Sage Sips / TaoCraft Tarot

Hoist the Questions

Hoist is a fun word.

It’s kind of pirate-y and fun. As in “Hoist the colors” just like Pirate baseball fans used to do. Now they hoist traffic cones and in a city where parking chairs are sacrosanct (IYKYK) it kind of makes sense.

But back to Tarot. I’ve been thinking about open readings. Open readings are the ones with no particular question or topic in mind. From the readers side of the table, these can be challenging to do. For the client, it can be a great reading if for no other reason it can raise questions to be asked.

It’s like we were talking about in “Tarot and the Art of Not Knowing” the other day. Sometimes you don’t have any clue there are gaps in what you know.

Open readings are often validating, reassuring, and let you know you are going in the right direction. I did a thank-you reading for a blog supporter recently that was exactly that. All minor arcana cards, lovely validation energy included with the reassurance that any hiccups along the path at hand were likely to be short-lived.

Great news for the sitter. As the reader, these readings always leave a little niggle or two behind. What if it didn’t help? What if they thought it was scammy and trite and vague like a bad newspaper horoscope?

Questions are key. Some of the best parts of reading come when the person getting the reading starts answering questions. Of course, this part is easier in-person, but the conversation is equally valid when it happens over time through email. Email is as valid for communication in Tarot as it is in work and business. Its as valid as any written document or printed page…although I still think pen and paper carries a little extra magic somehow. But that’s beside the point.

The point is, whenever you get a psychic reading, hoist the questions! It helps to dial in a general reading to better meet your individual needs even when that message is really just “You are doing great kiddo. Keep up the good work.”

Thanks for reading. See you at the next sip

Pathway

This is an actual Tarot reading I did a couple of years ago. As you can see, the recipient kindly gave me permission to use it here in the blog. This is the kind reading you’ll get if you support Sage Sips on ko-fi now.

Reading from The archives: Use the search bar to find Tarot readings, Q&A, BTS and more.

Q: You drew a card for me on Halloween which was (and still is!) really meaningful, so lovely to connect with you again. I saw your Instagram post and would love to have you pull a few cards for me if the places haven’t been filled, but no worries if not! Happy to have a reading via the blog 🙂

For ******

First of all, thank you so much for your kind words!

I’m always so happy to hear when a reading is helpful….after all, that’s why we do these things! But the same is true as the last reading: If you have any questions, complaints or need any clarification with the reading please don’t hesitate to contact me.

Since you didn’t specify a topic, I’ll just move ahead with an open-to-anything point of view.

Your Cards Today Are:

Influence from the Past: King of Coins (Pentacles)
Current Situation: Three of Swords
Moving Forward: King of Swords

General Pattern

All cards are minor arcana, which in a layout this small is no real statistical surprise. Intuitively it feels like a bit of reassurance, that nothing really major is stirring the energies for you right now. It is all pretty business as usual more than it’s not. It has a feeling that business as usual for you entails being really good at what you do. Business as usual is kicking butt and taking names from the feel of it. In that vein, it feels like a very plain-talking, no nonsense kind of reading. It also feels like most of the reading energy is pointing toward work and career thoughts, which would go right along with having a coins card right off the bat like that. The repetitions are asking for attention. You have two swords, which connote action, the element of air, intellect and logic, authority, or your connection with society and culture at large. Knit all of that together and my attention is pulled to using cold, calculating intellect when it comes to work, especially when dealing with the authority structure, or any vying for promotions or power within the structure of the workplace. “Power Play” comes to mind along with an old episode of M*A*S*H where the Colonel accuses someone (Frank? Hotlips? Klinger?) of “going over my head so many times I’m getting athletes scalp” I guess the shorthand for that would be watch out for power playing brown nosers at work. The other repetition is the two kings. Kings connote leadership. It feels like the situation may be asking you for leadership, confidence, self-starting, standing up for yourself….even if you are already good at that, it feels like the skills you have will be put through their paces, and you may even be pushed a tiny bit outside your comfort zone in that respect. I ‘hear’ (meaning the intuition comes as words instead of feelings or images) to “Hang on and be brave” There was a great meme about spirit guides (the lady) you (the boy) and a life lesson. Here is the photo part if you want to take a peek: https://goo.gl/images/gdXriU Your guides feel like they are reminding you they won’t lead you anywhere you are not ready to go, but since you are ready…buckle up baby!

