As I continue my exploration of the Northern Traditions, I was pleased to see “Norse Goddess Magic” by Alice Karlsdottir appear on the New Titles list from Inner Traditions, and their publicity department kindly sent me a review copy. This is an expanded and updated version of the earlier “Magic of the Norse Goddesses”.

Karlsdottir has deep experience working with what she terms the “Germanic Heathen revival”, and has written about her work in print and online. The book is written for an audience who may be new to or moderately familiar with the Norse pantheon, and to meditation / trance work. The writing is coherent and easy to follow, and the ideas are presented in a way that is understandable and engaging.

She describes her research and personal explorations of working with the Asynjur, the Norse Aesir goddesses. As we all find, over and over, historical resources on the female members of the pantheon are few, and most simply repeat information from prior sources. Karlsdottir conducts what research she can with material sources, and deepens her knowledge through direct work with the Goddesses through trance and ritual. She includes a brief and thoughtful discussion on the use of personal gnosis in group practice, and also a good, basic introduction to meditation and to creating a ritual.

The main section of the book is a thorough introduction to Frigg, The Allmother and Queen of the Gods. Karlsdottir explores the historical depictions of Frigg, as well as her associations with other goddesses in the Norse and Germanic worlds. By understanding Frigg and Her role in depth, we more easily connect to the 12 Asynjur whose chapters follow. I especially enjoyed her description of Frigg’s hall, Fensalir, “like a women’s college”, as that creates not only a visual image, but an intellectual concept that creates a workable structure for the book.

Each chapter describes one goddess, starting with the commonly accepted lore regarding Her, associations with Her, and connections to goddesses in other pantheons and figures in folklore. Karlsdottir then suggests ways to approach each goddess, and details one of her own trance encounters. The chapter closes with an example ritual for invoking and working with that particular deity.

The bibliography is a good mix of sources, including a few that were new to me, so I am pleased at having further reading to do!

The goddesses covered are Frigg, Eir, Saga, Gna, Gefjon, Snotra, Lofn, Sjofn, Var, Fulla (Frigg’s sister), Hlin, Syn, and Vor. The book also includes appendices which contain stories of Mother Holle, The Three Spinners and Queen Olga, which round out the book with a pleasing mix of magic and folklore.

For 2014, we’ll be taking a numerological tour of the Tarot. On October 11, it’s the Lovers, the Devil, and the Sixes, along with the Chariot, the Tower, and the Sevens.  What does their numerological link say to us in a reading? What other connections do these cards have? How can we work with the energy of the Sixes and Sevens to deepen our readings?

Bring your cards, notebook and pen, and your experiences with these cards!

The workshop features discussions, practical exercises, and direct, personal exploration of the cards.  The registration fee includes morning coffee and tea, a light lunch, and afternoon refreshments.

Each class runs from 10:00 am — 4:30 pm, held at our studio in Alameda, California. We’re trying something new – a full day class that includes two workshops – allowing us to delve deeper into our work with the cards.

Due to space considerations, we request that you preregister for the class on the Tarot Media Company website.

See you in October!

“The Complete Lenormand Oracle Handbook by Caitlin Matthews is a wonderfully comprehensive and practical Lenormand guide. Matthews does a thorough job of presenting the history of the Oracle to give the reader a solid sense of the deck’s development over the centuries. The clear definitions, varied reading techniques, and extensive practice exercises are a helpful introduction to the deck for new readers, and provide insightful and challenging tools for the more experienced Lenormand reader to move well beyond basic cartomancy. Matthews has created an inspirational manual for Lenormand which can be a reader’s companion at all stages of their cartomantic career.”

The above is the short version of this review, provided to Inner Traditions for inclusion in the marketing materials for the book. For more detail, read on!

Allow me to start by saying that I have enjoyedCaitlin Matthews’ prolific output over the years. Her Da Vinci Enigma Tarot consumed my life for months when it came into my life. I greatly appreciate Matthews’ ability to combine historical scholarship with myth and magic to create her unique and intriguing take on the various oracles she studies.

The Complete Lenormand Oracle Handbook is the newest addition to Matthews’ body of work, and a most welcome book on the subject of Lenormand.

One of the things I appreciate most about Matthews’ work is her ability to present a complete and yet concise history of the topic. Her careful research and inclusion of up-to-the-minute developments is a refreshing change from the half vague, half sensational dramas that I’ve seen far too many other authors rely on in an attempt to lend legitimacy to their topic. Matthews takes great care to present factually correct and useful history.

