It might have immediate blowback, or it might be building foundations or planting seeds that pays off later.
Potential lies in the hands of action.
All of the cards this week are swords. Swords are associated with air and action, intellect, and our relationship with authority, culture or society at large.
The fading energy card is the Page of Swords. Pages are students and learners. With this being in the fading position, it is a clue to a change of phase. It is the end of the beginning. It’s time to put on the big kid underwear and get to work. At some point you have to leave school and do the thing. For many, now is that time. Now is the time to make old efforts pay off, true to the harvest season, lending this card a sense of rapid expansion. The page is supposed to represent a knight in training. Knights can become kings. With these two cards side by side, it gives a feeling of rapid expansion, a rise through ranks, rapid progress after a dely.
Current energy is the king of swords. King cards are protectors and leaders. Again intellect and action mixed. This is a time of head over heart. Kings protect the kingdoms boundaries. This is a hint to set and protect and enforce our boundaries. Insist on respect but give it in equal measure and with equal discipline.
Anything in its extreme contains the seed of its opposite
Rapid expansion can also translate to ‘in over your head’
The growing energy card, the three of swords is a caution against falling prey to your own naivete and inexperience. Know what you don’t know, and know enough to ask for help when its needed to avoid problems. The faster you move, the harder it is to see and avoid pitfalls in time. Heads up. Problems may come at you faster as the week rolls on.
Thank you for reading. Good luck and be careful out there!
Next up: Learn with Me: Lenormand on Wednesday. See you at the next sip!
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It’s full-on, for-real spooky season. It’s said that the “veil” between the subtle and physical realms becomes thin this time of year. Theoretically humans are more sensitive to the mystical, mysterious and spiritual.
This week the fading energy is the 10 of cups. Cups are emotion. Tens are the largest and only double digit minor arcana number cards. Emotions have surged. Put in astrology terms, the last full moon in Pisces, the mercury retrograde, something Saturn or another -not my area of expertise – may have had nerves on edge. Everything is out of the gatorade and the microwave isn’t on, so emotions may be a little smoother this week. There is a sense of advice around this card to find peace of mind and peaceful emotions. Cups are associated with the element of water. Where there has been splashing and flailing for some and stagnant slack water for others, things are now moving in a better direction. Let it go, let it flow, go with that flow….all of those nice, rhyme-ish platitudes. Choose your battles. This may not be the time to fight. Find your flow instead of looking for hills to die on.
The current energy is the knight of wands. Wands are fire and can symbolize inner fire, inner passions, spirituality, philosophy. This is a time to stand up for yourself, but opt out of the drama. Don’t find hills to die on, find for your flag to fly on. It is a time of finding yin power – of attraction, transformation. If this were a major arcana card, it’d be the magician. Here I am reminded how in Suzanna Clark’s novel Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrel, the knight of wands was a sign of magic returning to England.
You have no more right to change other people than they have to change you, but you every right to BE you. The mental image of a force field, of energy shields akin to Star Trek or Dune comes here. Knights are self confidence and action. BE is a verb. Be yourself apologetically.
The growing energy is the Hierophant card, in this case from the Minchiate Tarot from the early 1500s in Italy. It has images of monarchy ruling by divine right, but could also be seen as divine inspiration or a muse-like energy. It doesn’t carry the religious imagery of the pope-like Hierophant cards.
This card is a reminder that sometimes it is ok to be a bit of rebel. In these days, it pays to use your head and be safe, but as you are able, allow yourself to follow your own calling, regardless of whether it meets other peoples expectations. Follow your own path, be your own person. The wind may not be at your back for that sort of thing right now, but supportive energies are growing – especially if you actively seek them. Find your tribe. Again, fly your own flag. BE your own person. Honor your own divine calling even if it is counter to the social, political, or religious so-called authorities. Honor your own internal guidance. You are your own best minister. Guidance from your highest self is heard within. Your happiness depends on no one but you.
Internal guidance put humankind on the moon.
