Gabriela Herstik could easily be the main character from a best-selling spicy witchcore fantasy book. You can't help but ask, "Who is this witch?" when you meet her and then follow her into oblivion, only to continuously be enchanted by her. I should know – I've done so for over a decade. 

When I first met Gaby, it was in Twitter's innocent and halcyon days; she was an earnest intern for a burgeoning platform at the time that I wrote for. There was an inherent sweetness to her that was not hiding behind her fashionable edge. Still, instead of being diminished, all this sweetness was uplifted by the punkiness of her Vivienne Westwood-style outfits and the dramatic swoop of her hair – pure charm and light while not shying away from the shadow. 

A well-researched writer with a poetic flair for words, a sexual ceremonialist who has learned from and collaborated with some of the most remarkable teachers, and a glamour magician of the highest order, Gaby has written for platforms like Cosmo, Nylon, Vice, Flaunt and more before she blessed us with five books.

I recently sat down with her on the launch date of her latest offering – a tarot deck and book, Goddess of Love Tarot, dedicated to embodying the erotic divine feminine. 

NB: How are you feeling? It's the birth of your Goddess of Love tarot deck today! 

GH: I'm so blown away by people's reception of it and also… I'm kind of over it! It's still my baby, but now that it's out in the world, I can surrender and trust in the deck to take care of itself, live its own life, and do its own thing. 

NB: Yeah, I get it! You create a lot. I mean, you put out a lot of content! You've published four books, written many articles, and constantly posted on Instagram. You're creating so much that I can understand how you're ready to move on to the next thing.

GH: Yes! It is the fifth release, and I have another book out in March. I'm also getting really excited about my upcoming podcast. I'm happy to have something free for people, and that's a different medium. I'm an air sign. I love talking! Having something a little different than just writing has been nice.

NB: I remember when I first met you (on the internet) in 2011 on Twitter. I looked at your account and was in love because you were like a tiny fairy with this badass goth Lookbook page. 

GH: Oh my God! Yes. My fashion blogger past. Yeah. Lookbook was the shit. Miss her, miss her every day. I still think about making a profile and uploading my outfits there because I love a good outfit photo! 

NB: You said that you’re ready to move forward and into your new things, but I still would love to know more about the Goddess of Love tarot deck. What inspired it?

GH: Oh my god, of course, I love talking about this shit. The Goddess of love and sexuality are my favorite things to talk about, which says a lot for an air sign who can talk about anything! I've worked with Tarcher Perigee for all my books. They approached me about making a tarot deck. I've been a student of the tarot since I was 13, right around the time I started witchcraft, but during the pandemic, I got really, really deep into my studies of the tarot and of the Kabbalah Tree of Life, which started me working with the tarot through that lens. As a devotee of the Goddess of love, this was the idea that I couldn't stop thinking about. All of my books, all the classes I teach, my exploration of my sacred sexuality through sex work – all of that for me is devotion to the Goddess of love. 

NB: I would love to hear more about how you brought all of the different goddesses of love into your deck. 

GH: The last book I published, Sacred Sex, was part of the inspiration. I'm very passionate and obsessed with sacred sexuality and eroticism and with the ways that those tie into the goddesses of love. From Inanna to Ishtar, Venus, Vesta, Hathor, and Babalon, I knew I wanted to create a tarot deck that I could use – that people could use for readings around romance, sacred sexuality, and lust, if they were having relationship problems, wanted insight, or wanted to read about a hookup or crush, especially as a tool to connect to the Goddess. I wanted people to return to something more than just the tarot deck, something more than just divination, but a tool that became a spiritual practice in honor of the Goddess of love. I wanted it to not just be from one pantheon or one tradition, but to connect all these different archetypes, all of these goddesses, all of these cultures, all of these energies while also respecting where these goddesses come from – from the cultures and the peoples they originate from. I also wanted the suits to reflect sex magic, embodiment, shadow, and goddess worship. Each suit has its own theme. The wands are sex magic, the cups are love magic, the swords are shadow magic and patterns around love, and the pentacles are how we embody that through the earth, through embodiment practices. I also wanted this deck to reflect the Goddess's journey of entering the Underworld and coming out transformed with a new experience and embodied wisdom. It was really important for me for the booklet that accompanied the deck to be more of a book with rituals and affirmations rather than a booklet. 

NB: This sounds so you – I can't wait to get mine! 

GH: Yes, thank you! I'm so grateful. I was really inspired by my devotion to my own practice. And I also feel that we need the Goddess so severely. Not because we're trying to flip the patriarchy and make it like Barbie – patriarchy with women on top and just patriarchy and pink – but to bring the pendulum back to a state of balance between the masculine and feminine. I'm passionate about bringing the Goddess to everybody – to every kind of expression of gender and sexuality out there! Because it is, to me, a frequency that we all have a connection to. It also helps that the deck is beautiful because I know I like having tangible tools that evoke beauty and are pretty to look at. It's a tool to help people connect to the Goddess within and outside of themselves.