Thursday, April 9, 2015

The Lovers – Love me tender, love me sweet

Joie de Vivre Tarot, The Lovers, Paulina CassidyToday’s card is The Lovers from the Joie de Vivre Tarot. As I have stated before, often in a personal reading this card symbolizes my relationship with myself.
We see two trusting lovers going on a journey together. They are holding hands, gazing in each other’s eyes and a little bird is flying back en forth, carrying love letters.
I like how their cloaks have such large ears so they can truly be attentive to each other’s thoughts and needs.
It is a timely card for me. A reminder to give my Self love practice some much needed attention. As many of my generation, I was raised to be humble and not to draw attention to skills I was proud of, or knowledge I had gained. It was also considered ill mannered to tend to your own needs first. Instead you should take care of others and hope and pray they would do the same for you.
Much later in my life I learned to trust, nurture and love myself and be proud of what I have accomplished so far in my life. Yes and even to celebrate this. Still it feels strange to compliment myself and accept who I am. And to go even further, not only accept who I am but to love and embrace myself fully. I thought I was fairly kind to myself. But then I realized kindness is not Love.

So I am going to start a “courtship” with myself by writing me a beautiful love letter. I hope this will be the start of an encouraging an uplifting self talk in my journal.

20 comments:

  1. I remember talking in my college days to a young woman from Sweden. She told me how it was impressed upon her growing up not to be "better than" or attempt to excel in any way. That stunned me, as here in America we are taught just the opposite. I think neither extreme works very well!

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    1. I have even experienced a difference between growing up in the east of the Netherlands and the south west. When I was in first grade (In the East) we would compliment our own work and ask for conformation of our peers. In the S.W however I had to put down my work( even though I loved it) in the hope others be so kind to deny it. I've lived their until my adult years

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  2. each new dawn is a reason to celebrate our self...go for it.

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  3. Self-love is something I have to focus on more as well. I can be very self-criticizing sometimes...especially about my artwork or anything I care a lot about. We all have the ability to improve and grow, but that shouldn't be used as an excuse to degrade who we are in the present.

    On a separate note, I really adore this depiction of The Lovers. I do not own the deck but I've been toying with the idea of purchasing an art print of this card.

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    1. Ha ha don't get me started about criticizing my own artwork. :)
      Yes this depiction is so cute. I like working with this deck especially when I could use a bit of Joie de Vivre in my life

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  4. That's a lovely idea, Ellen. I don't know what I would say in one to myself. Kind of telling in itself.

    I always liked this Lovers version. At first, I thought they were on one 'horse', which I still see if I glance quickly. I like that, since it shows them as individuals and partners, all at the same time.

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    1. You might surprise yourself Steve, as did I while writing my letter :D

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  5. Well I relate to what you are saying Ellen. It has taken me a long time to really know, understand, what it means to love and really accept myself, both the positive, and the shadow side and then to actually do it.
    I 'm of the belief we need to love ourselves the way the Creator loves us, and that is with kindness, and mercy and with great compassion.

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    1. I like that thought Catherine.
      Maybe it is that Divine spark in each of us that makes us capable of loving ourselves wholeheartedly.

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    2. Definitely what I think and believe! It's one thing to say it another thing to do it. It's the long journey from head to heart that is the hard part. <3

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    3. Your comment has put me on the right track Cath!

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    4. It's a wonderful thing to be able to help one another this way. :) <3

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  6. What a beautiful practice, Ellen, to write a love letter to yourself. I think that could be very healing. As humans we often tend to live outside ourselves, not giving ourselves the same attention and kindness that we try to give to others.

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    1. Your are right: first everyone else and for ourselves we have the some leftovers :D
      Writing this letter was a very illuminating thing to do!

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  7. I'm really happy for you Ellen that you are writing this letter to yourself. It is very healing and affirming for yourself. I have done this exercise at different times in my life. I also wrote one to my father and my brother. It's a way to let go and to let others you love including yourself know your deepest feelings.

    I remember when one of my best friends told me about writing letters to my father. I thought, that is foolish, but I was simply afraid of my feelings, and didn't want to feel the pain. But I did it anyway and yes, I sure as heck felt a lot of pain, but it needed to be released and then I could finally move forward. One of those adventures we were talking about!

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    1. Thank you for the encouragement but writing a letter to the ones that caused me pain and/or grief is an adventure I don't dare to go on yet. As you say this will cause pain and that scares me

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    2. I empathize Ellen with how you feel.
      You can choose not to send it. I chose to send mine. I never did receive any responses. But I did it for myself, no one else. You have to be ready to do it. I never, ever imagined I'd be able to do this. But it helped me release all the stuff I was hanging on to within myself. <3

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  8. Writing letters, to yourself or to others who have hurt you, whether you send them or not, is a marvellous exercise. I've been to a holistic holiday centre a few times where they encouraged us to write a letter to ourselves at the end of the fortnight, telling ourselves what we'd learned and wanted to take with us. They then posted the letters to us about six weeks later. It was always a lovely reminder to receive and read it, and see whether I was still living the lessons learned :) Perhaps you could mail your letter in a sealed envelope to a friend and ask them to send it back to you in a couple of months time...

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    1. That is a great idea. which I will remember for sure! (I'll even jot it down in my journal just in case). I think I can persuade one of my girls to play the part of the postman :)

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