Veronica Thiers likens reading tarot cards to a therapy session. Readings, she says, can give “insight and comfort” and help people “feel less alone and more confident in themselves.” And there’s no better moment to delve into a deck of tarot cards than the turn of a new year.
“It’s a very powerful time” to set intentions and make resolutions with tarot, Thiers said on an autumn evening on the deck of the Springs house where she grew up and still lives. A reading ahead of the dawn of a new year “is like saying to the universe, ‘What do you think of this?’ It will either tell you your current situation or give you a place to go,” she says over a soundtrack of chirping crickets, punctuated by acorns falling onto an upside-down kayak. “Sometimes, with a New Year’s resolution, you’re lucky enough with the cards you pick that you will get a direction or some advice or confirmation.”
Thiers sees a hungry-looking fawn and its mother in her backyard and feeds them a banana, channeling gentle Snow White energy before offering a reading to a guest. Waiting on her rustic wood table is a spread of 15 decks of tarot cards, each featuring a different style of art, and within those styles, 78 different card faces — each one a literal work of metaphysical art. The cards don’t have traditional suits like hearts and spades; rather, they depict symbols like cups, wands, and pentacles. Where there would be jacks, queens, and kings, there are magicians, emperors, and priestesses.
Thiers instructs her visitor to thoroughly shuffle each deck “to get your energy all over them.” If during shuffling a card happens to slip through your fingers or otherwise “pop out” in some way, she says, it means that card is meant for you. Maybe you “pull” the Five of Wands? You’re destined to endure conflict and emerge in a better state than before. Or you might pull the Seven of Cups, meaning you’re doing too much and it’s time to scale back on your commitments. If the Seven of Cups lands on the table along with the Balance card, you might as well take it as metaphysical gospel.
“Everybody thinks tarot is dark or evil, and that’s a wrong way to look at it,” Thiers says. “It can be light and bright and fun. It’s just energy, and it depends on what your energy is, too.”
She advises people to keep an open mind. “You can go into it completely closed off. I have seen people who have a halfhearted interest in it, almost at the level of complete boredom, and they try it,” Thiers says. “With no expectations, they are shocked by what they see. The emptier the vessel you are playing with, the more the cards want to fill that vessel up and show them something.”
Kristin Guldi-Vazquez of East Hampton, who has been reading tarot for a solid two-thirds of her lifetime so far, agrees that January 1 or thereabouts is a good time to get a reading. “You can do that to see what the year will look like ahead. Maybe pull 12 cards, one for each month.”
Monte Farber and Amy Zerner of Springs are something of a legend in the realm of the New Age. Their tarot deck and companion book, The Enchanted Tarot, were introduced back in 1991. The Springs couple, who have long reigned as the unofficial king and queen of mystical and metaphysical pursuits here on the South Fork, explain the purpose of tarot this way on their website: “The images on the cards and their meanings trigger insights from your Higher Self, the part of us that provides guidance by supplying us with those ‘irrational’ hunches, intuitions, and flashes of inspiration that can make everyday life sometimes seem so extraordinary.”
Here are five local experts to turn to for readings.
VERONICA THIERS
516-708-3238
Hamptontarot.com
Instagram: @hamptontarot
Thiers does readings from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. on Fridays at A Book Place, an independent bookstore in Riverhead. She also reads at parties and for private clients. Her approach involves using multiple tarot decks, which allows clients to experience “the undeniable power of energy each one of us possesses,” she writes on her website.
MONTE FARBER
theenchantedworld.com/tarot
Instagram: @MonteFarber
Yes, Monte Farber is a tarot reader and astrologist with clients around the world. Yes, he and his wife, Amy, have sold hundreds of thousands of copies of their many metaphysical books and tools worldwide since The Enchanted Tarot started it all. But at their core, their books and decks “are designed to teach people to read for themselves,” Farber says. “We try and make it simple.”
EAST END PSYCHIC
631-599-9803
Eastendpsychic.com
Instagram: @eastendpsychic
Lauren Stevens, who works out of locations in Springs and Riverhead, describes herself as a multigeneration spiritual advisor working on the East End for 35 years. Her mother and grandmother were “gifted healers,” too, she says. Her specialty is relationships. “My gift comes from love, and love comes from God,” Stevens says. “I love bringing people together and clearing their pathways for the blockages that we get caught up with in regular life.”
DIANE FERRARO
631-702-0246
Tarottauk.com
Tarot Tauk is located inside the brick-and-mortar business called Magnolia Wellness and Beauty Collective in Montauk. “Whether you’re interested in an impromptu reading, self-empowerment, or working toward specific goal-driven outcomes, I weave my gifts to best support your intentions,” Ferraro writes on her website. (She also teaches yoga and practices reiki.)
AZUR TAROT
631-745-0119
Azurtarot.com
Instagram: @AZURtarot
Kristin Guldi-Vazquez of East Hampton picked up her first tarot deck at age 15 and never looked back. As the owner of Azur Tarot, she primarily reads at parties and by video chat for one-on-one sessions of 30 to 40 minutes. She focuses on what she calls “the main three topics” — love, careers, and money — and encourages clients to open up “and ask deeper questions to figure out their path. Tarot can accomplish that.”