Three of Pentacles and Ace of Wands – A gentle kick in the butt

As you all know, I haven’t been feeling so well lately. Also I have been considering to take a short hiatus from blogging and social media all together.  Some days it feels like I am just going through the motions and ticking of my daily boxes.  The last two days I have been pampering myself and it felt really good: listening to music, reading books, drinking coffee, nibbling on biscuits, taking long showers and so forth. But  even pampering gets boring, although I am still not there yet. So  I asked my cards for advice on where to go from here. 

The Three of Pentacles came up: Creativity shared with friends. No Hermit or Four of Swords, which are my go-to cards in a situation like this. The other card which came up was the Ace of Wands: A budding wand, filled with so much potential. But be careful not to nip all these juicy ideas in the bud. Choose one and cherish is like a new born child.  

So here I am again with another blog post thanks to my “cardboard therapist” and it actually feels good to write this; sharing how it is right now and not pretending to be something I am not. Feeling like this often fills me with shame and/or guilt, because how can I permit myself these feelings when so many live in much more dire circumstances than I do. But it is what it is and I know from experience I will get better, probable sooner than later, because I’ve learned to recognize the signs early on.

Feeling like this confronts me with difficult lesson in self love. It is so easy  to love and  embrace who we are when all is well and life is on the upside but this lesson is about the hardest part: loving ourselves when we are faced with parts of ourselves we don’t like at all and are often embarrassed about.

 “I will be gentle with myself and I will only go as fast as the slowest part of me feels safe to go” Karin Drucker

Nine of Cups - Time to do the dishes

Today’s card is the Nine of Cups from the Original Rider Waite Tarot. This is also my card for 2017, so when it comes up in a daily draw it feel especially significant. This is the traditional wish card but instead of filling my mind with unfulfilled wishes, it rather filled it with doubts and questions.  At first I thought, I have everything I ever wanted and I have nothing left to wish for, so I must be utterly content with my life as it is right now but honestly that’s not entirely true. This card is all about fulfilled dreams and wishes but the man in the card doesn’t even look them. That made me wonder if for having a emotional fulfilled life it is necessary to call to mind our past dreams and achievements?  And even more, do out past dreams and wishes still still hold true for today? Or is it possible they can even be an obstruction to pursue new goals and dreams?

So many questions, so much uncertainty. As you might have expected I am a little out of sorts lately. Not knowing what I want, wish or dream of, or what to belief in anymore.  Always when I am feeling like this I tend to turn around and look at my nine cups to remember what used to make me happy and satisfied. But today I wondered, what if I would stand up, pick up my cups and do the dishes. Then I will have nine clean cups to fill up with loads of beautiful new experiences and fragrant wishes. Yes it was a nice party but now the guests are gone it and it is time to clean my house. Today is a new day with lots of possibilities to feel happy and content about.

Details, details…..

Today’s card is “ Details, details”  from the Enchanted Map Oracle cards. As is to be expected, the depiction is very detailed too. We see a tiny mouse with a magician’s head sitting on a looking glass. He is searching for “clarity” and “important notes” In the background many stars brighten  the study room. I wonder if he notices them...A compass is situated in the foreground.

It feels to me like the assignment of this card is to find a balance between paying attention to the details and not to get lost between them.  It is so easy to keep searching for more convincing reasons to stay where we are or to travel to the next phase in our life. Often searching for more reassuring details and is keeping us from experiencing life as it is presenting itself to us. It is often more tempting to keep searching for clarity in the books or on the internet than to take a walk outside, enjoy a sunny day and breath in nature’s wordless wisdom.

Five of Pentacles - Poor me!

Today’s card is the Five of Pentacles from the Original Rider Waite Tarot. This is the card of lack and poverty in whatever way we can imagine: Physical health, time, money, housing, stuff (more tarotdecks  J) etc. 

I often call this card: My “poor me” card, because even though sometimes I do feel like the Five of Pentacles, objectively I don’t have any reason to. I have a house, I have food on the table, I am healthy  and I have time enough to do the things I love. Conclusion: If I have the energy of this card hovering over me, it is usually because of the sad stories I tell myself: I am too tired, I am not fit enough, I am too busy, I don’t l have the money to buy myself those beautiful things other people have etc.

