cards – or, more accurately, the people reading the cards – have given me advice that shaped how I moved through my life’s next chapter.

For instance, in 2016, I sought counsel from a tarot-reading acquaintance of mine because I had gone through multiple romantic disappointments in a row: unrequited love, rejection, revelations of a partner’s abusive tendencies. I felt off-kilter and like I was attracting these terrible experiences into my life through something I was doing, or not doing. The reading told me pretty decisively that I needed to speak up more assertively about my boundaries and expectations in relationships going forward, and to be more guarded rather than letting people in right away. That advice has served me well ever since.

A year later, I sought another reading from the same person because I wanted some guidance with regards to my sex life. The cards declared that I should pay more attention to the wisdom of my body when making sexual decisions – i.e. if someone gives you a bad feeling, it’s probably for a reason – and that I should be more intentional in the way I approached dating. Again, this advice was exactly what I needed to hear and helped me turn my life around. I met my now-spouse later that year, by which time I had gotten much better at trusting my gut feelings about people and pursuing the people I liked with deliberate intention.

Obviously, tarot has been pretty transformative for me in how it’s allowed me to reflect on my own patterns – regardless of whether or not the cards actually have mystical properties like some people say (I really don’t know!). So I was delighted to get a reading earlier this week from Tazia Kuhani of Higher Self Tarot, and I wanted to write about it here.

I’m going through kind of a tough time lately, both personally and professionally. On a personal level, my mental health has been really tumultuous as I’ve been working through my traumas in therapy and getting actively confronted by triggers on a regular basis. Professionally speaking, I started a new gig recently that is taking up most of my time, so I’m struggling to balance my energy levels appropriately – and I’m having a lot of impostor syndrome about whether I “deserve” such prestigious bylines, even though I’ve worked for over ten years to get here. Needless to say, it felt like a good time to ask for some wisdom from a tarot pro!

I explained these issues to Tazia when she asked me what I wanted our reading to focus on, and we decided we’d do one short reading for my work life and one for my personal life.

The work-focused reading validated some things I already knew but hadn’t quite articulated to myself: that the expectations my editors have of me are high, but that I am skilled enough to meet or exceed them; that there might be an annoying adjustment period while I get used to a different work schedule and workload; and that doing my work with integrity and passion is my best route forward.

I found this astonishing because I hadn’t actually told Tazia anything about my new job or the things about it that I’ve been struggling with, but her interpretations of the cards she pulled were spot-on nonetheless. Tarot is wild!

As for the personal reading – Tazia pulled 3 cards that identified problems I’m dealing with, and 3 more cards that contained some advice for those problems. The actual issues I wanted advice on are too vulnerable and fresh for me to feel comfy sharing them here, but again, I was blown away by how accurate and specific the reading was. As someone who’s pulled tarot cards for myself as well as gotten professional readings, I can say that paying a professional has always been worthwhile for me. The cards alone can give me some information, or at least help me reflect more clearly and deliberately on the struggles I’m facing – but when an experienced pro can interpret the cards for you, especially a pro who knows a bit about you and your life, it’s a game-changer.

At the end of the reading, Tazia asked if there was anything I wanted clarification on. We had touched on my work in trauma therapy at one point in the personal reading, and I asked for some additional advice on how to move forward in the therapeutic process without feeling stuck or stalled out.

Tazia pulled two additional cards for me, both of which were meant to be advice on my trauma therapy process. The first one was The Fool, which she said meant that I should approach therapy as if I know nothing and am learning it all afresh. The Fool encourages us to listen and open up to what we don’t know, even if it seems foreign or strange. This card was telling me to become a student of my own trauma rather than trying to beat it into submission or speed through the process.

The second card she pulled was the Queen of Cups. Tazia said this card spoke to the role of creativity in my healing process – that I should lean into art-making, whether that be music, writing, or anything else, as a route through which to unpack my trauma.

Both of these cards felt super resonant and relevant to me, and gave me the little push I needed to feel like working through this stuff is still worthwhile. As my therapist told me when we began trauma therapy together two years ago, typically it gets harder before it gets easier, because you’re uncovering some old, raw stuff and it can be painful and destabilizing. But the important thing is to be patient with yourself and to keep going – which, of course, is easier said than done. This tarot reading helped me feel, more than ever, like that’s the right thing to do, even when it feels incredibly challenging.

