Reader’s Studio 2011- AMAZING!

I am still riding the excitement from Reader’s Studio 2011. I was nervous about going with all the things going on in life right now but it was exactly what I needed to reenergize my Tarot love and meeting some many of my online people in person was just awe inspiring.

 

We arrived on Thursday morning in New York and headed to our room to crash and get ready to set up for the evening selling opportunity and networking.  After I got up and ate (great Lobster Bisque!) I headed to the main hall to set up the Tarot Media Company table with Anastasia and Andrew.  We had some amazing items to share with everyone and I was excited to see who would be there Thursday evening.  We sold a few things and Corrine Kenner came by and said hello.  I was happy to also see that James Wells was in attendance as well as Dan Peliter with the Tarot Garden goodies whose table was just down the way from Tarot Media Company’s table. They have decks you just can’t find as well as other Tarot treasures.

The Amberstones had an opening greeting for their Thursday evening class and I left to go do a quick email check in on my computer.  I met up with Debbie Lake who is a hoot!  We chatted about many different topics such as our families and sharing thoughts on how we each read Tarot. As we sat and chatted the BatQueen, Thalassa, came by in her black elegance and pearls.  She was on her way to meet up with others but as always dropped a bit of humor on us.  Soon Debbie left to meet with her local Tarot people and Johanna Gargiulo-Sherman sat down on the couch next to me as well as Paul Nagy.  We chatted for a bit about the way Tarot had changed in the years since Johanna had put out the Sacred Rose Tarot and the different people she had read for over the years.  I was just happy to listen to such an experienced reader sharing her insight.  I of course had a FAN GIRL moment as her deck was the one I used most for many years. I had at a past Reader’s Studio let her know it.  This time I was calm and collected and just happy to chat with her about real life.  She is just a lovely person. If you get a change to chat with her you should. She is amazing.

Later it was off to the room for sleep and chatting with the roommate Susa Black.  But I needed to get ready for Friday so it was off to dreamland for me.

Friday I was downstairs having breakfast when Artemis J joined Andrew and I.  He had gotten in late on Thursday and it was great to see he had made it! After breakfast and checking in with Tarot Media Company, it was back to the main hall to get ready for the opening ceremonies of Reader’s Studio 2011.  There were so many people there who I have connected with online and through Twitter, it was amazing.  Wald and RuthAnn welcomed us and then began the opening ritual. After it, we got to meet our presenters for this year’s event.  First was Corrine Kenner who was going to share with us how to incorporate Tarot and Astrology. I had not really looked at how these two could be incorporated so I was looking forward to this presentation. I had been enjoying the Wizards Tarot that Corrine had put out this year and was hoping to get to chat with her more over the weekend.  Next Thalassa was the guest interviewer of Barbara Moore who was going to talk about Tarot Spreads and all the fun things we could do with them. After Wald introduced us to Caitlin Matthews. Her voice was mesmerizing. And she let us know we as readers are amazing for the work we have chosen to do. We are the modern day Oracles and we should all be honored to do this work.

These were our presenters and we were in for an amazing weekend.

Next we did our foundation reading that we would revisit at the end of the weekend. I worked with Artemis J and we did a basic 5 card reading. My question was how can I move forward with my Tarot work. It was very informative and suggested I start taking myself more seriously if I want others too do so as well. It is one of my biggest problems and the reading made some good suggestions for me to work on this issue.

After lunch we were introduced to Corrine Kenner and her way of looking at Tarot and Astrology. We each had our astrological charts. We then used the hand outs to see where things are at in an astrological chart so we understood the symbols that were common in a chart. We learned the symbol meanings as well as how to understand how they work with the Tarot. We got to figure out how our own charts could also be translated into Tarot cards and how to use them when we see them in readings for others.

After the class I went to dinner with Andrew and Artemis J and socialized with so many amazing people it is all still a bit of a blur. Then it was off to bed for the next day was Barbara Moore, Caitlin Matthews and breakfast with Mary K Greer.

