by guest author Stanislav Reshetnikov, creator of Red Feather’s newest release: Insight Tarot.

What you seek, seeks you in return.

Zdravstvuyte!

My name is Stanislav Reshetnikov. I was born and live in Moscow, Russia. A graduate of Moscow Medical Academy, and after years working for big pharma companies, my focus shifted to psychology and the surrounding disciplines, especially the Jungian school. This way led me to complete the Moscow Association of Analytical Psychology (Jungian analysis). Now I am a tarologist, psychotherapist, trainer, leader of several thematic seminars, and creator of the Insight Tarot (both the deck and training course).

I clearly remember my first experience of connecting to the hidden reality. In my early forties, I was young, handsome, and cocky, with a family and a prospective dream job. All of a sudden, things fell apart in my life, leaving it dark and devoid of light. This may happen to anyone, at any time: one day peacefully enjoying life, everything going according to a plan, and then suddenly one misses the right turn and finds oneself in a strange place with no reverse option. I spent that month almost entirely asleep; I returned home from work, ate something, and crawled into bed, as if remaining conscious was so unbearable that sleeping was the only sanctuary. The hardest moment was my return to reality upon opening my eyes to another morning, recognizing that the coming day would consume me, and I had no desire to live it. 

Witnessing my lost soul, my friend gave me a phone number. “You should go see her; she helps in difficult situations.” As I didn’t care where to go — I followed his advice. I found myself at an old woman’s apartment; she invited me into the kitchen and asked what had happened. In no time, I was sobbing without tears, only guttural grunts arising from my cramping core. She looked at me and said, “I’m aware now, don’t say a word!” She proceeded to reach for her Tarot deck and took out the first card. I’ve always remembered the image upon that card: there was a medieval castle’s room on it with a woman near a table covering her face with her hands. On the table, there was an opened envelope and a letter that she had just read. A picture couldn’t have been more precise in reflecting my emotions at that moment. Then, she began to talk to me.

I don’t remember what she said exactly, and I don’t think it really matters. The important thing is what happened after I left: I raised my eyes to the dark and deep sky and saw a bright star above me. Overwhelmed, in that precise moment I perceived a sharp feeling of a future (and the idea that I actually would have one). That feeling remained with me on my way home, which was remarkable, as I had spent no more than an hour at her place. It was very late and quite dark both on my way there and back. But on my way there, I only saw darkness, while on my way back, all was light.

I’m grateful for that encounter. This change in the course of my life exceeded my most daring expectations. I have no regrets and often wonder what my life might have been if that hadn’t happened? It was my initiation to what is hidden behind the curtains, and Tarot was my guide.

More than eleven years have passed since that day. I have walked a very long path from my initial cautious interest, immersing myself in study as I filled my apartment with decks and Tarot literature. Eventually, I started my own practice and created my deck Insight Tarot.

What initially was conceived as pure esoterica turned – as the years passed and I got trained as a psychologist – into a concentration of Jungian ideas.

Who, I wondered, is the target audience for such a Tarot deck?

Insight Tarot is for those who find themselves inundated with a crisis of self-identity — who have lost their feeling of being alive in their own life, when the old model and vision of self and the world become obsolete. At that moment, one seeks for a new Source. And those who seek shall find. Eventually, we wake up from the dream where we are predetermined by our previous role. But we are not that role!

Every one of us carries the knowledge of multidimensionality and spiritual depth within — it is the gift we all possess. The only problem is that access to it is blocked. Too many times we have been told who and what we should be: what “foolish” and “practical” are for us, where we should go and who we should become, and what we should relate to. We believed those telling us those things and have sealed ourselves. And now life is identified with a social mask, a “persona” — kind of a tested, made-up pattern. It is comfortable, safe, and customary, but one day it becomes unbearably dull, then…depressing. Finally, life completely drains out. Then a human, so unbelievably complex and deep, flattens into a 2-D copy of a Divine Design he was once meant to be.

“I gathered in the face of Beauty incomparable, suddenly colorless and flat you became.”

–Don’t do this to yourself!

Mid-life crises (some face it even as early as their thirties) signal that it’s time to depart upon the biggest and most important journey in your life: the journey into yourself. We spent years investing ourselves to adapt to society, thinking of our success, social ranking, and finances. We were good sons and daughters, responsible parents, and excellent workers. But we have paid our dues, the account is closed, and it’s time to set out into the depths of our own Universe.

Behind this thin surface shell that represents us in the society, there is a vast bubbling abyss. It is light and dark, has angels and demons, gods and heroes, houris and beasts, love and death. Knowledge of it offers living through each day with such completeness and sense of purpose, far beyond what you might see in the movies. To contemplate oneself and those around you is more than enough.

Insight Tarot will become your guide to this knowing. As if you were granted keys from something precious, something that has been locked so deeply within that you even forgot it exists. But it does. And it’s yours. Interacting and reading with the deck will invigorate this new life-giving sense.

Insight Tarot is dedicated to those who seek that revelation and are not afraid to open their hearts for it. Discover oneself. Take ownership of oneself. There’s so much more than the pain.

Watch this brief video to explore Insight Tarot in more depth:

About the Author:

Stanislav Reshetnikov was born and lives in Moscow, Russia. He’s a graduate of Moscow Medical Academy with a specialization in pharmacology and pharmaceutical marketing. After years of successful work as a marketer for big-pharma companies and reaching top positions in business, he shifted his focus to the psychology and surrounding disciplines, especially the Jungian philosophy. This way led to completion of the Moscow association of analytical psychology (Jungian analysis). Stanislav became a skilled tarologist, psychotherapist, trainer, and leader of several popular thematic seminars and created his own course on Tarot learning, based on years of practical experience and numerous cases.