Background & Context: King of Coins

This part is the reminder of competence you have, and that you are more than ready to meet leadership challenges at work, or any other part of life, really. The King of Coins as a card connotes wealth and success, so a note of reassurance there again. I hear “build on past skills and successes” I’m not clear whether that means use your skills and knowledge that you have in hand to fullest advantage, to build new skill and expand your knowledge and experience…or both. It doesn’t feel like a job change as much as an expansion of the current situation.

Current Situation: Three of Swords

Classically, this tends to be a bit darker, more dire card across all of the decks and references that I have. Often it will set me off on maternal lecture mode about be safe, keys out, park under lights, and all that usual lecture….but not so much for you today. This feels more petty than malicious. It isn’t the devil or dark side card for good reason. This feels petty, and small, and contained to one aspect of life, like office politics. “Watch out for petty backstabbers” comes to mind. Very office politics, but also heavy on the petty….like an annoying mosquito that can drive you mad if you let it, or just brush it away. The more calm, detached, intellectual and swords / mental-focus the better.

Moving Forward: King of Swords

You know how I read cards…the cards have suit, element, layout position, and general card meaning. But each card, based on all that other stuff, can have a different spin or ‘flavor’ of message; advice (something to consider doing) caution (something to consider avoiding) or validation (acknowledgement, encouragement, cosmic thank you) There has been a lot of validation energy so far. This has a little more of an advice spin. The card feels less like it pertains to you and more like it represents an ally…someone in the hierarchy at work who you can cultivate an working relationship with, who can be a mentor of sorts. “Have your back” comes to mind. Like someone who knows your skills, sees your potential. It feels like it might be literally a male figure of some sort. Does any of this ring a bell for you? I’m not sure how else to understand the card, because it has a not-you but someone who can help you sort of symbolism around it. Beyond that it is dark – meaning no signal, not evil or bad kind of dark. It feels like that is the card or energy telling me that is a singular message from this card….seek out a mentor or ally at work.

Summary

This part is like a psychic “cold reading” where I free form give you any impressions that come to mind. In readings that have a topic or question, this part might connect to that or the cards….or it might not. In an open reading like this one, it just stays in the open frame of mind.

Often it starts with colors, or crystals or both. In this case I see citrine. It associates with the solar plexus chakra, and therefor confidence. Wear or carry it for confidence at work. It also resonates with the King cards, and the coins suit because the golden color has to do with wealth, career, luck and to some extent leadership.

I taste butterscotch, with lemon scent in the background. That might be a continuation of the golden color associations. Butterscotch may symbolize comfort, while lemon in aromatherapy is very cleansing and energizing. Lemon may be important relevant to work, as diffusing some lemon fragrance, lighting a lemon scented candle, or using anything lemon after work might do two things…first it would be a clear transition signal. It could remind you work is done, clear any annoyances or negativity from your day, and let you know to shift into family/home/private life mode. It will also lift your energy…stress or pettiness at work can put an extra drain on your energies. Lemon could help neutralize that and lift your energy after a long day. Don’t use citrus oils on your skin if you will be in sunlight within the next 12 hours…it can cause sun sensitivity. Also don’t put it on your skin if you have autoimmune diseases as it enhances immunity (a good thing in cold/flu season for most people)

And there the energies step back. I hope this helps!

Best Wishes,

Photo: Witches Tarot by Ellen Dugan and Mark Evans, used with permissions published on LlewellynPublishing.com

What if…

Funny thing about intuition – it’s kind of misty and ethereal and mercurial.

Some images land in long term memory. I can still conjure up the mental image from a couple of weeks ago of the cliff top with the narrow mountain ridge and multiple paths from the summit and crossroads post.

Somewhere since then, Richard Bach’s book Illusions: Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah came through in such a way that it seemed like a BIG hint to re-read it. I can’t even remember if the Bach related thought made it into the final edit of whatever post.

So I whip out my ebook copy of Illusions. Sat down for a re-read and found exactly the idea that was trying to get my attention about two minutes into it:

“And what would you do,” the Master said unto the multitude, “if God spoke directly to your face and said, ‘I COMMAND THAT YOU BE HAPPY IN THE WORLD, AS LONG AS YOU LIVE.’ What would you do then?”
Richard Bach

Just to be clear – I am an atheist. The word ‘god’ is entirely irrelevant here.

But think about it…what would you DO? Imagine if whatever deity, entity or person whose opinion you respect straight up demanded that you be happy. Right now. No prerequisite beliefs, actions or conditions – just you, just happy.

