How long before you broke the seal....

I know its likely been asked before, but i am curious to find out how long it was before people went professional.

Now i know people differ on their descriptions of professional, thats a hard defination i know, it can be when you first got paid (tips included) , or simply when you felt you were a professional.

How long did it take you before you labeled yourself a professional.

I took various lessons whilst still working fulltime, so it took me 1 1/2 -2 years before i decided i was good enough to go professional (i dont count any other tarot studies i did through my teen , or early twenties as it was a bit random).

Thanks for sharing
Nik

I'm not actually sure what year I picked up my first Tarot deck, but it was somewhere in the middle or second half of the 1970s, and I was first paid for a reading in 1981. I didn't start reading regularly in public until the late eighties, though.

I think it was a gradual evolution - even if I could remember exact dates, I developed slowly, with no clearly distinct marker-days. Grew into it, perhaps.

It took me until early this year (after six years of being involved with Tarot!) to call myself "professional". I'd read for friends, and done many readings and exchanges on AT but wasn't paid for a reading until I launched my website/webshop. It was the best feeling! a really exciting day the day I received the very first order for money

Hi...

I have been reading tarot for over 12 years friends chat rooms etc to practice....

but I would say professionally just over 7 years since i did my first f2f expo.....Healthy Body and Soul Expo..... those were the times I charged $5 10 min just 5 cards readings or $25 for 21 cards half hr reading now I charge $15 for 10 mins or $40 normally 30 mins.....

My full reading always $40.......unless they ask for more..........it is an agreed price....lol...

It has been an incredible journey of quiet times then suddenly it has been really busy... such a roller coaster ride.......

Vesta

It took me 4 years to build up the confidence to read for others and about a month more before I started charging! I would have progessed much faster had I been doing readings for friends and family much, much sooner.

When did I?

At the point when the number of people insisting they pay me outweighed my resistance to treating a Tarot reading like a gig. In calendar time, in my case, it was probably 5 or 6 years, but I was very young when I started. I didn't call myself a pro reader until enough clients were paying me that complete strangers started contacting me on the basis of word of mouth. They let me know and that was that.

I feel like the public always lets you know. If you've read for a couple hundred strangers, there gets to be a point where people start leaving money on the table because you're giving them value. I always think of that moment as the dividing line between professional and hobbyist. When you are providing value for money that compels payment...

Inevitably I think context is everything. Nothing is the same is anything else. How much are you using the cards? How often do you read? How many kinds of reading do you feel comfortable offering? What's your venue? Do you give good dog-n-pony? Do you and your ppotential market intersect in ability and interest? Can you handle the boring professional things like promotion and networking and patter? Do people come back? Are you any good? How good are you? Most importantly, do you get results?

Bottom line: whenever readers are asking if they're ready, they aren't. "The readiness is all."

Scion said:

Bottom line: whenever readers are asking if they're ready, they aren't.

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It sounds like one of those glib, proverbial truisms that really, really annoy people, but I think there's actually a large spadeful of truth in it. And I'm really not trying to put anyone down. Questioning indicates inner doubt. Boasting also indicates inner doubt. Be comfortable in your own Tarot-skin, and you don't even question (or boast about) your professionalism, any more than you would about having brown hair or five toes on each foot.

Exactly. LOL

And it does sound awful to say it like that, but like many awful things, it's true. It's a little bit how I feel when people ask how you know you're a writer and the answer is virtually identical.

Fear is the mindkiller and all that.

Scion said:

Do you give good dog-n-pony?

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I'm so sorry to hijack the thread . . . but this question totally floored me!

Scion, what the hell does this mean? Coz I know it can't mean what it reads like to me . . .

To address the question - I sell readings on etsy but I don't call myself a professional. I don't think I'll ever call myself a pro, no matter what happens, because I simply don't want to turn what I am so utterly passionate about into a career. Umbrae and his minions always say, "It's not about you, it's about the sitter."

That's not the case for me.

I read Tarot for me. Occasionally, I read for others; occasionally, I read for someone who pays me to. In all cases, I give my all and do great readings, but it is always about me. Not the reading, obviously; but I do it because I want to, and that makes it about me.

So why do I sell readings? Hey, I like the opportunity to be able to make some extra money in my non-work time, and it also brings my reading to another audience, hence providing me with more opportunities to read for people outside my head. Plus it adds funds to augment my deck and bag collection I know there are some kinds of free reading sites where people do readings, but I've never found one I used to do a lot of readings on here . . . that just got very fraught for me, and continues to be, so I don't do it so much now.

\m/ Kat

Nothing vile , Kat. I promise...

I meant more along the lines of providing a reading that is fulfilling and memorable as well as informative. Whether that takes the form or mystique, or the gift of gab, or even props and magickal cred. In the US a "dog-n-pony show" is just an idiomatic expression referring to the expected bang-for-buck entertainment value that the average consumer expects to experience before they feel justified in parting with their dollars.