LEARN TAROT
 

How to Use Tarot For Self-Reflection

Apr 10, 2023 | Learn Tarot

How to Use Tarot For Self-Reflection

Knowing how to use Tarot for self-reflection can blow personal development wide open. We are so disconnected from the self in these modern times, Tarot allows us to come back home to who we are at our core. It illustrates the soul. It shows you what you can’t see. It allows you access to the deepest parts of your psyche. 

But, how do you go about interpreting the cards? What do you need to be aware of and what are the practicalities of it? Do you need a daily draw? 

Use the Major Arcana to Understand Your Reactions 

The first 22 cards of a Tarot deck are the major arcana. These cards are the archetypal energies we come across as we move through life. These archetypes can make us face aspects of ourselves, ask questions and help us see the reality of a situation. 

You can use the major arcana for self-reflection by stepping toe to toe with its energy. Challenge it. Think about what you would do if this energy was a physical being in front of you. How would you confront it? What conversations would you have? Would your opinions differ or align? 

When we use the major arcana in this way, we can start to see how we would react. For example, you have just been offered two different jobs, both of which will take you down two different paths in your career. For guidance, you pull The Hermit major arcana card. 

The Hermit in this instance could be asking you whether you are thinking about what will benefit more than just your bank account. It may help you realise that there is actually a very clear and obvious answer to this tough decision. You go with the option that not only makes you feel like you’ll have a purpose but also the one that supports you in all areas of life. 

Maybe one of these options offers you more flexibility with your time, allowing you the freedom to pursue more personal interests. Maybe the same option is in a sector that interests you more. 

The self-reflection that comes with the major arcana is the reflection of our options. We can easily become blinded by tunnel vision. Something often created by fear, doubt and limiting beliefs. The archetypes in the majors, therefore, come up to us to help us confront those things and move past them. 

Use the Minor Arcana to Plan and Execute Your Actions 

When using Tarot for self-reflection, we can use the minor arcana to pull a plan together. After the major arcana has shown us the truth of our reactions, the minors can help us see what actions we’re willing to take. And, more importantly, which ones we aren’t. 

Too often people use self-reflection as a tool for procrastination. Endless introspection does nothing to move us forward or allow us to grow. It’s the actions we take after these moments of reflection that really get the work done. 

The minor arcana helps us reflect on our plans, strategy and actions. It helps us understand what to do and in some cases, why we’ve already done what we’ve done. 

The four key elements, air, fire, water and earth, are the tools of creation. So there’s no wonder they are present within the minor arcana in the Tarot. Laying out these four tools for us, we can get a better idea of what tools we’re most drawn to. 

If we use the example from above about the job decision, we can now apply the minors to it. Doing so, we are offered a number of different tools we can use to get the job done and get that job accepted and underway. Which tool you decide to use can say a lot about you as a person. For example (and these are just my feelings, yours may be different):

  • If you feel more drawn to the fiery energy of the wands, you are a person of action. You don’t like to wait around or dilly-dally, you want to get shiz done. 

  • If you feel more drawn to the gentle energy of the watery cups cards, then you will probably lead from the heart. Making decisions based on how they make you feel and what your intuition is telling you to do. 

  • If you feel more drawn to the gusty air cards of the swords, then you are a planner and strategist. You’ll never take action without having a roadmap first to go off.

  • If you feel more drawn to the very stable and comfortable earth energy of the pentacles, then you’re not a risk taker. You like to use the skills you’ve already mastered and stay in your lane. 

Not only do your feelings towards the minors allow you to self-reflect on what type of person you are, but they can also identify imbalances. For example, if you are more drawn to the air energy of the swords, but in the past, this approach hasn’t worked that well for you, there may be a need to rebalance and use more grounding earth energy this time.  

Use the Court Cards to Step Into a Different Perspective 

As well as the major and minor arcana cards, you can also use the Tarot court cards for self-reflection. The way that I read the courts is as dual energies. This is based on Tarot reader Melinda Lee Holm’s teachings. 

When we’re sitting down to use the Tarot for self-reflection, we are coming to the reading already embodying one of the court cards. Should we get a court card in our Tarot reading, then we have to then ask the question “Is this me now? Or is this who I should be?”. 

Really immerse yourself in the energy of the card and see how it fits. A bit like trying on a new coat. Does it feel comfortable and familiar? Then it might just be a perspective and approach you are used to embodying. 

If it doesn’t fit quite right, it may be something you haven’t yet explored. Sometimes allowing ourselves to experience these new perspectives can help us see new ways to approach something. Sometimes it just confirms our original ideas and strategy. 

How to use the Tarot for Self-Reflection: A Tarot Spread

Tarot spreads are a great way of offering context and structure to your reading. So, to help you better understand how the Tarot can be used for self-reflection, here’s a ready-made spread for you. 

You will need to cut the deck and split out the majors, minors and court cards.

  • Your first card will be the major arcana card. This will tell you what archetypal energy you are dealing with or moving through right now.

  • The middle card will be your minor arcana card. This reflects your actions back to you so you can better understand them.

  • The last card on the right is the court card. This shows you the perspective that you are taking and can help you understand how to see things differently in order to find solutions.

How to use Tarot for Self Reflection Tarot Spread

How To Use Tarot Cards

Mar 17, 2023 | Learn Tarot

How To Use Tarot Cards


Tarot cards are a tool. They can be used to better understand our own psyche, explore our subconscious and be mindful of the conscious. When you pick up a deck of cards – like any tool – you need to know what you plan to use it for and what your ideal outcome will be.

Imagine picking up a hammer. You probably won’t get much use out of that hammer if you don’t have a project in which to use it. You may even end up thinking the hammer is useless and giving up on it. We need a project to use a tool and the same applies to Tarot.

When it comes to using Tarot, we are the project. It’s ourselves that needs work and using this tool will help us with this work. As a Tarot reader, I become a sort of contractor for the self when I work with clients. I come in to assess what needs to be done, and then I grab my tools and get to work.

How do you make tarot cards work?

The more receptive you are to hearing guidance and suggestions from the cards, the better they work. All the guidance the cards offer comes from divine guidance and subconscious understanding. If we are too close-minded to believe in divine guidance, we’ll struggle to read the Tarot.

Similarly, if we can’t be vulnerable and allow our subconscious to speak, then making the Tarot cards work will be tricky.

When people ask me how to read Tarot cards, being an open book is the number one suggestion. Sometimes being honest and vulnerable with yourself is harder than being vulnerable with others, so this is where many people get stuck.

Can you read your own Tarot cards?

Yes, you absolutely can read your own Tarot cards. In fact, that’s one of the primary ways I use my Tarot cards.

Reading for yourself is tricky though. Sometimes it’s easier for someone else to read your cards for you because they can tell you what you need to hear. When you do a reading on yourself, your brain will often try and spin things so they sound more like what you want to hear.

This is why you have to build the skill of stepping outside of yourself. To become an impartial and objective judge of your inner world.

All you need in order to do a Tarot reading on yourself is a spot to relax and meditate, a journal and of course your cards. The key to self-readings is to make sure you and your subconscious mind are as relaxed as possible.

The more relaxed your subconscious mind is, the easier it will be to give it a voice through the cards. Then, you’ll be able to communicate seamlessly with all the different parts of your psyche.

How to use Tarot cards for the first time

Whether you want to break in a new Tarot deck, or you are picking up a deck for the first time there are plenty of ways you can prep.

One thing that I love to do – and this is down to personal preference – is to sleep with the deck under my pillow before I use it. If you’ve got thin pillows then this may be less than ideal. In this case, you can just pop it by the side of your bed.

This helps you to connect the energy of your deck with your own energy. Sort of like creating a new bond, you’ll be able to swap energy and become more closely connected with it.

I always advise cleansing your Tarot deck before you use it as well. A deck can pass through many hands before it gets to you, so cleansing it just helps to give you a blank slate to draw from. Once your energy is shared and cleansed, you can get going with your reading.

For a new deck, you’ll want to give the Tarot cards a really good shuffle. The deck will come in chronological order so we want to mix things up as much as possible to ensure we get a good selection of cards. Once you’ve shuffled to your heart’s content, spread out your cards and get going with your reading.

When not to read Tarot cards

There isn’t really a good and bad time to read Tarot cards specifically. However, there are times that can offer you clearer or more organised readings.

Making sure your mental state is calm and ready to receive information is always best. As I mentioned before, putting yourself into meditation and allowing that subconscious to come forward always offers the best readings.

