Wheel of Fortune - Never lose your sense of wonder

Back from a pleasant visit to my mother, I am more than ready to jump into the wonderful month of October. This month I am planning to participate in two Instagram challenges; Yes Two! I don’t know if I will finish them, but for now I am excited to take part in both of them.

The first one is #shadowworkoctober themed "Cycles of Self" by @mnomquah and the second is #embracethemagical by Kelly from @thetruthinstory. I will be sharing bits and pieces from these challenges on my blog especially when they are not overly private. I guess the shadow work challenge will be the most personal one. 

Today’s word from #embracethemagical to draw a card with is: Wonder and I drew the Wheel of Fortune from the Deviant Moon Tarot. According to the dictionary wonder means: something strange and surprising; a cause of surprise, astonishment, or admiration or a miraculous deed or event.

The Wheel of Fortune is all about the ups and downs in life. Call it fate or destiny but the core of the matter is that life is in a constant state of flux. Whenever we are caught in a downward spiral, we know things will change for the better and whenever things are going swell, we feel in our gut this cannot last. But besides looking at the wheel and hoping or fearing what the next spin will bring we can also try to focus ourselves on the wonders our life is showing us moment by moment.  By looking through the eyes of a child to whatever comes our way, we can add so much wonder to our day to day life. It can be such a relief to zoom in to the magical tiny details of life and let the grand scheme of things be for a while.

"Whatever happens, always be on the lookout for the presence of wonder" - E.B. White

New Moon in May

For this New Moon I've drawn two cards as usual. The first one for the energy I am going to release and the second one for the energy which is beneficial for me to embrace. From the Wild Unknown Tarot I drew:

Release - Wheel of Fortune

This card is all about flowing with the ups and downs in life, while trying to maintain the center position of the wheel. Accepting of and adapting to every situation life throws at you and making the most of it. Being a very controlling person I imagine this card would be quite a challenge as an embrace card, so to see this card in the release position for me today, it tells me I need to let go of the urge to untie the knots of all these colored ropes and ribbons and sort them by color, length and material. The more I fiddle with them, the tighter the knots are going to get. I want to try to let go and to give life a chance to unfold on its own accord. Life doesn’t need me to hold the strings like a puppeteer. 

I could learn a lot from the owl in the left upper corner. She is sitting there so relaxed, observing how the wheel turns and not giving it too much thought. I think she is more curious to find out if I have it in me to show the same detachment as she does..

Embrace – The Moon

Lately I have noticed that I am quite adept in running from  difficult and confusing feelings and situations. I can bury myself in numerous distractions so I don’t have the time to deal with what matters most. Me!

The first stirring of discomfort became noticeable when I was working with the Five of Cups, which I dropped very soon after.  But just like everything in Spring, when something has budded, there is no stopping it anymore. I tried to cover things up for my birthday and now that has passed, the Moon card is calling out loudly and persistently. It’s time to get real with how and what I feel.  Just acknowledging my feelings can be a good start. Also I need to try to find out what is I love and dream of or fear and hide from. 

Like The wheel of Fortune, this card is also about cycles; times when I feel good and times when I feel less happy. I want to learn to accept this and not to berate myself when I am feeling down. I know these times will pass. Maybe if I learn to accept them when they arrive, perhaps they will pass sooner and I won’t lose so much energy fighting them.

The Wheel of Fortune – Through change we learn

For today, my last post in August,  we've got the Wheel of Fortune from the Crystal Visions Tarot. In this card we see a blend of the four elements around a wheel with on the inside the astrological signs and the moon and the sun in the middle. The outer rim shows the four elemental symbols. The wheel represents our fortune and changes in luck but also it stands for spiritual growth and changing visions.  As we all know life moves in cycles and we keep coming back at the same checkpoints. They can be as natural as the seasons (Yay, Autumn is here!) but also more personal, like the ebb and flow of our spiritual and emotional life. We learn that after the downfall we always will rise up again even stronger, more mature and resilient

The funny thing is this morning I realized a tarot deck is a kind of wheel in itself. Instead of spinning The Wheel and hoping for the jackpot, we shuffle our deck and pull a card. So often we pull the same cards and try to learn something new; add more meaning and /or discover more layers. Just yesterday I've read a post about the wheel at "By the Sycamoretree" and I wondered what more I could possible write about my wheel. But then I came up with this post and so my little tarot wheel turns again.

Golden Flower, always turning round and round

Today’s card is Golden Flower. It is the Temperance card of the Chrysalis Tarot and we see a mandala made of natural elements with a radiant Sunflower in the center. Due to the rhythmic rotating shape of the mandala, this depiction is all about balance. The fish symbolize how easy life can be if you  accept what is and go with the flow. The butterflies; a reoccurring symbol in this deck, are representative for the conscious mind: You can choose harmony and balance in every situation.

What is the benefit of a balanced and conscious mind….

Then I drew The Wheel (The wheel of Fortune). How beautiful these two cards are complementing each other. In both of them we see a wheel as a symbol for cycles and nature's rhythm 

This card is about coping with the ups and downs in life but also about the consequence of the choices we make. Often we think we are the victim of luck and chance but mostly our life’s events are the result of our own choices (conscious or not). We pray to God(dess) for insight, we burn purifying incense and sometimes we grasp a glimpse of the path we’re walking.

For me the ultimate challenge of The Wheel is to sit in the middle of the spokes and to experience the cycles of life with a balanced and conscious mind (Golden flower) without being powerlessly pulled along with every turning of this wheel

“Know this – your life, like a mandala, is your sacred conversation with the divine. Be ever mindful of this when making your decisions.” L. Vey