Information and Introduction into the Spirit of my work as a Tarot Reader….and Long Distant Reading Information.
“I must thank you for the work you’re bringing into the world.
I love having a template for my experiences and a way to reflect on them. “
Cathy Braun from Quesnel, B.C.
“Thanks for the wonderful reading you gave to me. It was simultaneously mysterious and illuminating.
Same as last time. Perhaps that is the point. I appreciate the experience of rapport and mutuality that your readings engender.”
Bonnie Morrissey from Burlington, Vermont
“I am so grateful for the reading.
I felt as though you handed me a compass and recognized that I could find my way. “
Meara Joy Norice from Truth or Consequences, New Mexico
I just wanted to write you a quick note to express my thanks and appreciation.
I was very impressed with the entire process/experience. You are very good at what you do.
Thank you so much.
Roq Gareau from Bowen Island, B.C.
Thank you for reading the cards and walking through this life with me. I always feel like life is an exquisite adventure or a hero’s journey after talking with you, and somehow, I find more courage to carry on. Thank You,
D.W. from Seattle, Washington
“Remember who you are!
You are the Mystery and not your history”
Rita Bresnahan
For me, Carol Stewart, life has become a beautiful mystery unfolding before my eyes. The challenges of existence are there but both challenges and beauty now seem to have a place in some greater evolutionary dance. This perspective allows me to embrace both a fuller range and, at the same time, find more balance in my responses to what is around me. From experiences of my own blindness and my own awakenings, I recognize how easy it is to be caught in an isolating box of assumptions, habits, and conditioned patterns, that in themselves are not bad, just limiting. Sometimes such patterns are useful and necessary. But, in truth they have a ‘shelf life.’ More than ever before, releasing ourselves from historic conditioned patterns is our collective human challenge at this time. At the turn of the Millennium, the Hopi Elders from Arizona, sent out a message that many of us have grown a profound understanding of over this last decade.
There is a river flowing now very fast
It is so great and swift that there are those who will be afraid.
They will try to hold onto the shore.
They will feel they are being torn apart and they will suffer greatly.
Know the river has its destination.
The elders say we must let go of the shore,
and push off into the river,
Keep our eyes open, and our head above the water.
See who is in there with you and Celebrate.
At this time in history, we are to take nothing personally,
least of all ourselves.
For the moment that we do,
our spiritual growth and journey comes to a halt.
The time of the lone wolf is over,
Gather yourselves!
Banish the word struggle from your attitude and your vocabulary.
All that you do now must be done in a sacred manner
and in celebration.
“We are the ones we have been waiting for…”
As we humans collectively or individually continue to cling ‘to the shore’ of old assumptions, habits, and patterns beyond their shelf life, we find ourselves suffering increasing physical, mental, emotional or spiritual distress. Each of us has an opportunity to risk letting go and becoming a part of the world maturing into something held for centuries as dreams in each of our individual hearts. Choosing the Mystery over our history is now more relevant than ever before. We are here to mature a life-sustaining, heart satisfying way of exploration, discovery and adventure. Humans are called now to find the courage to enter into ‘unknowing’, the Great Mystery, that essence that births who We truly are. Allow your mind to not know, to be surprised. Your heart, Soul and Spirit will experience a sense of welcome relief. You might touch inside what has eternally called us toward fulfillment of the dream you are, whether you notice it or not. My work is an invitation to notice…and then experience!
Tarot Readings are intended to offer a ‘resonant perspective’ – to open ‘the field’ in and around you to the more natural inspiration that life truly is meant to be. The result? A sense of enrichment, a renewal of depth in your connection to your heart’s knowing, guiding you into more authenticity with others and with life itself. A sense of purpose points you toward the more blissful, adventuresome path of remembering who you are. To support you here, I invite you to consider three thoughts:
1. Symbols are older than words, opening rather than directing consciousness. The stories these symbols evoke, invite each of us into more the profound mystery underlying one’s life. Meaningful stories and archetypal myths quicken our memory of the precious and sacred realms within one’s Heart and Soul. Here life flows into more meaningful, personal, felt experiences. Intuition is supported as guide.
