I forget to blog. Why would I blog when I technically vlog every other week during my livestreams?
It is difficult to keep up with everything that I am doing. My book, which will be published on 11/22/22, is out (talk about divine timing!). My podcasts are plural: Cardslingers Coast to Coast, and Tarot by Hilary.
I am also participating in National Novel Writing Month. This usually leaves me isolated, weird, and alone. If you could write 50,000 words per month, I’d be proud.
But I digress. Last week was a great episode of livestreaming. I wanted to share it with you.

Why Tarot?
It is very easy. Tarot is a tool that helps people. That’s why.
The tarot was initially for my personal use. The tarot helped me to map out my goals and plan how I would achieve them. Tarot helped me to stay on track, keep focused, and accomplish exactly what I wanted. It helped me through times of loss, grief, and confusion. The tarot helped me to relieve my pain when words and advice from well-meaning people didn’t work. Tarot for me has always been about self empowerment.
Friends would then visit my house from time to time. If I wasn’t careful, my crystals or cards would be lying around. Naturally they would ask about them. I would explain to them that I studied tarot. They might ask me a few questions about tarot and I would answer. Some of my friends would remember me later on, for reasons that were not known to me. I would offer to read the tarot for their benefit, which they would do. This was the moment I realized how therapeutic and powerful the tarot could prove to be.
Over the centuries, great leaders have turned to oracles for guidance, particularly in difficult times. Although tarot may be able to serve as an oracle in a certain way, it is not the real thing. This is a simplified explanation of its function. The truth is that tarot acts as a mirror. It shows you who you really are. It reveals your strengths and weaknesses. It forces you to confront your past decisions, your attitude (both good and bad), and how they have affected your life. Each time, the right archetypes are chosen to help you see what needs to be done to move forward. It is amazing how the tarot works. I don’t know why, but it works. It will tell you what you need to know to continue your journey (though it rarely tells you what you want to be told; such is the nature of life).
Tarot can be used to help you make decisions. I’m one of those people who makes to-do lists and action items. And who is organized in a neurotically structured way when it comes charting from Point A to Point B. Tarot has been an amazing addition to my neuroses. Therefore, I use tarot.

My Approach To Tarot
People who know me as a corporate lawyer learn about my tarot practice and ask me how I got into it. Is it possible for someone who bases all her analyses on cold logic and provable facts to be misled by divination frou frou, like tarot? No. Tarot is a psychological tool. It allows us to tap into our subconscious. We use symbols and universal archetypes to tap into our subconscious, unlocking the parts of our mind that have the answers.
Yes, tarot would have turned me off… if there weren’t such an unexplainable synchronicity… if the game was consistent with my knowledge of probability… If those I’ve read it for didn’t go, “whoa! What just happened there… How did you know that …”?” I don’t expect you to believe me. You are invited to experience tarot for yourself. You will be amazed at the synchronicities you experience and it will confirm everything I have said.
My friend said it so well, I want to quote her: “Regardless of whether or not it is predictive, tarot has tremendous explanatory power, if your are open to it.” It doesn’t matter if it “corresponds” to reality if you believe we create our reality, or story, to some degree. A tarot reading will give you a story through the which you can see the world.
Tarot Scholarship
My most important motivation to write about tarot is to promote tarot scholarship. Tarot is rich in culture and history. It is also a science of mind. Tarot readers are not psychics, fortune-tellers, or clairvoyants. You or I could be the tarot reader. However, they or she are someone who has spent time studying tarot and practiced tarot and is available to help you understand the tarot cards. The tarot readers are at their most effective when they act as a conduit. At the most, however, the tarot readers is an erudite. Someone who has spent time in a field to understand it and then applied that knowledge to solve others’ problems using an analysis that includes archetypal imagery.

It is very important for me to educate people about tarot. It is dangerous to be ignorant of it and creates fear. This is the view most people have before they even take the time to learn about tarot. It is my mission to educate people so they can adopt informedjudgments.