Saturday morning began with me getting down to Mary K Greer’s morning breakfast talk. She discussed how we as Tarot people say we are open but we can be closed minded in our own ways. We all have flaws, but we can all make efforts to work on our pet peeves. She asked around the room what are some of our personal pet peeves and how can we each work on turning them into positive solutions. It was interesting to hear everyone’s issues and I of course stated my “love” of working with the 10 of Cups card. Artemis J who was also in the breakfast meeting across the room held up a 10 of Cups card as I spoke. It turned out he had just drawn this in relation to a question he had and was laughing as it was at the same time as I had said my pet peeve statement. Love the Synchronicity in action. After he asked me what I thought of in relation to his pulling of the card and we chatted about it in context of his question. It made me smile to know that the Tarot has a sense of humor to it.

Back in the main hall we all gathered to hear out Saturday speakers. Barbara Moore was introduced and began her talk about Spreads. I love creating spreads and looked forward to the information she was going to share with us.

She began by having us choose how we would create our spread, using a random card or planning it based on a crd we liked. I worked with Andrew and we decided to choose a card at random and he pulled the Lovers. I had to laugh as that is my numerical birth card and his sun sign birth card. We chose to do a 6 card spread based on the elements in the card. We then listened to Barbara as she made suggestions of way to set up a spread and different elements one can use and ways one can lay out the cards to make a spread work for every reading one could do. She suggested that cards can move through a spread instead of remaining stagnate if the reader wants to have that happen. She shared other ways to lay out the cards for more complex readings as well as simple lay outs to do direct and quick readings.

Here is the reading that Andrew and I came up with:

Andrew and Rose's Lovers Spread

We had fun and that I think that was the big message from Barbara’s class. Have fun with creating spreads that work for you as a reader.

We had our lunch break and then it was back in for Caitlin Matthews talk.

She opened by singing to us. She just started singing to get the hall to know she was ready to begin. It was a wonderful way to begin the talk. She shared with us her thoughts on significators. She asked how many of us use these cards in our readings. Most people in the room didn’t use them. She acknowledged that she also used to not use them. However she had found that they were more helpful than she thought. She showed us how she worked with clients to find and use their significator cards and we did a few drawing of significators at our group tables. After she asked the room to shuffle their cards pick 1 card but not to look at it. Next she requested a volunteer to share an issue they were having and were willing to let the larger group help them with. Patty Shaw volunteered. She was having a hard time with public speaking and would be doing a presentation in the coming weeks. She came up and Caitlin had her pick a person from the room to represent her significator. She choose Elinor Greenburg who had the Death Card. Next she choose 4 people out of the room be represent 4 different elements in the Wheel of Souls reading Caitlin had shared with the group in our hand outs. Each person had a message to share with her in their places as the Family Soul, the Tribal Soul and Individual Soul as well as the Universal Soul. Patty choose me to be the last place, the Universal Soul, and I had the Hierophant to share with her. It was a very moving reading for the room and we helped her to face the issues she was dealing with about public speaking. After the reading she made the announcement to the group about the evening classes and the dinner that we were attending on Saturday evening.

The dinner was started with people parading for the group at large as a favorite card. I wore a gothic style dress to compliment Andrew’s Captain’s coat and steampunk style. We were encouraged to join the parade and realized we must be the SteamPunk Tarot Lovers. It was fun to honor Barbara Moore’s work as she is creating the SteamPunk Tarot deck in the next year. Also Ciro Marchetti came up to Andrew with a card from his new deck, Oracle of Vision, that looked like Andrew.

After we went to spend time with Jaymi Elford as well as Susa Black and Artemis J. We chatted about new decks and all the fun we were having. We compared notes and expressed our fascination with all that we were learning as well. It was a late night of joy and fun.

Sunday was the closing of this amazing event. We revisited our foundation reading from Friday and applied things we learned more about during the weekend. It was fun to see how astrology influenced how Artemis J read the same cards this time verses on Friday. I used the Wheel of Souls reading as well as moving the cards around in the reading for Artemis J. We then received our certificates and participated in the closing ritual.

And what did I take away from this amazing weekend? New friends, connections in real life with people I had started to connect with on Twitter as well as Facebook as well as terrific new ways to look at my Tarot deck.

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