The tricky part here is the DO. It implies that something needs to be DONE. It implies that happiness has some prerequisite action or condition in order for your happiness to exist.

This is where the happiness meaning of the Sun card comes into play.

The card doesn’t imply the DO. It is just plainly, unapologetically happy. Right here, right now, not because of circumstances but, perhaps, in spite of circumstances.

What if…

What do you think would happen if you just took a minute and allowed yourself to be happy? What if your God got in your face and commanded you to be happy for five minutes, could you? Would you?

What if this post, these words on this screen in this moment are your permission to simply be happy for the next five minutes? What if this is your permission to be happy from now on? Could you? Would you?

DO that. Be happy.

Thanks for reading! If you like these posts, please buy me a (virtual) coffee on ko-fi and I’ll send you a sip of tarot by email.

See you at the next sip!

Deck: Allyman’s Tarot by Seven Dane Asmund, used with permission

Tarot and the Art of Not Knowing

There are different levels of knowing.

There are the things you know – the hard data, the objective provable stuff.

There are beliefs, which are not much more than thoughts, electrons and neurochemicals bouncing around in your brain or, as Blue Man Group put it, “the hellawhack Shiznit that happens inside your brizzle.”

There are things that you know you don’t know. You might not be able to exactly fill in the gaps, but you can prepare for the possibilities, like guessing the shape of a jigsaw puzzle piece from the empty shape left by the pieces around it.

Then there are the real surprises in life, the stuff that you didn’t even know that you didn’t know.

Tarot, in its own way, can help with the unknowns. It can’t fill in the gaps or make exact predictions, but a reading or successive daily one card meditations can help you find the edges of that missing piece to the jigsaw puzzle. Tarot can help you learn about yourself and your situation and feel out those things that you know that you don’t know. This is where Tarot is at its stress relieving best. This is where Tarot helps you to make that action plan that eases anxiety.

But Tarot can surprise you, too. It can shine a light on the things you didn’t know that you didn’t know. It can spark a brainwave about something you never thought about before.

And sometimes Tarot is silent. Not every card on every day is helpful. The time might not be right. Perhaps it is better that we not know, because that would prompt an action that is harmful. Maybe, just maybe, not knowing something is the universe protecting us from ourselves.

You never know.

And sometimes that is ok.

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Look Ahead

Time is a tricky thing in Tarot

It doesn’t predict the future. I won’t use terms like ‘divination’ or ‘fortune telling’ here. Mostly because I see things as cause and effect driven – in spirituality as much as in physics. Magick happens when real world action harmonizes with subtle energies and the natural flow of things.

Tarot is spiritual GPS. It’s about navigating the current energies and making choices that both ease our current anxieties and helps us to do the things that cause the desired effects. Or, as I’ve said dozens of times:

Tarot isn’t about predicting what will happen in life, Tarot helps you figure out what to do when life happens.

Many times the Tarot message is about looking to the present moment. We need to be reminded to pay attention to the here and now. We naturally seem to look ahead and imagine. Often we imagine things that make us feel afraid but it is also why we, as humans, can see cause and effect and act accordingly.

Today’s card is a reminder we are able to look ahead and that is a perfectly good thing to do. The energy today supports a sort of quiet optimism and hopefulness. You need to decide what you want before you can lay the foundation to make it a reality. You have to decide where you want to go before you can take the first step in that direction.

It is ok to just stop and think about the what and where. It’s ok to look ahead.

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Sage Sips is Tarot wisdom for your day in the time it takes to sip your coffee

Action Eases Anxiety Tarot: Alliance

Sometimes just having some sort of an action plan can help ease worry. Even small, imperceptible actions like focusing on your breathing, or looking at artwork on Tarot cards can help. That is what this two card layout is designed to do: Help to understand a little bit about current energies that might be a source of worry and suggest a small something to do about it.

Sometimes its fun being a little bit clairaudient when music is involved.

What it is: The Corpse

When I saw the corpse card, my first thought wasn’t dead, smelly and gross. It was the Gizmodrome (I’m a Police / Stewart Copeland fan) song “Zombies Are In The Mall” I really like that song and have proceeded to earworm it off and on since filming the card draw. If you prefer Michael Jackson, think “Thriller,” It fits – Pittsburgh has a connection with zombies. My first apartment was a 20 minute shamble from where Night of the Living Dead was filmed. The card has an important message, but it is wrapped in a little pop culture and humor. Pure brain candy vibe on the order of 1989 movie, Weekend at Bernie’s

The sense is of something that maybe isn’t actively harmful, but more along the lines of something that has far outlived its usefulness but just keeps rolling along in your life out of sheer habit and pure inertia. Think dead weight. Think 10 of wands. Think that old pair of underwear with holes and stretched out elastic that keeps being put back in your drawer wash after wash.