The material is divided into four sections of 13 chapters, plus appendices, notes, bibliography, and index. Praise to the publishers for the index! Too many recent releases are omitting this important item, making it much harder for the reader to track down that one sentence they desperately want to find again.

In addition to card meanings and sample readings, Matthews also provides self-test items so the reader can check in with themselves about their grasp of the material. While my answers didn’t always match the ones in the answer key, it was quite helpful to think about the answer in the book and work through it, and then review my own answer.

Matthews provides a wide range of techniques to use within each reading to create a more meaningful experience for the client (and the reader–we learn so much each time we read for another!).

The sample readings are illustrated with cards from various Lenormand decks, including Matthews’ own The Enchanted Lenormand Oracle (you can read that review here), and my very favorite Lenormand, the Lenormand Revolution by Carrie Paris. Seeing the various representations of the same image among the different decks is useful and inspirational.

And so, in closing, I repeat: “Matthews has has created an inspirational manual for Lenormand which can be a reader’s companion at all stages of their cartomantic career.”

The Destruction card in the Dark Goddess Tarot by the divinely talented Ellen Lorenzi-Prince is, of course, Kali.

Inspired by Ellen’s art and words, I created the following spread to provide a structure for navigating a time of difficult transition.

1. Ego. The lies your ego is telling you to keep you stuck in this situation.

2. Illusions. How you are allowing yourself to be fooled in this situation, and keeping yourself stuck.

3. Fear. What you truly fear that keeps you feeling powerless and keeps you stuck in the situation.

4. What you are ignoring at your peril.

5. What you must face to break free.

6. The blood sacrifice required for your freedom. In Ellen’s words, “A blood sacrifice means giving up something important, something not easy to give, something with life and meaning.”

7. The energy shift that results from the blood sacrifice.

8. How to move forward with the new energy.

This spread was inspired by the image of the goddess Hel on the Two of Earth card in Ellen Lorenzi-Prince‘s fantastic Dark Goddess Tarot, and the accompanying text.

In Ellen’s words: “You have more than one task, more than one voice, more than one passion. You must make choices in your behavior, but do not deny this truth about your life.”

We have so many desires, dreams, and plans. We want to do so many things, but we can do only one thing at a time, and there are only 24 hours in a day. This spread gives you Hel’s assistance in making choices when you are overwhelmed by options, or if you are feeling stuck between a set of choices, all of which seem bad.

Have the client identify the various options for the choices they are facing. Lay a set of cards for each opportunity, and one additional set for an option which the client has not yet identified, but may become apparent in the reading, or in the near future.

If the client is unsure of what their options are, lay out at least two sets of cards and see if the client can identify what the options might be.

Bonus: use a different deck for each opportunity, and look for any repeating cards or similar cards landing in the same position.

1. The opportunity or option presented.

2. Your expectations about the option.

3. Others’ expectations about the option.

4. Worst case long-term scenario for how the option could turn out.

5. Best case long-term scenario for how the option could turn out.

6. How to cope with the worst case scenario.

7. What can be made real with this option.

8. How to move forward with the opportunity to reach the best case scenario.

This is a second spread inspired by the image of the goddess Hel on the Two of Earth card in Ellen Lorenzi-Prince‘s fantastic Dark Goddess Tarot.

In Ellen’s words: “If both are the reality, there is no choice. . . . In Hel’s underworld, opposites are accepted out of necessity, and through inescapability, are transcended. In Hel, two do not blend into one. Although intimately connected, each retains unique identity. Power lives in the dynamic tension between the two.”

This ended up being a 22 card reading. You could do this as a Majors-only reading for especially difficult issues and deep soul work.

1. The first reality.

2. The second reality.

3. What connects 1 and 2, and the power resulting from that connection.

4. How the first reality hinders you.

5. How the second reality hinders you.

6. What connects 4 and 5, and the power resulting from that connection.

7. What you can change about the first reality.

8. What you can change about the second reality.

9. What connects 7 and 8, and the power resulting from that connection.

10. How to create the change in card 7.

11. How to create the change in card 8.

12. What connects 10 and 11, and the power resulting from that connection.

13. How the first reality helps you.

14. How the second reality helps you.

15. What connects 13 and 14, and the power resulting from that connection.

16. What you must accept about the first reality.

17. What you must accept about the second reality.

18. What connects 16 and 17, and the power resulting from that connection.

19. How to reach acceptance of the first reality.

20. How to reach acceptance of the second reality.

21. What connects 19 and 20, and the power resulting from that connection.

22. The Goddess advises; the wisdom of Transcendence.

This simple, yet powerful spread inspired by the image of Hel on the Two of Earth card from the amazing Dark Goddess Tarot by Ellen Lorenzi-Prince. Hel has shown up as my card of the day several times in the past few weeks, so I’ve spent some time meditating on Her image and message. This is the first of a few spreads I’ve come up with while working with Her.

