I Never Stop Learning

I'll never forget when we met...

We were introduced by a mutual friend who's Mom happened to have a lovely deck that looked barely touched. I was told that this "magical" deck of cards was only brought out for parties and special occasions. Much like the good dishes in the china cabinet, these cards seemed to spend most of their time on a shelf.

That summer, my friend and I spent countless hours shuffling, dealing, gazing at, memorizing and even playing "go fish" with that deck of colorful cards that neither of us understood, but wanted to learn more about. Every single day I looked forward to running to her house to play our card game. I was drawn to them, I felt a certain kinship when they were in my hands. I began to understand what the symbols and the colors were trying to say. They wanted to be heard, to be validated, to be understood and I was determined to learn to speak in their language.

I bought my first deck of Tarot cards with the money I earned from babysitting when I was 15. I had the sense that my VERY Catholic parents would not approve of my choice for a summer activity, so Tarot and I began our secret relationship.

I didn't have any books to tell me how to use the cards. It was hard enough for me to find a secret hidey place for my deck, let alone having an array of books that would reveal my first summer crush. I taught myself how to understand what Tarot was whispering to me through it's lovely symbolism and use of numeric notations. It began to make sense...a great deal of sense. I found I could pass along the messages of the cards quite accurataely to those who had questions. Tarot and I were definitely in sync. We no longer had a language barrier. We were inseperable that summer...like peas and carrots.

Since then, our relationship has only deepened. Sure we have gone through our periods of breaking up. I wasn't always a good listener. I wasn't always disconnected enough emotionally to read clearly for myself. I wanted what I wanted and that was that. Tarot didn't respond well to my outbursts of stomping my feet and pouting my lower lip in order to get my way. Instead it had a persistant way of making me look at myself which at certain points in life is rather hard to do.

In my 20's Tarot and I decided to take our relationship to the next level. It was after our most recent seperation due to marriage and demands of raising a family that I found myself lost and lonely for my old friend. I took my Tarot out of its box, unwrapped its lovely silk scarf and right then and there I make a commitment to my cards to never stop learning along this journey. And in return Tarot also made a commitment to never stop teaching me.

I have been a student ever since :)

In love and light~

Shannon

xoxo