WHO I AM

I’m a healer. Consider me a conduit for the Divine Healer.

I give hope. In this day and age, that’s no small affair.

I’m an artist. My heart is constantly moved by everyday beauty.

I’m one of the most grounded people you’ll ever meet. No airy-fairy spirituality here.

Think about it: every powerful ruler relies on trusted advisors who guide and protect them – call them prophets, counselors, astrologers, oracles, “got your back” friends. When life gets tough, who do people seek out?

Psychics. Healers. Oracles. Counselors.

My gift is the ability to see beyond that curve in the flow of your life.

To remind you of the power of possibility.

To offer options that spark and empower you.

I believe in you: in your vision, your goodness and your intuition.

There is always hope, even in the darkest of times. And in the brightest, even more.

THE LONGER VERSION

I never wanted to be psychic.

I grew up believing that anything “witchy” was evil. Like most things I feared, I didn’t understand it. People involved in this work were The Other, enemies of Christianity who needed to “get saved” or keep on their fast track to hell.

God/dess certainly has a sense of humor.

I’ve always been sensitive. The favorite word adults liked to use around me was “moody”. Of course, this was long before I understood the meaning of empath and subconsciously believed that if I soaked up the emotions of others, I’d heal them.

No wonder I had serious headaches for 20 years.

Would you believe me if I told you that a nun introduced me to Tarot? It’s true. I took those cards from her hands, wanting relief from the wreck of my life.

The cards didn’t answer me. I simply returned them. Yet in that moment, something was planted. It was just waiting to unfold.

I continued the elusive search for a “real” job that would support me financially, spiritually and emotionally. In my early 30s, one of my oldest friends casually said, “You’re a healer. You’re going to read cards someday.” She was clearly crazy.

But Tarot kept seeking me out — on cafe tables, bookstores and friends literally handing me decks. When I moved to Vermont after a decade in NYC, people ‘mysteriously’ wandered into my life to teach what I needed to know. Or they’d simply say, “Good job. Keep going.”

My friend Karen introduced me to the The Faeries’ Oracle deck. She approached the tattered cards like they were old friends  and we’d get together and “throw”. I purchased The Goddess Tarot. Over and over, I’d consult the tiny book. One card, then three. Eventually, I moved on to the 10 card Celtic cross spread, the foundation of all my Tarot spreads.

As I slowly opened up my heart, the work found me. One afternoon, my friend called. A woman at her cafe wanted a reading. I hesitated, then heard an inner voice say, this day is going to change your life. I was nervous and insecure; my armpits soaking wet. The well-dressed woman was gracious as I stumbled my way through her cards.

At the end, she looked me straight in the eye and said, “My dear, you have a gift.”

And so I began.

“Work” is a misnomer. I love being a healer. I’ve guided thousands of clients — teachers, doctors, celebrities, lawyers, CEOs, shamans, psychics, moms, students and millionaires — to their own inner healer.

As I walk this path, I will always see Tarot as my friend who helped open the door to a world that was simply waiting for me to explore it. No judgment, no shame. Just, here is your gift and away we go.

Read the even longer version in my book, The Reluctant Tarot Reader: Adventures in the Gypsy Trade.

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Raven Mardirosian is a writer and healer. Her passion is empowering women and her specialty is “healing the healer”. She has given Tarot sessions to thousands of clients worldwide for nearly a decade.

She is the author of 365 Ways to Keep It Real, Heal Yourself and Be Free. She is also the author of the bestselling memoir, The Reluctant Tarot Reader: Adventures in the Gypsy Trade. Her essay, “Christian LGBT Kids: You’re Part of the Plan” is included in the New York Times best-selling anthology, It Gets Better. Her other books include: Chrysalis: Poems of Release, Spirit, Flow: A Photographic Prayer, and Esprit, Vole: Prière photographique.

Raven created and hosted the highly popular BlogTalk radio show, Tarot Talk, in 2009. She has an M.A. in English and taught in NYC and Vermont public high schools for many years.