Today’s Tarot: Own it

Your inner world is yours. You are the king of the world inside your own heart and mind. You can’t have absolute conrol over outside circumstances and certainly not over other people. But, no matter how traumatizing your past may gave been you can make new choices and do things differently this time around. You choose the lens through which you view the world now.

The energies have shifted. Many of us expected, or wanted, the early months of stay home orders and quarantine to be a time of introspection and spiritual growth. We wanted to make peaceful lemonade out of tge big pandemic lemon. The energy wasn’t in any way right gor that, however. Remember the avalanch of pentacle cards that kept pulling our attention to the physical realm and the urgent, practical (and dare I say scientific) issues at hand. It was a time for engaging life a real way, even when real meant wearing your pajamas for days at a time and staring into the refridgerator every 10 minutes. It was time for dealing with the actual circumstances , not esoterica.

Now, I’ve been seeing an avalanch of wands cards. Now we know the practicalities. We know what to do: wear a mask all the time every time you go out, keep your body a hockey stick distance away from every other human body, stay home as much as you can and wash your dang hands.

Now the energy has shifted to that spirituality we expected earlier. Now is time to look inside. Look inside, and whatever you find there, claim it. You don’t have to like it. You don’t have to judge you honest feelings as good or bad. They are what they are. If you learn what your inner landscape is like and then lay claim to it, then you can change whatever you don’t like – or turn up the volume on the things you like. In that way you can assume the throne of your inner world.

In this inner, spiritual way it is good to be the king. Own it.

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YouChoose Interactive Tarot June 22 – 27

Take a moment and pick a card. Out of a whole week, shouldn’t you do that much for yourself? Deep breath. Don’t over think it. These readings look at the general energies that touch us all, so there is no wrong answer, no wrong choice. The message you need will get to you one way or another if you just allow yourself to listen for it. If you want a minute to think, pause the video, then restart for the reveal, but following your impulse instinct to the card that most calls to you, the card that draws you in is usually the best thing to do.

Left: Empress. The energy around this card is simple and straightforward. Get the heck outside. Wear a mask, keep your body two arm lengths away from any other body, and go experience for yourself that the world hasn’t entirely ended yet. If the weather is bad, at least let yourself look at some cute animal pictures on the internet.

Center: King of Pentacles. Things are starting to turn a little bit of a corner IF you do it smart. Mind your budget, use some real, logical, pragmatic planning. It isn’t all sunshine and roses work or finance-wise but the pressure may just give you a little wiggle room to make repairs and get ready for the second side of the storm. Don’t delay. Take advantage of opportunities as they come. Make no assumptions.

Right: Six of Cups. Don’t think things to death this week. Expectations are the enemy of intuitions. Life has its cycles. Tides ebb and flow. Seasons change. We just had the solstice, where the sun seems to pause, and nature holds her breath for a moment before the progression begins again. If you chose this card it is both permission and advice to pause. See things as they are without judgement or preconception. This is a moment of silence for you collect your thoughts and enjoy the moment with all the wide eyed innocence of a child at play.

Thank you for reading. If you haven’t already, please consider following the blog so you get all new posts in your email inbox (sign up in the right hand column on laptop, scroll WAAYYYY down to the bottom of the page on mobile. Have a great week!

More Kitten Whiskers

Time for some Friday fangirling over a few favorites.

