Gifts and Secrets

In this session, I was more excited going in than I was for a few others after just quickly scanning through the review of the session in our manuals of the weekend convention. Karen Wyman was the leader of this workshop as well, which also made me excited because she conducted an amazing workshop that I previously attended.
The room was set up in a circle, as were a lot of other workshops that I was a part of, and the lights were all shut off except for a few to create a more relaxing atmosphere. We went around the room stating our first names and a one word wish for something we want for ourselves. Karen took us through relaxing breathing techniques so we could become more intuitive to our thoughts and to ourselves in general.
After taking us through this silent relaxing exercise, we were asked to walk up to a table where there were face-down tarot cards laid out for us to each pick four. Once we picked out our cards, we needed to go back to our seats and then study all four of them and try to relate ourselves to what we see in the cards.
After a few moments of analyzing the cards, Karen asked us all to each pick out one card that we felt reached out to our lives the most. This part was hard because some of the cards were more difficult to interpret than others, but once we finally figured it out, we held our chosen card out in front of us until everyone was finished. After everyone was done, Karen had each of us go around the circle and explain why each card reached out to us the most. All but one woman seemed very comfortable with this exercise and opened up themselves a little bit to the rest of us, including myself. Once we were finished, we placed that one chosen tarot card down in front of us on the floor and held the other three in our hands to further analyze.
Next, Karen had asked us to turn our cards upside down, shuffle them a little bit, and arbitrarily chose one and hand it to the woman to the right of us in the circle. The person that we handed the card to then had to explain what they thought your card meant in conjunction with your life from what you have already told the circle from your previous card. This was a nice exercise because it was amazing to see how much all the women listened to one another and the input they shared.
After that was finished, we still had two remaining cards left in our hands. At that point, Karen asked us all to chose one card and give it to another person in the circle that we thought it belonged to as well, and then we needed to explain to them why we thought the card belonged to them. It was interesting to see why other women chose to give certain cards away, and it was very touching in other ways to realize how much we all seemed to care about the other 'strangers' in the circle. This part of the workshop seemed to touch everyone in a much more concerning way. You could see certain faces light up after being surprised that another women had read them so well.
Afterward we only had one more card in our hands. Karen told us that the last card represents one major message that we should be taking that corresponded with our current lives in general. We were told to take a few minutes to analyze the card, and think deeply about the potential meanings of each one. Some women, (myself included,) needed to ask the circle for help in understanding their card, as some cards were more misleading than others. Other women had a direct connection to the card. We each went around the circle and explained how our last card related to our lives and what the main message could be. It it nice to say that some women were left with a satisfying feeling, and others took their cards as motivational messages, and others found themselves opening up to the rest of the circle and coming out with feelings that they have never even released before to anyone else.
The fact that we were comfortable enough to talk about our personal lives, and even be trusted enough to listen to other the women's deepest emotions and life struggles was touching on its own. Even if the cards did not make you feel like you learned something or recieved a universal message, we all at least had the oppertunity to actually stop for an hour and a half and think about OURSELVES, (for once!) The exercise was not too difficult because the cards did not only have words on them, but Karen explained in the introduction of the workshop that tarot cards were invented so that people that were illiterate could also interpret them as well. I feel like all of the women in the circle certainly bonded to one another in a way that we were not expecting to when we walked in to the workshop. It was a very rewarding experience, and in my opinion a great way to end such an amazing weekend of learning, educating, and enlightenment.