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Action Eases Anxiety (9 Nov 25)

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The “Action Eases Anxiety” layout was inspired by Buddhist philosophy (I HIGHLY recommend Dan Harris’ Substack) and my “Learn With Me” series about Lenormand Tarot.

The layout is like a sentence…a noun and a verb. It represents the current energy, then what to do about it. It isn’t a prediction or a quick fix, but making an action plan like this takes the edge of worries. Any tarot reading can help us focus on the moment at hand, not what may or may not happen in the future. That in itself can help ease worry.

What it is (left card): Ace of Cups, reversed. Something is leaking or spilling. Where are your emotions being spent uselessly? Where is your creative energies being wasted? What fucks are you giving that would be better not to give, or to at least give somewhere else?

What to do (right card): Ten of Wands. Put down responsibilities that aren’t really yours. Remember that you can show the way, but you can’t walk through the door for someone else. You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make them drink. Your happiness is your responsibility, no one else’s. No one can give it to you, but equally, no one can take it from you unless you give it away.

Thanks for reading and watching! See you at the next sip!

Deck: Alleyman’s Tarot by Seven Dane Asmund, used with permissions Publishing Goblin LLC

Action Eases Anxiety: Feel your way home

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L- what it is (cross, reversed)
R – what to do (the Lady)

Energy is flowing at cross purposes to your higher intentions. Magick moves slower, this is not a time for impulsive actions.

Feeling is both noun and verb. Feeling IS doing something. Emotions, intuition, gut instinct may sway back and forth, but like a compass needle will help you feel your way forward, like gently finding your way across a pitch-black room.

The Lady card today resonates with the sacred feminine, with the mysterious, spiritual, inward, contemplative side of human psychology that is akin to the High Priestess in other Tarot decks. That is the thing to do. By the same token, being rigid, outward, legalistic, or dogmatic (as one might expect from the Pope card) is something to be avoided in this energy environment.

Lenormand tradition does not give much weight to reversals, but in this case it seems to emphasize the message that the energies are not openly hostile but definitely moving at cross purposes to your intentions. This is not a time for new projects. This is not a time for impulsive action or rash decisions.

Think about finding your highest and best, think of acting (albeit carefully) for the highest good. This is a good week to contemplate your true calling and highest path. Find direction now, take action later when the way is more clear and the resources you need are within view and closer reach. your true calling and highest path. Find direction now, take action later when the way is more clear and the resources you need are within view and closer reach.

To put it in short but controversial terms, be loving and spiritual this week, avoid religion. Feel, more than act this week. Contemplation and kindness lead the way through this time.

Thank you so much for reading. See you at the next sip!

Action Eases Anxiety: The More You Know

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The times are vibing with the Lenormand Deck, which inspired this two card layout in the first place. My experience with Lenomand resonated with a conversation I heard on “The Circle is Pod Cast” with Matt Auryn and Rachel True. Lenormand really is concise, direct, and often very sentence-like . That in turned this short subject/verb, what it is/what to do format.

What it is: CROSS. The liminal portal-like energy from last week continues. Think of this in religious terms if you must, but this energy is like crossROADS more than connected to any one religious viewpoint. This is a time of choices. Progress demands it. Linger here and become stuck, or choose well to manifest your next path for the highest good. This is a potent time. Use it well to set intentions, plant seeds, lay foundations.

What to do: Book Symbolic of both sacred mystery and deep learning, this is a reminder that learning isn’t always about logic and knowledge. Wisdom asks to be learned as well. Learn the way of your chosen spiritual path by reading, listening, finding a mentor. King of cups Tarot card comes to mind. Spirit guide energy is nearby to help, but you must still do the work and learn to find the best way for you as an individual to be a part of this energy and flow with this powerful time.

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Week Ahead Tarot: Cleverness and Trust

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THE SNAKE: Stay quiet and camouflaged, use logic and observation to learn who you can trust – or not.

THE DOG: Someone trustworthy is near. Find them, and be as good of a friend to them as they are to you. The sum will be greater than the parts for all concerned.