  • Get yourself an uncontrollable jaunt – you’ll be glad you did. Actually, get yourself to yourself to Spotify, iTunes, google play or Stitcher and follow Ninth World Journal written, directed, and produced by David S. Dear who also voices Januae. Based on the role playing game Numenera and set in the far future, Januae invents a teleporter which, for reasons, causes him to randomly & spontaneously teleport or “jaunt” and sci fi adventures ensue. I won’t spoil it, but if you like sci fi or fantasy an eentsy bit, please give it a listen. I’m more of a reader than a listener, but I’m transfixed. If an audio drama holds my gnat sized attention that is saying something. I am eternally honored to have been invited by David to be a co-host on his previous podcast Menage A Tarot, which was one of the most fun things I’ve ever done (it’s still available on TuneIn if you want to give it a listen) I can tell you first hand that David is one of the wisest, kindest people you’d ever want to meet plus has an enchanting fm radio voice that you could listen to for hours. That, plus the perfect length of the Ninth World Journal episodes and David’s sense of humor make it one of the most binge-able podcasts around. Please support Ninth World Journal on Patreon and ko-fi.
  • Speaking of wisdom and podcasts! If non-fiction is more to your taste, the please visit CoachJoseJohnson.com, home of you guessed it….Coach Jose Johnson, mindfulness coach, martial arts master and musician (Side Streets of Dreams is one of my all time favorite songs) I’ve had the privilege of taking clinics taught by him, and chatting with him as friend and colleague in the mindfulness & spirituality field. I know and respect his work. My husband studied with both he and Justin so of course if you have any interest in martial arts whatsoever, please give The Kung Fu Equation podcast a listen. Lately he has been posting I Ching (the “Book of Changes”) inspired thoughts on instagram. While I don’t use I Ching in my professional work, I’ve used it personally almost as long as I’ve worked with Tarot…since the 90s. He is absolutely spot on. Take it from someone with “Tao” in their website name…listen to him about the I Ching and mindfulness. His book Mindfulness Secrets is available now.
  • From audio art, to nonfiction and music … now back to art. Ry Summers is one of the most multi-talented artists I’ve ever cyber-met. I first met him on the poetry site “We Drink Because We Are Poets.” His writing is gritty, raw, real, powerful and alive. For his poetry, I recommend an older work of his written under the pen name Sahm Atain King, Laria Onyx. At the same time, he is a brilliant artist and photographer. Check out his work (including my favorite of his paintings that he’s posted so far, “Mephistopheles”) on www.instagram.com/ry_summers.  Rumor has it that he has a new project in the works. Please visit his instagram profile to learn how to support his work.

 

 

 

Today’s Tarot: Anchors & Aweigh

Traditions are an anchor with two sides. Traditions can comfort us and orient us when everything seems chaotic and changing. Traditions can anchor us in turbulent waters. Or they can drown us in rising waters if we hold on too tight. Changing now, adapting to our current situation, raising the anchor now, doesn’t prevent us from dropping anchor and revisiting cherished traditions once the storm has passed.

YouChoose Interactive Tarot 15-20 June 2020

Welcome to the “link in the description below.” This is the blog page I talk about in the video. If you came here directly … thank you! Following just on YouTube gets all of the “Today’s Tarot” and “YouChoose Interactive Tarot” posts, but there will always be plenty of print-only content that you can only get here. I hope you will follow the blog (free of course…opt in with your email over in the right hand side of the screen on laptop or scroll WAAAYYYY down to the bottom of the page on mobile)

Thanks for reading!

Left: Ten of Wands. Don’t carry old emotional burdons. If it isn’t useful for you to lug around, then put it down. It opens up bandwidth in your energy and attention for better things. By the same token, don’t be afraid of saying yes. Shouldering something that seems trivial to you might mean the universe to someone else who needs you.

Center: Knight of Sword. This is the card of daring and self-confidence. It doesn’t mean you are necessarily going to FEEL it. It also means that the time is right to step outside of your comfort zone and see what you can do. Courage isn’t the absence of fear; courage is doing what must be done in spite of feeling terrified.

Right: Nine of Wands. Stake your claim. This week is not the time to be a shrinking violet. Stand up for yourself, defend your emotional perimeter. Remember Eleanor Roosevelt – “no one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”

Today’s Tarot: Sightline

“Acceptance doesn’t mean resignation; it means understanding that something is what it is and that there’s got to be a way through it.” – Micheal J. Fox

Taraffirmation #14: I see things as they really are, and work for the best with the resources at hand.

Don’t let old experiences or expectations for the future cloud your vision. Solving a problem requires that you see the problem for what it really is. Sometimes when accept things as they are for what they are, there aren’t as many obstacles in your line of sight after all.

Today’s Tarot: Cup of Contemplation

 

The Four of Cups in the Witches Tarot (by Ellen Dugan and Mark Evans, all rights reserved, used here with the permissions granted on Llwellynpublishing.com) is my favorite of all of the Four of Cups that I’ve seen.

It reminds me of the word abide.

If this present moment is one of contemplation, of introspection, of moodiness, or melancholy. Abide with it. Sit with it. Allow the mood to be in its fullness without judgement, action or reaction. 

