About FVNERAL of False Selves

A Tarot student’s notebook. A funeral for the selves that kept me alive.

I set out to understand why I kept getting in my own way. Why my body braced for impact when there was no threat. Why I said yes when I meant no. Why I disappeared into roles I never wanted to actually live.

Tarot found me through the back door—a deck on my husband’s shelf, a book by Lon Milo DuQuette, a curiosity that became a lifeline.

I always wanted to understand tarot more, but I never knew how to apply them to my life. Doing readings left me feeling like, “well what do I do with that?”

Especially the “reverse” meaning on cards. I just wasnt able to find the right meanings and I have learned the best way I learn, is to write. So I started this tarot study.

The cards kept showing me my own ghosts.

What This Album Is

FVNERAL is 27 songs that walk through the 22 Major Arcana of the Thoth Tarot—reversed. Each card became a ghost: a survival identity that once protected me, then outgrew its welcome.

• The Hesitator (Fool reversed) — paralysis disguised as caution.

• The Deflector (Magician reversed) — power turned away from itself.

• The Escapist (High Priestess reversed) — mystery as a hiding place.

• The Smotherer (Empress reversed) — care that becomes control.

And so on, all the way to The Mimic (World reversed) — the one who borrowed everyone else’s self because the original went missing.

Between them, four gates (Yod, Heh, Vav, Heh final) — breaths between descents. And a closing seal (the LBRP) that doesn’t end the ritual, just grounds it: Walk forward.

What I Am Still Learning (Not Learned)

I am not a tarot teacher. I am a student who wrote songs to understand what the cards were showing me.

If I rewrote this album a year from now, it would be different. My understanding changes as I change. That’s the point. Tarot isn’t a fixed doctrine—it’s a mirror that reflects whoever stands in front of it.

I studied Crowley’s Book of Thoth. I read Lon Milo DuQuette until his voice became a permission slip to be human about this stuff. I leaned on Jung to understand shadow work, Abraham-Hicks to understand alignment, Louise Hay to talk to my body, Sarno and Ozanich to listen to what pain was saying. I pulled from every teacher who helped me breathe.

This album is my practice. I wrote these songs to myself.

If you want to learn tarot, go to the teachers. They’re real. They’ve done the work. I’m just a mom in Omaha, standing in a kitchen with a toddler, trying to bury enough ghosts so I can show up real for the people I love.

This is what I saw in the cards. This is what the walk showed me. I leave it here as breadcrumbs, in case any other curious crows want to know what’s possible when you stop running from your own reflection.

The Architecture: Movements (with Tarot Cards)

I’m still new to tarot. This was my first deep study. The cards showed me a map, and the map broke into three movements. I’ll list them here with the card names—both the traditional ones and Crowley’s Thoth names where he changed them—so you can follow along if you want.

First movement: Defense mechanisms
Hesitator → Rider
The selves that kept me safe by keeping me small.

• The Fool → Hesitator

• The Magician → Deflector

• The High Priestess → Escapist

• The Empress → Smotherer

• The Emperor → Commander

• The Hierophant → Gatekeeper

• The Lovers → Split

• The Chariot → Rider

Each one was a survival logic that eventually became a cage.

Second movement: Distortions of self
Bender → Overmixer
What happens when survival patterns calcify.

• Justice (Crowley: Adjustment) → Bender

• The Hermit → Withdrawn

• The Wheel of Fortune → Spinner

• Strength (Crowley: Lust) → Indulger

• The Hanged Man → Bracer

• Death → Embalmer

• Temperance (Crowley: Art) → Overmixer

The middle arc, where the body starts speaking louder than the mind.

Third movement: Attachments and dissolution
Pacifier → Mimic
Deeper fixations. The false center gives way.

• The Devil → Pacifier

• The Tower → Patcher

• The Star → Hoarder

• The Moon → Nightmare

• The Sun → Pretender

• Judgement (Crowley: The Aeon) → Should

• The World (Crowley: The Universe) → Mimic

What’s left after all the ghosts are buried isn’t a triumphant new self—just presence.

“The original is missing. Maybe it’s me.”

A Note on Names

Aleister Crowley renamed several Major Arcana in his Thoth deck to fit his Thelemic current:

• Strength → Lust

• Temperance → Art

• Justice → Adjustment

• Judgement → The Aeon

• The World → The Universe

I kept some of Crowley’s names (Lust, Art, Adjustment,) and returned to traditional names for the others. The ghost names are my own—my translation of each card into a survival identity. I changed them because each card showed me a “reverse” version of myself I’d never named—and once named, it could be buried.

If you want to study the cards yourself, I recommend Lon Milo DuQuette’s Understanding Aleister Crowley’s Thoth Tarot. It’s the book that unlocked this for me. I’m just a student walking the path; he’s a real teacher.

