​Dear Poppyseed,

I found out I was pregnant with you on the day of a full moon. Before I realized you were with me, I had done my usual ritual of taking a guidance card for the day. It said upon it ‘Full Moon – Completion’, the card spoke in fancy terms of gestation, something brewing, coming to fruition. I didn’t know it was you. And that of course is not even the beginning, it never is.

We planned you in a relaxed kind of way. Your Dad and I, we never plan anything properly. We don’t make lists or draw up laborious maps of our life. We make up our minds and then things happen. We are haphazard, blundering perhaps, but so far our blunders tend to turn to gold. We married in Vegas after eight years, and after ten years we decided to have a go and see if you wanted to come along. On our first month of an open invite, you accepted. I feel very honored that you were so quick to respond.

As for the other events that precipitated your arrival, well this is where you find out what a soppy hippy your Mom is. Firstly, I felt you implant in me. I was driving to see your Great Grandma Grist for her 90th Birthday and I experienced what seemed like a pencil drawing something deep inside me. I am sure this was you settling yourself in. I asked my angels and guides for a sign, and at that moment, a car went by with a sign on the window that said ‘little person on board’. What could I do, I smiled!

Later that night the cause of my hippy ways, your Pagan Grandpa Tony and I, were reading our tarot cards and quite clearly you were there. Up came the image of a little tiny baby, nestled in an egg, and held carefully in a Woman’s arms. This deeply meaningful card glared up from the table right into my heart. The card was The Moon, it seems you are my little ray of Luna Light. The synchronicities thus far suggest loudly to me that you and me, my little love, are meant to be. I know already that you are the biggest piece of my soulful and personal growth, and come hell or high water, I will do my best.

Before I had even had a pregnancy test we had chosen your name. In giving you a name, I guessed that you were inside me. But I didn’t want to admit it for fear I was wrong. I pondered on the thought that maybe this baby naming game was part of some cruel self-inflicted fantasy. Your Dad and I had literally only just started trying to get pregnant. But something felt different. I was averse to making plans for my birthday – which is so very unlike me! I knew that there was a very good chance I would not be celebrating with champagne. I avoided the gym too – perhaps not so unusual - but I had a feeling that jumping about and getting sweaty was not what my body needed right now. So I obeyed these inner instincts. Already you have me digging deeper. Listening to my intuition more than ever.

The following weekend I attended my first class of a spiritual based therapy course that I had signed up to for the next ten months. I knew when I signed up to this course that it might coincide with you. Whilst this might be a problem in terms of attendance in my late stages of pregnancy, it feels right. I am sure that what I learn here is preparing some foundations, helping me firm up how I see the world, putting it into a context that will suit us.

On this course I went on a Shamanic Journey – a spiritual meditation type adventure - to meet my guiding power animals. So to the beat of a drum, I let my mind voyage past imagination and into a place where things apparently started to happen of their own accord. In this inner vision, I met my animal and he took me to a man. A man I believe was you, or your guide. Either way he was linked to my future child, that much I was certain of. He too had an animal. Our animals lit up the jungle with loud roars and as I recognized a miracle I felt your spirit move into me. This was undeniable and powerful. I couldn’t speak for a while after. I was dumbstruck, choking on emotion and it was beautiful. You are beautiful. I know your spirit is with me now.

The night of meeting you in the shamanic journey, I took you to a cage fight. The least appropriate place for an unborn child, but still, life is life and people fight in cages. So what. Live and let live. Your Dad’s friend was in his first fight, and the atmosphere was brutally male. Sadly our guy lost, but he’s a fighter, much like you will be I am sure. Someone who will always take life’s blows and come back wiser, confident, stronger, with an inner faith in your abilities.

The next day, feeling very bloated and as though my period was due, I decided to do the test to see if I was pregnant. I was scared that I was living out of my imagination, and didn’t want to be dreadfully disappointed when my period came. But of course, two tests later and I was as red as a beetroot, on the phone to your Dad, telling him that I was pregnant. I then had the longest phone call in my life to a client about something or other, before I could get off and tell our friends and family. Two more tests later and you are very much confirmed.