Thanks for reading! If you found this reading at all helpful, please consider a private reading or clicking the white mug to support the blog with a virtual coffee. Next up: Learn With Me, Lenormand introduction part 2 coming Wednesday 9/27/23
See you at the next sip!
Alleyman’s Tarot deck used with permission Publishing Goblin LLC
The five of cups was the growing energy card for this week in Monday’s Energy path reading. Now that the week ahead is mostly the week behind and we are looking forward to the weekend, let’s see what’s going on with the growing energy.
The vibe of it feels steady now. Yesterday’s one card reading, the Devil, puts this card into better perspective. The negative connotations of the Five of Cups are sometimes imposed from the outside more than they are experienced from the inside.
It’s the Addams Family. It’s goth.
It’s like seventeenth century philosopher Barauch Spinoza said – any objective thing can be viewed as good, bad or indifferent all at once.
Things that some might consider dark, brooding, melancholy or even evil or devilish, others consider to be their comfort zone. The “dark and melancholy” is a place of comfort and happiness.
Who are we to judge?
It’s far better to ask how you can help rather than just assume something is wrong in the first place.
Today the card brings to mind both the Addams Family and their unabashed enjoyment of their own life and lifestyle – and the Cure song “A Forest”. While I am a Cure fan from way back, I keep mentally hearing the iconic guitar notes, so that must be some sort of intuitive clue, or at least a confirmation of the “indulge your inner goth” vibe of today’s card.
I think the carry away message of all of this is to reassure everyone that you are not a bad person just for having a shoe-gazey emo kind of day.
Even professional performers don’t have to be up and on point every minute of every day. You don’t have to be up and talkative all the time either.
Melancholy and moody is a human experience. It’s practically the definition thereof. Have a good mope if you feel like it.
Just don’t take it out on all the bright and chipper extroverts out there. They can’t help it they are cheerful.
Enjoy your weekend, whatever mood or mode it comes in. Now I’m going to go listen to one of my new favorite goth bands, Vision Video.
Back Monday for a new look at the next week ahead.
See you at the next Sip!
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The Devil isn’t just in the details…it’s all over the darn place.
Life isn’t always pretty, so Tarot isn’t always pretty. Sometimes the best thing a reading can do for us is break through walls of denial, yank the rose colored glasses off of our faces and set some jade ones into their place.
The Devil card from the major arcana is the ultimate card for that aspect of Tarot. It’s up in your face with cold, harsh reality -usually just when you need it most. It isn’t a call to fear. It is a call to courage.
There are reasons why positivity can go toxic. If there is nothing but light you are just as blinded as you are in pitch dark. It takes both light and shadow to see.
The Devil card’s reminder of the dark side can vary anywhere from the common sense to the dire and dramatic. The purpose isn’t to scare you – the purpose is to put you on an appropriate level of guard. Have batteries in the flashlight when a storm is forecast. Park in well lit areas and have your keys ready as you go to your car. Have the hard conversation with your significant other. Admit people you care about have the capacity to make bad political choices – and sometimes do.
There are gnarly things out there in the world. The Devil card reminds us that there are people out there who really don’t have your best interest at heart and this might be a good moment to take stock, face facts, and be safe.
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Life is a stress test.
In medicine, a cardiac stress test is where a person exercises with an EKG, an electronic measurement of heart activity. In some kinds of heart disease the problem doesn’t show until the heart is put under stress by the physical activity.
Sometimes in life, our innate strength doesn’t show until it is put under stress by life.
The problem comes when strength isn’t recognized for what it is or if we expect it to be different than it is.
Being sad during sad times isn’t a failure of strength. Acknowledging it and dealing with it is strength, especially when that strength comes in the form of asking for help.
In The Crow movie, Eric Draven said “It can’t rain all the time.”
The sun can’t shine all the time either.
The world would be Death Valley if it did.
Both are essential. Both are inevitable wherever life survives and thrives. There will be times of sadness or suffering. Period.
They come, but they need not steal our strength. If anything, they just might uncover a gift, namely the strengths and foundation that the good times provided.