If you want to book a reading with Tazia for yourself – and I would highly recommend you do so if there’s any situation in your life right now that you could use some guidance on – you can click this link to learn more. Tazia’s offering 5% off her already wildly reasonable prices for Girly Juice readers when you use the code “GIRLY” – go go go!

Trust Your Body & Say What You Mean: A Sweet & Salacious Tarot Reading

Kate Sloan

The older I get, the more I appreciate people who perform emotional labor for myself and others. These skills are undervalued, underemphasized, rendered almost imperceptible by this culture which says emotional labor isn’t labor at all. Anyone who makes that claim simply doesn’t understand how much they have benefited from the emotional labor performed for them by people in their lives. If they saw it for what it was – if they recognized it while it was happening, instead of breezing past it in an entitled huff – they would be in awe. They would be grateful.

I feel this way about so many people in my life who perform emotional labor for me regularly: the friends who sit with me calmly when I’m sad, the partners who remember which small things upset me and which small things bring me joy, the therapist who puzzles through my motivations with me, even the baristas and waiters who remember my usual order. They are all giving me an exquisite gift made from compassion, intuition, and mindfulness. I do not take it for granted.

I feel this way about Carly from Tiny Lantern Tarot as well. Our reading last year opened my eyes to many worrisome patterns I was perpetuating in my dating life; Carly helped me see these issues by reading my cards, drawing on her knowledge of me, listening to my questions and concerns, and simply being present with me. (Carly uses both she/her and they/them pronouns, so I’ll be alternating between those in this post.)

This past week I went back to see Carly for another reading – specifically, a reading about my sex life, which Carly calls a “pussy fortune.” (They’re quick to point out, of course, that this language doesn’t resonate with everyone and there are many other things you could call a sexy tarot reading. My pun-brain is whirring… A “pre-dick-tion”? A “whore-oscope”? A “get-off-ecy”?!)

I’m a sex-nerdy, kinky, non-monogamous queerdo, so if I’m going to open up to someone – in either a personal or a professional capacity – I need them to be cool with all those things, or even involved in those communities themselves. Carly totally gets all of that, and I feel 100% comfortable unpacking sex/kink/poly things with her. If you are similarly inclined and live in or near Toronto, I would highly recommend booking Carly for a reading; their knowledge of and comfort with these areas of sexuality sets me deeply at ease.

She made me a cup of coffee and we settled onto the couch in her little turquoise office. We discussed some questions I’ve been wondering about: 1) How can I adjust my approach to dating to attract more people into my life who I’m emotionally and sexually compatible with and who want to date me? and 2) What areas of sexuality should I explore next, in my personal life and in my work? (Sex is inextricable from work for me. My sex life fuels my sex writing; my sex writing fuels my sex life. I cannot discuss one without the other.) I watched as they shuffled their gently glinting black-and-gold cards and laid them out methodically on a navy chest repurposed as a table, and we began the reading.

It was a long reading, full of thoughtful silences and the internal whir of one “aha!” moment after another. One of my favorite things about Carly’s readings is that she leaves long, comfortable silences in between sentences and cards. As a journalist, improvisor, and podcaster, sometimes silences make me panic – they’re “dead air” and that’s bad, right?! – but they are incredibly useful in a setting like a tarot reading. Sometimes I need a good ten or twenty seconds to absorb and process something one of us has just said – to turn it over in my mind and look at it from all angles – and it’s in those long pauses that I connect the dots, find the common threads, reach revelations. In everyday life, we so rarely get the opportunity to take a breath, think, and decide at our own pace what we want to say next. Carly holds space for their clients in ways both figurative and literal, and it is such a gift.

They pulled many cards and we discussed many facets of my dating life, sex life, and work life, so I won’t go into detail about all of it – but here are a few key concepts that have stuck with me in the intervening days…

Listen to your body. Trust your body. Let your brain take a backseat. This message came up in multiple cards. It’s something I frequently struggle with, as an anxious weirdo who over-intellectualizes and over-analyzes sex. Sometimes my body really does know best, and that’s hard to accept; I want to be able to conquer all problems with sheer brainpower! But my body is at least as smart as my brain, and I need to let it do its thing.

