History

A Brief History of Tarot & Magick

The decks I primarily use are The Universal Waite illustrated by Pamela Coleman Smith, the Modern Witch Tarot by Lisa Sterle, and the Journey to Enlightenment Tarot by Daniela Manitus Forster, with additional insight from the Sovereign Oracle by Theresa Pridemore (full disclosure, she is also my web designer).

Every deck  since 1910 — consciously or unconsciously — has been created on the shoulders of Pamela Coleman Smith’s original illustrations, first published in 1909. She and Arthur Waite — whom she knew from the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn and purportedly bonded over both being American ex-pats in London — spent hours at the British Museum looking at the Sola Busca Tarot, donated in 1907 by the Busca-Serbelloni family.

For further reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sola_Busca_tarot, and Pamela Coleman Smith, the Untold Story https://bookshop.org/a/82791/9781572819122

My Relationship with the History of Tarot

In a world of irony, I am an only child with a deep love of legacy and lineage. Before reading Mary K. Greer’s Women of the Golden Dawn: Rebels and Priestesses, I never thought of myself as being part of a legacy; I thought I was the completion of one.  I acutely feel being the end of my family tree’s branch and I want my life’s work to inspire lots of future leaves and seeds. Yet, this book taught me, I am also a part of a single, childless, female legacy. 

I join Annie Horniman, Florence Farr, and Pamela Coleman Smith on the path of unwed, childless Magicians rooted in theatre and magick. How Annie Horniman and the artists who were also a part of the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn changed the face of theatre as we know it is a rabbit hole I’d love to go down with you over coffee one day. 

Know Your Foundations

I was raised in a NYC suburb with a garden by a southern mother  — parts of her family tree can be traced back to some of the first US colonizers and British royalty — and a second generation Polish father from Wallington, NJ — a.k.a. Little Poland. 

Both sets of his great grandparents immigrated for reasons that were hidden from me. My dad’s father chose to change his name in high school. It went from Chmura, to HMura, to Mura. No one knows why. I can make a lot of guesses — Chmura means “cloud” in Polish and is a common Polish Jewish name. Even though we were fighting Nazi’s during WW2, there was still a lot of anti-semitism in the US… but correlation is not causation.

Why do I bring this up? Because we bring all of ourselves to work, whether it’s noticed or not. I feel it’s important for you to have a sense of the lens I will be reading the cards through, or at least some access to it. It’s also important to remember the rich individual legacy residing in each of your coworkers.

There are thousands of readers out there. I am the only one offering group readings like this.

Your Company’s Foundations

As I said, we bring all of ourselves to work, whether it’s noticed or not.

That’s true for me, that’s true for the land(s) your company resides on, and it’s true for everyone you share an office or workspace with. Knowing more about each other - plus having shared experiences to talk about - leads to bonding and empathy.

Unfortunately, for some, it can also lead to exploitation and manipulation.

Knowing  you and your company’s foundations, both lived experiences and literal foundations, help coalesce shared values, which can exclude and actively discourage exploitation and manipulation.

Other questions that consciously and unconsciously affect Group Tarot are,  what is the history of the land your building resides on? What is the company’s origin story? And what are the workers’ lived experiences outside work?