The Power of Image

​I am often asked, “How do you work with Tarot and why?”
 
Many of my clients come with questions about their life path. They want to know what is the best career direction, should they stick out a relationship, make a change in location? Some feel they have everything they want materially and yet inside feel something is missing, others complain of feeling spiritually bankrupt, or that work drains their energy and there isn’t any for nurturing pleasurable activities. Some simply want to live a more creative life but don’t know where to begin.
 
The journey can feel even more confusing because often the question we bring to a counselor or coach is not the question that we are really concerned with. We may sit and talk for sometime before that primary concern surfaces. This is because many of our unhealthy motivations, urges and troubles originate in the subconscious, hidden from our conscious discerning mind.
 
Yet all is not lost. We can find the answers to most of our questions and problems if we know where to look and how to listen, engaging with the subconscious mind is often the first best step; and image is the language of the subconscious.
 
The Tarot images give us an immediate opening or doorway into the realm of the subconscious. They go straight to the heart of the matter, because the subconscious mind never lies. I have been a counselor and life coach for many years, but I’m also an artist and I understand this power of image.
 
For instance, I love to travel and once thought of writing a book entitled, The Traveler’s Tarot. The idea was to do Tarot readings for people about to go on a long voyage or pilgrimage and see if I could identify any themes, collective concerns or common revelations. But each time someone who was about to travel to New Zealand, or Italy, or India would come for a reading, what would come up, what would be revealed through the Tarot images as paramount, was not the concerns or interests of travel.  Instead what surfaced was concerns about a difficult relationship, or dissatisfaction in vocation, or concerns about money and resources…nothing about the eminent trip. So I scrapped the idea. The subconscious will lead us to our true and hidden concerns or questions through working with the Tarot images. This gives us a start. At least we are moving in the right direction.  After the first reading we can come up with a plan and clarify the on going support needed to follow through with it. Once we have a true direction, I am able to coach my client through out the journey to the creative fulfillment of his or her own purpose or vision.  

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