If you already feel frazzled, or like you can’t focus on anything in particular, it may be best to avoid reading. This is because you can end up just making yourself more frustrated and confused. I always find that my readings are pointless when I’m all over the place. A better use of time is taking care of yourself. You don’t need more information from the cards, you just need to destress and regroup.

If you’re as in love with Tarot as I am and want to know different ways to use Tarot cards, then you can take a look at my annual Introduction to Energetic Tarot course. Or, if you miss the deadline, why not take a look at some of my Tarot workshops and free masterclasses?

Fancy a Freebie?

23 Tips for Getting Started with Tarot

Get 23 of my biggest tips when it comes to getting started with your own beginner Tarot journey. Click the button to get started.

Download

How to Cleanse Tarot Cards

Mar 10, 2023 | Learn Tarot

How to Cleanse Your Tarot Cards

How to cleanse your Tarot cards. What's the trick? Are there good ways and bad ways?

Cleansing your cards is essential before use as your cards can hold stagnant energy that might mess up your readings. To get the best out of your cards, give them a little cleanse using the methods below.

WORDS: Cat Crawford

IMAGE: Karly Jones, Studio Kealaula

Knowing how to cleanse Tarot cards isn’t something that is often taught to Tarot beginners. Most of the time, you have to feel out for yourself. This is because how you cleanse your own Tarot cards is based on personal preference. It’s based on what feels the most cleansing to you.

The good news is that are plenty of ways you can cleanse your cards.

The main thing to keep in mind is how the energy of the Tarot cards feels to you and how you feel in yourself. It’s no good using a technique that doesn’t make you feel like something has shifted.

To help you find out how you should cleanse your Tarot cards, here are some things I’d like you to try.

Cleanse Your Tarot Cards With Smoke

One of the easiest ways to cleanse your Tarot cards. Using smoke from herb bundles or smudge sticks that include things like sage or rosemary will do the trick.

All you need is to burn your herbs, whether it be a bundle, Palo Santo, or via loose incense. Then grab your Tarot deck and slowly run the deck through the smoke plume. Make sure to allow the smoke to fully wrap itself around the cards.

This is also very therapeutic to watch. Really pay attention to how the smoke moves around the Tarot cards. Where does it meet with the cards, and where does it appear to be repelled?

When I cleanse Tarot cards I like to hold them in the smoke for 1-2 minutes depending on how I feel. I like to try and tap into the energy of the cards and intuitively decide when the deck has been fully cleansed.

Cleanse Your Tarot Cards With Crystals

how to cleanse Tarot cards with crystals

If working with smoke doesn’t appeal to you then cleansing your Tarot deck with crystals could be the ticket.

There are a few ways to do this. My favourite is getting a piece of clear quartz or selenite and popping it on top of the deck before use. You can leave it for an hour or overnight depending on how deep of a cleanse it needs.

Some other crystals that are good for cleansing Tarot cards are Black Tourmaline and Citrine. Black Tourmaline is a great sponge for negative energy, so it can suck up all that badness before you pick up your deck again. Citrine is another great energy cleanser because it replaces negative energy with positive, joyful energy.

Another way you could cleanse your Tarot deck with crystals is by using crystal grids. This is a good way to also add in more specific types of energy whilst you’re cleansing. For example, create a grid using rose quartz to instil loving energy in your deck.

Cleansing it in this way can also help you set intentions for your reading, if you’re doing a reading about career, you may choose the money attracting Pyrite, or if you’re looking to get over a break up, a heart healing emerald could be ideal. 

Cleanse Your Tarot Cards By Tapping

When it came to figuring out how I cleanse Tarot cards, tapping was the first technique that really felt right. I do this before I use my deck without fail. It’s quick, efficient and great for daily cleansing.

My go-to tapping technique for cleansing my Tarot cards is to use the heel of my hand. I simply give the deck three knocks and I’m good to go.

What this does is knock the stagnant energy from the deck. You’re using kinetic energy to replace the energy that is being held in the cards. The reason we want to do this is that the leftover energy can confuse our readings. We want to be able to have a good, clean slate before we dive back into a new reading.

Cleanse Your Tarot Cards Using The Moon

We’ve all heard of cleansing our crystals with the moon, but how do we cleanse Tarot cards with the moon? Well, the same exact way.

Which moon you use for cleansing is up to you. I prefer new moons because they represent new beginnings. A completely new cycle from which to start afresh.

Some people prefer a full moon to cleanse. It all depends on which phase of the moon you feel is the most cleansing for you. For me, I much prefer using the full moon to recharge my Tarot deck.

I wouldn’t advise putting your deck outside like you would crystals. Weather and dirt could end up damaging your cards and we don’t want that.

*Tip: If you’re looking to work with your cards and the moon phases more closely, make sure to check out my annual Tarot Diary. I include how to work with the moon through Tarot and Oracle card readings in there, so you can build your own lunar card readings. 

Tarot Diary 2024 - Moon Phases

Cleanse Tarot Cards Using Visualisation

The final way to cleanse Tarot cards is visualisation. This is another of my favourites. All you have to do is visualise a soft white light entering your deck and cleansing it of all the energy it is holding.

It is best, however, to make sure you are in a deeply relaxed state before you start the visualisation. This is just so you aren’t transferring any negative energy to your deck.

If the soft white light isn’t working for you, think about something that feels cleansing to you. Maybe one of the elemental energies that we often find in the Tarot cards themselves. Maybe it’s a trickling stream or a gust of wind. Imagine it moving through the Tarot deck and carrying away all the stagnant energy.

Where to start your spiritual journey?

Dec 28, 2022 | Soul Purpose


where to start spiritual journey

I remember back in the day when I was just starting my own spiritual journey I thought ‘how do you know where to start your spiritual journey?’.

I took one look at how many different avenues I could go down, got scared and retreated. From then on I was living in a constant cycle of near starts but not actually getting very far.

That’s when I decided to start a Book of Shadows. A Journal that would keep track of everything I learned on my spiritual journey. I started with absolute basics like the wheel of the year, the different sabbats and how to set up an altar.

Of course, this is all from a witch’s point of you. But, where do you start your spiritual journey outside of witchcraft? To be honest it’s not too dissimilar. Instead of writing down the witchy stuff, you can start with the basics of spirituality.

Everyone’s journey is unique to them, but I thought I’d help out those of you who are right at the beginning of your journey. So, here are my top tips on knowing where to start your spiritual journey.

Where to start your spiritual journey? From the beginning…

Most people fall at the first hurdle because they want to get to the exciting stuff right away. The problem with that though is that the stuff that we label exciting or mystical needs a foundation on which to make any sense.

It starts with you. Your spiritual journey relies on you knowing exactly why you want and need to be on this journey. Grab a journal now and answer these three questions:

  1. How do I think this spiritual journey will help me live a better life?

  2. What is my main motivation for wanting to start a spiritual journey?

  3. What is my goal for this journey? Where do I want it to take me?

I highly encourage you to start a spiritual journal to help you keep track. Beginning with these three prompts will instantly set you on the right path. It can also help you better understand what you need to look for within the spiritual world.

A lot of the time we feel lost and overwhelmed by all the options because we don’t know what we want from the spiritual journey itself. Your intention is really all it takes, once you’ve set that then things start to line up and become clearer.

Focus on the self

A spiritual journey is about understanding your soul’s place within the universe. To understand how your energy affects the things around you. How the mind, body and soul are intrinsically linked and all three need as much care and attention as the others.

Your spiritual journey is about you, so start by pinpointing areas that could benefit from some spiritual guidance. For me, it was my confidence. My confidence levels were one of the biggest causes of my anxiety and once I decided to work on that part of me, everything else started to fall neatly into place. I gained a sense of direction, I saw new opportunities to explore new tools and theologies.

For you, there may be a limiting belief that you want to investigate further. You might want to do some shadow work to uncover the root cause of that belief. You may keep a journal where you track your progress and make notes of any ideas and realisations you uncovered.

The way you see the world and others starts inside of you. If you are constantly judging yourself, then you will always judge others. If you’re unhappy at home, then that will carry into other areas of your life. If you are in a terrible relationship then you will have a negative view of relationships as a whole.

Have you ever heard of the phrase ‘charity starts at home’? The same applies here. Spirituality starts at home, from within you.

The tools do not make the journey

The spiritual community has seen a huge boost over the last few years. We’ve now got more spiritual influencers, authors, podcasters and coaches than ever. We’re living in a spiritual renaissance. However, with this comes the usual issues with the likes of social media and public representation.