We are all very excited, all your new family. Your Dad and me are transformed already. He even put the pizza in the oven last night. He burnt it, but he put it in the oven. Trust me, this is a jaw dropping change. As I type he is making himself a bacon sandwich, I am amazed at his newfound ability to prepare food without resorting to the microwave.

Daddy warns me not to feign symptoms or to become a helpless pregnant wreck, but if I try to do something for myself he rushes to my side and takes over. He has been kissing my head an awful lot. I love it, but I think deep down he is really kissing you. We just got back from the doctors and even though they talk in fearful terms of what to do, what not to do, serious tests, I have a quiet faith that all will be well.

I hope you don’t mind me writing to you, and about you. The last thing I had to say in my previous book was I’m spiritual, what next? Now I have a more important question, I’m pregnant; this trumps everything, what next now? I want to give you the best and handle this in the most soulful way a person possibly can. I won’t ask you to be like me, but I will feed your soul in every way I can. The next eight months is an adventure of all of that. A big mish mash amalgamation of bodily matters, spiritual concerns, physical craziness, and a whole lot of love.

I’ll be really honest now. I know nothing about what comes next. Right now you are the size of a poppyseed and I can still fit in my skinny jeans. The only thing I do know is, that you are loved unconditionally now and forevermore.

Love, from your Mum

So it seems I’m Pregnant…

I am four weeks pregnant but to my actual official knowledge it’s only been a week. In spite of this, I have suffered backache pretty much since conception, so I had an inkling…

Apparently, the next two months represent the most dangerous time of pregnancy. And so everything changes. Overnight. It’s not only the danger that forces change. It’s the hope, the joy, the excitement, the sudden desire to put myself first, but only because there is a little teensy weensy baby growing inside me.

Within seconds my relationship to everything has vastly altered. My marriage has apparently become deeply more significant. There is love beyond love, and all those little niggly arguments, well, they have vanished (more or less and of course I’ll keep you updated). Friendships seem different as my socializing options instantly minimize. Some people want to talk baby, some don’t. Both options are fine. More often than not, I have no choice. I try to talk book, and people talk baby back. I give up. This is all about the baby, a language I am only just learning to speak. Please let’s not get so far as nappies yet. I’m still coping with immediately expanding boobs and random exhaustion. Conversations and thoughts of nappies, vaginal stitches and bladder weakness can all wait.

My understanding of biology is broadening as I set foot on the initial weeks of baby development. Who knew all the tiny miracles that occur everyday to make up the miracle that is my first child?  There is already a strain on myself as I aim to do my best, but constantly feel I could be doing more…I should not have eaten those crisps…so make vegetable soup to compensate. I’m chasing my tail, and my tailbone is actually aching as my body adapts to the pains of growing a little one.

Something that really interests me, and the partial reason for this diary, is the spiritual and personal changes that I presume will occur in my life. I say ‘presume’ because for the past few years I have been indulging in my own spiritual path, wallowing in it, bathing in it, and loving it. I have tried to be soulfulness personified. I am happy to report that because of these efforts I have become a better person. I’m not blowing my own trumpet, it’s true. Nor am I perfect, but I am better. I’m happier and saner than I was several years ago. A spiritual path has been like a massive dose of therapeutic self-help.

So now that I have contentedly found myself, what will this trip of pregnancy and parenthood bring to my life? Will it be soulful, or am I headed onto a wholly more physical plane whereby all that matters is what I can see and wrap my arms around?

I spoke strongly in my last book, The High Heeled Guide to Spiritual Living, that all things are spiritual, and so I believe that this pregnancy, this giving of life, this giving of myself to another person, is as spiritual as it gets. If indeed this parent-to-be trip does turn out to be deeply soulful, will that be because of an expanding waistline or inspite of it? I’m thinking, in this early stage that it may be because of it. If I can embrace all that pregnancy brings, the gritty, earthy, primal nature of it, then maybe I will have found all I will ever need. And until I shave my head and move to Nepal, this could be as spiritual as it ever gets. Whilst child abandonment may have been good enough for the Buddha (who left his wife and child to pursue enlightenment) it’s a step too far for little old me. So with total abandon, I embrace whatever happens next.

