🎁 The gift I gave myself in November 2023

Reflecting on the past, present and future through the lens of tarot

Your Five-Year Plan is a newsletter about embracing life’s profound uncertainty.

Maybe your own plans went up in flames; maybe you’re considering a big, scary leap. This is your trusty companion while you’re writing the next life chapter.

Welcome to the conversation—and to the adventure that unfolds when your plans go sideways. This is letter #32. ✨

🎁 Today’s letter is a gift to you.

The last letter of the month is usually addressed to paid subscribers (whose support makes this newsletter possible!). Today, I’m unlocking this paid letter as a holiday gift to free subscribers. Enjoy!

The gift I gave myself in November 2023

My beautiful new Klimt tarot deck

Even as a tarot amateur, I knew just enough to understand there’s no such thing as a “good” or “bad” tarot card. Still, I sat quietly, hands folded, awaiting the unveiling of my cards—as if my good behavior might result in a more auspicious draw.

If witchiness is a continuum, I sit squarely on…well, whatever defines the opposite end of that spectrum. The stack of books on my nightstand? All nonfiction. My autumn rituals? They’re more like “pumpkin everything” than #spookyszn. And my diffuser and essential oil collection are covered in dust from disuse and general negligence.

And yet the gift I gave myself in November was a half-hour tarot reading with

Caroline Cala Donofrio

of

Between a Rock and a Card Place

. In addition to reflective personal essays, her newsletter includes tarot card readings for the collective (like this one) that—despite tarot’s potent symbolism—feel powerfully grounded.

This gift was inspired by a girls’ trip I enjoyed in September. While wandering a boutiquey business district in the Colorado Rockies, my friends and I stumbled upon the town’s Magic HQ. A stairway hugged the brick building’s left flank, climbing through a hilly garden to the second-floor entrance of a crystal shop. To the right, at ground level, a sign advertised tarot card readings.

My travel companions banked left, wanting to invest in $7 crystals at the upstairs shop. (Honestly, that seemed like a great deal for a purchase promising the “healing of emotional wounds,” “clearing and cleansing of the auric field,” and “attuning the energetic body to love.”)

Before I followed them, though, I paused. I wanted to head right, beckoned by the promise of my first-ever tarot reading. But if I overpaid for a tourist-trap experience that left me biding the minutes till it was done, I’d probably never spring for a spontaneous reading again.

So, back home in Washington, I booked my first Zoom reading with someone I trusted. Logging a positive initial experience, I knew, would lessen the stakes of future on-a-whim readings.

As you can read in this mainstream guide for the uninitiated, standard tarot decks contain a set of 22 “major arcana” cards reading like a list of archetypes: The Empress, The Magician, The Fool.

An annotated page from my mom’s copy of Modern Tarot

They also contain a set of 56 “minor arcana” cards, that—much like a deck of playing cards—has four suits (cups, pentacles, wands, and swords), each with its own series of numbered and royal (court) cards.

Each archetype, suit, number, and royal holds embedded themes, to be sure.

But interpreting a card also relies heavily on studying its artwork and noticing what bubbles up for you. Each illustration in the classic Rider-Waite deck is so rich with symbolism that newbies can (blessedly) forego memorization of card meanings in favor of careful observation.

And because tarot isn’t about fortune-telling or divination, it’s perfectly compatible with life’s profound uncertainty…and, you know, that minor detail called “free will.” Tarot is as much a ritual of self-reflection as anything else.

It invites us to ask and respond to our unanswerable questions about the future by going within and getting reacquainted with our atrophied powers of intuition, rather than looking outside ourselves for every answer.

The reading went like this: Caroline pulled one illustrated card, then another, then one more. The first would have something to say about my past; the second, my present; the third, my future.

Having spent much of 2023 writing about the gifts I gave my Present and Future Self, this tripartite structure felt…fitting.

Since the first days of this newsletter, I’ve argued that we should all approach life with a gift-giving mindset. And viewing the past, present and future through tarot’s dreamy, reflective lens invites that mindset. Wondering how I might embody an inspiring card’s energy feels more delicious than, say, visualizing the future as a series of SMART goals.

My Past/Present/Future draw (photo by Caroline)

So why not consider early 2023 through the lens of the eight of cups? After all, I can certainly relate to the figure who’s turning away from one thing just as decisively as he’s walking toward something else—a landscape on the horizon that, frankly, looks pretty inspiring.

Why not think about the King of Pentacles as I consider where I sit today? He seems comfortable taking a beat, resting, and luxuriating in the (considerable) fruits of his (also considerable) labors. And why shouldn’t he? Why shouldn’t I?

And why not think about 2024 as an invitation to embody the Knight of Swords, ready to take bold action, headwinds be damned? Maybe it’s time for me to get comfortable charging into new territory, even if it means making a few mistakes along the way.

Tomorrow can bring another set of card pulls, and after that, still another: past, present and future all shifting dynamically with each new day, each change in perspective.

I can try to find the beauty within cards that make others recoil, while also remembering that—because there are no rules—I always have permission to draw a new card and try again.

In honor of my inclusion in

platonic love

’s delightful gift guide, here’s the approachable entry-level gift I bought myself as a tarot newbie:

1️⃣ Michelle Tea’s Modern Tarot + 2️⃣ the Rider-Waite tarot deck

Want to splurge on someone special? Add a second, more personal deck—one that calls to you from the shelves of your local indie bookstore or metaphysical shop.

Other decks aren’t usually as beginner-friendly as Rider-Waite—for example, I can’t interpret my new Klimt deck to save my life (found via

Jillian Anthony

in this stellar roundup)—but it’s stunning.

💬 What gifts did you give yourself in November?

Today is my late mom’s birthday. To allow extra space for quiet reflection, I’ve turned off comments on today’s letter. ❤️

But I invite you to answer the following question on your own: what’s something generous you did for your Present Self this month, or something you did to take care of your Future Self?

I hope it’s a reminder to carry reflective energy into a Black Friday otherwise stuffed full of promotional emails—and a holiday season packed with joyful obligations.

Warmly,
Maddie