Sometimes a ‘fading energy’ card is less overtly fading, but a reminder of times past…a reminder to use tools and skills that have worked well in the past. This card is less fading and more reminding, asking us to remember the lessons we’ve learned and bring them forward to apply to current situations. Those lessons learned are a treasure trove – like 9 coins is a treasure, a high number pentacle card.
The Ace of Cups has an abundant, overflowing cup sort of feeling. It confirms what you have – confirms the inner strengths symbolized by the 9 of coins is indeed there, full, at the ready to pour out on any problems that come up.
The five of cups is emotion spilled, but not emotion denied – tears spilled, but not tears denied. It may be a new problem, but it just might be a comfort to find an old skill that still works.
Thank you for reading. Please come back Wednesday, September 20 to start the next “Learn With Me” series when we start to explore the 36 card Lenormand Tarot.
If you don’t know, you will later if you stick with this for any amount of time.
Own more than one Tarot deck, that is.
If you are a Tarot enthusiast you probably have a deck or two around, especially if you read very often. If you are a professional, it goes double. We all end up with more than one deck. Most are self-purchased, which shows what baloney the superstition about being gifted your first deck can be. The tradition of it has value, I suppose. It would boost the confidence of a young reader and tie them to some degree with a mentor, or at least connect them to a more experienced Tarot reader one way or another.
Some of the professional Tarot readers I know have dozens. Oodles and shelf loads even. I’m not a collector by nature and started off swearing that a good reader should only ever need one deck – so of course I have 10.
Choosing a deck for a reading is the same as dealing with reversals. When you get right down to it, it is a matter of pure intuition.
With reversals, I just feel my way through it and decide if the reversal should be considered as PART of the card’s message, or whether it was just happenstance in which case I just flip the card right side up and move on.
Same with picking up the deck for these collective energy blog readings or private email readings. For in-person readings, I carry two decks in unmarked tarot bags with me and let the client choose. I have one deck, the only one gifted to me, that I use only to read for myself. I use the Alleyman’s, Heart of Stars, and 1909 RWS primarily here in the blog – the first two because their creators have graciously granted me permission to do so and the latter because it is in the public domain.
Often I’ll compare and contrast the different decks when I’m doing a one card post like this. Different decks visually capture different facets of the deck. You can do the same thing by doing an online image search to browse different decks.
Today’s card is a good example. Some cards use fairly consistent images across decks. The three of swords, for instance. It almost alwasy has some iteration of three swords in or around a heart. I don’t know if that is by design, by coincidence or the sheer strength of the card’s presence in the collective unconscious. Other cards, like the five, differ. The RWS above gives a sense of “cleaning up” after a battle, both in the literal sense and in the modern meaning of profiting to the max. The figure seems to be picking up dropped swords, smiling and making gains from the suffering of others.
The Heart of Stars portrays the figure as more egotistical, even sadistic or disturbed taking a form akin to the Joker in the Dark Knight series of Batman movies.
Witches Tarot with art by Matt Evans shows five swords arranged tips together and downward in the sky with a dragonfly and fairies (I think hinting at the trickster wishes granted in Fea and Genie lore)
The five of swords made by Sam Dow for the Alleyman’s Tarot shows a throne made of a tree with swords in the roots.
All show victory but at a high cost or some sort of concurrent loss, but all have subtle differences that shift the emphasis.
The advice today is basically try not to shoot yourself in the foot as the saying goes. Ask yourself if the victory, the win, the competition is worth the cost.
With these fresh cards, it finally feels as if we have moved past the focus on cycles and change and ebbing and flowing. No Moon card or tide images today.
In one sense it feels like we’ve cycled back to that still, “slack water” image that came through a few weeks ago when the big Moon card energy first appeared, but it isn’t “slack” at all, really. It feels more like alert, deliberate, poised, ready-to-move stillness. It is a liminal energy, and the word balance doesn’t quite capture it. It isn’t the dynamic balance or back-and-forth balance that we see in the Temperance and Two of Pentacles cards. It feels more like a flat out, steady, matter-of-fact “BOTH” It isn’t balance or tension between opposites, it is the steady presence of diverse things without tension among them, without a need to balance. That “coexist” bumper sticker comes to mind.