I follow a lot of witchy, spiritual women who I love, but I also recognise when a photo is staged for Instagram and when props are just that, props.

When you first start your spiritual journey you’ll probably look to those with more experience as inspiration. That’s fantastic and highly encouraged by me. However, know that in order to live a spiritual life all you need is yourself and the courage to keep peeling back your own layers.

Tools like Tarot or Oracle cards, crystals, altars, and the tangible material objects we often see grace our feeds, these are not essential. You could do a ritual with one candle or a hundred candles, crystals and a bonfire. It doesn’t matter. Your tools are not the heart of your spirituality, it’s your intention that counts.

Choosing your tools with intention

If you do want to have tools and objects surrounding you as you move along your spiritual journey, then they need to be chosen with intention. The reason I got so invested in Tarot cards was that I discovered that they were the perfect tool to help me tackle issues relating to my mental health. They helped give me support with my anxiety. They helped me make clearer and more confident discussions at a time when everything In my life seemed volatile.

If you want to start using crystal energy in your spiritual practices, then you need to know why that is the perfect tool for your work. Imagine a painter trying to paint but they choose a stapler instead of a paintbrush. The same applies to someone on a spiritual journey. If you don’t know why you’re using something then don’t use it.

Some beginner tools I’d recommend are:

Aim to find beginner-focused resources for any tools you want to investigate. You’ll find that the more you learn about your tools, the more new tools you’ll be introduced to. I didn’t know much about astrology before I started working with more advanced Tarot concepts. Trust that you’ll be introduced to the right tools when you need them most.

Knowing where to start your spiritual journey

A spiritual journey isn’t all love and light, there are periods of shadow, darkness and sadness. It is about becoming emotionally aware, to a point where you can fully embrace the good and the bad in equal measure.

Never shy away from the difficult conversations you will inevitably need to have with yourself. The shadow self often holds the most nourishment for us.

If you still feel like you need a bit of help getting started on your spiritual journey, why not take a look at my coaching package? I offer free discovery calls so you can feel confident that I’m the right coach for you. So drop me an email and let me know if you’d like to book a call.

How To Start Your Spiritual Journey

Nov 28, 2022 | Soul Purpose


As a spiritual coach, I am often approached by women who are looking to take a step into spirituality. They may want to take better care of their well-being or find a way to disconnect from being the ambitious business owners they are. But, the majority of them are looking for divine support. The feeling of not being alone on the journeys they have chosen.

It’s not easy knowing where to start with this spiritual journey. How do you even begin to be a more spiritual person? To help you take that first step, I thought I’d over 8 ways you can start your own spiritual journey. Once you’ve started you’ll start to see more avenues you could explore.

Everybody’s spiritual preferences and needs are different. One thing that interests one person may bore another. Choose something that not only interests you and makes you want to know more, but also helps you feel the way you’ve always wanted to feel.

1) Connect with your inner world

Essentially you’ll do this no matter what form of spirituality you choose to follow. Traditionally spirituality was closely linked to religion, but now we use the term to describe someone who is seeking a deeper meaning from life.

To start connecting with your inner world, I recommend starting a meditation practice that is consistent and turns the everyday focus inwards to pay attention to feelings, intuition and inner thoughts. It’s only by knowing what’s going on in the conscious mind and subconscious mind that we can work on personal growth and ensure we’re getting exactly the care we need.

2) Connect with your outer world

Mindfulness will help with this. Bringing your focus to the world around you by practising gratitude, connecting with the physical body, and connecting with nature.

When we connect with our outer world more we start to notice how we no longer covet things. We start to become more content with our lives, and what we have and let go of what we don’t have. If you’re someone that regularly lives inside a daydream or is always in a state of want, then this could be a great place to start your spiritual journey.

3) Connect with the divine & spirit

A remnant of the more traditional use of spirituality. Connecting with the divine energy or with spirit is something that can help you feel supported by a higher power. Whether you believe in one god, no gods or multiple gods, connect with divine energy can help us find the confidence to do what you feel most called to do.

Some people choose to connect to a god/s, and many modern witches will call upon deities as a personification of whatever energy they need support with or are looking to bring into their lives. This isn’t for everyone, but if you do feel a connection to a higher power or a divine force moving through you, then this could be an ideal topic to look into.

4) Connect with a practice

The way I got started with spirituality was through Witchcraft. Many label Witchcraft incorrectly citing it as a religion, but it’s a practice. Witches believe in different things, there is no one way to be a witch or practice your craft.

Creating a consistent practice and making an altar space dedicated to spiritual work and activities was a lifesaver for me. It became something familiar – no pun intended – and my brain started to recognise spaces and habits and preemptively put me into ‘spiritual mode’ before I even lifted a finger. This is a good place to start for those that love to be crafty and feel more relaxed and connected to themselves when they are doing something productive.

5) Connect with the chakras

The theory of chakras comes from ancient India, found within the Hindu Vedas, and is most commonly used within Eastern practices such as Yoga and especially Kundalini Yoga. Essentially the chakras are the seven main energy centres of the body. These energy centres lie within different areas of the body and manage their respective energy flow.

Each of these centres helps to keep our energy in balance and flowing through the body smoothly. The better the energy flow, the more balanced and at peace we feel. The chakras appear across a number of different spiritual journeys and topics. From crystal healing and meditation to Yoga and even the Tarot.

6) Connect with the universe

Similar to connecting with the divine, you can also start by connecting with the universe. Think about activities and subjects like manifestation and divination. Each of these relies on trust and belief in the universe to guide you in the right direction.

When you start to actively connect with the universe, you submit to the fact that you are not in control of fate. Not to say you hand over your free will, but you do hand over some responsibility for the trajectory of your life to a higher power. A power that is formed on synchronicity, symbolism and sacred patterns.

7) Connect with the body

Similarly to connect with your outer world, you could start your spiritual journey by getting more connected with your body. Doing this can help us calm the mind and ground ourselves in the present, leading to more awareness of the self and creating space for more abstract thought and downloads from that higher power.

There are lots of ways to connect to the body spiritually. Whether it’s Yoga, walks in nature or self-massage. Even practices like Reiki, breathwork and sound healing can help you find a new connection with your body.

8) Connect with different energies

If you’re interested in energies, the energies found within you, around you, divine energies etc. then looking at things around energy healing could be a good place to start your journey. Many beginners of spirituality start with the world of crystals, as each type of crystal projects a different type of energy depending on how it was formed and its chemical makeup.

You can even start simply by learning about lunar energies, the lunar cycle and how to use the different energies of the moon throughout each month.

If you still need some help and guidance on your own spiritual journey, make sure to check out my Soul Tarot Coaching sessions which uses the guidance of the Tarot cards to help uncover solutions, clarity and direction. Or, if you have a quick question about anything in this blog, drop me an email!



Ask me anything

Guide + Free Workbook: The Meaning of Saturn Return & How Can it Affect you?

Nov 1, 2022 | Soul Purpose

What is the meaning of Saturn Return? How does it affect us and why is it one of the most well-known astrological events in our lives?

Anyone over the age of 30 will tell you that there is a period before the big 3-0 that feels like a complete quarter-life crisis. You have no idea what you’re doing with your life, you can feel the years slipping away and everything you thought you knew about yourself and your life just feel false.

It’s such a fun time.

It’s probably no coincidence that I started reading Tarot and practising Witchcraft more intensely around the age of 28. I felt completely adrift in my own life, I had no confidence that I was in the right career or even living in the right location. It was like just when I’d put down the final piece of the puzzle that is my adult life, another version of me came along and through all the pieces into the air and then walked away.

Download the FREE Saturn Return Workbook

What does Saturn Return mean?

The planets in our solar system each have their own cycles – how long it takes them to do a full orbit of the sun. Even the sun and the moon work on cycles, the sun has a 12-month cycle which is why we have seasons and of course, the moon works on a 28-day cycle.

Saturn has a cycle of around 28-30 years, meaning that’s how long it takes to do a complete orbit of our sun. When we’re born, Saturn will be in a particular place in the sky, so when we talk about Saturn Return we’re talking about Saturn completing its orbit and returning to the same place as when you were born.

Think of it like Saturn was there to welcome you into the world and then it went on holiday for 28-30 years and now it’s back to make you question everything you thought you knew.

>
“Saturn Returns usually happen between ages twenty-eight and thirty and fifty-eight and sixty. Those are the ages at which you lose your illusions and mistaken ways of thinking to take great steps forward. If this time is used well, you can take a quantum leap.”
— Suh Yoon Lee

The properties of Saturn

Each of the planets rules over a certain kind of energy. This is one of the ways we can read astrological birth charts, assigning specific properties to the planets to give their placements some context.