Let. It. Go.

This doesn’t warrant rolling out the Kylo Ren quote but it is a reminder to look out for any metaphoric zombies that have been following you around lately.

It could be anything. Things, habits, thoughts, beliefs. Here the Death card joins the chat with its connection to change. Again the phrase “outlived their usefulness” hinting at a gradual change. That outliving doesn’t happen all at once. It’s a gradual decay. We change, we grow, and old parts of us wither up and usually fall away like shedding skin cells or the papery outer layers of an onion.

Seriously, this could be as minimal as a cue to go ahead and try that new exfoliant face treatment or indulge in that spa sugar scrub. Or it could be a cue to let go of that now dead part of you that you worked so hard to deconstruct.

Change isn’t always easy, even when it is change for the better. Changes both big and small, gradual and fast, can leave us feeling a little anxious and unmoored.

What to do: The Familiar

There is nothing wrong with comfort food. Or a comfort watch on TV. Or wearing your favorite emotional support hoodie. If that is the meaning of the word familiar that this this card evokes for you, by all means follow that.

I feel drawn to the cards author-intended meaning of alliance.

Familiar in this sense is like a witch’s familiar, a helpful entity that takes the form of an animal. In traditional lore, the witch / familiar relationship is a master / servant one. I think this card is giving something far more nuanced, and far more powerful: symbiosis. This has a feeling of mutually beneficial cooperation, of teamwork.

When you discover the old parts of you are dead and gone, when you finally recognize the zombies that are following you around, let them go. Lop the heads off if you have to. But nature really does abhor a vacuum. Find your tribe. Find your allies. Find friendly energies to take their place. The Familiar card is reassurance that they are indeed like minded people out there if we allow ourselves to go out in the world and find them.

Deck: Alleyway Oracle of Secrets by Seven Dane Asmund, used with permission

Weekend Oracle: Wonder Full

Sometimes happiness is something you have to do on purpose.

The energy today, at the start of the weekend, continues along the same thread that we saw at the start of the week in the “Strive to Abide” week-ahead reading.

This card comes from the Alleyway Oracle of Secrets by Seven Dane Asmund. The Alleyman card (art by voidbug) is intended to represent awe and wonderment, as is often found with a chance encounter with a mysterious embodiment of the Alleyman within the original deck’s fictional lore.

If you like thought provoking fiction I highly recommend The Alleyman Podcast.

But back to today’s card.

If you can strive to abide, then you can choose happy.

Deliberately. On purpose. In the middle of disaster.

It’s not easy. I wouldn’t want to imply that it is. It is a black belt level fight with yourself.

I read somewhere that we humans are hardwired to spot threats and dangers long before we process the good things. It’s evolutionary survival.

But so is happiness. It’s hard to survive when your mental, emotional, and physical health is disintegrated by constant stress, pessimism and negativity.

If you aren’t feeling it – ok. Abide. Feelings are temporary. Feelings can be influenced. Causes have effects and you can be the cause that has the effect of you feeling a little better.

The mind body connection flows both ways. Decreasing stress can improve physical health, and caring for your physical being can improve your mood.

If memory serves, it is a Buddhist premise with some solid physiology sprinkled in.

Arrange your face. The face is highly innervated. Arrange your face into a small Mona Lisa smile and keep it that way for a few minutes. The feeling represented by the facial expression and body posture you’ve adopted can sleep into your emotions however you were feeling at the outset. That may be why Buddhist teachers mention posture and facial expression as a part of beginning to meditate. It sets up a positive feedback loop. Body posture improves meditation which reduces stress which improves physical health which improves mood….you get the idea.

It may not be our first instinct to see beauty and good things. We are wired to focus on threats so we can avoid or mitigate them. Today’s card is a reminder (akin to the high priestess card in the RWS Tarot) to use our big old homo sapiens brains and step in and deliberately appreciate the good that saturates our existence. If it wasn’t there, we wouldn’t exist to appreciate anything. Look around. You aren’t actively in danger right now, are you? (If you are, what the hell are you doing staring at a screen reading this?!)

Take a breath.

That is a life giving miracle, right there.