Oxford Language defines liminal as “occupying a position at, or on both sides of, a boundary or threshold.” The “both” part is key here. Not balance, not cycle, not give and take – flat out all of the above, all at the same time.
It is interesting that we have two aces and one major arcana card. If this was a ‘yes or no’ kind of just for fun reading, it would be a plain YES. We all know Tarot doesn’t really work that way, but I think yes or no readings can be helpful in limited situations. Usually in minor choices where the options truly are equal and the situation is something that could be decided by an actual 50-50 random chance coin toss. Yes/no readings are exactly that – a coin toss, but with slightly more food for thought from three randomly selected Tarot cards adding their two-cents to the conversation.
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September 11 – October 31 2023
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The fading energy is the Ace of Cups. This is a card of creation, creativity and emotions. The current energy is the Ace of Pentacles. The real message is in the two side by side more than either one fading or growing individually. Here is where that liminal both-ness we were talking about earlier is strongest. It isn’t head over heart or emotions over intellect…it is BOTH in generous measure. Think “emotional intelligence.” These two cards together give an energy that is alert, engaged, feeling but thoughtful, active and effective – all at the same time. The two together are an extraordinary foundation upon which to build.
The growing energy, the Magician, is exactly that building process. The Magician is about transformation and manifestation – not just sitting and wishing. In “as above so below” the below is your part of the deal, your end of the table to lift. You do your part in the practical-pentacle part of life, and the universe helps the emotional-energy-spiritual-psychic part. Neither half is better or worse or more important than the other. It isn’t even a see-saw balance of the two. It’s both, all at the same time. The Magician’s magick is about having a foot firmly planted on each side of the “as above, so below” equation.
That is what makes up liminal spaces and energies and that is what makes up our energy flow for this week.
At least as it stands now. Please come back Wednesday for another “Odinsday Oracle” post and Friday for the Weekend Update where we’ll take another look at the Magician, our growing energy card to see how it unfolded during the business week and what, if anything, there is to see about the weekend.
Thanks for reading. See you at the next sip!
*Meet Zombie Cat: This cartoonish alter ego does all of my yes/no readings. Tongue in what’s left of his cheek, Zombie Cat readings have a 100% guarantee to contain word and a 50% chance of being dead wrong.
Yesterday was quite a week as they say. I personally am very glad to see the weekend get here. I’m also still into the idea of revisiting the energy path reading from Monday to see if and how anything has unfolded now that it is, thankfully, Friday. Four days is nothing so the changes won’t be dramatic, ever.
Time does keep turning, just like the Wheel major arcana card. “Churning” comes to mind as well as an active old-fashioned water wheel or the paddle wheel of an old Mississppi River steam boat.
On Monday, the “growing energy” card in the pathway layout was the Wheel. It is by nature a churning, changing, dynamic kind of energy. I think the Wheel’s energy has increased a bit over the past few days. My sense of it for the next few days life will be on the energetic side. This is a major arcana card, after all. I hear (‘hear’ meaning the intuition comes as words instead of mental images) “dating” “social” – in other words it is a good time to get out and around and be social if you are feeling it.
Spirit, energy, life, the universe and everything doesn’t care about our expectations much less our calendars and schedules. In the bigger picture of it all, four days really is next to nothing in the flow of time and energy. Let’s look at a bigger pattern that we’ve seen over the past few weeks of readings (August 21-28, August 28-September 9)
First there was Moon card energy both up front and underlying these current cards. There were a series of water and tide images. Tides are literally associated with the actual moon, so that certainly fits the card. First we were given the image of “slack water” that wasn’t moving much, then the tide turned and flowed inward, and now I get the image of an outward flowing tide, which would match that social, outward, dating and fun energy that came through a moment ago.
This week we have the Wheel card, which is a card of change. That part of the Wheel connects with the “natural cycles” meaning of the Moon card. The cycles meaning has been the dominant moon card meaning this whole time, and the wheel card is validating that. The wheel card is all about change, but also luck, good fortune, taking action so it gives an even stronger “the tide has turned” feeling. The Wheel takes the softer, gentler ‘natural cycles’ Moon energy and makes it much more active, energetic, churning. The tide not only has turned, but it is picking up speed.