Mercury rules over things like travel and communication, Jupiter rules over our generosity, expansion and fortune and Saturn rules over our limitations and responsibility.

This means that when we’re born Saturn will gift us a certain way in which we see what we’re capable of, and what is required of us in the world. But, when it returns it comes back with new ideas that challenge all of these things. It asks us whether all of these limitations we’ve put on ourselves are actually valid.

This is why we often feel like we need to completely unravel our own lives and start again when we reach our late 20s.

>
“I feel as I were disintegrating and “growing up”, whatever that means, simultaneously.”
— James Agee

How can Saturn Return affect you?

Your Saturn Return will be unique to you, but some core things to watch out for are:

  • Questioning your soul purpose

  • Feeling lost and confused about your future

  • Feeling the need to sell everything you own and run away from life

  • Feeling like you need to become someone else for a while

  • Questioning your career path or field of study

  • Questioning what goals you have for the long-term future

To name but a few. Essentially you feel like burning your life to the ground and starting again from nothing. I find the easiest way to describe a Saturn Return is to tell my own story. For reference, I’m about to turn 32 so my Saturn Return has been and gone, but I now see exactly what it was and why I had to go through it.

Exploring my own Saturn Return

I was around 27 and living in my own flat in the centre of Manchester. The perfect location for a 27-year-old to be, with plenty of pubs, clubs and things to do. I had a job that was a very short walk from where I lived, I worked with people I loved and I was paid a good wage.

I started thinking about saving for a mortgage and then one day that idea seemed like I was giving myself a prison sentence. Completely out of the blue might I add. I started thinking about my 30s, what I would want to achieve where I would want to be and I realised that I wouldn’t be happy if everything I had at that moment was it for the rest of my life.

I was sitting on my uncomfortable rental sofa drinking my second cup of coffee back to back when I decided I needed to do something with a purpose. I wanted to work with a charity that meant something to me so I could feel like I was benefiting the world. I started looking at mental health charities because it was a cause I was and still am very passionate about. I flicked through endless ‘race for life’ races, 5ks, 10ks, sponsored this and sponsored that but none of them felt big enough.

Then I came across a huge (and costly) challenge. Walk the Great Wall of China for charity. I’d never stepped foot out of Europe and I didn’t know anyone that would accompany me, but before I knew it I was booked on and my participant pack was on its way to me. That was the turning point for me. The point where my Saturn Return grabbed me and strapped me in for the ride.

From then on I didn’t feel like I had any control over where I was going or what I was doing. A week before my 28th birthday I had a panic about turning 30 and how many doors would close for me regarding things like working holidays and cheaper travel visas. So within an hour of thinking to myself ‘I wish I’d lived abroad at least once’ I was signed up for a working holiday in New Zealand.

In the space of just 3 months before and after my 28th birthday, Saturn Return had kicked down my door and said “Ok, biatch. It’s time you stop procrastinating and planning and started doing something“. I was powerless to resist. It was like I had no say over what was happening and where I was going, I was just doing what Saturn wanted me to do.

>
“And this is the part where you find out who you are”
— Unknown

What did Saturn Return want?

I’d love to say that all that exciting stuff made me into this amazingly cool new person, but it didn’t. What it did do was teach me a lot about myself, what I needed in my life to be happy, what I didn’t need and what my purpose was moving into my adult years.

I’d also love to say that those were the happiest years of my life, but again, that’s not how Saturn Return works.

Were both China and New Zealand an amazing once-in-a-lifetime opportunity absolutely. Was I the best version of myself during those times? Absolutely not. I was a mess of a person, completely out of control. My mental health was dire whilst I was living in New Zealand and as much as I loved living in that amazing country, being so far away from family and friends took a much bigger toll on me than I had ever imagined it would.

I had always assumed that I was a completely independent person who loved their family but didn’t need them close all the time. I was wrong. That was one of the biggest lessons Saturn Return taught me.

The important thing to remember though is that if Saturn hadn’t pushed me into those situations I would never have learned those lessons. I needed to strip everything away so I could experience who I was in the rawest and most vulnerable state possible. To do that, I needed to be removed from the things that I desperately needed to be happy but couldn’t appreciate.

When I came out the other side I started my own business and went freelance so I could have maximum flexibility to live my life to the fullest. I now have a business that I love, I have variety in my work which keeps me motivated and excited to wake up every morning. I get to see my amazing friends who I’ve known since I was 4 years old, I get to spend time with my family regularly and I have plenty of time for all my creative hobbies. It all turned out pretty great if you ask me.

Will I always feel so content, of course not! But I’m 100% in a better place than I was before my Saturn Return.

This time it’s personal

You might think you’re a pro at inner work, that you are self-aware and know exactly who you are, what you stand for, and what or who you need, but I promise you if you haven’t gone through your Saturn Return, you’re in for a bumpy ride.

I thought I was self-aware before but Saturn comes in to humble you. Is it comfortable? Absolutely not. Is it necessary? Undoubtedly.

It’s nothing to be afraid of, even though it isn’t the best years of your life, the lessons learned and the trials you go through during this time bring you out into a place that feels like a breath of fresh air. You feel like you’ve been reborn and you feel older, wiser and more grounded.

When you’re going through your Saturn Return it’s like you’re being carried by a strong current downriver. It’s better to just relax, sit back and allow yourself to be carried away. Trying to fight or resist will just make things feel harder.

To help you get your head around Saturn Return and do some tasks to help you better understand what’s going on in your Saturn Return right now, I put together a free workbook. You can find the form at the beginning of this guide. In this, we also go into a bit of detail on how your birth chart can help you focus on this journey.

If you are currently facing this pivotal moment in your life and need a bit of support, however, then I highly recommend my Soul Tarot Coaching sessions where we can work 1:1 to help you find clarity and direction.

The Elements in Tarot Reading Guide

Oct 24, 2022 | Learn Tarot

Elemental Energies in Tarot Reading

Within the world of Alchemy, the four classical elements make up the existence of everything in our world...

Because of Tarot's long history, it has collected many features of different esoteric subjects, one of them being Alchemy. Tarot has incorporated parts of Alchemy into its meanings, including the concept of the four classical elements, earth, wind, fire and air and their role in the makeup of the universe.

WORDS: Cat Crawford

IMAGE: Joanna Kosinska

 

Working with the four classical elements – air, water, fire and earth – within the Tarot, allows us to create a deeper context and direct our focus into specific areas of life. For example, if there’s an abundance of air energy in a reading, we can make a fair assumption that the issues and obstacles being referred to are of a more mental or communicative nature. 

When I first came across the idea of seeing the elements in the Tarot cards, I was working with the Elemental Power Tarot Deck by Melinda Lee Holm. The guidebook from this deck is one that I use regulalry now, just to double check interpretations and gain some extra insight. 

 

The elemental energies can be found throughout the Tarot cards, both in the imagery, colour psychology and most importantly – and what we’ll be focusing on in this article – the four Tarot suits. 

This isn’t a new concept by any means, it’s been present in some form since the 16th century, maybe even earlier depending on who you ask. But, when it comes to learning Tarot, it can be a key to unlocking your ability to read faster than ever. It was for me. That’s why I wanted to share how you too can benefit from understanding how the four classical elements work within the Tarot cards.  

 

Why is it so helpful to understand the use of the four elements?

When you first learn to read Tarot, finding context can be a little tricky. You’ve spent so long learning the meanings of the cards, but threading those meanings together to create a narrative is a lot more difficult. How do you know what a card is talking about if it has similar meanings to another? How do you know what the whole theme of the reading is? 

Using frameworks like the elemental energies can help you pinpoint the theme and focus of your readings faster and with more accuracy. It also supports your intuitive interpretations, helping you feel more in the flow of a reading. 

 

The easiest way to start with this framework is by understanding which of the four elements is linked with which of the four Tarot suits. Once you’ve got this down it makes it so much easier to read with confidence. 

Alchemists assigned properties to each of the four elements, properties we also now attribute to the four Tarot suits. This is how we know that the Tarot swords corresponds with the element of air and the Tarot wands corresponds with the element of fire. They share their properties with those classical element properties. 

 

Elemental Air = The Tarot Swords

Element of Air and Tarot Swords

The element of air is often associated with our mental space. It is the element that manages our thoughts, the way we communicate, our ideas and our ability to think and speak clearly. We take those elemental correspondences and we apply them to the cards within the suit of the Tarot swords. 