2. A reading is a spiritual practice, a privileged opportunity to view your Soul in action, expressing its quest to live its purpose in everyday life. From this perspective, you explore more consciously and compassionately both what it means to be alive and what it means to be you. We quest for the mystery of what is ‘right relationship with yourself, others, and life’? With an attitude of humility and respect for that Wholeness you are – you discover how to open the door of your own Great Mystery.
3. Each time you look into this mirror, you can take in and explore new aspects of your Self. You do this for the sake of the journey, shared with all humans, of both an individual and collective evolution toward ways of being we glimpse during the peak experiences of our lives. You do this so that one day you may accept this glimmer, then have a deepening sense, then a ever clarifying knowledge that comes from the direct experiences of who you are. What a wonder, a miracle, when any of us are able to surrender our limited view and stand in awe of what we truly are, always step by humble human step.
Background
I received my first Tarot deck from Eileen Nelson, one of my “spiritual mothers”, in 1975 and began my study of these symbols as a mirror to the deeper realities of my own personal life. At the same time I was in an intense five year training process in personal growth at Cold Mountain Institute (now Hollyhock) on Cortes Island, BC.
By 1980, I felt ready to begin offering Tarot Readings professionally as my training at Cold Mountain Institute and my personal exploration had revealed that the Tarot symbols were a very powerful form of spiritual counseling as they embraced everything I had been learning in my training process. In 1983, I began a practice of traveling to cities across North America. Over the years, I have developed a clientele from all over the world through referrals from previous clients.
When I am facilitating a Mystery School, I am not able to travel much to do readings. However, for anyone I have done a reading for in the past, I offer personal long distance reading from my home in Nelson, BC, Canada by email and Skype or FaceTime. Further information below…
If you are new and interested in becoming a new client for long distance readings, I will need a personal referral from one of my current clients. However, if you travel to Nelson BC, I do take new clients in my home-based practice. Contact me by email or phone for an appointment. When I travel to various cities, I also will take new clients so let me know of your interest and I will put you on my email list in the area you live.
Below I offer an overview of my basic approach to the Tarot – the Spirit in which I do my work. Following this are instructions to do a Long Distance Tarot Reading.
The Spirit of a Tarot Reading
Exploring the Tarot symbols in my personal life as well as in the lives of my clients since 1975, I have learned that…
The Tarot symbols are….
- A Mystery School
To awaken in a humble, step by step way, a sense of the privilege of your unique reality in order to realize the wonder and responsibility of maturing, of becoming a whole human being.
- Our Life’s Picture Book…
78 ‘Pages’ or Symbols, each relevant to the Fullness of the Human Journey
40 Minor Arcana reflect the patterns of the human condition and the creative process
22 Major Arcana reflect the archetypal pathways of awakening knowledge through direct experience
16 Court Cards reflect the nobility of a person’s will to heal the splits within existence
- A Vehicle for Your Soul’s Articulation
To utilize a magical and mystical realm of archetypal symbols, stories and mythology as a doorway to your Soul’s Mystery, a means through which your Soul can tell her story.
- A Method of Spiritual Counseling
To deepen an appreciation of the ways that the uniqueness of your personal life process moves inside the context of our greater collective human journey. You are unique but not alone. You are connected to a field of interconnectedness to everything around you.
A Reading is an Opportunity ….
- To access your Soul’s voice and sense of adventure
- To welcome and embrace your unique mystery
- To allow for a more conscious step on your life’s path
- To be inspired by your own human process
- To deepen in the memory of Who You Are
- To move into a flow of “Right Relationship” with yourself, others, and life
The Means….
A reading is an initiation into a step of your life’s path of ever-deeper awakening. Our conversation is recorded to provide you a map to explore your life at this time.