I’m intrigued to see how I might combine my soulful inclinations with the very biological inclinations of pregnancy? Well happily, I have come to terms with the fact that human life is the most important thing we have on our plates right now. We are not here to float off into some divine mist, not yet. We are not above and beyond the carnal, the physical, the fights and the failures.

And so, as I head into the world of parenting, allowing those very human based activities to take centre stage. Which is a good job because several days into this pregnancy and before I knew I was ‘up the duff’, I went out and got horribly drunk (I blame the over generous barman). Not a great start. But, a good lesson in self-forgiveness. I’m on the fruit, veggies and pure water from now on of course. As a soulful human, and as a future parent, I suspect I need to occasionally let myself off the hook. 
You know that thing spiritual types talk about, giving over, releasing, allowing life to happen, living in the moment, being grateful, and focusing the mind. Well I have a feeling that pregnancy will pretty much force me to embrace those concepts far more deeply than I previously knew possible. How can you know how to release until another being inhabits and takes over your body? How can you be grateful until you realize the joy of ripping yourself open in labor, potentially undergoing mad pain, but yet being ridiculously happy to see the tiny little person who has caused you all that agony? 

On paper, pregnancy, childbirth and what comes after, seems to me to be the most soulful undertaking a person can undertake. Lucky for us Women that we have the option! Though I’m sure our partners would argue that they too go through a gritty spiritual mill in supporting us, holding our hands, watching us torn asunder with aches and pains, and that they too find some enlightenment at the end of the deep dark birth canal. 
​
Writing this, I have happily convinced myself. Pregnancy and all that comes after is one sure way to taste a little enlightenment. It’s one simple way to find yourself, forget yourself and rise from the ashes anew. It is one way to taste your soul. I may be wrong. I may be right. I may learn something else altogether. Luckily I have eight months ahead to figure this one out. This is the biggest adventure I’ve ever undertaken and I have a feeling it could lead anywhere...  
  

​A Note from the Author…
 
Yesterday my husband, James and I were clearing out the house looking for a lost passport. Somewhere in the mêlée of drawers, boxes and paperwork he came across my diary from nine years ago. The diary began just a few weeks before I met him. It documented my arrival in the town of Leicester, our meeting and my general life around that time.

It was like being confronted with a total stranger. Even James remarked that I am now a totally different woman from the lost, self conscious, slightly conceited girl that I had been then.

It made for hard reading. I was horrified by some of my small-minded comments and throwaway asides. I felt sorry for the child inside me who had been very confused about the world, about relationships and about where on earth her life was headed. It was the diary of someone consumed by her own messy life, and was desperately trying to fathom a way out, but without having to make too much effort. It was Bridget Jones but with soft drugs, hard rock and a boyfriend.

What scares me now when reading back through my diary, is how unconscious I was to anything. These days I am stringently aware of myself, of others, of the world, the planet, animals and all of our spiritual places within it. Back then, I could not see past my own bed, work and another rampaging night out. I was living the fantastical young woman’s life. I was exploring all that life had to offer when living in a two up two down on the hard side of town.

I was making friends, meeting people, shopping with the funds from my first proper job, misbehaving and apparently having massive amounts of fun.

But my thoughts never drifted beyond all of this. The only inner seeking I did, was to harp back to my life just before Leicester and wonder where it all went wrong.

This may sound like a familiar scenario to you. Many of us have a tendency to live shallow, self-seeking lives, not because we are bad people, but because there are few other options apparent to us. We earn money, we buy things, we feather our nest and we believe that this gives our lives meaning. At weekends we pour this money into a social account that sees us through another week with a few funny memories. The lucky few of us have great careers, or wonderful children to focus on. But still… we are not thinking outside of the four walls of our own lives.
I believe there is more to our lives than we currently realize. We are not simply little human consumption machines, we are powerful spiritual beings and it is time we started to explore this. Accessing this knowledge and empowering ourselves with it is the aim of this book.
The High Heeled Guide to Spiritual Living will help take you from the shallow side to a deeper and more fulfilling existence.

I intend to show you that beyond our little lives, you are connected to infinity.

You are in cahoots with all other people and things on this planet, and when you know this you can begin living above and beyond your current, somewhat limited, potential.

