Mini-muse 011: Ceremony, reflect, labor

Looking back on a year of tarot journaling

Hi little coven.

Over the past year and change, I’ve guided members of my weekly tarot journaling club through the spreads featured in my first book, The Tarot Spreads Yearbook. Last night, we worked through the final spread in the book (watch the replay here), reflecting on the changes we’ve survived and created both on our own and in the community.

Fittingly, I was inspired to make a change when pulling my own cards for last night’s spread: I opted — for the first time in this container — to use an oracle rather than tarot deck. The cards I drew from The Earthbound Oracle spoke directly to my experience facilitating and participating in our weekly meets this year, and I thought I might share them with you.

Photograph by Chelsey Pippin Mizzi

The Ceremony card represents the changes that have shaped me in the past year. Meeting weekly with all of you to journal through The Tarot Spreads Yearbook has become a gentle Sunday ceremony for me.

In so many ways have our Sunday sessions shaped and changed me this year: they’ve rewritten the DNA of my Sundays for the better, prompted me to lead by example and pay deeper attention to myself. They’ve driven me to release perfectionism and show up to you as I am week by week. They’ve humbled me and helped me get comfortable admitting when I don’t know the answer. They’ve given me the chance to revisit and change my own relationship with my work.

When I began this offer around this time last year, I wasn’t sure how it would be received, if I would be happy with it, if I could sustain it… and through the process of showing up here week to week, spending time with you, with the cards, with myself, I’ve had the opportunity to shift my own expectations of myself as a facilitator, and as member of a community. The change has been subtle, rich, and life-giving.

The Reflect card represents changes that have shaped my community in the last year. I’ll admit, when I first drew the Ceremony card, I wasn’t sure what this reading was going to be about. But when I turned this card, with its cycle of leaves, face up, I knew immediately that these cards presented an opportunity to look back on my experience with Tarot Journaling Club over the last year. The image presents leaves in different seasons; it’s titled “reflect” - and that’s exactly what we’ve spent the last twelve months doing in community together: reflecting on what I call in the book four “seasons of the soul”.

It has been the greatest source of joy to watch this community grow and change over the past year. The Shuffle became a bestselling Substack publication a few months ago, our live group Journaling Club has more than tripled since early sessions, and The Tarot Spreads Yearbook recently sold enough copies that I’m now eligible to earn royalties.

More than these changes shaping this community, you, my community, have shaped these changes. From the bottom of my heart, thank you.

I do hope you have felt shaped through your participation in this community, too — I hope that, like me, you’ve felt those subtle, rich shifts in your relationship with yourself, the tarot, and within our little corner of the internet.

The Labor card represents the changes I want to keep fighting for. This was my favorite card of the bunch — I was immediately struck by the flower bud blooming out of the honeycomb in the upper left corner of the card. It occurred to me that bees don’t pollinate the flowers for the sake of beauty, they do it for their own ends, and yet we all benefit from the beauty that blooms as a result of their work. Their labor has a greater impact than they’ll ever know.

When I wrote The Tarot Spreads Yearbook almost five years ago, I had no idea what would bloom from it. I had hopes and dreams for the book, for my writing career (some came true, some went down in flames), but I had no designs to start a Substack at that time, or to lead a live journey through this book. I had no idea that the Season of Shadow would serve as the foundation for my third book, or that I would create the opportunity to work through my own spreads as a reader years later, no idea I would meet you here, or that we would build something gentle and wholesome and safe together, week by week.

Reflecting on this card last night, I journaled that I wanted my work to have a wider, more beautiful impact than I might know. I wrote that I’ll keep working toward facilitating beautiful changes — in this community and my wider world — even if I never directly see the benefit of them. I prayed that the ripple effects of the experiences you have here in this safe and gentle space enrich your lives beyond our wildest dreams.

With our journey through The Tarot Spreads Yearbook coming to a close, Tarot Journaling Club is entering an exciting new era!

But some things stay the same:

• We’ll continue to meet live on Sundays at 7pm UK / 2pm Eastern US / 11am Pacific US.

• Replays of past sessions are available here (with an upgraded interface launching this spring!)

Here’s what’s coming up next:

Feb 9: Love Letters from Your Creativity Spread (Pre-Record, no live session)

Feb 16: Week Ahead Tarot Journaling (Pre-Record, no live session)

Feb 23: Tarot Art Journaling - Pisces Season

March 2: Creative’s Cross (My spin on the Celtic Cross, for writers artist’s and small business owners)

March 9: Special Guest,

Alyssa Polizzi

will lead us through a tarot spread she created (NOTE: Daylight Savings Time starts in the US; this session will take place 1 hour earlier for UK and EU members)

March 16: Tarot Muse of the Year Quarterly Check-in (NOTE: Daylight Savings Time starts in the US; this session will take place 1 hour earlier for UK and EU members)

Coming this spring/summer:

• Special Guest Cassandra Snow

• Reflecting on Reversals

• The (Tarot) Artist’s Way

Have a topic/tarot tip/favorite spread you’d like us to work with in journaling club?

I’m always open to suggestions and recommendations. Comment below or replay to this email!

Tell me in the comments:

What do the cards I drew from The Earthbound Oracle bring up for you?

What have you been musing about, lately?

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