When I sit with you…I am holding five fundamental assumptions:
1. You have everything you need inside you to fulfill your life.
2. You have the challenge to simply remember Who You Are.
3. You are a piece without which the puzzle of our collective existence would be incomplete.
4. You are beautiful and your life matters.
5. Wholeness, not perfection is The Great Work.
Preparation for Long Distance Reading
To work with me, you will need to acquire a Rider-Waite deck of Tarot cards as this is the deck I read with. It is one of the most traditional and I find the images tell good stories. During a reading, I often refer to images presented. You also will need a bit of time to yourself – 30 minutes or an hour.
♥ 1. First, take a few moments to write for yourself an intention for the reading – what you would like to address in terms of questions or issues. This is a time to reflect, to articulate your sense of your life at this moment in time, what issues and possibilities are there and to prepare yourself for another life step.
♥ 2. Consider your life in a period of a year’s time, what is the particular time frame would be useful to work with (3 months, 6 months, 9 months, the year)? This “container of time” will hold this one vital step in your life journey that the reading maps.
♥ 3. Then, take some time to meditate, i.e. to be, to go within, to breathe, relaxing your body. You might imagine yourself in a sacred-to-you place on the Earth where your Soul – carrying the mystery of all her seeds of creation – might enter. Be with this for awhile.
♥ 4. When you feel settled or ready, ask your Soul to guide your hands as you take the whole deck of cards, set them face down on a table or such, and spread them all around, mixing them up while you reflect on your intention, the questions or issues you are bringing. Imagine yourself pouring your life force into the life force of the symbols. Invite your Soul or Essence to show you that which you can most deeply work with, at this point in time, to help you take yet another step in that great mysterious process of Self-Awakening.
♥ 5. Then begin selecting your cards. Keeping them face down, you will choose 17 of the 78 symbols before you. When you have 17 cards, gather them up in a stack and then, again without looking at them, just take a moment to go inside to feel, see, or intuit as you will, if the cards are in the ‘right’ order for you right now. Trust that whatever you decide will be correct for this moment. Feel free to move them about, still without looking at them, until there is a sense of completion and readiness. Set your chosen symbols down in front of you, and then, like turning pages in a book, you will turn over ‘each page’ one at a time and note in a list from #1 to #17, what each symbol is and whether it is upright or inverted / reversed.
♥ 6. Gather the remaining cards that you did not choose into a pile. Turn these over noting what symbol is on the bottom of the deck.
♥ 7. Then email me your reflections, intentions, questions and time frame you want for the reading along with the list of symbols you choose: #1 to #17 and also please note the symbol that was on the bottom of the deck remaining. Finally, if you are a new client, please include your full name, address, phone number and date of birth as I will also do an introduction on your Soul Path with the reading.
♥ 8. When you email me the list, we schedule a time for the reading to occur. I will take your list, transfer them to the Celtic Cross reading form I use. I will email you the photo of the symbols on a Celtic Cross laid out. You then have two choices about how you would like me to proceed with your reading.
I will do the reading at the appointed time, record it, email you a link to download the recording, with an opportunity, after you listen, to ask questions or make comments by email or phone.
We can do a phone, Skype or FaceTime reading to talk directly. To do so we must set a time convenient to us both. Plan for up to an hour and a half to two hours of your time for the phone reading. My phone has a speaker on it to record both of our voices.
♥ 9. I will send you a link to download the recording of your reading. Let me know when you have downloaded the recording in a form you can listen to. Contact me by email or phone (an arranged time) if you have I can any questions or comments you would like to share. At that point you can mail me a check for $220 for any preparatory material, the reading, emailed images of your chosen symbols. I will gratefully receive your offering as support for my life. Email me when you put the check in the mail and I will let you know, by email, when the check arrives.