This has come up in my dating life a lot lately. I’ll force myself to go on a first date (and then sometimes a second or third date!) with someone because they seem like a good fit for me, logically. But my body knows different: my shoulders get tense as I enter the plan in my calendar, my eyelids feel heavy as I force myself out of bed the morning of the date, and I’m fraught with anxious nausea as I slide my shoes on and head out the door. There is a difference between good-nervous and bad-nervous, and I can distinguish between the two if I silence my brain-chatter and listen to my body. Nine times out of ten, my body has a better sense of whether someone is good for me than my brain does, and I should heed that more often.

This lesson also plays into more established relationships. It’s been over a year since I found out my ex-FWB was chronically abusive to other partners of his, and I keep reflecting on all the warning signs my body noticed that my brain decided to ignore. I didn’t feel good around him, I never got excited to go see him, and he often said creepy things that grated on me – but I kept assuring myself these were small things that ultimately didn’t matter, since the sex was good and he was, on the surface, “nice.”

Contrastingly, I recently had sex for the first time with a new beau who I believe is actually nice, and afterward, he breathed in my ear, “I have a good feeling about you.” I had a good feeling about him, too – in my body, not just my brain. Our bodies are wiser than we give them credit for.

Say what you mean, and mean what you say. One of the cards Carly pulled for me this time, the Seeker of Feathers, also came up in our last reading, which I gather means I haven’t learned its lesson yet. This card is all about honesty, assertiveness, telling the truth, even when doing so is hard. I think most of us could stand to get better at this.

Sometimes I tell dates I like them and want to see them again when I kinda don’t. Sometimes I tell dates I’m cool with us keeping things “chill” and “casual” when I utterly am not. Sometimes I tell dates I’m “not sure what I’m looking for” when I actually know I’m looking for a committed primary partner.

Sometimes I tell partners I don’t care that I didn’t have an orgasm, when I actually do care. Sometimes I tell partners what they’re doing feels great, when I actually know what would feel better. Sometimes I tell partners our sexual incompatibilities are solvable, when I’m actually frustrated to catastrophic levels with one crucial mismatch or another.

I get myself into trouble when I lie, distort the truth, or omit pertinent details. I end up going on dates with people I barely like, making out with people I’d rather just cuddle, having sex with people to whom I should’ve said “good night” hours ago. To be clear, these experiences are consensual; they just lack the passion and enthusiasm and “oh yes”-ness that I consider vital. If there isn’t mutual excitement in a romantic and/or sexual interaction, why am I even there? What is the point?

I told Carly about how I struggle with letting people down, even when I know I’m not feeling a connection. She reminded me that dating is inherently risky and most people know that. There is always a risk of rejection, sadness, conflict, disappointment. That’s just part of the deal. I don’t have to protect people from that. Trying to postpone those feelings often just worsens them in the end. “Stop going on second dates with people you know you don’t want to keep seeing,” Carly advised me. Okay. I’ll try.

Consider your intentions. One of the cards Carly drew – the Ten of Feathers – was meant to represent how others observe or interpret me, and it indicated a fall. Chaos. Mental health struggles, addiction, loneliness, fears.

I felt a rush of embarrassment when they explained this to me. I flashed back to Kat Williams advising against being a “car-crash blogger” – a blogger who only writes about bad things that happen to them, in an effort to get clicks and sympathy. I often write about difficult stuff – but is that what I want to be known for?

As I blathered about this internal crisis, Carly reminded me that having a public image laced with conflict and chaos isn’t necessarily a bad thing. And I realized they were right. I’ve received so many nice notes from readers telling me that my writing about soul-crushing experiences – unrequited love, rejection, insecurity – helped them understand and get through tricky situations of their own. This was a nice reminder that I should consider my intentions with regards to my work: writing sad stuff isn’t necessarily bad, it should just be something I deliberately choose to do, if and when I do it.

We also talked about how I should be more deliberate and intentional in my dating life as well. If I’m going out on multiple first dates a month with new Tinder suitors, I should ask myself: why? What am I hoping to get out of this? Am I actually having fun, or am I just doing this because I feel like I’m “supposed to”? If I’m having sex with a lot of people, is it actually as fun and exciting as I want it to be, or is it just exhausting? Am I pursuing romantic relationships because they’re what I’m “supposed to” want, or do I actually want them?

These are all questions for which my answers tend to oscillate, but the important thing is that I’m pondering them at all. Things get messy when I wander into new endeavors with no idea what I’m really doing – whereas, if I know exactly what I’m hoping to get out of an experience, I’m likelier to have a good time and get what I want.