Do you have the means for your next meal? Are you wearing clothes? Obviously you have an electronic device to entertain you and connect you to other people. This train of thought reminds me of the scene from the 1990s Robin Hood where Morgan Freeman’s character tells Kevin Costner’s Robin of Loxley “You whine like a mule – you are still alive!”

I can’t remember where I saw it, or if there is any logic or facts or data behind it, but I think I’m latching on to the memory of a 2 second social media clip because there is some level of truth to it….bursts of emotions, even the most painful ones, last 90 seconds unless we mentally grab onto them and keep replaying them in our mind.

If the Chariot card from Monday reminds us that we can choose to abide then today’s Alleyman card reminds us the world is full of wonder that we choose to see.

Thanks for reading! See you at the next sip

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Week Ahead Tarot: Strive To Abide

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Point of view is telling.

This is cool. I never thought of this before. I always put so much mental bandwidth into communicating the message for my client that I never thought about my point of view within the intuitive mental image.

Point of view is often part of the message – just like the mental image of the three paths at the narrow mountain summit what has repeated recently in “Summit and Crossroads“, “Move With Charisma” and “Feeling Kawaii” collective energy readings here on the blog.

In that repeating image, my point of view arrived at the summit facing forward with the message to wait and watch and with all three directions (forward, left, right but of course not off the cliff behind – that’s a whole other post right there). When the image came back again later, my point of view was still facing forward with the right and left paths in shadow and the path straight ahead was lighted. Clearly the message was to move forward, to change altitude, to enter the new phase and new cycle message that came through the repeating moon card.

While the Chariot isn’t a change card per se, it touches that energy through its wheels, which evoke much of the same energy of the Wheel of Fortune / Wheel of the seasons card. Round, moon, wheel, forward travel; there is a theme and pattern here.

Chariot is at it’s best a card of willpower, alertness, attention to the present moment. It very much resonates with the head-over-heart vibe that has been repeating lately as well. It is science and personal power and confidence, and presence of mind. I think of it as the test pilot card, or for those familiar with the 1980s movie, a Buckaroo Banzai kind of card.

The thing that fascinated me as I write this is the shifted point of view. Always before I’ve seen the Chariot from outside the Chariot. The message of willpower and persistence and presence and attention always came through just fine, and every bit of it is there tonight, a night of dark moon. Tonight I saw the Chariot from inside the Chariot. The change in point of view added something vital, new to the Chariots usual message: relaxation. Enjoyment even. Driving the Chariot was like driving a car at night with the window down. It was blues and cool breezes, no traffic, no stress. It was like the quiet relaxed mindfulness of a long drive on a quiet highway in good weather.

This is about embracing the change, participating in the inevitable changes in life. I am reminded of an Instagram post by my favorite meditation communicator Dan Harris, author of 10% Happier. In the post he quoted another of my favorite authors, Alan Watts.

“Everything is change. Nothing can be held on to. And if you go with the flux, you flow with it. However, if you resist the stream, it fights you. If you realize this, you swim with the flow—you go with it, and you’re at peace.”

Which reminded me of Frank Herbert in Chapterhouse Dune

“Live the best life you can. Life is a game whose rules you learn if you leap into it and play it to the hilt. Otherwise, you are caught off balance, continually surprised by the shifting play.”

The Chariot from a forward facing point of view is encouraging us to keep our mind in this moment, go with the flow, and go with it to the absolute hilt. Don’t strive and stress. Enjoy the ride and abide.

In this night of the dark moon, I wish Peace, Presence and Prosperity for us all.

Feeling Kawaii, Won’t Delete Later

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The deck choice fits the feeling today. The energy seems light and playful, at least for the weekend.

I don’t know why I don’t use it more. This deck, the Kawaii Tarot by Diana Lopez is one of two decks that were given to me as gifts – late in my professional Tarot career, actually. Just want to say up front that I totally do NOT buy into that Tarot cards have to be given to you nonsense. It’s the right tool for the right job kind of thing and saying a tarot deck has to be gifted to you is like saying your favorite screwdriver or kitchen pot has to be gifted to you in order to be skilled at home repair or a good cook. But that is beside the point – back to feeling cute.

Let’s do this as an Action Eases Anxiety layout. Anxiety short circuits cute, which is the major part of the message here.

What it is (current energy): The Moon card has been popping up a lot lately. Natural cycles go at their own pace. I hear “gentle pirouette” It is like the gradual fade of ombre hair color. It’s isn’t the flip of a switch – it is more like dissolving a sugar cube into a hot cup of tea than running through a doorway.

