Happy New Year! Thanks for reading in 2025! I hope you will stick around for 2026 too. Sage Sips Tarot blog will stay free to read, no paywall at all, supported by Tarot fans like you.
2025 was a helluva year or a lot of folks individually not to mention the collective energy here in what was the United States. Inspired by my favorite meditation teacher, Dan Harris (inner peace, motherfuckers!) “Action Eases Anxiety” is stepping forward as a key idea for the new year. What is that David Axelrod quote? “Everything you can do is all you can do” or something like that. If we do all we can, then whatever happens we can also rest easy without regrets knowing we did everything possible. Then we can regroup, re-plan, re-relieve any new anxieties and try again as needed without beating up on ourselves about it.
Given that energy, I’m setting aside the usual prediction-tinged “Season” layout and bringing back what I used to call the “Timeflow” layout or some such thing. For 2026, I think a better name might be “Action Plans Ease Anxiety” I’ve re-worked the layout meanings to be a more substantial version of the two card Lenormand “Action Eases Anxiety” layout.
Understanding a problem is key to solving it, yes. But that kind of understanding is the foundation of any Tarot work, really, not predictions. I’ve said it before and I’m going to keep saying it…Tarot doesn’t tell you what is going to happen in life, Tarot helps you know what to do when life happens. This year the plan is to post primarily daily meditation readings, two card Lenormand action eases anxiety readings, and these larger Time Flow / Action Plan (I need to come up with a better name for this thing. PLEASE – feel free to leave suggestions in the comments!)
Anyway, here is today’s layout with the intention behind each card position
The general pattern of any layout holds its own message over an above the meanings of the individual cards. It can give context to the individual cards or it can be a whole message in and of itself within the context of the reading.
Today this is a whole-assed message, almost independent of everything else. Three out of the four cards are major arcana. This is nothing short of a loud buckle up buttercup we are going for a ride.
High energy doesn’t mean bad energy. I ‘hear’ “glimpse of recovery” as if the high energy is re-energizing more than doom-saying. I see sunny gold light and a clover lawn. (Bonus points – look up the clover card in the Lenormand deck). The level expanse of clover makes me thing that the energy and dynamics are all ‘under the hood’ Earlier today @spiralseatarot on Threads posted about the common wand image on the Magician and three other cards. In numerology, 2026 is a ONE year (2+0+2+6 = 10 and 1+0 = 1) The magician is typically numbered 1 in the RWS style Tarot decks, a magic wand echoes the shape of the number one. Both last night and this morning I coincidentally looked at the clock at 11:11. Wands in Tarot are self, and the element of fire. Be mindful and prepared and ready to control the fire, but in the end the Phoenix of 2026 rises from the ashes of 2025.
Part of me thinks all of that sounds a little psychotic. The bigger, intuitive part thinks we are being hit over the head with a message to “rekindle the fire within.”
The “Hold It Tight” card is about the things that are beneficial, helpful or very much needed in this moment – but might have been flying under your reader. This is an idea to pull out of the shadows, embrace and USE.
Here we see the Emperor. I’m not very knowledgeable when it comes to Norse Mythology, but I’m getting an Odin vibe here. That is the face to put on the Emperor card in this context. BE YOUR OWN ODIN. I don’t remember the author, but read on social media from a pagan themed feed that the typical christian-ish prayer mindset was to pray asking for protection and safety from diety, while the Nordic pagan mindset was to pray and ask for the strength and resources to protect ourselves. That is the message of the Emperor today. It is a reminder that what we need can be available. We aren’t going to be rescued, but we can / will be able to get the strength, wisdom, and resources to help ourselves and those around us. Hold tight to that strategy and mindset.
“Let It Go” is just exactly that – release the things that no longer serve so those things can move to another place to help and serve others. Don’t carry what you no longer need to carry. Release makes space for better things to fill in.
Here we see The Sun – happiness. This is a very Buddha – like paradox. Let go of happiness…to find happiness?
Yup.
It’s not the happiness you are letting go…it’s the searching, striving and TRYING to be happy that has to go.
Stop trying to be happy and stop relying on something or someone in order to be happy. Stop the search for happiness…and just be happy right here, right now with things just as they are in SPITE of everything being just as they are right now. Let go of finding happiness, and just BE whatever you are. It’s like the old Tshirt…Smile. It makes everyone wonder what you are up to.
Or, as Mark Salzberg wrote in Iron and Silk, “There is a saying that it’s the height of stupidity to look for the donkey that you’re already riding on.”
If you spend your time and effort looking for happiness, you never find the happiness that has been riding around inside you the whole time.
“Queue It Up” is like the green room for a TV guest on a talk show, or the on-deck circle for the next batter in a baseball game. This is a growing energy, that is close at hand but not quite in its time just yet. Timing is a theme here, combined with a message to trust your own instincts. This tells you what would be good to carry in your back pocket…your intuition will tell you better than anything when is the right time to deploy this action or this idea. “Queue it up” is something to prepare so you can use it when your intuition says the time is right.
In this case we see our third major arcana card, The Fool. The thing we are preparing is ourselves. All of this manifesting and ash-rising might require a little agility. You might be asked to start something new on spur of the moment. A chance, a leap of faith might crop up in this year’s energy environment, and this card is advising us to keep a little openness, adaptability and willingness to say yes to the unexpected in our pocket so we can take advantage of any sudden, unexpected but excellent opportunities.
Finally we come to the card of the moment. THIS is the idea whose time has come. This is where to focus our energy and attention right NOW. This has an element of release, too, being located right next to our “let it go” card…but this isn’t something to release, but rather something to ALLOW – this is the task at hand, and the flow to roll with.
Being the only minor arcana card gives two hints….that this nonthreatening. It isn’t the big Major arcana energy…it’s going to be ok. Trust. Flow.
Also this is the path of least resistance right now. Fighting the flow might be exhausting. Let it be easy for a few minutes. Not everything has to be filled with effort and striving. Here we get an echo of the previous Sun card’s message.
The ten of pentacles is also a card of happiness. True happiness, and appreciation and gratitude for all that money can’t buy. This is the donkey. This is the happiness we already have that we can only find when we let go of all the striving and looking and trying.
Here I am giving another pop culture reference. It echoes the social media reference to praying for strength over being protected because strength can be used to protect ourselves and those we love as well.
In the TV adaptation of Neil Gaimon’s American Gods, a character said that is the difference between his (Muslim?) prayer and that of the typical American – we pray to be given stuff, while in his tradition they pray to give thanks for what they already have.
Sit with that idea for a while. It is a game changer.
In summary, no one is saving us this year. This is the year when we learn to save ourselves. This isn’t the year when someone or something will make us happy – this is the year when we stop looking for happiness and can discover it was there all along.
Where ever or however you find it, I wish you a year of peace, health, and happiness.
Happy New Year!
Sage Sips / TaoCraft Tarot 
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