For each issue, draw the following cards:

5

4

3

1

2

1. The wound. What needs to be healed. This could be anything that is causing you pain, eithe recent or from long ago.

2. The past, dead things to be buried. What you need to let go of so you can heal.

3. Hel’s advice on how to heal the wound. It may not be easy, but healing is less painful than living with the wound.

4. The opportunity which arises as a result of your healing. Your new strength and confidence create new possibilities.

6. Hel’s advice on how to move forward with that opportunity. Healing releases emotional baggage and psychological burdens. You are lighter, freer, and have more energy to focus on what lies of you ahead.

Let me know how this spread works for you. I always appreciate hearing how people work with the cards!

10 days to moving day! You know what that means, right?

Moving sale! Thursday, August 21. 9:00 am – 2:00 pm.

Furniture, office supplies, catering items, and who knows what else we’ll find as we’re packing.

The one and only San Francisco Bay Area Tarot Symposium, presented by Thalassa and the Daughters of Divination, will be August 23 – 24, 2014 in San Jose, California. You need to be there!

This two day divinatory extravaganza has everything – speakers! shopping! readings! fun! frolic! costumes!

I’m honored to be presenting a workshop on “Tarot by the Numbers” at this year’s event! Numbers give order and form to the universe. Words are important for describing the world as we experience it, and words definitely shape our reality, but underlying everything is the mathematics of the cosmos. The numbers in the Tarot are only seemingly random. We’ll dive into the numerological ocean and see what treasures are to be found. Scuba equipment and math degree not required.

The speaker roster is replete with authors and artists you want to see and hear!

Mary K. Greer, the Godmother of Tarot

Ellen Lorenzi-Prince, Creator of The Tarot of the Crone and The Dark Goddess Tarot

James Wanless, creator of the Sustain Yourself Cards and the Voyager Tarot

Carrie Paris, creator of The Lenormand Revolution and The Magpie Oracle

Julie Cuccia-Watts, creator of The Ma’at Tarot and the Journey Into Egypt Tarot

Mark Ryan, creator of the Wildwood Tarot and dishy pirate

Rana George, author of “The Essential Lenormand Handbook”

and so many more! Tarot, Lenormand, Egyptian, Celtic, all kinds of topics!

The Vendor Room will have tempting offerings from Tarot Media Company, Devera Publishing, and the wondrous art of Beth Seilonen.

See you there!

I sent the wise and wonderful Rachel Pollack a copy of my new book, Painting the Soul: The Tarot Art of David Palladini

And the Godmother of Tarot returned these kind and lovely words:

“In this beautifully produced full-color book, David Palladini and Anastasia Haysler open the door–or rather 156 doors–into the elegant yet deeply meaningful world of Palladini’s two great decks, The Aquarian and The New Palladini.  In some ways, what is most remarkable about these two works is the nearly thirty years between them. Rarely does an artist allow a work to stand, to find its own way in the world–as The Aquarian certainly has done, being continuously in print for over forty years–and then return to the themes in a new work, a new vision, later in life.  By setting each card side by side with its counterpart, and giving a full page to each, the book allows us to immerse ourselves in David Palladini’s visions and what amounts to a dialogue between them.  For each card, the artist speaks of the image and its essence, its core meaning as he understands it.  Then, Anastasia Haysler’s clear and accessible interpretations of each card, in each deck, not only set the cards alongside each other but also in the context of Tarot tradition.  There is no long introduction about the history of Tarot, no set of instructions on how to do readings.  Instead, the book devotes itself, just as it should, to the art and soul of these two remarkable Tarot decks.”

~ Rachel G. Pollack, Co-creator of The Burning Serpent Oracle, and author of The Child Eater: A Novel

I can die happy now. My life is complete.

The book is available to order on the Tarot Media Company website!