Continuing with the water and ocean analogy, the idea of “undercurrent” comes through here. I get the feeling that a subset of us is still flowing inward, with an energy of deep introspection and a need for alone time to sit with difficult emotions and circumstances still exists. In my mind’s eye I see the Five of Cups again and now also the Hermit card.
So as always, follow and trust your own instincts. Allow what your emotions and body is telling you it needs. If you feel pulled to be out and about and are in the mood for a light, fun weekend then by all means indulge if you can. By the same token, if you feel gloomy and introspective, don’t fight it. Sitting with that side of things helps us to acknowledge, process and let go in a healthy way.
Weirdly, I get a sense that this won’t break along the expected introvert/extrovert personality lines or along any sort of pop culture stereotypical lines. It feels very individual with a mental image of mixed grains of salt and pepper. The best way I can describe the feeling is that this weekend may be a good chance of each individual of us to make friends with our inner opposite. Channel your inner Barbie – or inner Wednesday Addams – as the case may be.
No matter which side of the yin yang symbol you are feeling the most, have a good weekend! Next up: a new Energy Path reading for the week of September 11-18 will post on Monday.
See you at the next sip!
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Hello and welcome to the Energy Path reading for the week of September 4 – 11. I’m glad you are here.
Change and cycles are still a thing this week, but in a different way. It feels like it has moved from a general environment thing to being more personal advice. The lingering Moon card energy from the past few weeks feels like it has turned a corner, ebb is beginning to flow. The mental image here is outgoing tide, not at all the “slack water” energy from a few weeks ago.
At the same time there is emphasis on change. Now it has shifted to a more intense, personal, evolutionary change more than broad, gentle, slow, tectonic shift natural cycles.
Two other things come to mind, generally.
First, we are responsible for who we are now. Yes, life has been hard. Yes, you have experienced trauma of all sorts. Yet, you can heal, you can rise again, you can overcome. Destruction becomes disappointment becomes release.
It gets better when you get to the point where you can, at last, let it go.
“You are under no obligation to be the same person you were five minutes ago.” – Alan Watts
Second, as I listen to my favorite darkwave playlist-
If we choose who we are now, why do I and others choose dark, goth-ish, witchy, INTP, neon cyberpunk self-expression.
Yes, I said choose.
We could be all bright and karen and hot girl summer if we wanted to do that – but we don’t.
And we are doing right by ourselves and our souls and for society at large by doing so. I am reminded of the adage that religion is for people who want to avoid hell while spirituality is for those who have already been there. Perhaps the kindest people are the ones unafraid of the dark because they have walked there so often before.
Sometimes, the most revolutionary thing you can do for your shadow side is to admit it exists.
Why revel in what some call darkness? Consider the alternative: false, toxic positivism.
The Ten of Swords truthfully and directly acknowledges our injuries and our circumstances. The figure stays face down and flat to allow the profound change of either death or healing to begin.
This phase is fading. We’ve been down, so to speak, but the tide is turning. It is time to once again rise.
We rise, not fully transformed, but with lingering disappointment. Traces of old experience can cling. Now is a time of contemplation, of coming to understand what happened and is happening. Swords may be intellect and action, with a certain physicality to it all, if not from our physical person then from our social environment. The Five of Cups is about the emotional aftermath of whatever the Ten of Swords represents for you.
Growing energies are the Wheel. This is the change of the death card plus the cyclic nature of the Moon card plus the transformation energy of the Magician card all rolled into one. We are coming to a potent time of change, and a potent time of choosing the person we will be five minutes from now.
We are under no obligation to be the person we were before but we are under every obligation to choose who we will become five minutes from now.
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Major arcana energy is right in the middle of it.
You know that moon energy that has been lingering the past few weeks? The same message is here but in a more direct, confrontational way. Major arcana cards tend to be more energetic, urgent, profound, far reaching…you name it.