Some thoughts to support you…
- Tarot work is a spiritual practice. Tarot images are a language and a doorway between one’s everyday self and one’s deeper reality, a way to awaken to the mystery within and to work more co-creatively with the beautiful elements of life and spirit all around. My job as a reader is not to be ‘right’ but to stimulate your world and your connection with life’s mystery from my own connection. A deeper dialogue between us grows over time. I know that each one of us has our own unique connection to life’s archetypes. My intent is not to predict but to inspire, to guide you into a celebration of that uniqueness and its true nature.
- Know that each reading offers a vision of only a very small piece of your totality. The Tarot symbols, as a whole, represent everything that is going on inside us all the time. Individually, we are wondrously rich, multidimensional beings. Collectively, we have barely scratched the surface of what we truly are. We have yet to develop a mind or consciousness large enough to take in our whole selves all at once without short circuiting. So the Tarot is an opportunity, in a step, by humble human step way, to get connected to and embrace the realities of one’s whole self. Think of your life as a banquet and each reading as a plate of food from that banquet that you will take to eat and digest over a period of time. Such Soul food helps one to become aware, alert, more heartfully connected to yourself, life and a ‘bigger picture’. Such food helps you grow healthy and strong.
- Remember always that there are no symbols that are inherently good or bad…each ‘aspect’ is a part of an essential wholeness. Each of us has to find our own unique relationship with all life’s archetypes and conditions. “Learning to play with a full deck” is what we are after here but this takes many years of patiently “growing up and into our true nature”. The spiritual practice of working with Tarot readings is to open to and work with whatever arises. Each reading is a step in the direction of one’s wholeness where all life is sacred and holy.
- Reversed cards: There is nothing ‘wrong’ with inverted or reversed cards. Reversed cards are a part of each reading. One can think of it this way…there is a time for inner work and reflection. There is also a time when things are more active. We flow into the world more easily with some aspects of ourselves than others. When a card is reversed, it is saying that the work you are doing with this symbol is inward rather than outward. When you are ready and only when you are ready, will the symbol upright. I never hold that a reversed symbol is fixed because at any time you might be ready to move more actively from inside out. One’s task in life is to do just that. To connect with oneself inside and then move out into the world of others from that place. When symbols stay consistently reversed, there is usually some deeper work to do. There are usually one of four primary reasons for reversals:
a). A card could be reversed because it is primarily unconscious and needs to be brought into a more personal consciousness.
b). A card could be reversed because, while it may be conscious as an aspect of life, one may be unwilling to identify with this aspect. In other words, one’s patterning or conditioning, the growth of an idea about oneself usually says ‘I’m this, but not that.’ The truth is each of us are everything put together in our own unique way. So working to embrace aspects of one’s life one does not usually identify with is an important practice of a spiritual warrior.
c). One may be conscious of an aspect of life and be surprised that it is reversed. Sometimes one has become quite comfortable with an aspect of life, then the symbol for that aspect reverses in a reading. This may seem confusing yet what this means is that our Soul is saying…’go deeper with this one’. This is called the “Tip of the Iceberg” effect. Each symbol is a door into a universe and we might work quite easily with something and then it is time to go deeper with it.
d). Lastly, a card may come up reversed simply because one’s momentary attention is elsewhere…’I’m busy today, I’ll do it tomorrow’ kind of state. Just turning your attention toward this aspect may upright it.
- So when reversals are there, it is an opportunity to consider all these possibilities and decide more directly how and when to activate something more fully in your everyday life (or perhaps to deal with why you are not).
♥ If you are a first time client, in the introduction to your reading – when you listen to the CD, you will receive an overview of the Celtic Cross form as well as do an explanation of Soul Path Mythology.
If you have any questions about what I’ve written here, please contact me. We will be taking a deep journey together so blessed be,
Carol Stewart
2358 Bing Road
Nelson, British Columbia
V1L 6K6
Canada
(250) 825-0104
email: cstewart@mysteryschool.ca