Anthony Louis’ Tarot Beyond the Basics is filled with really fascinating ideas, techniques, and practices. His application of drive theory to the four suits was particularly intriguing. Here’s what he says: Psychologists love to invent theories about what motivates people. For Empedocles, the two basic drives existence are Love and Strife, which in astrology are embodied by the planets Venus and Mars respectively. Freud expressed a similar idea when he reduced human motivation to the two basic urges: libido (sex) and thanatos (the death instinct). Jung became fascinated with the four humors, based on the four elements, and came up with four fundamental personality types. Each

In Bringing the Tarot to Life, Scott Martin adapts activities that actors use to prepare for performing to tarot. Because tarot is often used for advice, I thought this example might be a good one to peak your interest in this really fun and useful book. A Piece of Advice In this exercise you are writing a letter requesting advice about a personal matter. Before you write the letter, make the following decisions: What is the specific nature of the issue about which you are seeing advice? Select a card that represents the person you think is in the best position to give you advice, and explain why. Give this person a real name, other than its tarot name. What is your

Although this book is specifically written for use with a Marseille Tarot-style deck, I found a lot of useful information that can apply to any reading with any tarot deck. Yoav includes a section on reading symbolic language in the cards. He includes categories that many of us have seen before, such as color and number, but he includes other categories that are less commonly discussed. I found the section of body parts particularly interesting. Although I never had what I consider a formal method of interpreting body parts, I realized that I do casually think about body parts symbolically. For example, I usually notice if a character is wearing any sort of headpiece such as a crown

This summer, the Omega Institute offered a Masters of Tarot weekend workshop featuring me, Theresa Reed, Sasha Graham, Mary Greer, and Rachel Pollack. One of the signs of a good teacher is that they are always investigating and exploring. Even if you’ve had classes with them before or read their books, they always have something new to offer…or perhaps a new approach to an old favorite topic. It was a wonderful weekend for both us teachers and for the students. I am probably most well-known for my Steampunk Tarot, Tarot Spreads, and Your Tarot Your Way. As teacher, I like to share some of whatever philosophy, neuroscience, sacred studies, and psychology ideas that are filling my head