Just like last time, I left Carly’s house feeling inspired, emboldened, and amped up. Their perspective, advice, and the simple act of listening to me had helped me shake loose some areas that had felt stuck. On the subway ride home, I stared at the notes I’d scribbled in my journal, and it felt like I was looking at a road map to a more satisfying sex life.

If you want to book a reading with Carly – which you should, ’cause she’s fucking terrific – you can make arrangements to come see her here in Toronto. They also occasionally travel to other locales; follow them on Twitter for updates on that. Carly also writes a tarot advice column called Ask a Feelings-Witch, to which you are welcome to submit questions.

I’m never entirely sure how I feel about witchy, magical practices – whether I believe they actually help or they’re just made-up silliness – but what I know about tarot is that it bridges a gap between the magical and the practical. The cards tell you some things, and you can connect those messages and lessons to the events of your own life, in ways that are often shockingly illuminating. Whether you believe tarot is a mystical practice imbued with the supernatural, or merely a secular window into your own psyche, I think it can be a helpful tool. After all, if you ask me, all the best things in life have a little ambiguous magic in them – and the wisest people are those who are open to mystery, to the unexplainable, to being surprised by life.

Strength, Courage, & First Impressions: An Illuminating Tarot Reading

Kate Sloan

image

In mid-February, I couldn’t stop crying about boys. All in a row, I’d crossed paths with a series of people who I adored, who felt almost mystically perfect for me, who nonetheless couldn’t or wouldn’t date me for various reasons. Such is life, I suppose. And although I knew I’m worthy of desire and would find someone awesome eventually, and although I kept telling myself “This too shall pass,” tears still kept pouring down my face as I sat in bed wailing along to Missing Ember.

“It has been a year and a half since the end of my last relationship,” I wrote in my journal, “and whereas that break-up initially made me feel wonderfully free and independent, now I just feel weirdly unmoored. I miss the emotional support and consistency of having a primary partner.”

After writing some more and effectively soaking my journal with tears and snot, I fired off an email to Carly from Tiny Lantern Tarot. (Carly uses both she/her and they/them pronouns, so I’ll be alternating between those.) I had read an interview with Carly on Up, Down & Out and loved her nonjudgmental, intuitive and queer-friendly approach to tarot, and since my emotions were so tumultuous at that time, I felt I needed some direction. Some types of emotional turmoil call for a visit to a therapist, or a long phone call with a best friend, but for some reason I craved advice from someone wise and witchy. “I have some concerns around romantic and sexual relationships in my life that I would love to get some guidance on,” I wrote in my initial email to Carly.

A few more emails and a couple weeks later, I headed to Carly’s home office for my reading. They made me tea and we sat on their little couch. We talked a little bit about my concerns around romantic relationships, and then she drew some cards.

Carly uses the Collective Tarot, a deck whose illustrations are bursting with queer people, people of color, and a diverse array of bodies. This immediately felt right to me. Tarot cards are usually traditionally gendered and free of flagrant sexuality, and my life is… not those things. Carly’s calm manner, and the cards themselves, affirmed to me that this was a safe space for me to talk about my queer/sexy/kinky life, if need be – and that’s important, when you’re getting a reading about relationships!

Two of the four cards Carly drew were major arcana cards and the other two were face cards, which they told me meant the issue at hand was an important one to me. It certainly was!

The card at the center represented “the heart of the matter,” and it was the Seeker of Feathers. Carly explained that this card is about communication and assertiveness. “It’s more important that you say the thing,” she explained, “than that you say the thing nicely.” I’d gotten into a habit of downplaying my needs, of telling people I was okay with my romantic and sexual entanglements being “chill” and “casual,” when actually I wanted something more. This card told me to be more honest with potential beaux about what I want – and I interpreted that to mean honesty about not only my feelings but also my desired relationship structure (non-monogamous) and the kind of sex I want to be having. I’m not always good at communicating my needs if I think they might ruffle feathers, so this card reminded me to do so regardless.

The card on the left represented “what to do.” It was the Code, which features what appears to be a queer kinky person flagging red for fisting. (So, so, so awesome.) Carly told me that this card refers to boundaries, borders, and communities, and recommended I consider the communities I run in: in what ways do I fit into them, and in what ways do I stand out? In the places where I stand out, do I want to accept that and be proud of it, or do I want to adjust my approach so I fit in better?

