Hello beautiful people!
I'm writing today to thank you all for supporting my journey as the Tarot Astrologer for an entire year! My heart is overflowing with love and gratitude for you, for me, for Spirit and the Universe for allowing us to embark on this incredibly Divine adventure together. Today, on The Tarot Astrologer’s first birthday, I’d like to reflect on this past year with honesty and transparency, and share all I have planned for the year ahead!
How The Tarot Astrologer Came to Be
At the tail end of 2019, I was undergoing my first spiritual awakening, developing my clairaudience, experimenting with herbal and cannabis medicine, creating a personalized astrology guidebook, studying the art of tarot everyday, and bursting to share my newfound knowledge with anyone who was interested. My close friends on IG and Snapchat watched lovingly and patiently as my daily stories were filled with tarot decks, oracle cards, shiny crystals, and astro memes. Ultimately, I needed a new creative space, solely dedicated to sharing my spiritual journey with those on a similar path. I spent several weeks brainstorming a name that would encapsulate my existing and evolving love of astrology, with my new and blossoming love of the tarot. Then, on March 3rd, 2020 at 2:14PM, “The Tarot Astrologer” was born!
What you may not have known is that during this new and exciting chapter, I was simultaneously enduring a loveless karmic relationship, tolerating being overworked and underpaid at my non-profit day job, while silently suffering from anxiety and mild depression.
The Trauma of 2020
Then, the COVID-19 pandemic hit, the world went into lockdown within weeks, and everything changed. Millions were suddenly out of work, fearful of how they would survive. Government officials were exposed for their disgusting under-preparedness for a public health crisis. State-sanctioned violence was enacted on the Black community and our allies for an entire summer, all before witnessing the hellfire and aftermath that was the presidential campaign and election. In 2020, it became painfully clear just how little my existence mattered to the society I was indoctrinated into and expected to contribute to. To cope, I shut myself off from those who loved and cared for me, spent most of my free time doom scrolling, bringing further stress upon myself, and even began abusing the sacred herb.
One summer night, after an especially difficult anxious episode and during a meditation to calm myself down, Archangel Raphael came to me and said “It’s time to stop running from yourself. Rest. Reflect. Recover.”
My Spirituality Saved My Life
From that moment on, enhancing and deepening my connection to Self and the Divine became my number one priority. For me, this meant developing daily mindfulness practices, unpacking my traumas with shadow work, and opening a running dialogue with my subconscious. It meant cutting out any people, places, things, and ideals that no longer served my highest good. It meant developing a healthier relationship with plant medicine, and using it with careful intention and purpose. It meant learning to trust myself and to trust that Divine was always taking care of me. I reflected on the covert messaging I received as a young girl about my self-worth and inherent value, and how that harmful rhetoric was unknowingly at the root of most of my adult thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.
I say all of this to say that despite the hard and ugly truths that Spirit needed me to face, The Tarot Astrologer became (and continues to be) my saving grace. This platform has inspired me to live in truth and to move with authentic love. It has provided me with an outlet for endless creativity that I can always rely on when times are tough. In just one year, I’ve started the Your Sign in Tarot series, hosted giveaways, created original tarot spreads, opened up for personal readings, discovered my clairvoyant and clairsentient abilities, launched a YouTube channel, cultivated my first professional website, and performed nearly 100 tarot readings!
I’ve made friends from all around the world, connected with BIPOC healers and spiritualists of all kinds, and learned profound and life-changing lessons about myself and the world around me. I started wearing my natural hair in public for the first time. I began attending individual and group therapy. I finally accepted and embraced my identity as a bisexual Black woman. I became a plant mom to a beautiful Monstera Deliciosa named Venus. I advocated for the pay I deserved and received it. I ended my karmic relationship, and got my first booking for a paid personal reading seconds after. Talk about Divine timing!
Trials and Tribulations
Though this journey has been nothing short of miraculous, I'd be lying if I said I haven't been faced with challenges along the way. Since launching the YouTube channel last fall, I’d noticed myself becoming overly consumed with growth and monetization. I did not start The Tarot Astrologer with the intention of becoming a business, but as time went on and I met more spiritualists doing similar work, a growing sense of competition, the desperation to stay relevant, and the mounting pressure to be like everyone else became pervasive. Long story short, LLC Twitter really got in my head! Of course, I'd love nothing more than to make my living as a full-time tarot reader, but my heart was never, has never, and will never be in this just for the money.
The overwhelm I experienced was no-one's fault, but I felt imposter syndrome and my avoidant tendency to run, quit, and hide starting to rear their ugly heads. While on my healing journey, I have learned to challenge that behavior, and to instead listen in to what this emotion is trying to tell me. I am far too passionate and enamored with this work to abandon it completely, but this feeling is telling me that it’s time to make changes in what I can realistically offer to my community without sacrificing my wellness.
Looking Forward
At this time, I am feeling inclined to shift my focus from performing tarot readings, to instead, continuing my study of tarot and astrology! Thinking back to when I first discovered tarot, I didn’t fall in love with reading it. I fell in love with learning it. Learning the meanings of the Major Arcana, the suits in the Minor Arcana, the Court cards, the astrological connections, the numerology, the history, the symbolism in each deck’s imagery, the intuitive links I could make between several cards, and so much more. I consider myself a student of life, and I feel that this vital element of learning and teaching tarot and astrology has been absent in my presence here. My creative bank is filled with ideas of how I will share my knowledge in the future, and all will be revealed in Divine right timing.
Essentially, I want you to know that my content moving forward will not solely be focused on reading tarot cards and channeling messages from Spirit. I am working on creating a balance that is feasible for me, and will be enlightening and entertaining for you :)
With that said, I will remain available for personal readings on thetarotastrologer.com, and will continue doing Full Moon readings and monthly readings for the Elements on the YouTube channel. A subscription tier service/Patreon page is also in the works, and will be coming sooner than you think!
Thank You For Being Here!
Alright. This was a long one, y’all. If you've made it to the end of this post, I cannot thank you enough for taking the time to listen today. Your ongoing support means more to me than I could ever express in words. I'm so so excited for all that is to come in 2021 and beyond!
With love and appreciation,
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