I want you to know that you are a spiritual being, having a human experience. To explore this you do not need to wait until you die. You are spiritual now, this is your life now. The two things can be merged to great effect and all things can become more meaningful than you ever anticipated.

Whilst we didn’t find James’s passport during our clear out, it became clear to me that somewhere along the line I had found my passport to a crazily fulfilling life. By realizing my spirituality and the life force and energy of all things, I too had realized who I am. I have found my purpose and flown to greater, happier heights.
 
I will say no more, save for the fact that this book is written for you. My last book, if I am honest was written for me, it was a kind of therapy that prepared me for my spiritual path.
​
Instead now I devote this book to you in your high heels, your biker boots, your sandals and your bare feet. I devote it to women, and to men, and to children should they feel that way inclined.
 
All I want to do is help change the world and if I can get your consciousness to budge one tiny little millimeter, then I am smiling.
 
Peace and Love
 
Alice
 
Introduction
 
“I believe that we are so unenlightened in our ever distracting world that simply opening ourselves gently to the notion of enlightenment is a small enlightenment in itself. It is an achievement simply to choose to believe and to let the faith that follows become a life guide.”
Alice’s Diary March 2010
 
If you learn one thing whilst reading this, then let it be this, you are already spiritual; you must be, because you are spirit. This is one spiritual truth that is often overlooked and lost in the complexities and varied opinions that inform you how to become a spiritual person.
The premise of this book is that your spirituality is entirely individual to you. The High Heeled Guide to Spiritual Living aims to show you that the true discovery of your spirituality can only ever come from your own personal existence. Gurus, books and mantras aside, I believe that your spirituality is innately and unequivocally yours, it already exists, it is you, and I hope to help you scratch the surface and set it free.
I started learning about spirituality through consulting the wisdom of ancient faiths, as is depicted in my book The High Heeled Guide to Enlightenment. That was hugely profitable in beginning to understand a global view of what spirituality is, and how I could bring it into my modern life. After finishing my explorations of faith, I found myself at a loose end, and it was within this loose end and the resulting year or so of living that my own spirituality truly found me.
In writing The High Heeled Guide to Enlightenment I had opened myself up to a spiritual life. At the beginning of my trip towards enlightenment I may well have believed spiritual life to be all fairies, angels and wishing upon a star. However as my divine trip progressed I soon came to see that spirituality is found more powerfully in the things that you see and experience every day.
There is spirituality in your work, in your arguments, in your debt and in your grievances. There is spirituality in your bad hair days, your best friend’s pony and the way your sister always borrows your clothes without asking. There is spirituality in your heart, your mind, your flesh, your bones, in your walk and in your talk.
Let me assure you of this, a bus ride home from work can be as spiritually enlightening as a private dinner with the Dalai Lama. Your life is your spiritual teacher, and The High Heeled Guide to Spiritual Living is your personal road map to your own version of spiritual freedom and enlightenment.
Through the pages of this book I wish to show you that spiritual living is not the sole remit of a far-flung journey to the mystical corners of the planet. It is not a guru chanting mysteries of the universe into your ever-willing ear, whilst you pay by the hour. It is not found solely in a spirituality class, through meditations or via a strict cleansing, fasting and praying regime.
Spirituality is found through your every day life. It is discovered through the highs, the lows, the boredoms and the barmy! Any guru worth their robes and title should tell you that fact. A good guru should tell you that what you are seeking is yourself, and they should tell you to look inside yourself for answers. But that is a bit vague isn’t it? Yes a few meditations may help, but what about when the boiler breaks and the tires burst or your best friend runs off with your husband? What about real life? How are you supposed to get spiritualized when life gets in the way?
Well I have lived through that dilemma and I am now finding my way to the other side of it. I am beginning to understand that spirituality will find me no matter what, but I will not see this unless I alter my way of understanding the world.