This card made me think about how often I feel like a baby/newbie/impostor in the sex-positive communities I’m in. Though I’ve been running in these circles for years, it’s still hard for me to accept that I’m a valued member of the Cool Kids’ Club. I’m well-liked and respected by the members of that “club” who know me; there’s really no reason for me to feel like I don’t belong. This card reminded me that I should dive even deeper into that scene, unapologetically and enthusiastically.

Naturally, given the kinky content of the illustration, this card also refers to power dynamics. As we talked about my issues with anxiety and feeling out of place, Carly suggested that maybe I need to develop a power dynamic with myself: be my own dom, so to speak. This might involve bossing myself into doing stuff that is slightly uncomfortable for me, but will help me grow and meet potential partners – like attending social events that make me nervous, talking to new people, and entering new social scenes. I found it strangely helpful to have my anxiety re-framed in this way – as something I can challenge bravely if a cute toppy person tells me to, even if that cute toppy person is me.

The next card represented “what to think,” and it was the Apprentice of Bottles. Carly explained that this card usually evokes a person who is very charismatic, charming and shiny, but then turns out to be shallow and disappointing. They weren’t entirely sure what the card was trying to tell me, but it made a strange kind of sense to me: a lot of my emotional upheaval at that time had happened because I was idealizing people I had a crush on. Some of these people appeared to be my perfect partner, but of course, they weren’t actually perfect, and in many ways we would’ve been a bad match if we’d gotten together. I felt like this card was telling me to take people off the pedestals I’d put them on – and also to consider what qualities I actually need in a long-term partner, rather than just the dazzling qualities that capture my attention in the short-term.

Carly told me that this card can also refer to first impressions: making a big splash, and then retreating. We talked about how I often worry that the first impression I make is misleading. “I’m a sex blogger” is usually one of the first things I tell new people about myself, and I think it gives some people an incorrect impression about my personality, my priorities, and what kind of relationship(s) I might be looking for. Carly encouraged me to experiment with the way I talk about myself – which I started to do later that night, by removing the phrase “sex blogger” from my Tinder profile. I figured it’ll be easier for me and potential matches to discover each other organically if I roll out information about my sexuality more slowly. (Preliminary results: Tinder dudes have indeed been less skeezy and more curious about me since I did this. Innnteresting.)

The final card represented “what to avoid,” and it was Strength. Carly told me this card refers to strength not in the traditional/brawny sense, but in the sense of emotional bravery and vulnerability. At first, she was puzzled that this card came up in the “what to avoid” slot, since obviously, these traits are usually a virtue in relationships. “The only thing I can think,” they said, “is that maybe you have a pattern in your dating life of being too vulnerable and open, of letting too many people in too quickly.”

I almost started crying when she said this, because it was so amazingly true and there’s no way Carly could have known that. I give far too many people the keys to my emotional kingdom, and it results in me getting hurt a lot. When I choose to invest emotionally in someone I’ve just met or barely know, at first it feels like an exciting rush, but it quickly gets heavy and painful, with very few exceptions. “Vulnerability is necessary,” Carly told me, “but not everybody deserves your vulnerability.” They were so right, and I made a promise to myself to be more careful about getting invested in people who haven’t yet proved they deserve my heart.

I left Carly’s house with an immense sense of clarity and inspiration, like I’d just been given the road map to my next stop on life’s path. The despair of feeling unloveable had lifted. I was still just as single, my life just as devoid of serious romantic prospects, but that felt less important and less permanent than it had before.

Now, here’s where shit gets weird. Two days later, I met a boy on Tinder. We went out. We hit it off. We started dating. I leapt headfirst into a relationship with him, before knowing if he even ticked all the boxes that matter to me (“Is he a feminist?” and “Is his sex drive compatible with mine?” being the two key ones in this case). I was so desperate for a boyfriend that I viewed this dude idealistically, filling in the blanks and paving over problems to round him up to a person I could date.

I should have communicated my needs more clearly, more quickly. I should have held out longer before calling him my boyfriend and pinning my hopes on him. I should have remembered that first impressions aren’t everything and people change as you get to know them better.

These are all things that Carly told me in my reading with her. But it was like the universe wanted to hammer these points home. And hammer, it did.

In the end, I learned these lessons the way I learned so many math and science concepts in school. Someone smart explained the lesson to me – and then I had to put what I’d learned to use in the real world.

Well, I sure learned quick. I won’t make those mistakes again. And if I do, maybe I’ll pull a few tarot cards to learn how to fix it.