This means, when we get a sword card, we instantly know that we need to be looking at our mental processes. We know that it’s this area of the self and a situation that is pulling our focus. 

Where the magic really happens is when we integrate other frameworks of reading such as numerology. If you know that the number two refers to duality, then understanding that swords refer to this mental space gives us the interpretation of a duality within the mental space. 

You can even simply add this new knowledge to the keyword meanings you’ve learned from a course or a guidebook. 

For example, if you know that the Ace of Swords marks a new cycle, then by applying the properties of air to this meaning, you get = a new cycle within the mental space. 

Another good way of remembering that swords correspond with the element of air is by remembering that swords cut through the air in order to hit their mark. Swords are often said to cut to the truth of a situation, so if you visualise someone swinging a swords, you can see it cutting through the air between the blade and its target. 

You could even try thinking a bit more literally, such as remembering that when we are struggling to think clearly, it can help to take deep breaths (air) so that we start to calm down and allow our brains space to work things out. 

 

Elemental Fire = The Tarot Wands

The element of fire corresponds with our Tarot wands. Alchemically, fire holds the properties of creation, destruction, power and creativity. These are all things we can easily identify in the energy of the wands. Just think about what wands are used for. In fiction they are used to create things from thin air, change the structure of something or make something disappear completely. In reality, Pagans and Witches will use wands to direct energy and focus such as when casting circles. 

There is a power that comes with wielding fire. If someone is careless with it, it can be a huge source of destruction. If it is properly managed it can help us to create amazing things. Think about how glass is made, precious jewellery or even something as simple as keys to your home. All of these things require the element of fire to be brought into existence. 

Even metaphorically, humans are brought into this world through passion (a fiery feeling) they are literally created through the channeling of this energy. 

The wands are also known as the ‘action’ suit. They encourage taking action through their powerful creative push, through their passionate motivation and desire to get s**t done. Nobody wields a wand and does nothing with it. The act of creation is an act, which is why when we get  a wand card it is either asking us to take action, think about taking action or consider the action we’ve already taken. It’s an indication that there is power to be had, whether that power is ours to take or if this power is lording over us is determined by the number of that wand card. 

Just like the element of fire, wands can be impulsive and unpredictable, which is why too many wands in a reading can spell disaster if left to get out of control. 

 

Elemental Fire and Tarot Wands

Elemental Water = The Tarot Cups

Elemental Water Tarot Cups

To me, the relationship between Tarot cups and the element of water is one of the easiest to remember, so here’s how I do it. First of all, what do you put into cups? Liquids, doesn’t have to be water but I best it will have a base of water even if it’s an ice cold beer. Secondly, I like to imagine being in water and how it feels, drawing parallels with the meanings of the cups, which are based in emotion and intuition. 

Just like being in water, you can feel calm, cleansed, supported and fulfilled by your emotions. However like all elements there is a darker side. Again, just like being in water, your emotions can feel overwhelming, overpowering and leave you gasping for air. Grief is an emotion that sometimes comes up in the cups cards, such as the Five of Cups. Grief is like being in a raging storm in a vast ocean. Sometimes you’ll get moments of levity, but then a wave will come crashing down threatening to pull you under. 

On the lighter side of things (let’s not get too heavy, it’s just a blog post after all!) when your emotions are balanced and you feel happy and calm, you can feel like your cup is filled. You may have even heard of the phrase ‘fill your cup’ in the well-being community. This essentially means ‘take care of yourself, show yourself some love and recharge your batteries’. 

Similarly to the element of air and subsequently the Tarot swords, the cups and their element of water are very passive energies. It’s hard to grab hold of air and water, to control it and bend it to your will. Just like it’s hard to fully grapple with difficult emotions or thoughts or make them disappear when you want them to.  

It can help to think about cups and their element of water in a literal sense. Image the cups being filled and thinking about whether a cup might be emptied by the card it is in. Again the Five of Cups in the Rider-Waite deck is the perfect visual example of this, with three cups visibly empty behind the figure and the other two full and upright behind the figure.   

Elemental Earth = The Tarot Pentacles

Finally we have the element of earth and the last of our Tarot suits, the Pentacles. With this, I like to think of the Pentacles as seeds. We plant them and nurture them to build our physical world, just like how a farmer would plant seeds to grow crops to sell, which then provides financial support and security. 

The element of earth refers to our physical world, it is everything that make up the building blocks of our lives. This can include our physical bodies, our careers, finances, homes and even our relationships with family and friends. All of these things have to be worked on, they have to be planted and taken care of so they can thrive. Just like a seed planted in the earth. 

We tend to see a lot of imagery of plants and fields on the Rider Waite Tarot Pentacles, which directly refers to this connection with elemental earth. 

Like the wands, the pentacles are more of an active energy. They require us to work, to put effort in. When you think about your career for example, you have to work on it over time in order to reap the rewards. It’s not an impulsive or passionate energy like that of the wands though, earth doesn’t burn bright and hot like elemental fire, it takes its time to work. 

Thinking about the four elements in a real world context can also give us a much better idea of the speed of the energies being portrayed in the Tarot. Like I said above, earth is a very slow energy. It takes time to form and grow stronger. Fire on the other hand burns fast, it can destroy in a blink of an eye and needs constant fuel to keep it going for long periods of time. This is just another way understanding elemental energies in Tarot can add depth and meaning to our readings! 

 

Elemental Earth Tarot Pentacles

Master using elements in your own Tarot readings

Elemental Energies in Tarot

Elemental Energies in Tarot Workbook and Guide

If you feel like you’d like to know a little more about using the elemental energies in Tarot, then don’t miss out on the elemental energies workbook and guide. 

This workbook gives you all the information you need to put this theory into practice, plus learn other ways you can identify the four elements in the Tarot cards. 

 

How learning Tarot puts you in touch with your authentic self

Oct 17, 2022 | Learn Tarot

Being able to be your authentic self is something that many people work their entire life to try and achieve. Having that connection with who we are authentically can help us feel fulfilled, aligned with our soul purpose and just generally happier and healthier.

Creating that connection with your authentic self though is not always an easy one. We have something called an adaptive self that often stands in the way. This adaptive self does what is needed in order to fit in and find a place in society. Although this ‘fitting in’ can bring its own wealth of positive emotions, it stops us from aligning who we are with the actions we take. Long term this can lead to feeling stuck, lost or unable to enjoy life to the fullest.

How can you start to connect with your authentic self?

When we’ve been adapting for so long, it’s hard to have the courage and confidence to open up that connection with the authentic self. We have to break down a lot of the protective walls we’ve built up in order to finally allow ourselves to be who we truly are.

To do that work, we need the right tools for the job. This is where Tarot comes in. I’ve tried a lot of different tools to help me do this deep inner work and the best by far is the combination of Tarot readings and journaling.

How does the Tarot put you in touch with your authentic self?

The Tarot is a divination tool that reflects back to you key information about who you are, what you do, what you think and what you feel. Think of a Tarot reading as a large mirror reflecting back to you all the different aspects of yourself, so you can finally see what’s going on under the surface.

Knowing how to use Tarot cards has a way of helping us to step outside of our own patterns and behaviours so we can readjust, realign and find solutions we couldn’t see before. It can allow us to see what it is we want the most, what our authentic self wants and needs.

It’s a bit like your authentic self uses the Tarot cards to talk to you. A bit like how spiritualists will use a Ouija board to speak to spirits or guardians, we can use the Tarot to talk to our most honest versions of ourselves.

Knowing how to use the Tarot is the greatest gift to yourself

I may be biased because I’m obsessed with learning about Tarot, but investing in a course to learn all 78-cards was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.

Since learning to read the Tarot cards I’ve:

  • Built an online business that I can’t wait to work on every morning

  • Helped and connected with like-minded women who want to make the absolute most of the life they’ve been gifted

  • Massively improved my self-care routines and deepened the care I offer myself

  • Learned more about myself than I ever thought possible and can now easily connect with my authentic self

  • Made informed, intentional and confident decisions in all aspects of my life that have led to endless successes

There’s lots of ways you can give this gift to yourself. You could try and do it alone with a Tarot guidebook and regular practice. You could start listening to Tarot podcasts and practicing along with your own deck. Or, if you want to feel supported and gain insights and guidance from a Tarot professional, then take part in an online Tarot course for beginners.

The most important thing is to think about how you learn new skills best. If you’re an auditory learner than listening to podcasts or audiobooks will be best. If you’re a visual learner then seek out courses that include video lessons or online video tutorials. For those that learn best by getting hands on, buy yourself a deck and get stuck in with practical Tarot readings and learning tasks.

