Times of Transition
Concept photo of changing leaves, pinned to a clothesline.
Before I moved to Florida, August was my least favorite month. At some point, the cool weather would move in, and summer would unofficially end. I'd felt this way since childhood. As a teen, I wrote angsty poems about the unfairness of summer's end. I think I was born believing I had a right to sunshine all year. Once I moved to the Sunshine State, though, I realized seasons happen everywhere, in one form or another. Nothing stays permanently unchanged.
Seasonal change is a good metaphor for the changes we go through in life, big and small. Some people resist change by nature. Others are change makers. Some create change thoughtfully; others are agents of chaos.
We use spirituality to help us handle change, and to create the changes we want. We pray or cast spells for the outcomes we're hoping for, and to avoid the ones we're not. We use divination and prophecy to try to understand what's coming. Some believe certain prayers or actions guarantee good outcomes and block the bad. That kind of thinking is never healthy. Unwelcome change will happen, and we'll sometimes be denied what we want, regardless of our mindset, beliefs, or practices. Still, approached with realistic expectations, spiritual practice helps us heal from hardship and helps us attract and create some of what we need.
Seasonal change differs from other life changes in that it's cyclical and predictable. But knowing something is coming doesn't always make it easier. Change can mean loss, or the need to adjust. It can bring more responsibility, or a new schedule.
Expected changes are easy to plan for, but they also build habits that are hard to shake. Every year, as back-to-school season arrives, I feel the urge for new shoes and a notebook. I haven't been a student or had kids in school in years. Still, the moment the season turns, I want to shop.
Times of transition are unavoidable. The seasons of the year, and the seasons of our lives, will always bring change. We need flexibility and creativity to meet it. We need vision, to see the changes we need and the ones already on their way. And through all of it, we need a good sense of humor and a good sense of our own spiritual nature.
StaarCon 6 Postcard featuring Pixie Arcana by Pamela Steele.
The StaarCorner
I am very excited to announce the return of Dame Darcy to StaarCon! At StaarCon 6, Dame Darcy and her partner, Pleasant, will present an important session about piracy of tarot images and counterfeit decks. This is an issue that plagues our community. We are glad to have a forum to discuss it at StaarCon 6.
Dame Darcy and Pleasant are both acclaimed artists. Together, they have produced several independent tarot decks. They will be vendors in the Marketplace, so you will have an opportunity to see and purchase their decks, dolls, and other works of art.
Darcy is also a musician. She plans to share a song with us in the Bardic Circle Saturday evening! We are grateful that Darcy and Pleasant can join us for StaarCon 6. Please make your plans to join us, too!
StaarCon 6 Presenter Dame Darcy.
StaarCon 6 Volunteer Pleasant.
Tickets to attend StaarCon 6 in person in Palm Beach Gardens are now available, along with guest rooms at the DoubleTree at a favorable rate. Get your tickets and book your rooms now! We look forward to seeing you in October!
Dame Darcy and Pleasant.
Vicki Santell and Christiana Gaudet record a presentation for virtual StaarCon 5 attendees.
Virtual Presenter Spotlight: Vicki Santell
Fifty-eight years with the tarot, and a StaarCon 6 session that asks you to stop looking at the cards and start standing in them.
Vicki Santell has been part of StaarCon since the very beginning. She has presented at all but one of them, which makes her something close to a founding fixture of this community. When she sat down with Christiana Gaudet to talk about her StaarCon 6 session, the conversation started with a deck of cards she was handed in 1968 and ended somewhere none of us expected, with a paper plate and an invitation to play.
Walking Into the Cards
Vicki's tarot story starts in 1968. Someone handed her a deck, she found the images immediately profound, and she has stayed with them ever since. Fifty-eight years later the cards are still teaching her. She describes tarot as an adaptable tool, one that met her wherever her interests happened to take her. Today she works as a shamanic practitioner with a focus on divination, and she does ancestral work as well.
That first encounter set the pattern for everything after it. Vicki did not study the cards so much as enter them. She saw each one as a doorway and put her consciousness through it, absorbing the image rather than reading it. That instinct, refined over decades, is exactly what she is bringing to the Mindful Room in October.
The Minor Arcana …Live!
The Mindful Room is not set up as a classroom. It is open space with chairs and not much else, and that suits Vicki's plan perfectly. Participants will physically enact Minor Arcana cards, recreating the postures, gestures, and facial expressions in the artwork, then paying attention to what those positions actually feel like in the body.
She is bringing the four tools of the Minor Arcana with her, so people can hold a wand, a cup, a sword, or a pentacle in their hands while they work. She has pre-selected cards from all four suits, focusing on the aces and twos, with some threes if the clock allows. For a 45 minute session, that is a full plate.
The premise is simple, and once you hear it, hard to argue with. Tarot is not only a visual tool. It is a full body tool.
Something to Try Before October
For anyone who cannot be in the Mindful Room, Vicki's homework is refreshingly low tech. Pick out a few cards. Look closely at the physical expression, the body language, how the body is positioned, the colors, the clothing. Then improvise your props. A stick from the yard becomes a wand. A paper plate with a pentacle drawn on it works fine. Grab a cup from the kitchen. Then start playing.
She is emphatic that this should be fun. It is a game, she says, a little toy. Tarot did start as a game, after all. The results just happen to be profound.