This far along in my spiritual path I have been forced to examine a number of areas in my life in minute spiritual detail. I have had to open up my heart and soul to really get to grips with what is true and real to me. I have had to decide for myself what I believe in and what I do not.
I am not only talking about spiritual subjects, I am talking about topics like the environment, and beauty, shopping, my body, diet, my liking of alcohol and my tendency of feeling sorry for myself sometimes. I have held a spiritual mirror up to all of that and more, and the results of this are reflected back in the pages of this book.
The High Heeled Guide to Spiritual Living sets out my spiritual experience, as an example. My life is one that is lived very normally. I do not hang out with writers, spiritual gurus, psychics or celebrities. I do not have Oprah on speed dial. I work full time, I see my friends, I have minor car crashes, I have pets, I love to eat and I moan when my jeans get too tight. I too have seriously bad hair days.
Within this book I do not attest to tell you The Truth. I can only tell you my truth. If that rocks something deep inside of you, then jump on it and experience it for yourself. I intend to help you to understand the intrinsic spirituality that is already inside you.
It is my mission to assist you to find your personal spirituality. I intend to show you how to find it through the familiar, through the ups and the downs of your everyday existence. ‘Is this possible?’ I hear you shrill and shriek. ‘How can little old me, up to my eyeballs in business, bills, nappies, shoe choices and housework, possibly find the spiritual divine in my own life?’ ‘Surely a trip to India is needed?’ I hear you cry! ‘Maybe a trip to the local meditation retreat at the least?’
Well maybe… but then again, I really do not think any of those are necessary. The reason they are not necessary, and the fact that we all tend to gloss over, is, as I stated before, that you are already spiritual. You are a spiritual being hacking it out in a human body. I believe that part of our purpose in life is to somehow fuse the two.
Nobody owns spirituality, they can tell it to you all day long, they may even try to sell it to you, but it is not a product, it is not something you can purchase. Spirituality must be lived. Spirituality is what you are. You simply need to realize that fact. When you have realized it, then it is your job to find a way to live it.
Unlike my first book, the only person’s advice I have taken on writing this is my own. I have had one or two dealings with potential gurus, but they have had their own set of complications and unexpected spiritual lessons. Instead of following someone else’s lead I have trusted my personal connection to the spiritual divine, as I will encourage you to trust yours. 
I am not trained, or attuned in anything (other than a dose of Reiki). I am not your guru. I am a woman who has learned thorough the mayhem that is life, and who has a better idea about how to understand and interpret her own very special spirituality. It is my aim now, to help you to do the same. No trips to India required!
The adventures and mishaps that are contained within these pages are fresh and steaming from the annals of my own life. Seriously, I went through the mill on this one for you! I aim to show you how it is the every day events, and our spiritual interpretation of them that make each of us our own Guru. I hope that through the everyday enlightenment of my daily occurrences, you will see similarities in your own life.
I have set the book out in ‘lessons’. Each of the lessons covered is something that I have had to plough through to get myself a little closer to the genuine spiritual being that lays inside of this human woman’s body. I believe each ‘lesson’ will address aspects of your life that are similar to mine, and some that I believe to be the sicknesses of our society and generations. Each lesson will help you to knock down blocks that are barring you from your own spiritual self. Each lesson will assist you to see life a little more spiritually and in turn help you to forge a stronger link to your true, higher, divine self.
As well as setting out lessons, I have proposed many fun and easy exercises to help you get stuck into fast track spiritualization! From there onward you can start to get to know your own personal and highly individual version of spirituality and enlightenment.
You are here to learn your spiritual lessons, as I am here to learn mine, I am sure that our paths are quite different. It is the similarities within our lives through which we might both find some solidarity and some spiritualization. I hope that this little offering, The High Heeled Guide to Spiritual Living, helps us both on our way!
 