In my Tarot For Beginners course I try and cater to all learning types, with video lessons and presentations for audio and visual learners and plenty of practice tasks and quizzes for those that like to take a more practical approach.

Take a look at the course and see if you feel called to gift yourself the knowledge of Tarot.

Guide: How To Discover Your Soul Purpose in Life

Oct 10, 2022 | Journaling, Soul Purpose

You’ve been brought to this guide because you are ready to find your soul purpose in life. You want to do things that fill you with joy and make you feel like completely aligned with your highest self.

Some people are born with their soul purpose built in. They know from an early age that they want to be XYZ. The rest of us though have to figure it out ourselves. We have to test out different hats throughout our life to see what feels the best. A lot of us struggle to do it alone though.

Discovering your soul purpose in life is not easy. It can take time, inner work and a lot of overcoming long-standing beliefs. It’s like mining for precious metals, you have to chip away at a lot of solid rock to be able to find the value nestled deep within it.

In this guide, I’ll take you through all the questions you need to discover how to find your soul purpose. There will be practical tasks and a downloadable workbook so you can continue this work in your own time.

Make time to work through this guide. Really commit to doing the work to find your soul purpose in life and I promise you’ll leave feeling certain about how to move forward.

Download the FREE 31-page workbook to follow along with me ⬇️

What brings you joy?

Your soul purpose will be something that lights you up. That ignites a passion and fire within you like nothing else. That’s why the first step is to figure out what things bring you joy. This can help you see what you’re already intuitively drawn to. Your soul purpose in life will be burrowed into those things.

Journal prompts to understand what brings you joy

  • Write down five times when you’ve felt truly happy. The type of happiness where you’ve lost track of time and are completely in the moment. Where you’re not thinking about the past, present or future, you’re just going with the flow and allowing the moment to carry you with it.

  • Looking at those five things, break them down and highlight what activities you were doing. Are there any patterns between all five? Were you doing the same activity every time? Is there a theme you can spot between them?

With these journal prompts, you’re mining your best memories to see if there’s any clue as to what your soul purpose could be. Here’s an example of how that final prompt could work:

  1. Kayaking with friends in the Lake District

  2. Hiking up in the Pennines

  3. Sitting in the garden reading in the sunshine

  4. Going to a festival for 4 whole days

  5. Going on a Yoga retreat in the countryside

From those five happy memories I can glean the following themes:

  • Nature and being immersed in nature

  • Socialising with friends and new people

  • Moving the body in different ways

  • Travel maybe even specifically adventure travel

  • Mindfulness and moving meditation

You can see that from those five simple happy memories I’ve already managed to start building a list of potential threads to follow. Maybe I could start looking into holistic therapies that work with nature. Things like forest bathing or nature retreats. Maybe I could get my yoga teacher certification so I could start running my own yoga retreats at home or even abroad.

This brings us to our next task. Idea mapping. You can do this in the form of a list, or if you like to be more creative, try an idea tree like the one illustrated below.

I’ve used the example list from earlier but you can fill these with your own (there’s a blank template in the free download). At this stage, we’re just getting all our ideas and thoughts down on paper. You can let yourself be guided by those themes towards job titles or general activities that come to mind when you think of those things.

It’s like a big brain dump, getting all our ideas out in the open so we can start to sift through them and narrow things down later on.

What sparks interest?

In that last task, we assessed the things we already have experience in, but what if our soul purpose in life is tied to something we haven’t yet tried? How do you know what you don’t know? Where do we look if we don’t know what direction we’re supposed to be looking in?

The next step is to look at your interests. Before we were working from your heart chakra, connecting with our emotional responses. Now, we’re looking at our intellectual realm.

Write a list of all the things you know you’re already interested in. Think about the books you read, what you find yourself Googling, what makes you sit up and listen when someone mentions it or if there’s a program to do with it on TV. Make sure to write down why you’re interested in those things as well, this can tell us a lot about our inner workings.

For me, this list would look a little something like this:

  • Witchcraft & the history of witchcraft – because I practice witchcraft and I’m fascinated by the history of witch trials, especially in the UK

  • British history – because we have thousands of years of it, from the Jurrasic period to the Tudors, civil wars to the pagans, there’s so much to dive into

  • Tarot (obviously!) – because I am a Tarot reader and there are so many different layers and perspectives to take on it

  • Historical fiction – because I find it gives you a more focused look at life during historical periods and I have a passion for history so this ticks all my boxes

  • Psychology & Philosophy – because I want to know how the brain works, why we do what we do, think the way we do, how experiences affect our reality, asking questions about the bigger things in life

  • Metaphysics – because it’s a branch of philosophy that studies the nature of reality and encompasses things like divination, energy and all things spiritual, all things that I work with on a day-to-day basis

Now you have a list of what sparks your interest and you know why it sparks interest. You can use this information to once again do that brainstorming exercise. This time use that list of interest in place of the themes used previously. What jobs come to mind, and what hobbies and activities spring up? Write it all down, either in list form or using the idea tree template.

Something that I notice when I do this is that my brain will bring up things I know I wouldn’t like. For example, when I think of Psychology I think of a Psychology professor. I know I wouldn’t like that because I wouldn’t like to be in an academic environment. However, write it down anyway. There could be something in that thought. There might be another way of looking at it that feels more aligned. Remember that right now it’s more about getting all these ideas and thoughts down on paper.

What are your core values?

The key to discovering your soul purpose is values. Your core values will be directly linked to your soul purpose, making up a considerable portion of the ‘why’ behind what you’re trying to uncover.

When we talk about core values we are talking about what you stand for. What are your beliefs, how do you live your life?

Here are a few examples of core values to give you a better idea of the kinds of things we’re looking at:

  • Honesty

  • Diversity

  • Fairness

  • Innovation

  • Transparency

  • Consistency

  • Reliability

Your core values are the cement that holds your soul purpose together. It brings the intention to the table so you know why you want to do what you’re doing. They also help to give your purpose structure.

This next task is inspired by the Tarot, specifically the four suits and their elemental energies. You’re going to split your core values into four different categories. You’ll have:

  • Emotional Realm – Cups/Water

  • Material World – Pentacles/Earth

  • Behaviours – Wands/Fire

  • Ethics – Swords/Air

Below I show you an example of how this will look and I’ll give you some value examples for each, but I want you to fill these sections with your own ideas. Again, there is room to do this work in the free workbook. You don’t have to come up with hundreds, just three for each section will be enough.

Tip: It can sometimes help to finish the sentence ‘I am…’ to get a better idea of your values.

Emotional

  • Compassionate

  • Empathetic

  • Kind

Material

  • Loyal

  • Honest

  • Balanced

Behavioural

  • Adventurous

  • Fearless

  • Independent

Ethical

  • Charitable

  • Open-minded

  • Tolerant

Now you’ve got your lists of values, start to prioritise them. Which value do you focus on upholding the most in everything you do? You should have no more than 12, so start numbering them 1-12 with 1 being the value you hold highest and 12 being the value you have but don’t actively implement.

What are your strengths?

Now you know what your most important values are, you know what brings you joy and sparks interest. Now it’s time to think practically. What are your strengths?

When we talk about strengths we are looking both at the inner and external world. I bet there are strengths you have that you didn’t even recognise. Often we downplay our strengths so we don’t seem egotistical or big-headed. We don’t want to admit to ourselves that we’re really good at something because it opens us up to criticism, so it becomes safer to keep them under wraps.

We’re going to play them all out now though because they deserve to be seen. You deserve to be proud of them and shout about them to the world. Focusing on your strengths can help you to see where you already have a leg up.

We’re going to be looking at the following areas of our lives:

  • Self-development

  • Physical health

  • Social

  • Relationships

  • Hobbies

  • Spirituality

  • Work

  • Finances

This time though, we’re going to use something called a Wheel of Life template. Usually, this is used to see which areas of your life need focus, but I’ve adapted it to help you see which areas of your life house your biggest strengths.

You’ll think about how confident you feel within these 8 sections and fill in the wheel sections. Choose how confident you feel by filling in sections 1-10 with 1 being ‘not at all confident and 10 being ‘extremely confident.

Click the image below to print out and fill it in, or refer to your free workbook where you’ll find the template for you to use. It helps to use different colours for each of the 8 sections, so you can see the difference more clearly.

Take a look at which of these 8 sections has the most sections filled in. I’ve done it for myself below so you can see how it should look.