Now I’m taken back yet again to the mountain ridge image from the Summit and Crossroads post. The path straight ahead is still the one in light, the one with pull. The side paths along the razor sharp narrow ridge are even darker. It is like climbing a cliff, standing a moment to look around the stepping forward from that rocky ridge into a wide gradual grassy meadow to walk down the other side of the peak.

When we look at ‘what to do’ and ‘how to do it’ we run right into reversed cards. As we’ve talked about before, there are a few different ways to handle reversals (cards that are upside down relative to the person doing the reading) Some people just flip the meaning from a positive to a negative meaning regardless of the intuitive feeling. Another strategy is to simply flip the card upright and go on taking all possible meanings into consideration, as is typical in the Lenormand tradition. Finally (my favorite) is to read the card taking all of it’s possible meanings into consideration BUT leave it inverted using the reversal as a hint that the energy is blocked or turbulent.

What to do is the Queen of Pentacles. The queen has to do with comfort and prosperity and meeting material needs and, as with all Pentacles, down-to-earth practicality. The reversal reminds us that times are tough. It isn’t yet time for a splurge or to be too spendthrifty. Plan purchases. Head over heart for a while longer while the gradual fade to better times happens.

How to do it gives us the Two of Swords. Swords are air and intellect, emphasizing head over heart. It is ok not to know what to do, or be able to plan with great confidence right now. It is enough to be responsive and aware. A cool head responding to situations at hand is enough. If you are of two minds about something, all things being equal, let logic lead the way for the next little while.

We’ll know when it is a heart-forward kind of time again.

Meanwhile, while logic and intellect lead, let the heart have a little time to play and feel cute – no need to delete now or later.

Thanks for reading! See you at the next sip!

Low Tech Ritual

Also on Sage’s Second Cup blog

Our hot water is out.

Sure, I’ve done my fair share of complaining about boiling water on the stove to keep us and the kitchen sanitary like I’m Ma Ingalls and this is 1826 or something. That’s in spite of the fact that I’m doing it in an air conditioned house with an electric stove and not over a wood fire in some hovel hole of a cabin in the wilderness. I LIKE it here in the future with electricity, indoor plumbing and whatnot.

But you know what they say about clouds and silver linings. Or as author Richard Bach put it “there is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in its hands.”

Hmm. Maybe that plus the narrow mountain top ridge image from the “Summit and Crossroads” and “Move with Charisma” tarot readings is a solid hint to re-read Bach’s Illusions or finally get around to reading The Razor’s Edge. That’s idea, too. Book reviews over on Second Cup – but none of that is the point. Back to the hot water thing.

The problem with the stovetop hot water is that it is a sloooow way to do things.

The beautiful part of the stovetop hot water is that it is a slow way to do things.

I especially noticed it bathing. The slow acts of putting the water on to heat, cleaning the sink, moving the soap from its usual shower spot to a place on the countertop within reach; trivial things to be sure, but it takes on an almost ritual-like quality.

It was a mindfulness trap.

Without intending it, it dropped me into a meditative mindset. Instead of quick, thoughtless and profoundly mundane, I found myself engaging with the moment. It wasn’t the usual quick hop shower. This was a thing.

The same can, and does, apply to Tarot reading.

It doesn’t matter what you ritual IS – it matters what your ritual DOES.

Whatever your process or ritual, it shifts you from the everyday world into an engaged frame of mind. The ritual and process of a Tarot reading shifts us from mindless to mindful. Whatever your ritual, habit or process might be, it makes tarot reading into a thing.

Spirit speaks in whispers. Tarot and its attendant rituals, even the casual ones, helps us to hear those whispers.

Using a reading cloth, or a particular shuffle pattern, having a dedicated space, lighting candles or incense or whatever you do when you do a reading all has the effect of slowing down our normal pace. Those objects and activities aren’t sacred, but the mindset they create is.

Tarot reading rituals are a mindfulness trap.

The pattern quiets and comforts. It is like giving a toddler a new toy or handing a banana to a hungry monkey. Some routine or ritual that is a built in part of beginning a reading comforts and quiets our logical mind enough to help us hear our intuition and the quiet whispers of spirit and energy.

A wonderful as the modern age and its indoor plumbing may be, some things are ancient and still powerful. Often the most powerful things are the quietest, and the simplest, like a low tech ritual.

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