The stream is key. Let the mood flow. Don’t keep it. Don’t deny or bury it. Moments and moods pass. 

Today’s Tarot: Controlled Burn

The suit of wands is associated with the element of fire. The Three of Wands in particular is associated with waiting combined with alertness, inward activity that isn’t always expressed with outward activity.

It reminds me of an episode of “Avatar: The Last Airbender we recently watched. Controlled fire is life. Uncontrolled fire can lead to destruction. The Avatar was given a leaf with a smodering fire at the center. His training task was to keep the fire from reaching the edge of the leaf for as long as possible but not to extinguish it.

The Three of Wands hints at that same subdued energy and change. It isn’t a card of charging ahead, but still is positive, and hints at success. It isn’t a card of completly standing down and taking a nap. It is a card of watching, analysing, following your dreams, but not chasing and flailing after them.

Follow your passions in a clear, focused, deliberate way. Control the burn, not put out the flame.

YouChoose Interactive Tarot June 7-13: resonance, anomalies, and a find line between

Watch the video, and choose a card. Pause the video if you need a moment. Then restart for the reveal and read the card interpretation below.

This week the energy around the cards are remarkably different from the past several weeks. Last week, I didn’t do a a card draw at all. It just wasn’t the time or place for a chirpy little youtube video. Too much was going on. Democracy was dying, innocents were attacked, it was and is real. If you thought the pandemic was time to get pragmatic, this is the time to act. If nothing else, use whatever social media presence you have to support the protests, and also contact your members of congress and urge them to support the legislation being introduced this week to modify qualified police immunity and improve transparency and accountablility. Above all, please, vote in November. Black lives matter. Love is love. Women’s rights are human rights. Remember peaceful protestors being tear gassed and shot with rubber bullets to give insanity a photo op. Don’t let democracy die. It’s already on a ventelator.

That being said, there has been a shift in the connection of the cards to the general current event energies and the social zeitgeist. These cards are remarkably separate and distinct. I think that might be a reminder that, no matter how intuitive or empathic we may be, we can find, strengthen, protect and enforce the boundary between our own inner world and the energies around us. Even though this has been an issue and message for months now, it is more important than ever to know what is truely you, and what is you responding to outside stimuli. You are the bell, not the thing ringing it. Healthy boundaries are more important than ever. Think for yourself. Feel from a place of compassion more than a place of reactivity.

Another change is the interconnection between the cards themselves. The past several weeks, the cards seemed to work together, like individual words within a sentence. This week they are more like individual bubbles. They seem to be speaking to different people in very different mental places.

Left: Nine of Cups. Job well done! This card is associated with cycles, phases, or projects that have come to completion in a good way. Your boundaries are strong. Don’t feel guilty about what you have (or soon will) accomplished. Stay strong so you can inspire others. Your energy flows with the quote from Mahatma Ghandi to “be the change you want to see in the world”

Center: Five of Wands. Are you ready to rumble? Life is turbulent right now. Even if you are perfectly happy and content energies and challeges might take some annoying swipes at you. Stay chill, you’ll get through it. I get very martial arts, kung fu images here. Conflict can be rightous. This reminds me of the CK Chesterson quote “A soldier fights not because he hates what is before him, but because he loves what is behind him.”

Right: Temperance. You are still in a place where it isn’t a good time to be overly spiritual, or make any big decisions. It is extra important for you to be sure of your balance. Take whatever extra time you need before making big choices or moving big steps ahead. Work from your center, work and think and decide from the most centered, most level headed, lowest emotional temperature place that you can muster. Balance and clear headedness is critical, with the full force of a major arcana card.

It’s not much, but it’s what I have right now: 20% of all proceeds from the new “TimeFlow” Tarot readings by email will be donated to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) through August 30, 2020. Please visit the special offers page to order.

Thank you all for reading and watching the videos.

When life happens

Tarot isn’t about telling you what will happen in life, it’s about figuring out what to do after life happens. The cards are not all rainbows and unicorns because life isn’t that way.

That’s the genius of Pamela Smith’s minor arcana artwork. From agony to ecstacy, the images touch on the widest possible array of human experiences. Some iteration, some interpretaion, some combination of cards can offer insight to almost any situation.

Yet sometimes things happen that are so heartbreaking that they leave us all speechless.

And somethimes one card can speak for us all.

Black lives matter.