My results look like this:

  • Self-development – 9 – I do it as a job and I work on it pretty much every single day

  • Physical health – 6 – the pandemic made me very inactive but I still have some semblance of physical fitness

  • Social – 5 – I rarely leave the house and socialise rarely

  • Relationships – 7 – even though I’m not social, I have strong core relationships

  • Hobbies – 8– I have a lot of them and I’m averagely talented at most creative things, but very much so with photography and painting

  • Spirituality – 8 – I used to be a lot more spiritual but I feel like this could be stronger

  • Work – 7 – I work a lot, but maybe too much, I’ve very work focused

  • Finances – 6 – I have a lot of limiting beliefs around money so it’s not my strongest area

Looking at my wheel of life, I can determine that my main strengths lie in:

  1. Self-development

  2. Hobbies

  3. Spirituality

Once you’ve got your top three you can start to break this down further. Look into what exactly it is within those sectors that you feel most confident with. So for example, I would pick out things like limiting belief clearing in self-development because I’ve done A LOT of it and help others do it.

For hobbies, I can pick out creativity as a strength, as well as camera skills, painting skills and idea generation.

Make your top three headings and underneath each, write down where specifically your strengths are found in those areas.

What are your weaknesses?

We can use that same wheel of life to also pick out our weaknesses. We already know which areas of our life house the most strengths, but which house our weaknesses?

Again looking at my wheel of life, I can see that my top three areas of weakness are:

  1. Social

  2. Physical health

  3. Finances

Again, when you have these three areas nailed down, list under each where your weaknesses specifically lie. I would say that having the motivation to attend social gatherings was a weakness of mine for social. Or my cardio fitness would be a weakness within my physical health because I prefer to work on strength training.

Knowing where your weaknesses are not only helps you see things you aren’t as drawn to (you won’t catch me being a spinning instructor anytime soon) but it can also show you where you might need external help or support, should you be faced with these things on your journey towards your soul purpose.

If we refer back to those idea maps we did at the very beginning of this guide, we can review what we wrote down, look at our strengths and weaknesses and start to get a better feel of how we could practically take action on those ideas.

Example:

I said that landscape photography could be a way to be in nature more. Applying this to my interests I could evolve this idea into a historical landscape photographer, someone who travels around the UK taking photographs for English Heritage or even blogging about the country’s most fascinating historical landscapes and ruins.

Then I look at my strengths and weaknesses. Well, I have great creative skills so the photography part will be easy. I could tie this in with my strengths around spirituality by niching this down even further by focusing on historical landscapes and places that have a spiritual connection. Places like stone circles, old churches and cathedrals etc.

Looking at my weaknesses I might have to get a loan to help with buying camera equipment good enough to travel with. If these places are in remote locations I might have to work on my physical fitness in order to be able to reach them.

We’ll work on bringing everything together in a second, but this is just an example of how we can start to weave the thread between all the work we’ve already done.

What are your biggest obstacles when it comes to doing what you love?

We’ve already started to reveal the practical obstacles we might face by looking at our weaknesses, but there may be mental barriers as well. These limiting beliefs can make or break our ability to not only discover that soul’s purpose but also act on it.

We need to know what limiting beliefs we currently hold, the walls that separate us from what we need in order to feel fully aligned. Here is some journal prompts to help you do just that:

Journal prompts to uncover limiting beliefs

  • Visualise yourself living one of those ideas that you uncovered in the previous tasks. What fears come up for you? What thoughts come in to stop you and make you think? What is that inner voice saying?

  • Reflecting on past experiences, how have you self-sabotaged? What habits do you have that have caused conflict between you and your goals?

  • When you think about completely flipping your life upside down, what thoughts and feelings come up? Do any thoughts start with the phrase ‘I can’t do that because…’? and if so, finish those thoughts and write them down.

Tackling limiting beliefs is extremely important because when you’ve discovered your soul purpose, you don’t want anything standing in your way. Especially not yourself!

Take a look at all the limiting beliefs those journal prompts brought up for you. Write them all down into a list so they are clearly laid out. If it helps, fill in the sentence ‘I can’t do X because…’

Once you have that list, start to counter those sentences with more affirming ones. Write down a positive response to them.

So, if you had a sentence such as:

  • I can’t be a historic landscape photographer because I don’t have time to build a portfolio in order to get paid work

Your counter sentence would be something like this:

  • I can be a historic landscape photographer because I can schedule time into my calendar to go on days out to historic landmarks to take photographs. I can start building a portfolio quickly and easily right from my phone, uploading my images to Instagram and tagging potential clients.

Your limiting belief created a problem. Your counter sentence solved that problem and now your limiting belief has nothing to support it. If another limiting belief arises off the back of your counter sentence, just repeat the exercise. Do it as many times as you need. Think of it as a debate with yourself. One where you refuse to let the negative opposition win the argument.

How to bring all your findings together to outline your soul purpose

We’ve done a lot of work there. There’s a lot of stuff out on the table that we now need to pick through and sort into something more tangible. It’s like doing a big bedroom deep clean. You have to make a huge mess so you can see what to keep and what to get rid of.

To make things easier, here are steps to take to bring all your findings together.

Step 1: Link what brings you joy and your interests

Spend some time looking at everything you wrote down in the first two exercises. What connections could you make between the two groups of answers? Referring back to the example idea trees, I could link my joy of yoga to my interest in reiki. Or, connect my idea of being a shop owner and my interest in antiques.

Start to build a list of these connections so you can dive into them more in the next few steps.

Step 2: Which of your ideas aligns with your values?

Start assigning your values to those ideas you’ve come up with. Using those previous examples, I might assign my values of compassion, balance and fearlessness to my idea of combining yoga and reiki. Or for my second idea of joining my idea of shop ownership and antiques I might apply my values of honesty, charity and independence.

These ideas then become even more fleshed out, supported by our core values, leading them to look like this:

  • Idea 1 – Becoming a yoga instructor that combines yoga and reiki healing, to help people feel more balanced, connect with their deepest selves and clear out negativity. Values applied: Balance, spirituality and self-development

  • Idea 2 – Opening up an independent antique shop that buys antiques from people in the community and uses a portion of the profits to support a local charity. Values applied: Charitable, honest and independent

See how adding those values to your ideas gives them more heart? You can start to feel more connected with them, try them on and see which feels like the best fit. Having ideas supported by your values makes them so much stronger than just the ideas on their own.

Step 3: How do your strengths and weaknesses come into play?

Review those strengths and weaknesses lists and start to identify them in your ideas.

For example:

  • Idea 1 – My strengths would come into play around self-development, helping people to leave a session feeling like they have evolved in some way. To feel more connected, to offer people a more creative way to connect with themselves. My weaknesses might come in because I might not yet have the stamina to run a whole session of yoga, or I might not be able to price the sessions correctly because of my limiting beliefs around money.

  • Idea 2 – My strengths would come into play regarding creativity, being creative with window displays, and the layout of the shop. Connect with the people who bring the antiques and the meaning behind the pieces, so I can market them effectively. My weaknesses may pop up around finances, renting shop space and managing inventory and customer service/ dealing with the public.

It will be up to you to decide whether your strengths outweigh your weaknesses. Looking at the two ideas above, I can already see that my weaknesses wouldn’t be as big of an obstacle in idea 1 as those outlined in idea 2. Just reading those paragraphs I already feel pulled more towards idea 1 than 2.

This is the point where you start to narrow down those ideas further. You start to feel which ones are on the right track and which ones aren’t. Which ones feel easy and which ones already feel like a hassle.

Step 4: Tackling the limiting beliefs around your ideas

Once you’ve got that condensed list of fleshed-out ideas of what you want to pursue in life, it’s time to tackle the limiting beliefs that come up around those things.

Work on each idea at a time and write down all the limiting beliefs that come up when you think about bringing them to life. What evidence is your mind giving you around why you have those limiting beliefs? What evidence can you find to counteract those beliefs?

Use the techniques we learned before to start breaking down these limiting beliefs.

Once you’ve completed all these four steps, you’ll have an amazing list of potential soul purposes that you can start to follow up on. Like I said at the very beginning of this guide, our soul purpose in life is not something we can figure out overnight. Come back to all the ideas you’ve come up with at another time and see how they feel. Which ones do you still feel excited about and which ones have lost their spark?

Remember that if you set out on one path and it starts to feel wrong, it’s never too late to choose another path. You haven’t failed, you’ve experimented and your findings were that it wasn’t the right fit for you at that time. Now you know and what you’ve learned from this experience can inform your decisions in the future, to help give you a better outcome.

