Tag: emotions

Follow the Feels

TaoCraft Short Sip is Tarot for today in the time it takes to sip from your coffee. Today: Ace of Cups and following the feels. Private email readings are OPEN.

Thank you so much for listening, watching and reading TaoCraft Short Sip Tarot. It’s a Tarot reading for your day in the time it takes to sip from your morning coffee. Or afternoon coffee. Or whatever beverage you enjoy.

Today’s card is the ace of cups.

Ace cards carry the essence of their suit of cards. In many ways they are the most abstract cards of the minor arcana. Being the first card of the suit, there is also a trace of connection to the Fool card, the first of major arcana cards. All of them connect to the idea of beginnings and newness in one way or another.

While cups cards are often read as symbolizing romantic relationships, they also include other inner circle relationships, both our family of birth and our family of heart. In the abstract, cups are connected with water, intuition, and emotions

Deep running emotions are sometimes a double edged sword. They can get us through our most difficult moments in life. Lau Tzu, writer of the Tao Te Ching is credited with saying that being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.

Strong emotions can also be paralyzing instead of strengthening. Frank Herbert describes fear as “the little death that leads to total obliteration.”

Either way, emotions have real world implications and effects. At a minimum, emotions affect our experience of life. They aren’t necessarily a bad thing. Emotions can be difficult to face, and difficult to experience, but that isn’t to say they should be suppressed with stoicism to rival Mr Spock from Star Trek. Emotions don’t have to take over and run the show, either.

I’m not sure who first said it this way, but my first encounter with the notion that “the feeling is the power” was in a book by Scott Cunningham.

In a middle way approach, we can have a relationship with emotion that empowers life. Emotion can motivate and enrich. Emotion can work in balance with logic and intuition.

Whatever day you are reading or listening to this, whatever day this card crosses your path, this may be your clue that it is a day to listen to your emotions. If you can’t follow your heart 100%, at least give it a listen. Allow your honest emotions to be heard and they may help you to begin something new and wonderful. Follow the feels to find the power.

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See you at the next sip!

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Today’s Tarot: It’s all good, even the bad.

It’s OK to be OK. It’s OK to not be OK. It’s not OK to pretend.

“The only sin in any of that is in the pretending”

Tuesday afternoon, I watched the secular coalition panel discussion at the Democratic convention. I wish I’d written down the details of the story, who told told it, who it was about, but it didn’t occur to me. The anecdote struck a very personl chord with me. Other than the quote above, the details have escaped.

The speaker told of an atheist friend of his who told his devoutly religious father of his non-belief. He listed all the things so important to the friend’s family that the 20 year old friend could no longer honestly do because he thought it was all, well, BS. He expected anger, hurt or worse from his father, who simply stood, gave the man a hug and told him the only sin in any of his rejections is in the pretending. It would be a far worse offense to pretend to believe, to go through empty motions.

The same idea is true of emotions in general. Queen cards represent a caretaking and nurturing kind of leadership (contrasted with the protective leadership of a King) while Wands cards have to do with the inner world, and the element of fire…our inner passions, emotions, spirituality, beliefs.

The only sin is in the pretending.

This speaks to “toxic positivity” as some are calling it. You could also call it emotional dissonance, or even outright denial. Like most things, it is a two way street.

You can’t manage stress unless you admit it exixts in the first place. You can’t fix the problem until you honestly acknowledge that it is there and begin to understand the real nature of things. Pessimism isn’t always helpful. But neither is seeing the wold through rose colored glasses. Both add to problems. You have to stare reality in the face to deal with what actually is happening.

AND you have to stare your own heart and emotions in the face to accept and acknowledge what they are too. Emotions aren’t good, bad, positive, negative or indifferent, unless we assign that quality to them. It reminds me of that quote from the movie Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins. “Fear is just a feeling. You feel hot. You feel hungry. You feel angry. You feel afraid. Fear can never kill you.”

Wise words, even if it comes from pulp fiction. It’s ok to feel what you feel. The feelings won’t hurt you. It’s the stupid shit we do in the name of those feelings that cause problems or make existing problems worse.

So yes, by all means, it’s ok to be ok.

It’s just as ok to not be ok.

But it’s not ok to pretend.