The literal full moon is in two days. I chalk that up to a good old fashioned Jungian sychronicity – a meaningful coincidence. The Moon card has shifted to the Death card, but the energy of change remains.
As we all know from watching the Simpsons, the death card isn’t literal death…it is a big change. It’s not ‘you are going to get hit by a bus’ death, it is the death of an old view, action, persona…the “old” you that makes way for a new you. This is the ‘natural cycle’ energy from the past few week’s Moon card and the ‘only the empty cup can be filled’ energy we talked about last week but with the volume turned up to 11.
The cup is brimming, and is soon to turn over. The moon is nearly full, it’s time for tides to turn. This week feels like a tipping point of some sort.
Maybe it is the outrageously loud pavement cutting and water line work that is going on in front of my house right now, but I have a twitchy, gut churning ‘bad feeling about this’ worthy of Princess Leia. Something is up somewhere, but I don’t know what and I don’t know when. All I can do is sit here and take my own advice.
Fading energy: Queen of Pentacles, reversed. The Queen of Pentacles in any orientation is about nurturing. Often it is about nurturing yourself to preserve your capacity to help and nurture others. The reversal makes it feel like a reminder to let others nurture you. We all need a little care. If you don’t even have the reserves to care for yourself, allow others to help. Just ask nicely. It’s that simple. The fading energy here may be ours. It doesn’t feel like a go-getter, entrepreneurial kind of week. Astrology might blame it on the Mercury in the microwave phenomenon – it feels like a bigger pattern, more of a tectonic shift than a zippy little optical illusion.
Current Energy: Death. The funky mojo energy reminds me of the beginning of covid to be honest. Maybe we are finally shifting out of that phase of human history. It doesn’t feel quite like impending doom, but a sea change of some sort. Sea change is a good way to put it…it connects with the moon cycle, ebb and flow imagery that has been so prominent lately. The phrase “Brave New World” comes to mind, although it doesn’t feel like an Aldus Huxley reference at all. The unknown can be gut-twistingly frightening. Maybe that is the bell ringing resonant energy that is going on here. We are finally moving out of that storm, cleaned up a little of the mess and are being forced to face facts. Everything has changed and will never be the same again.
I’m going to go put “We Don’t Need Another Hero (Beyond Thunderdome)” on loop. Maybe we are looking at the unknown beyond Thunderdome so to speak. Ah – there it is – “I wonder when we are ever gonna change, change Living under the fear, ’til nothing else remains.” Is this going to be fear or freedom for us? I suspect it will be whichever we choose.
Growing energy: Five of Pentacles
It’s interesting that the Pentacles are the only minor arcana cards showing this week. It’s right back to that hunker down and be practical vibe from 2020. Maybe this really is the unknown other side. Again, the sense of this card as fearful or freeing is again up to us to our choice.
The card also brings to mind a TikTok I saw yesterday. I forget the creator, it was something survival. It was a very sped up video of someone who dug a hole and built a survival shelter out of branches and dry grass & mud daub. They even dug out a fireplace (about the size of a small cooler) complete with chimney.
I looked like a totally warm, dry Hobbit hole when it was done.
The Five of Pentacles is about seeking shelter in a storm.
You can focus on the storm or you can focus on the sanctuary that is available for you to take. Again, our choice.
I ‘hear’ “wrap your wisdom around you like a cloak.” Sheltering through a storm means gathering in, yin, not pushing, not being ostentatious. But it also means being happy that shelter exists to take.
Sometimes humble but sturdy and reliable is a wonderful thing. Look for those kinds of things and take whatever shelter you need this week.
Thank you for reading! Your support through likes, follows, social media shares, and comments is always appreciated! Nothing on this blog is paywalled anymore, and none of my social media is monetized so YOUR Tarot message always comes first. Your support through private readings, memberships, and virtual coffee tips are what fuels it all.
Next up – Wednesday “Odinsday Oracle” – not because I’m not particularly Norse pagan but I am, however, fond of alliteration and Neil Gaimon novels.
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