A brief aside first: I will use the term spirituality frequently in this book, but I will also use other terms. I do not feel the term spirituality does justice to any of what I have written about. Having wrangled with other words, none, on their own, quite fit the bill. So instead I will use a variety of language, because it is colorful, I like it, and it fits into the realm of spirituality as I see it.
When I use terms such as divine, mystical, higher self, angels, guides, helpers, energy, vibration, please know that these all mean the same thing to me, more or less. These terms mean, the force, the energy, the spirit and the soul that makes up everything. They are spirituality spoken in a myriad of ways and so to reflect the dynamic, exciting and mysterious nature of spirituality, I have chosen to use them all. 
So let’s begin.
Having sat more deeply within my own spirituality for a few years since writing The High Heeled Guide to Enlightenment there are a few things I would like to share. This book represents my real life learning about what spirituality is to me. I hope The High Heeled Guide to Spiritual Living will kick-start your journey into the world of all things divine, mystical and spiritually exciting.
This book is here to help show you, that in fact, everything is sacred, and every action, movement and thought you undergo can easily be done with spirituality as its starting point and center point. As a society we have swayed too far from this path and it is for that reason that I believe our society is somewhat confused. We have in essence forgotten our essence! I believe that everything is spiritual, and that if we all lived that way our society would be a truly wonderful place.
The High Heeled Guide to Spiritual Living will help you to look at your own spirituality in a universal context. I want to show you how to keep your own spiritual self-true and then how to expand that beyond yourself so that you increase your own spiritual flow and assist others to find theirs too. This book is about peace, harmony and love; it is about finding it, keeping it and about beginning to live at your spiritual peak. It’s simple, come join me.

Is there a point in your life, a sticking point, a place you pivot back to time and time again? Perhaps it is a career goal you just can't reach, or a love fantasy, that lays beyond your stretch?

We all have blocks. They hold us back in numerous ways, be that financially, romantically, health wise or in our experiences. Blocks are built on fears ingrained into us, as kids, as young adults, and, by a culture that wants to keep us small. We all have them. Yet, we do not need to let them rule. Seriously.

I was told I couldn't write a book. I told myself I would do it when I was older and more experienced. I wrote my first aged 28 and have done four since then. With a gust of crazy self belief and a wave of passion following. I did it. I smashed my blocks. 

Blocks are made for smashing.

Yet I still have stumbling patterns. One that I always come back to. 

Let me tell you a secret. I'm ready to get so far past my blocks that they are obscured by a thick, fiery dust. I am ready to move, the heck, along.

It's been ten years since I wrote my first book, and despite the successes my books have brought me. I am still, more or less, in the same place as when I started. I still work a day job (that I hoped to leave ten years ago). I still pull back from book and tarot success any time things get a bit to hot or busy. I fly blindly back into the 'security' of something that is outside of my comfort, because that is what I was told, all my life, was safer.

But life isn't meant to be safe. Being safe, is a shortcut for becoming stale, for getting staid, for not living to the full. 

Yet, I, like you, stumble, and put up blocks.

I realised this the other day with startling clarity. My insurance for my tarot coaching work was up for renewal. And I did the same thing I have done for the past three years. I ignored it. And then, when the date was passed, I took my services offline. I totally, and utterly self sabotaged. Because my work has been getting busier, more successful... And whilst I love, love, love it. I succumb to that fear, over and over again. The fear that says it' couldn't possibly be as safe or as stable as employed work. And I have kids and a mortgage and blah, blah, blah.

But then I started reading 'Money, A Love Story' by Kate Northrup. And she has opened my eyes to my value. To the value I get from writing books and doing tarot coaching and that others receive from these as a result. The value is tremendous. It is immeasurable. Yet it can be measured, in money. And the work I put into avoiding this, is the product of fear.

So, for me, it always comes back to this. Stood on the precipice of another life. One where I really, truly do what I want to do. Or one where I dabble with it and exhaust myself living two lives. 

I choose the other life, the next life, the life I really want, the life I am meant for. And it's scary. Smashing blocks, is terrifying, I know this, it was terrifying with each of those four books I previously didn't think I could do, but I did... And I know it form the Cosmic Mother tarot deck, I didn't think I could design and sell, but I did.... This is my time, the kids are a bit older, I'm ready to do that particular work. Are you ready to do your work? 

I am here. And I am opening to the universe to send what I desire, and what I fear my way, and instead of dodging it when it arrives, I will damned well ride it. I am ready.

Does this ring so true for you? What are you coming up against time and time again? What are your stumbling blocks and how can you smash past them? My tarot coaching is a truly powerful tool to take them down and fly forward. Whether you are trying to boot an addiction or reach a goal, I can absolutely help. 

Come join me to smash some blocks! Let's do this thing together. This is the one life we have, and we can't sit on the fence a moment longer. Book a tarot coaching session with me by Skype and let me help you using a mix of tarot, meditation, healing and empowering NLP style chat to get where you totally deserve to be! 