The Body as Witness

I learned from TMS literature (Sarno, Ozanich, Hay) that pain isn’t random. It’s a signal. My jaw locked when I was silencing myself. My back seized when I was carrying what wasn’t mine. My stomach burned when I was swallowing what I should have said.

Each ghost in this album has a somatic signature.

Hands jitter, jaw shivers — stomach quivers.
Cramps rattle my bones. Break my own body to be caretaker.
My back goes out when I won’t. Neck locks when I can’t say no.

The body doesn’t lie. The body remembers. The body will break the silence the mind tries to keep.

On Card Names

A quick note on names—because tarot has a history of being renamed by those who worked with it deeply.

Aleister Crowley renamed several Major Arcana in his Thoth deck to better align with his Thelemic current:

Traditional (RWS)Crowley’s ThothStrengthLustTemperanceArtJusticeAdjustmentThe StarThe Star (unchanged)The MoonThe Moon (unchanged)The SunThe Sun (unchanged)JudgementThe AeonThe WorldThe Universe

He also swapped the attributions of The Star and The Emperor, moving The Emperor to Aries and The Star to Aquarius (which I followed, since I worked from Thoth correspondences).

For FVNERAL, I kept some of Crowley’s names and returned to traditional names for others. The ghosts themselves—the titles you see as song names—are my own translations of each card into a survival identity.

Where I kept Crowley’s names:

• Lust (Strength) → my ghost: Indulger

• Art (Temperance) → my ghost: Overmixer

• Adjustment (Justice) → my ghost: Bender

• The Aeon (Judgement) → my ghost: Should

• The Universe (The World) → my ghost: Mimic

Where I kept the traditional names:

• The Fool → Hesitator

• The Magician → Deflector

• The High Priestess → Escapist

• The Empress → Smotherer

• The Emperor → Commander

• The Hierophant → Gatekeeper

• The Lovers → Split

• The Chariot → Rider

• The Hermit → Withdrawn

• The Wheel of Fortune → Spinner

• The Hanged Man → Bracer

• Death → Embalmer

• The Devil → Pacifier

• The Tower → Patcher

• The Star → Hoarder

• The Moon → Nightmare

• The Sun → Pretender

I didn’t change names to be clever. I changed them because each card showed me a version of myself I’d never named—and once named, it could be buried.

If you’re curious about the original Thoth names, I highly recommend Lon Milo DuQuette’s Understanding Aleister Crowley’s Thoth Tarot. It’s the clearest guide I found. I’m just a student who walked the cards and wrote down what I saw.

The Crow

Crow is not me. Crow is the witness who doesn’t flinch. The one who names what’s stuck without shaming it. She appears throughout the album—sometimes as a voice, sometimes as a presence, always as a reminder:

You are not your ghosts. You are the one who buries them.

Crow doesn’t teach. Crow reframes. Crow asks the question that moves the work forward.

What if mystery is not the veil—but the fear behind it?
You can’t call it faith if it never risks you.
If I stop being yours, who am I?

Crow holds the funeral. The listener walks out.

The Date

The album releases April 8 at 7:04 PM (1904 military time).

This date chose itself as I was finishing the record.

April 8–10, 1904, is when Crowley received The Book of the Law. The birth of Thelema. “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the Law.”

I’ve been chewing on lines from that book throughout this album—and in other songs, and will keep studying it for years to come. Crowley is a teacher I return to again and again. So when the release date revealed itself, mid‑study, mid‑writing, it felt like a wink. A current recognizing a student who showed up.

I’m not claiming lineage. I’m not a Thelemite. I’m someone who stumbled into a current that was already moving, and the date hummed. I listened.

I use the Book of the Law in my work because its language helps me name what I’m living. If you know the history, you’ll feel the gravity. If you don’t, the album will still hold you. Numbers carry energy whether we name it or not.

What Remains

When I finished the last song, I sat in my kitchen. The same spot where most of this work arrived. Two mirrors, a black mat, a photo of my granny. The toddler was asleep. The house was quiet.

I thought about the ghosts. All the selves I buried. The Hesitator who finally stepped. The Escapist who learned to eat first. The Smotherer who let go. The Mimic who found her own voice.

They’re not enemies. They were protectors. They did their job. Now they rest.

What’s left isn’t a finished person. It’s a clearing. Space to move. Space to grow. Space to be wrong and keep going.

I’m not teaching tarot. I’m showing what happens when you let the cards read you.

If you’re curious about this work—go find your own teachers. Lon Milo DuQuette’s Understanding Aleister Crowley’s Thoth Tarot is where I started. Jung is waiting. Abraham is waiting. Louise Hay is waiting. Sarno is waiting. The cards are waiting.

I’m just a student, standing in a kitchen, leaving breadcrumbs.

May you find your own ghosts. May you bury them with care. May you walk forward.

A little crow’s on the wire, keeping watch over you. 🐦‍⬛