If your individual intuition is the engine that drives a Tarot reading, symbolism is the steering wheel.

Like a car in Pennsylvania during pothole season, it’s very easy for that steering to get out of alignment. Symbolism is very influenced by culture and time and has to be kept in context. It has to be in alignment with the reader and the sitter and the intuitive vibe of the reading.

Take the color black, for example.

For some, black is seen as aligned with “evil.” In western traditions black has been associated with death, funerals and mourning, but also with evening elegance and fashion, men’s tuxedos for example.

In Japan, novice monks and many lay people wear black as a symbol of their dedication to practice and as a symbol of community.

The symbolism for snakes is just as varied. Sometimes they are seen as symbolizing lies or deception as in the Christian garden of Eden myth or someone being a “snake in the grass” in an old western movie.

In Chinese cultures, snakes are associated with wisdom, intelligence, charm and grace. In many places they are connected to personal growth and transformation through their ability to shed their old skin as they grow.

Dogs on the other hand, are all just good bois and gurls. How an individual person treat dogs and other small animal is the tell here more than any broad cultural reference. If a dog likes you, you must be OK. If you like dogs, there must be some kindness in your heart. Dogs symbolize great loyalty and deep friendship almost everywhere. Only after they have been through horrors do they devolve into aggression and threat.

If you chose the snake card, beware deception – use observation, cleverness and intellect to understand who to trust. Take inspiration for the snake to adapt and transform yourself.

If you chose the dog card, know others by their proven trustworthiness and kindness. Be a friend, find a friend, hold on to your friends.

Action Eases Anxiety: Portal

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Current Energy: THE KEY. This is a time of transition, a liminal portal from one cycle to another – not quite finished, not quite begun. This energy is akin to a blend of the RWS eight of cups and the Magician energy than the pure beginning energy of the Fool card. This isn’t pure beginning. It is manifesting in the context of a new cycle. This resounding quiet is a potent time to plant the seeds of being and set intentions to manifest in the future.

Next Step: CLOUDS. Endings and beginnings both carry potent emotions. When endings and beginnings come close together, as in a closed circle, the emotions can be intensified. Be kind to yourself. Remember moods and emotions are transient as clouds. Let go. You can’t grasp the mist.

Action, doing something, can ease the anxiety and worries that can’t help but persist if we do nothing but wonder ‘what if…’ Action is necessary for there to be change, for anything to actually manifest. But the first step in any action begins in the invisible, begins with thought or decision. Making an action plan is as essential as the action itself, no matter how quickly that thought or decision or plan happens.

Making a decision – even the decision to do nothing – is in itself an action that eases anxiety.

Action Eases Anxiety: Smooth Sailing

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In this simple layout is almost like a sentence: what it is and what it does – more accurately what you can DO with the collective energies around us all today. Actions eases worries, in this case worries about relationships or connections with people.

The ship hints at a time of prosperity & progress. The emphasis is on progress, on forward movement. The ship implies smooth sailing, much like with the smooth waters / go with the flow collective energy I’ve seen lately with the Six of Swords in collective and private readings alike.

The bouquet hints at affection and, more importantly, showing it. Not is not the time to bottle up feelings. If you feel kindness, compassion, love, amusement, or any good thing – now is the time to show it. Show it in no uncertain terms.

If you feel less pleasant things, show that too. Yes, by all means, communicate those feeling too, but the key here is to show it with emotional maturity and kindness. The Bouquet card with its pretty flowers reminds us of those wise old adages: “You catch more flies with sugar than with vinegar.” and “A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down.”

Again the phrase “emotional maturity” comes to mind. Pitch kindness, not a fit. A little calmness and reason will go a long way for you in this energy environment.

The outer world may be chaos, but it is a good time to show love and kindness. If it is returned, soak it in. Even when it is unrequited, you can feel good about loving in the first place. That moment, that feeling existed and added to the good in the world and still does.

When you love, you win.