I was fourteen years old when I purchased my first ever pack, Astrotarot by Russell Grant. Since then a pack of cards has never been far from my side. My initial use of tarot cards, was, of course, consumed wholly with what they could tell me about my love life. When my Wiccan dad and stepmum would read for me, all I was waiting for was the card that told me that true love was coming. Alright, forget true love, really I just wanted a nice boyfriend, a bit of a snog. Like many teenagers before me, the world revolved around me and my desires, and so for some time, that is how I used the cards, as prophesier of how likely or not I was to get hooked up. For years, and years, those cards were barren on the boyfriend front. It was frustrating. But it reflected truth. Compared to many of my school friends I was a late starter.

But then I got started... My favourite tarot memory occurred somewhere amidst the melee that was losing my virginity and drinking far too much. I was staying at my friend Jenny's house whilst her parents were on holiday. This was our very own American-style crazy spring break. We were seventeen and a little wild. We had friends round every day, parties every night, we drank illegally, and I finally hooked up with a dude. As stated this was an important two weeks: Jenny got herself a long-term boyfriend and I lost my virginity to the guy who I had harboured a crush on since, like, forever. It was a rites of passage fortnight, but one soaked in modern terms, sex, drugs, rock and roll, oh and a little bit of tarot too.

The stand out memory I have of that two weeks was not the obvious one. It was not the memory of popping my cherry, that was in fact, rather forgettable. It was instead the mega tarot session I performed for around twenty young folks who literally lined up around the side of the house for their cards to be read. These teenagers, surely, had better things to be doing, like partying and shagging. Instead the word spread and before I knew it I had a captive audience who were willing to forego the dancing, drinking and youthful fumbling and who instead submitted themselves to something a little bit spiritual.

I loved every second of those readings. They taught me something too. They taught me that beyond the laddish bravado, the drunken banter, the girls' thick make up, we are all sweet little souls, stumbling through life, looking for something a little bit deeper to grab onto. My tarot cards were a life-raft that night, they taught me about people, and they taught people a little something of their soul beyond the teenage culture of instant fulfilment. I have never felt prouder, as person after person marvelled at how I knew them, at how I had read their lives and how the advice I gave was just perfect. What an unexpected privelege.

This was a turning point. With my virginity a distant memory, my use of the cards shifted. No longer was I so concerned with that particular milestone, and instead I began to use the cards as a tool to spiritually activate and intrigue other people. At the same time, my use of tarot meant I was connecting with some fundamental universal archetypes and understandings of life. Some people take a lifetime (or several) to uncover such truths. Yet the cards afforded me a glimpse into a human spiritual condition often unfamiliar to one so young.

When I was a youth, tarot felt all-powerful. In honing my tarot skills, I felt I had an ability to connect with others. This ability was like an icebreaker in any situation. I was a shy kid really, yet with tarot cards in my hand I could talk to people on the deepest possible level. I could uncover their soul and see past all the devices and delusions that they surround themselves with, and I could see them, the true them in all their colours and dimensions. It was a beautiful experience, and one that I treasured.

I have learned over time, and with the inevitable maturing benefits of age that tarot cards are not necessarily a great party game. That special night my readings were treated with reverence and respect. Though these days I take my tarot with green tea and homemade cupcakes and would not recommend conducting sessions whilst under the influence of anything. But to be real, to keep my story honest, I will confess that my early tarot learning was set amongst the paraphernalia of youth, and, yes, that meant parties and craziness.

As I've grown into my understanding of tarot, I see them now as a good friend. One who is willing to impart fabulous, soulful, friendly advice to anyone who'd like to hear what they have to stay. Whilst tarot started out about my experience of other people, they have morphed into a roadmap to my own inner self, through them I get to know my personal intuition and my soul. Tarot are a tool for self-empowerment and inner understanding like nothing I have previously known before or since...They changed my life.

Change your life with my new tarot book Dirty & Divine; a transformative journey through Tarot (Womancraft Publishing). Available online and in any good retailer.

Preorder the Cosmic Mother Deck painted by me here...