In an effort to curate the publicly visible videos on the Benebell Wen YouTube channel, many past videos are now unlisted but still publicly available via the Playlists tab.
For a ballpark sense of how many videos are now unlisted, as of this posting only 129 of 405 total videos are publicly visible in the general Videos tab and thus only those 129 videos are searchable on the YouTube platform.
Continue reading “Changes to the YouTube Channel and Access to Past Videos”
Carolyn Cushing and Jenna Matlin, in collaboration with Weiser Books, are hosting a series of content to celebrate the late Rachel Pollack’s re-release of A Walk Through the Forest of Souls. This is a day-long event for the tarot community, and you’ll find many contributors to this celebration.
Read more about the event in this announcement from Carolyn Cushing.
On May 10, 2023, Carolyn, Jenna, Weiser Books editor Judika Ilkes, and author Mark Horn will be live streaming here between 3 pm and 5 pm Eastern time.
Jenna Matlin and Mary K. Greer will be in conversation about A Walk Through the Forest of Souls here, going live at 8 pm Eastern.
My contribution is a video workshop of a tarot reading prompt:
That is a question presented in the book.
For even more “training wheels” support, download the following quick reference table of keywords (DOCX file):
After noting the card drawn for each position in the 21-card spread, write down the keywords from the reference table onto your worksheet pages. The keywords themselves will support your arrival at the divinatory significance of the reading.
Tarot: The Path to Wisdom by Joseph D’Agostino was first published in 1976. A second edition was released in 1994, which is the copy of the book that I have.
I’m not sure whether this book was intended for beginners, but I’m guessing so, since it devotes most of its pages to card meanings, and gives the obligatory opening chapters on what the tarot is.
As a beginner’s guide to the tarot, it starts you off with instructions for two divinatory methods: the Celtic Cross and this 21-card tableau. . . . Beginner tarot books have come a long way since then. =)
Continue reading “21-Card Spread from Joseph D’Agostino’s Tarot: The Path to Wisdom”
I had the incredible opportunity of meeting Dr. Yolanda Robinson in London a few years back, where she gifted me with a copy of Studies on Mystical Tarot: The Court Cards, published in 2013.
Robinson is a professor of transformational psychology and a member of BOTA, the Builders of the Adytum, a western mystery school tradition dedicated to the study of Qabalah and the Tarot. Studies on Mystical Tarot explores the tarot courts through a Rosicrucian lens, contextualizing the courts through Hermetic Qabalah and modes of inner alchemy.
This Sightsee the Tarot video installment will guide you through two self-reflection meditative exercises with the court cards in your favorite tarot deck. The first will focus on the four Kings to reaffirm your personal power and the second will be working with the Page of Pentacles.
Continue reading “Court Card Self-Reflection Exercises with Esoteric Tarot”
Ancestral Tarot (Red Wheel Weiser, 2021) by Nancy Hendrickson, a genealogist and tarot master, is an incredible journey into self-discovery through ancestor work. This Sightsee the Tarot video is a guided meditation and three-card reading from Ancestral Tarot— how to commune with your Ancient Ones. You’ll find this spread in Chapter 5, Ancestors of Blood.
Continue reading “Connecting to Your Ancient Ones (with Ancestral Tarot)”
For each year of your life, you have a card from the Major Arcana called the Tarot Year Card, which represents the tests and lessons you’ll experience in any given year. Your Tarot Year Card indicates the kind of archetypal energies that are constellated in that year, suggesting personal qualities you can work with.
In Archetypal Tarot (Weiser, 2021), Mary K. Greer connects astrology and numerology to the tarot to create an in-depth personality profile that can be used for self-realization and personal harmony.
This video workshop will explore Chapter 14 from Greer’s text. We’ll reflect on your Tarot Year Card from 2021 and write out forecasts for the year to come in 2022.
Continue reading “Tarot Year Card (from Archetypal Tarot by Mary K. Greer)”
Tarot Tableau: The Fool’s Journey (2020) by Thomas of Hermit’s Mirror is a versatile, power-packed tarot reading method based on the Grand Tableau from the Lenormand tradition. Thomas takes that method many steps further and presents a way of reading the cards that you’ll turn to time and time again, for your personal readings and for your professional client readings.
Skill Level: Advanced
To start, let’s introduce the basic tableau, the foundation of Thomas’s Tarot Tableau: The Fool’s Journey. I’ve put together a Sightsee the Tarot video to guide you through the basic spread along with 22 tarot journaling prompts excerpted from Tarot Tableau.
In this workshop, we’ll be using the Tarot Tableau for a long session of free-writing as therapy. Writing therapy helps you to process your thoughts and experiences, which opens you up to new insights on how to get back to equilibrium, facilitate much-needed spiritual healing, and grow emotionally.
Working with your reading results from the Tarot Tableau method, you’ll answer 22 questions inspired by the 22 Major houses of the spread and after you’re done, you’ll attain newfound clarity in the situation you were inquiring about or, at the very least, understand the “why.”
Click above to download.
Print out the PDF linked above and free-write your answers to the journaling prompts. If you have a particular tarot journal layout and design going on already, you can download the DOCX and edit accordingly.
Download the above-pictured worksheet and either print it out or copy the layout into your tarot journal before you start the video. You’ll be recording your reading results on the worksheets.
The rest of this post will be my review of the book.
Continue reading “Tarot Tableau: The Fool’s Journey & Card Journaling Therapy”
Skill Level: Intermediate & Up
Set aside 30 minutes for a mood-altering tarot reading experience. This is a guided reading with the Riddle of the Sphinx tarot spread from M. M. Meleen’s Book M: Liber Mundi (2015).
Book M is the companion guidebook to Meleen’s tarot deck, the Tabula Mundi Tarot. She recently launched a Majors only deck, which I’ve been working with and loving, the Pharos Tarot. You can support this incredible artist and occultist by ordering your copy here.
If you have a specific question you’d like answered by the Great Angel HRU or you don’t have anything particular in mind and just want a general prophetic reading about the direction of your life, try out this spread. You can use any tarot deck or even a Majors only deck.
Continue reading “Invoking HRU and the Riddle of the Sphinx”
The launch date for the Pride Tarot, a collaborative artists deck from U.S. Games, is scheduled for this month, April 2020. This video and companion blog post is going up during difficult global times. We’re in the midst of a world-wide shelter-in-place quarantine and most of our business-as-usual has been put on pause. People are anxious, feeling insecure and uncertain. I’ve found great comfort and insight in my reading with the Parade Spread and I hope you will, too.
When You’re Feeling Lost: The Compass Spread
Surprise. I know I said here in this video that there would be no Sightsee the Tarot episodes over the summer. However, everybody makes exceptions for The Tarot Lady, amiright? I’m so excited about this newly released book, Tarot for Troubled Times (Weiser Books, July 2019) by Shaheen Miro and The Tarot Lady herself, Theresa Reed. So I just had to set aside everything else, make time, and share with you my impressions of the book.
This installment of Sightsee the Tarot walks us through The Compass Spread and then offers some insights into post-reading candle magic, per the guidance and tips you’ll find in this book.
When you’re feeling adrift, like you’re just floating along with no sense of direction, use the Compass Spread by Miro and Reed to chart a steady course.
In this companion post, I want to showcase the book.
Continue reading “Tarot for Troubled Times by Shaheen Miro and Theresa Reed”
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