We were lucky to catch up with Emily McGill recently and have shared our conversation below.
Emily, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Was there a moment in your career that meaningfully altered your trajectory? If so, we’d love to hear the backstory.
For as long as I can remember, I wanted a life in the theatre. The only thing that mattered in my life was doing what I loved in community. Working on Broadway was my only goal, and I was fortunate to achieve it early on, as a publicist, communications consultant, and event producer. But I got burned out.
When the pandemic hit and live entertainment shut down, I had an opportunity to reconsider where I was in life and what I actually wanted. An intuitive hit to go back to grad school was strong enough to share with my therapist, who suggested I explore the Spirituality Mind Body Institute at Columbia University. I began following the ‘yes’es and earned my Master’s in Spiritual Psychology with a thesis on tarot as an effective tool for self-reflection.
Combining these two loves has been a long time coming, and in September 2024 Running Press released my first tarot deck, The Hirschfeld Broadway Tarot. This deck has been such a gift in bridging the worlds that have made me who I am today. We see so many archetypes in both tarot and theatre, and the overlap has been fun to map out.
Emily, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
In my work doing transformative spiritual care, my role is to serve as a mirror—reflecting back what clients might not see or fully realize about themselves. This is rare in a world where others often project their biases, opinions, and expectations onto us. I offer a judgment-free space where you can explore your true self clearly.
My approach to spirituality and tarot is deeply rooted in ethics and empowerment. Spirituality is a highly personal experience. And tarot isn’t about mystical secrets or predicting the future; it’s a tool—a mirror in its own right—that invites you to engage with your subconscious and the collective unconscious. The magic lies not in the practices or cards themselves but in how they resonate with your experiences and open new perspectives and pathways of thought.
I work with private spirituality coaching clients, bring tarot readings to events from New York Fashion Week to the United Nations, and keynotes for theatres and organizations to talk about how these two seemingly different things, tarot and Broadway, relate – and of course The Hirschfeld Broadway Tarot is available now and makes an excellent holiday gift!
Ultimately, the work I do isn’t about handing out answers; it’s about guiding you to access your own. It’s like granting yourself VIP access to the most valuable thing you have: your Self. Too often, we deny ourselves that access. My goal is to help you reclaim it.
Other than training/knowledge, what do you think is most helpful for succeeding in your field?
While I was fortunate to attend an Ivy League program dedicated to spirituality, there are so many people doing this work without the academic rigor and credentials that I chose to pursue. What unites ethical and legitimate practitioners is life experience and their own practice. Walking the talk.
It’s easy to prescribe spiritual practices or suggest modalities, but prioritizing yours when life throws you a curveball is its own challenge. Morning meditations and self-hypnosis, pulling a daily tarot card, and saying my morning prayers have become non-negotiable. Even when traveling, I prepare a small altar and keep my morning rituals.
Perspective is the other tool that is most helpful – being able to see things from a vantage point that is foreign to others allows me to shed light on angles or ideas that they hadn’t considered. That’s where some of my biggest magic lies. Often my seekers will ask whether they’re experiencing a tarot reading or a therapy session. I am not a licensed therapist, but the sessions feel therapeutic.
We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?
All my life I’ve felt like an outsider. Someone who doesn’t naturally click with the way the world around me works. For the longest time it made me believe there was something wrong with me. It turns out I’m neurodivergent and it is one of my greatest gifts!
As a child, I was one of those kids that got sent to another classroom every week for GATE (gifted and talented education). I followed instructions to the T when they made sense to me, and completely ignored them when they didn’t. Puzzles and logic games were my idea of fun. Anything that captured my curiosity was worthwhile, but if it didn’t hook me, I was a goner.
I had no idea these were all indicators of neurodivergence, but give me a list of symptoms and I’ll tell you how long I’ve been compensating for mine.
Entering the workforce was a different game. I learned the coded intricacies of office dynamics and tried desperately to navigate the unspoken social rules that eluded me. The hypervigilance was exhausting and completely unsustainable. Something had to change.
Thankfully my therapy journey deepened and I began releasing others’ expectations and assumptions about how to move through the world. I began to embrace my neurodivergence and even celebrate it. The gift taught me magic could be made out of the hardest experiences.
One thing that hasn’t changed over the last few decades is my ability to quickly read a situation and consider multiple solutions to problems that no one noticed yet. These days, it is a superpower to continue learning about myself, my needs, and being curious about solutions.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.emilymcgillentertainment.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/emilyannemcg/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/emilyannemcg/
- Other: https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/emily-mcgill/the-hirschfeld-broadway-tarot/9780762486984/
Image Credits
Laurel Hinton
Genevieve Rafter Keddy