If you’ve worked through this guide with me, well done you on reaching the end! If you feel like you didn’t quite hit the nail on the head, why not explore my Soul Tarot Coaching? A one-off coaching session that combines the wisdom of the Tarot and Spiritual/Soul Purpose coaching techniques to help you find ultimate clarity.

10 Things Fuelling your Limiting Beliefs Around Money

Oct 5, 2022 | Limiting Beliefs

Money makes the world go round. That’s a fact and there’s not much we can do about it. Limiting beliefs around money can cause stress, stop you from taking risks or leaping towards your biggest and most exciting goals.

There might be something you would absolutely love to experience in your life, but money stops you in your tracks. Even those with bank accounts filled to the brim will not have enough to do something. For the rest of us though these limiting beliefs can be the thing that stands in the way of us creating that awesome dream business, stops us from taking that once in a lifetime trip or even being able to take time off work to rest.

If you find your money limiting beliefs are making you miserable, like mine were this time last month, then here are 10 things that might be fuelling those beliefs and how you can start to overcome them to live a happier and healthier life.

1) I’m not someone who is meant to have money

Says who? A lot of the time people who have this belief come from backgrounds where their parents struggled with money. Or their family members have a history with debt that has been carried through generations.

When it comes to this belief, ask yourself:

  • Why you feel you aren’t supposed to have money

  • What was your parents and grand parents relationship with money? Did they have some and lose it? Were they always in debt?

  • Have you adopted a belief that you’re not meant to have money because you’ve grown up with a lack your whole life? Think about the comments you heard around money growing up.

2) I’m not deserving of more money

Everyone is deserving of money, but we can often feel guilty about wanting more and more of it. You might tell yourself that you only want what you need to live, but is living hand to mouth really the way you want to live your whole life? Probably not.

When it comes to breaking this belief down, ask yourself:

  • What makes me underserving of money? What proof do I have that this is true?

  • Have you ever been in a position where you had an abundance of money but lost it or didn’t manage it wisely?

  • How could that have influenced this belief? Are you still using this as evidence as to why you don’t deserve money?

3) I don’t know how to handle a lot of money so it’s best to stay small

This is something I used to tell myself all the time and I had no evidence to back it up. It didn’t stop the belief from taking hold though. This is something else that can be passed down from generation to generation. We usually learn how to manage money based on our parents example. Or in some cases the example of our older siblings.

When you find yourself thinking that you don’t know how to manage money, ask yourself:

  • When I have I managed money well? How did I do it and how did it feel?

  • Am I making someone else’s experiences with money my own? Are these beliefs the beliefs of those around me rather than my own?

  • What are the pros and cons of stopping yourself from being able to make larger sums of money? Do the cons really outweigh the pros?

4) People won’t pay X amount for my services/products

This is one for the business owners and aspiring soulpreneurs. When you’re trying to build your dream business or side hustle this is one of the biggest limiting beliefs around money. It can stop you from pricing your services and products correctly and downplay your worth.

If you’re an entrepreneur, then ask yourself these questions to figure out how to overcome this major business block:

  • Taking away money, what value does my product or service offer my dream clients/customers?

  • Who is doing what I want to be doing? How many people follow them? How successful do they appear to be?

  • How much are other people charging for what I am offering? Am I under, over or matching those prices?

5) Money is bad and leads to greed and selfishness

There are many stories we’re exposed to that have money as the enemy, the route of all evil. We associate money with greed more than anything else, it’s a trope that we see in media and stories everywhere. Think about the story of King Midas and his golden touch, or all the villains in movies that have done terrible things for fortunes. This stays with us, a subliminal message telling us that if we’re rich, we must have done bad things to get there. Not true.

When you feel guilty about having more money than you need or you’re afraid to ask for more money at work, or accept loans or winnings, then ask yourself these questions:

  • How has money benefited me or brought positivity to my life or the lives of those around me?

  • What are all the ways money is used in a good way? Think charity, life experiences, gifting.

  • Thinking about all the things I would do if I had more money, what positives would those things bring me? What is my core reasoning behind wanting to attract more money into my life?

6) Money is limited so I should save as much as possible

There’s such a thing as being too careful with money. It’s called frugality. We hold on so tightly to what we have already that we block any more money flowing to us in the future. This is not to say we shouldn’t save for emergencies or a rainy day, but saving more than you really need to can leave you with nothing for the present.

You’re not a dragon hoarding gold, you are a human being that has to move through a life. Don’t make it unbearable for yourself if you have the option to live a life filled with adventure and joy.

When you start to tell yourself that money is limited and you need to hold on tighter to what you have, ask yourself these questions:

  • When is my next pay check coming in and when does the next one after that and the one after that? Visualise that money flowing in and out of your account like waves on a shoreline.

  • How much do I need to budget to live and pay bills and how much will be left over? Is that amount worth saving or could I find a way to treat myself right now?

  • What examples can I find where my money has been replenished when it was at its lowest?

7) I can’t be trusted with money because I shop too much

Poor money management is definitely something that many struggle with and those with a shopping addiction can face some serious consequences. However, it’s treatable. If you do shop too much, then you can look at your reasoning – does it give you a dopamine hit? Take your mind off real life? – and work to readjust that habit.

If this is a limiting belief around money that plagues you, ask yourself these questions:

  • When have I had an abundance of money and not bought anything?

  • How do I budget each month? Could I budget better? Create more structure in my finances? Could I learn more about money management to help me?

  • When have I shown that I can be responsible with money?

8) I can’t do what I love and be able to make a living

Where are my creative business owners because this one is for you. If you’re a Millenial or Gen X then you will probably have the belief that work is supposed to be hard. If you’re not doing whatever it takes to earn money then you’re not working hard enough. If you do something that you love and is tied to your passion, it’s a hobby not a job.

When I first started working for myself and working from home, I often had comments along the lines of ‘taking a break are we?’ whenever I went to get a coffee. Or, heaven forbid I finished work before 5pm because then I was ‘slacking’. This idea that work has to fit into a certain mould to be valid is a very outdated belief. One that Gen Z are very good at shattering.

So, whenever you’re thinking of that dream life and dream business, but are struck by this limiting belief ask yourself:

  • Who are my idols? The people already doing my dream job successfully.

  • How many people can I find that do what I want to do as a job? (Maybe you could even reach out to them and ask them about their own experiences)

  • How could I start to create a structure in my life that would help me support this dream career? Could I go part-time while I build the business? Could I start carving out intentional time to spend on my business throughout the week?

9) Money doesn’t buy happiness so why would I work harder to gain more of it?

This one is closely tied to that limiting belief around money somehow being bad. The phrase ‘money doesn’t buy happiness’ is one we’ve heard thousands of times and now it’s seeped into our deepest subconscious. Originally this phrase was ‘money buys everything, except morality and citizens’ which is a lot more true than this very generalised phrase.

Money can’t make you happy on its own that’s for sure. When you don’t use it, money is just lumps of metal and paper or numbers floating about in the stratosphere. It’s what money offers you, what you can trade it for that can bring joy.

When thinking about how money can’t buy happiness, ask yourself:

  • If I take the material aspect out of it, what could money actually offer me?

  • What does money represent to me? What values can it help me to uphold?

  • What things give me joy and would I still have access to them without money?

10) I don’t have any control over how much money I make

Of course there will be people who do not have the privilege of having options when it comes to work, but I’m assuming that you are not one of these people. If you are then that’s another challenge for another time.

Whether you’re working a 9-5, freelance or have your own business you will have some control over how much you make. If you have a salary then why not ask for a promotion or pay rise? Prove your worth with data and stats if you have to but have the courage to put yourself out there and ask.

If you’re freelance or own your own business, look at ways you could make adjustments to cut costs or increase prices.

If this is a limiting belief that is stopping you from reaching the financial potential you want to achieve, then ask yourself these questions:

  • Are the money obstacles I’m currently facing created by external energies or internal ones?

  • Do I believe I am worth more money than I am currently attracting? If not why? If yes, why?

  • How much power do I really have over how much money I make? What are all of my options?

Limiting beliefs around money can be something that keeps you completely stuck and never evolving or moving forwards. To help you overcome them, why not explore my Soul Tarot Coaching sessions? Let’s work together to overcome these beliefs so you can finally start achieving your biggest goals.

Need a bit of help smashing those limiting beliefs?

Take a look at my online workshop Tarot for Limiting Beliefs and use the cards to start identifying the root cause of your beliefs are and create a plan to overcome them in no time at all.