About Vicki
Vicki Santell is a tarot reader, shamanic practitioner, and spiritual counselor who has worked with the tarot since 1968. She blends tarot with extensive shamanic experience and ongoing study of metaphysical, psychological, and spiritual teachings, including Family Constellation, ancestral healing, and inner child work. She is available for private sessions and offers classes occasionally. Find her at VickiSantell.com.
StaarCon 6 Presenter Vicki Santell.
StaarCon 6 runs October 2 through 4, 2026, in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida. Vicki presents The Minor Arcana …Live! in the Mindful Room on Sunday, October 4th at 2:00 pm, with her recorded conversation released to StaarCast Virtual attendees at the same time. Tickets are available at staarcon.com/tickets.
Illustration of a woman reading tarot.
Navigating Change with Tarot
We might go to the cards or get a reading when we are facing or wanting a change in life. It is also true that we might catch wind of any upcoming change in a tarot reading. Whether we are the client, the reader, or reading for ourselves, we need to handle change in the cards carefully.
It is important never to predict, for ourselves or others, an unavoidable devastating change. We know that forewarned is forearmed, but we also know that, in divination, it is hard to see the degree of harm.
For example, I have seen the Tower predict a non-egregious wardrobe malfunction. Imagine a reader seeing the Tower in that moment and using it to predict something much worse!
When we see something ominous in the future, it is important to ask further questions of the cards, such as, what do I need to know about this? And, how should I prepare for this?
If there is a specific change you are longing for, you can use tarot cards for manifestation. Choose the cards that represent what you want, visualize that event occurring, and place those cards on your altar with that clear intention.
If a difficult change has happened, a tarot reading can bring perspective and hope for the future, as well as acknowledging and holding space for grief. It is important, when we see grief in the cards, to use that as an opportunity to validate and understand feelings.
The I-Ching, an ancient Chinese divination system, is translated as ‘The Book of Changes’. Perhaps divination and tools of divination have always been used to help us navigate the changes in our lives.
Tuesday, August 4, 7 pm to 8 pm: Global Tarot Circle Live on YouTube, Twitch, Facebook & Instagram.
The Week in Review
TarotScopes for August are available for members on YouTube. TarotScopes for everyone will become available on August First on YouTube and will be uploaded to TikTok this week.
On Tuesday, August 4 at 7 pm ET, please join us for Global Tarot Circle. I will livestream on YouTube, and multistream to Facebook, Instagram, and Twitch.
From Around the Web
At StaarCon 6, there will be some offerings that connect tarot to theater. Clearly we are not alone in our thinking! Here, in the Los Angeles Times, is an article about a tarot theater experience.
The Dali Museum in St. Petersburg, Florida is running an exhibit about Salvador Dali’s tarot deck. I love that this is happening at roughly the same time as the tarot exhibit at the Morgan Library and Museum!
August First is celebrated as Lammas, or Lughnassad. This is the first celebration of harvest as we move toward autumn. Ethony has a Lammas Tarot Spread for you to try!
The Death Tarot Card.
Tarot Wisdom for the Week
Major Arcana 13, Death, is a card that gets a lot of attention, for all the wrong reasons. It has a scary name and image. Yet, this card is by far not the most disturbing message that could appear on the tarot table.
While tarot divination can discuss all matters, including those of life and death, Major Arcana 13 is not a card to be feared and normally is not seen as a prediction of physical death.
Major Arcana 13, Death, very often speaks of change. This card can discuss changes that have happened or are on their way. It can also discuss our ability to handle change.
When we see Major Arcana 13, we can usually assume we are reading about transition. While that itself can feel scary and uncertain, the transitions the card discusses could even be positive, like a job change, a marriage, or a new baby.
Unseen hands leafing through a calendar.
Upcoming Events
Christiana teaching at Retreat Day at Mitchell Osborn's home, 2016.
About Christiana Gaudet
Card and Craft, Inc.
Southeastern Tarot Artists and Readers, LLC.
Christiana Gaudet
770 SE Indian Street, Suite 10
Stuart, Florida 34997-5604
Locations in Port Saint Lucie, West Palm Beach, and Stuart, Florida!
Email cgaudet@cardandcraft.com
On the web www.christianagaudet.com
Online classes www.cardandcraftacademy.com
StaarCon information www.staarcon.com
YouTube @YourTarotFairyGodmother
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Private telephone, Skype, FaceTime, Zoom, and in-person readings and instruction are available by appointment.
Tarot parties at your home or office are available throughout Florida.
Zoom parties and group instruction are available almost everywhere!
Call toll free 866-99TAROT (866-998-2768)
For business or agent inquiries, call 772-301-0232
For appointments, call or text 561-655-1160
Schedule Appointments, Mentoring Sessions, or Purchase Gift Certificates Online!
Schedule your private reading or mentorship session, or purchase gift certificates at https://christiana-gaudet.as.me.
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Tarot Topics Newsletter
Volume 9 Issue 30
July 29, 2026
Christiana Gaudet Your Tarot Fairy Godmother banner.
Third Tuesday Tarot is an ongoing, beginner-friendly class exploring how tarot speaks to you, with each session standing on its own. This month's class digs into the Court Cards — what they represent, how to read them, and what they reveal in a spread. $20 class fee; advance registration required.