YouChoose Interactive Tarot 20 March 20

 

I hope this slight change in format showcases what I’ve always known about my readings: Distance is my specialty. I’m really good with the written word. Typing a reading filters through my language centers differently. The information is the same, and it spits out the the same core message as in a live, in-person, on the spot reading, but I communicate that message just a tiny bit differently through email and the handwritten InkMagick readings. There is more emotional power. There is more style and panache. There is more poetry.  For example, imagine the message from spirit is “flowers.” In the real-time reading you will 100% for sure get “flowers”. In the written reading you will 100% for sure get “flowers. The core message is absolutely identical. With the written message, there is an chance the message might be a tad more polished, sophisticated or poetic…you might get “flowers like a yard full of spring violets” or “flowers, like a bouquet of pink roses”. I’m really good at doing in-person readings…you’ll always get your flowers, so to speak, but I’m super-extra-good at written readings. In all fairness, that might just be my perception because written readings are just so darn satisfying to do. Especially the pen and ink on paper one. I use a glass dip pen (I swear it reminds everyone of a magic wand) and specialty ink. Pen and ink holds a certain magick even beyond the power of the written word in a digital reading. It goes without saying all of the readings you get here are done by little old me and all the years I’ve been doing this, never a computer program, always unique, always for you, no matter which format you choose.

That being said – on to today’s cards.

Left: Four of Cups. Feel the feels. Emotions are running high. Emotions change often and things are understandably stressful. If you are one of the lucky ones who meet the times with calm or humor, keep it up…the world needs you. Look at the young man under the tree. He looks more introspective, not terribly happy. The Mermaid is silently, patiently present. Whatever your response to these times may be, sit with the present moment. Be present, not judging.  Times will flow like the stream, circumstance will change. This moment requires a patient, perhaps silent touch. Be. Be with the moment, be with each other in the feeling of the times, if not in physical presence.

Center: Ace of Pentacles (Ace of Coins) Coins have to do with the element of earth and the suit in general relates to the physical realm. This card picks up where the Queen of Wands left off. This is beyond leading by calm management and expample. It is time do do the practical things, do what you need to do to manage and preserve. Be smart and logical. Manage your resources and preserve them, never mind the notion of leadership. Ace cards are more primal and of the essence of the suit. Manage things well and keep it up.

Right: The Hanged Man. Boy does this capture the current energy, with everyone with a brain and a heart sheltering at home to protect everyone. We are in this together, we are isolated and at home for other people. In the past I’ve written that the Hanged Man teaches us that one person’s stuck in the mud is another person’s day at a spa. My mind is especially drawn to the bird with the bauble in its beak. This is a gift. It is a spa day. This enforced cut-back in outside activity and distraction is our chance to do something deeply wonderful. We are busy feeling stuck when we are also being handed a treasure. Now is the time for introspection. Set goals. What is it you want out of life? What can you do to move toward that when this is all over? People pay money for the chance to eat simply and meditate all day, take walks, do yoga  and go on a spiritual retreat. Don’t let this treasure fall past you. If you are reading this, you have internet access enough to find yoga instruction, new recipes to try, free ebooks galore. The “hang” won’t last forever. Take it in. The energy that is touching the human race right now is profound and powerful. It might frighten you. It might frustrate you. Or, if you take a hand in the process, it change you for the better.

You Choose: Free Interactive Tarot Reading

Left: Page of Coins. A day for learning practical skills. You don’t have to be perfect right away. It’s more about usefulness and progress than prettiness and perfection.

Middle: Knight of Cups. Emotions are more real, complete, and satisfying when they are constructivly expressed. Don’t just tantrum or gush – make something good come of whatever feeling motivates you today.

Right: Knight of Pentacles. It doesn’t matter if your journey takes you a thousand miles or across the room. Unless you take that first step, you go nowhere.

You Choose Tarot (7 Dec 19)

Left: Four of Cups. You don’t have to take your feelings out on other people to express them or honor them. Have a good pout. Sit and snarle at the air. Have a good cry. FEEL you feelings for a little bit. It is surprising how quickly they move along on their way once they have been heard and acknowledged. Both people and emotions want that same simple thing; to be heard and acknowledged.

Middle: Ace of Swords. Today is an updraft for some folks. Rise to the occasion. If a brilliant insight or creative idea hits, roll with it (or at least write it down.)

Right: Seven of Cups. Don’t be paralyzed by fear. It is ok to go slow and think through overwhelming options, but at some point the reasoning transforms into fear. Choose before that happens

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