By Pops Peterson
Photographs by Ben Garver
I was apprehensive, almost fearful, to have my first tarot card reading by Sheilaa L Hite at Crystal Essence in Great Barrington. I’d recently abandoned my life in Manhattan to run my new business, SEVEN salon.spa, and I was in a funk. The beauty business was a lonely and foreign world for me, having spent my previous life as a freelance writer, singer, and web guru. I knew Sheilaa couldn’t cast a magic spell and fix my depression with the cards. I only hoped she would convince me her gift was real, and that her intuition would offer me some relief.
As I took a seat at her table, I was sizing her up. A mane of cascading curly black braids framed her pretty face and bright red lips, and her large brown eyes were checking me out, as well. She didn’t look happy.
“You’re on a small raft, adrift at sea,” she declared, reading her eight-card spread taken from two decks of my choosing. In my hands she had also placed three 12-sided, transparent dice, which I was instructed to roll after envisioning a color and a number. “You feel alone and totally out of your element.”
Her thoughtful, accurate assessment wasn’t sugar coating anything, so she won my trust. And by the end of the hour-long session, she did offer me the hope I longed for. She predicted my neglected talents for music and performing would come together in an exciting way in the spring, and the veil of depression would also be lifted by then. After the three-month wait, not only was my gloom gone, but I unexpectedly found myself featured as a singer in my first national TV commercial!
In the 17 years since that encounter, my love and admiration for Sheilaa have steadily grown. I marvel at how she continues to thrive in a career with no guarantees, help, or guidance other than what she gleans from the spirits. Her practice in tarot and astrology has grown to include authoring books, a monthly blog, YouTube and Instagram content, and a sideline as a tour guide, taking groups on spiritual journeys to discover Paris and the Pyramids. But how does one embark on such an esoteric path? It seems Sheilaa was born for this role.
“At birth, my grandmother told my mother and father that I would be a special child,” said Sheilaa when we met recently in her apartment in Lenox. “I was to be dressed in certain colors and listened to carefully. When the cadence in my voice changed, my parents were supposed to follow what I said.” Sheilaa’s late parents did indeed follow her sometimes random commands, changing their daily schedules or routes or avoiding situations, which Sheilaa assumes may have prevented accidents or worse fates. Those parents were also conservative professionals, her father a union organizer turned marriage counselor and her mother a nurse turned psychologist, living in Hyde Park, a mixed, middleclass neighborhood in Chicago. And while they routinely obeyed her voice from beyond as well as her dreams, they were vehemently opposed to her pursuing a career based on these same intuitive abilities. “They wanted me to get ‘a real job.’ So I learned I had to live my life without their approval. When this worked, it amazed them!”
What amazes me about Sheilaa is that I always feel better after I meet with her. When I’m struggling with a career decision, or worried about a personal situation, I never regret consulting Sheilaa’s cards.
“I love my work,” said Sheilaa. “I love that I’ve been chosen to do it and I love that I’m good at it. Helping people to be happy and feel empowered makes me happy. Life is a grand adventure, and we are meant to enjoy and grow from the experience.”
Tune Up Your Intuition
You don’t have to be a medium to trust your gut. Here are a few simple exercises from Sheilaa to help you get started.
Notice recurring thoughts of someone or something. Very often you’re receiving a message that you’ll be interacting with them soon.
Write down your dreams. Many important personal messages are given to us in our dreams. The more attention you pay to them, the more you’ll understand your own intuitive “code.”
Try “quiet casting.” It’s like casting a fishing net into a lake. Sit quietly and let the thoughts float or drift through your mind and see what information falls into your intuitive “net.”
Pay attention to synchronicity. Synchronicity is what happens when a combination of seemingly unrelated events come together in such a way that the combined events spell out a personal message to you.
Listen to your body. Notice whether you feel comfortable and safe or anxious and fearful in a situation or around certain people. Please pay attention to those feelings and act accordingly!
Sheilaa’s Astrological Forecast
Here’s an intuitive “heads up” for the coming months: Since 2025 is a numerological “9” year, as well as the Year of the Snake in Chinese astrology, and the planet Pluto has moved into the visionary sign of Aquarius, we’ll have a lot of opportunities and help from unexpected sources and circumstances that will assist us in reinventing ourselves and finally creating the hopes, wishes, and dreams that had to take a back seat to the old status quo of the past.
As this spring sets the stage for the transformation and renewal that these times call for, there will be a fair amount of turmoil (there always is with any kind of change), but that turmoil is the useful kind—it’s like the necessary combining of ingredients in a mixing bowl. The key to moving through it all successfully is to approach the experience as an enriching opportunity, to not take anything personally, and to acknowledge and honor yourself.
