I had the pleasure of meeting Kait Fowlie, Usui Reiki Practitioner, Tarot Reader and writer back in 2017 right before I took a blogging hiatus. Learning about how she created her practice with Tarot and Reiki was inspiring. She’s also running a 21-Day Tarot challenge that you can join in on with details here. Read below to learn more about this intuitive Pisces and how you can include these practices in your life.
What was your first experience with astrology like? Who introduced you to it?
Like most of my peers my intro to astrology was reading horoscopes in Seventeen and other teen magazines! I loved doing this with friends. I came to understand that astrology was so much more than that when I discovered sites like The Numinous and The Hoodwitch around my early twenties. They started me down a bit of a rabbit hole. The vocabulary of astrology really resonated with me.
How did you get involved with Tarot?
When I was about 11 years old a friend of mine bought me a Rider Waite Smith deck for my birthday. I was curious about it, but I was more afraid of it – like, having it around would bring me bad luck or invite spirits into my house or something. So I gave it away.
Tarot came back into my life around the start of my Saturn return, when I discovered a time capsule I’d made for myself as a kid, it was this envelope of letters I’d written ‘for my future self.’ I wrote what I hoped I would dress like, what I hoped I’d be doing for a living, where I hoped I would live, etc. I cut out pictures out from magazines and glued them on the page. There was this picture of the page of pentacles on it, and I wrote next to it, ‘I hope you get into tarot. I have a deck now, but I don’t know everything about it yet. I think it adds a certain kind of smartness to you though.’
I was like, OK inner child – message received! The smartness I was talking about was my intuition, which I have always felt deeply connected to. From there, tarot and I became fast friends, really, and we continue to evolve and get more intimate in our relationship every day.
What deck do you use? Do you have more than one?
Yeah! I have a few. I use the Rider Waite Smith deck for client readings and events because I like reading for people who also read cards, and then they can recognize the imagery too. For myself, I love reading with The Hermetic Tarot, which is dark and monochromatic and just looks occult as fuck. It’s super nuanced with a lot of potent symbols in each card. I’ve also acquired the Tarot Tarot de Marseille and the Thoth deck over the years.
Do you have any Tarot tips to share? Do’s and Dont’s?
Sure! Here are 3 tips:
Do learn what each of the cards mean traditionally, and how they fit together, but don’t ever feel like you can’t make this system yours. If for example the Emperor feels like, a father figure and it feels at all oppressive, the card doesn’t have to be like that. Think about the energy or essence of it – to me, the essence of the Emperor is about taking up space. Like, a mountain. We can see the energies of the cards as expressed in nature, not as gender roles or ranks in a hierarchy, etc. The tarot should never feel like it excludes you. Lindsay Mack does a great job of teaching inclusive tarot.
Also, lay the major arcana out in order so you can see it, like the whole story of it. It’s helpful to know what cards come before and after each other. And lastly, have some sort of regular tarot practice that feels authentic to you. Like a daily draw. It helps to feel like you’re in a relationship with your deck.
What led you to Reiki?
I got into reiki when I was working in my first real full-time office job in my early twenties. I had a really hard time commuting in rush hour traffic, being in a sterile office with no real friends there. I was just unhappy at the time. I wanted to find some kind of all-encompassing self-care practice that felt authentic, so I tried getting reiki. I responded well to it, and I wanted to do it on myself, make it a regular part of my life. I got attuned because I knew would make it feel real to me, like I had some permission to be my own healer.
What is Usui Reiki?
Usui reiki is a form of Japanese energy healing that started around 1920, so it’s pretty new. It was named after it’s founder, a man named Mikao Usui, who dedicated his life to exploring all these different systems of healing and achieving enlightenment. At one point he became a Buddhist monk and took a 21-day retreat on a mountain in Japan. There he had a vision of white light entering his head and then he was like A-HA! REIKI! That was said to be his reiki attunement from the universe. Then it spread from Japan to the States, and outward and onward.
I love his story because Usui was so determined – like, it seems to me that his drive to move through all these different modalities of healing in some epic search for purpose just resonates with me, as a millennial.
What are the major benefits of these practices?
Reiki brings me back to the present and reminds me that I’m here, my power is here, and I actually have a lot of strength and power and life force to work with. Reiki simplifies things. It gets me sensitized again. It’s really subtle, energy work. That’s the point. You have to get quiet. I do a body scan on myself mostly every morning and still in the bath, like I first did when I just started.
How do you think your aesthetics are reflected in your birth chart?
I’m a Libra rising, so looking presentable has always been important to me to some degree! I have a Pisces sun and a Virgo moon. I’d say I have a bit of a bohemian flair (for better or worse) thanks to the Piscean influence, and also I hate any kind of constriction. I have no time for pants without stretch. I loathe underwear. I don’t know if the Virgo expresses itself in my style in any way. I’m not particularly neat, or boundaries, in my style. I do appreciate the idea of a sustainable garment, though.
How did the interpretation of your birth chart help you?
Learning about my birth chart gave me permission from the universe to just be who I am! It helped me to see how I might work with myself, rather than against myself. Like, all these energies make up me, in a way, and I can work with them if I’m aware of them. It gave me another way to be self-aware and compassionate. I don’t need to feel wrong for wanting to have control (Virgo moon), and I don’t need to feel wrong for wanting a lot of alone time (Pisces sun), etc. If I accept these, I can make these express in healthy ways.
How often do you check your horoscope?
Every couple days probably.
Do you have any favourite mystic apps?
Tiny Spark by Jessica Lanyadoo I like. I don’t use any others at the moment.
How does Tarot work on the internet? (for instance, how is a card reading online different from one with a physical deck?)
Well, I mean, to be honest, I’m not sure I buy the legitimacy of sites that are offering automated online readings. It seems inhuman, to me. A reading from an actual person (whether online or in person or on the phone, etc.) comes with like, the impression of their soul. It just does. You can tell.
Which is your favorite tarot card? (can you please send a pic of it?)
I love the moon. It’s all about just walking the path just one step at a time, using your intuition, not really your other senses, to guide you. When you pull it, it’s like, ‘you’re not supposed to know what the future looks like, right now.’ Just be really present and look deeper inside yourself for a guiding light. I don’t think of this card as the ‘dark night of the soul,’ I think of it like, you’re being called to see the dark beauty in where you are right now, and embrace that. After the moon comes the sun, so you’ll get to see a lighter beauty soon, but see the beauty in the darkness now. It’s the stuff of great art.
What is the 21-day Tarot challenge?
The 21-day tarot challenge is a practice I did last year to develop a deeper relationship with the cards. You go through the entire deck, one card a day, for 21-days, and work with the energy of that card. To ‘work with’ the energy of the card, you can journal about it, or just contemplate it or look for examples of it as you move through your day. I loved doing this. I got a lot out of it.