So  I asked my cards what to do next and I got the Four of Pentacles.  This was not at all what I expected. This card is often seen as the miser card, the card of thrift and greed. At first I thought I should be more grateful for what I do have instead of letting myself be put down by my own sense of lack. Of course this always a good thing to do but besides that, this card reminds me of clinging to the stories I tell myself over and over again. Even though scarcity is most often experienced in the physical world, I think it usually is the result of what we think. Imagine all the things the guy in the Four of Pentacles is telling himself. He is still such a long way from the sharing position of the Six of Pentacles. 

For today I will try to let go of the internal messages of lack, so the sun can come out to melt the snow in my card of the day.

Year Ahead Spread: February – Two of Swords and Laguz

My card for  February is the Two of Swords from the Wild Unknown Tarot and my rune for this month is Laguz.

The Two of Swords is all about postponing a decision or reaching a stalemate.  This can become quite a challenge for me, since I am usually  all about solving problems and making things right as quickly as possible, so I don’t have to feel uncomfortable any longer than necessary. But truth be told this behavior doesn’t always benefits me. It can cause stressful situations because I tend to act quickly and sometimes too ill considered. Resolving unpleasant feelings as soon as possible has really become a second nature of me. But then I started reading “living Beautifully” by Pema Chödrön again and this reminded me how staying with whatever you feel and experiencing life how it is right now can be an act of compassion toward ourselves and how this can bring about a sense of deep peace and calm.

I feel this card symbolizes my effort to stay with whatever occurs in my life and refrain myself from seeking  a quick habitual solution to make it all go away.

The rune Laguz emphasizes this  notion because Laguz is the rune of  water, of feeling and emotions and of our unconscious. This rune fit seamlessly with “II Inner Voice” of the OshoZen tarot (aka the High Priestess), my rune for this lunation. Both urge me to listen to my heart,  before I decide how to act in a situation. This requires slowing down, becoming more mindful of what is really going on and trying to maintain a regular mediation practice. I am happy to say so far the latter is going rather well this time around. 

New Moon of January

For today’s new moon I’ve decided to only draw one card as a focal point for this lunation. This because I also want to work with my monthly cards of my Year ahead spread and I don't want to make things too complicated. I’ve also noticed that I don’t pay that much attention to the release cards which I usually draw on the day of new moon. Perhaps it is better to draw such a release card on the full moon and to work it when the moon is starting to wane…

Anyway, for this lunation I’ve drawn: II inner Voice from the Osho Zen tarot. This is the equivalent of the High Priestess from  more traditional tarot decks. It is always a very welcome card to receive but also challenging one: Listening to our inner voice can be very tricky, especially when we have some many voices in our head chattering the entire day to us and even to each other. We all know they hardly ever shut up.

Maybe this knowledge is the pathway to listening to our Inner Voice because she doesn’t speak with words springing from our every busy mind but she speaks with the wordless language of the heart. 

She is both dark and light, crystal clear and veiled, playful and profound. She is Truth without having to explain herself. We only have to sit down and find her wordless whispers between the myriad of voices we hear all day long.

Ten of Rainbows - We are the World

Today’s card is the Ten of Rainbows – We are the world, from the Osho Zen Tarot. This card immediately reminded me of the Women’s March and  all the other occasions where we stood or will stand together for what is right and just. It is such an empowering card. No matter what color we are, we are all in this together ….

And that’s when it dawned on me. Even while looking at this beautiful circle of colorful rainbow people, I was excluding everyone who didn’t agree with my political or my spiritual convictions or with whatever I feel is important for my world, my country, my house and my body. Yes while watching this card, I was still thinking in terms of I, me, we, us, ours and they, them or theirs. 

These days, it is easy to feel connected to like minded people but what about the other part of humanity. Is our heart big enough to let them in too? We don’t have to agree with them to be able to acknowledge they are just as human as we are. What does it take to include every living soul in our heart?  What does it take to hold on to our viewpoints and opinions, without feeling superior over those who think differently?

As of yet I don’t have the answer but I am very grateful for the awareness of this issue caused by my card of the day.