Weekend Oracle: Keep Clearing

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This is a direct continuation of the energy we saw in the Action Eases Anxiety: Clear Away post from Wednesday

“Keep cutting away the unnecessary to find (and protect) the blessings beneath” Precision and minimalism are your allies. It is a time for scalpels, not sledgehammers.” Intuitively comes through here.

The key point of this card, as I understand it, is that personal growth is a double edged sword. The reversal of the card feels significant here, pointing toward shadow work in particular. It is painful to face the darker side of ourselves, but leads to peace and emotional health in the long run.

Shadow work is the emotional equivalent of a blade that cuts through our defenses causing painful feelings – but opening the way to calmer, more peaceful, more fulfilling emotions as well.

“We cannot be more sensitive to pleasure without being more sensitive to pain.”
Alan Watts

This is the same energy seen in the Heart and the Crane Lenormand cards from our previous reading. Cut away the excess. Clear away the unneeded. Love exists, whole and complete but obscured, just like the beauty within Michelangeo’s sculpture:

“The sculpture is already complete within the marble block, before I start my work. It is already there, I just have to chisel away the superfluous material.”
Michelangelo

In this orientation, the sword on the Blessings oracle card resembles the Ace of Swords, which is associated with clarity and truth among other things. The Lenormand reading, the Oracle reading and the hinted-at RWS tarot card all point toward the same basic idea: simplify, clarify, do the hard personal growth work to uncover the obscured now and it will reveal great benefit in the end.

You can be yourself with me. Happy pride month!

Deck: Alleyway Oracle of Secrets by Seven Dane Asmund used with permission from Publishing Goblin LLC

Action Eases Anxiety: Clear Away

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It’s an ancient idea. Buddhist teaching long ago realized that taking action – or even making a decision or making a plan of action – can ease worry and anxiety. Practice and role play are a crucial part of emergency training.

Action eases anxiety, even in tarot. Knowing your energy environment and thinking about a good next step can go a long way to easing turbulent emotions.

Today’s Energy

THE HEART: Hope and love exist. It is near, but tangled in the maze and weeds of daily living. Don’t lose the forest in the trees as the saying goes. Don’t lose the love in the background noise, either.

Next Step

THE CRANE: Something new must deliberately be created. Clear away the mindless, the outdated, the harmful, that which has lost usefulness and the love and hope surrounding you will become clear. It is like Michelangelo’s sculpting method:

“The sculpture is already complete within the marble block, before I start my work. It is already there, I just have to chisel away the superfluous material.”
― Michelangelo

The love and hope energy is already there.

Clear away the extra and unneeded, and love will emerge.

Action Dissolves Anxiety: Lucky Listen

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The ADA layout, opposite to all of my other layouts is read left to right, just like reading English. There is a reason for both. Reading in a direction opposite of my native language disrupts the logical process of reading and grammar, which makes it easier for intuition to flow through.

In this case, the sentence-like structure is the point of it.

I was listening to a podcast that was talking about Lenormand Tarot, and it echoed my own (albeit limited) experience with the Lenormand deck. It is very language like and better suited to small 2-3 card layouts. These small Lenormand readings are often blunt, forthright, in the present moment with a subject and predicate, noun and verb quality. This layout focuses on exactly that: the energy thing that is and what to do.

Today’s energy: Clover. Just like the famous four leaf clover, this is a card of growth, luck

What to do: The letter. Communication is key. Take care to listen and not jump to conclusions. Take care about what you say and speak into being.

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Action Decreases Anxiety Tarot: Strength and Shade

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The ADA (action Decreases Anxiety) layout shows

what it is / the current energy or situation
what to maybe do next because action Decreases anxiety

Today’s energy: The Tree – growth and stability. Your source of strength might not be obvious, but it there, underground, like roots to nourish you.

What to do next: The Cloud. Stay cool, enjoy the shade that cloudy days offer. Your social mask doesn’t have to high energy all of the time. Turn down that wattage and use some of that energy for your own recharge. Take a minute. Let the clouds clear and the muddy water settle…a pause can bring clarity. The better you understand, the less frightening it is to move forward. Knowledge is power, but make sure you see clearly.