Tag: mean

A Sentence Suspended In Time

This post is not going the way I thought it would. This is about the 10th re-write of something I’d hoped to post last Wednesday – or something like that. Even after all of these years, cool & fascinating stuff still happens with the cards. I’m not 100% comfortable with how self-referential this is turning out to be. At the same time, I feel pushed by intuition to share the stuff that has been going on inside my head, the hope being that it will show you a little bit about how valuable a daily Tarot practice and DIY Tarot can be. Then of course, I hope you will click over to the shop and buy PeaceTarot to learn how to tap into the coolness for yourself. So shameless self-promotion out of the way, let’s take a peek at Tarot, social media and a sentence suspended in time.

The daily cards from this week have been niggling at me for days. I originally started the series with the intent of connecting a very young-seeming audience on a new (to me) social media platform. The intent was to draw a simple daily card with a short stand alone message with the hope it would help whoever stumbled across it. As the week went on a pattern emerged. It was like a slowly unwinding message, a paragraph draped across an entire work week.

  • Justice (reversed): You have done / are doing something boneheaded. Just stop. Do better next time.
  • Three of Swords: Use your street smarts. Use what you know.
  • Five of Cups: Mistakes happen. It can’t rain all the time, but neither is it sunny all the time. Let it go, this will pass.
  • Six of Wands: Make peace with yourself and the rest falls into place.
  • King of Cups: Spiritual guidance may come in its own time and at its own pace, but it always, always comes when it is needed. Even when you don’t know that it is needed.

I’ve tried a half dozen times to write this post, but it just wasn’t coming together. When writing a post feels more like a sparring match the message is often as much for me as for the audience, usually more. When the message is detached, channeled for a client or for someone “out there” in cyberspace, it flows in a different way. When it is something I need to get my head around, then the niggling and wrangling begins.

Today’card, the King of Cups, is proof in action of its own message. Even though I’ve been wanting to knit the first three cards together for a while, it needed the King of Cups’ message to feel right, to be complete.  I didn’t know it was needed, but here it is after taking its own good sweet time to arrive.

This is how the slow motion message reads now; You are doing something bone-headed. Just stop. Use some street smarts. Letting it continue might lead to bigger regrets later. Let it go. Be at peace with yourself and the right opportunities will come. Let guidance and opportunity unfold with its own timing and trust the process of intuition.

I know, I know. I should – and do – trust the intuitive process. If I didn’t we wouldn’t be having this conversation.  We all need little reminders every now and then. Even though it is an absolutely normal, needed, everyday, commonplace practice, sometimes the marketing and promotion aspects of owning and running a business (especially an artistic, esoteric, service business like this one) make me a little uncomfortable. I know my shit. It feels a little wearisome and narcissistic to have to keep telling everyone that I know my shit and am good at what I do. But that’s another story. Back to the cards.

These particular cards are courtesy of my new Tik Toc account. I thought it might be a good way to reach a younger audience that wasn’t dialed into Instagram or Twitter. I push to Facebook and Tumblr, but don’t interact with them directly very often. I just enjoy IG and Twitter more. Logically speaking, social media is both a fun and low cost promotional resource. More promotion, more clients…and I need the cash flow as much as anyone else. So what is there to lose giving a new (to me) platform a try? Short format videos is a good way to flip a card, give a sentence, and then come here for a longer interpretation. Easy.

The mechanics of it are easy. The energy of it is not. When the first page of trending videos loaded, I wanted to click away as fast as possible. Not my crowd. Like I have always said about finding the right psychic or Tarot reader… just because there is a personality mis-match doesn’t mean the other person is doing anything wrong. But ego and the bank account over rode the street smarts. I thought the “young” demo there maybe “needed” something a little more spiritual to go with the sea of selfies and narcissism. So much for TaoCraft’s “fierce authenticity,” right? I really don’t think that crowd is a good match for personal growth and spirituality. I work next level. The energy every time I opened the app is that they are still operating at the Miss Cleo stage razzle dazzle predict-my-future-so-I-don’t-have-to-think-about-it-fix-me level of Tarot. Not my gig. Still, in the spirit of giving it a fair chance, did the cards every day except the holiday to see what would happen.

What happened was the cards give me a little reminder to be authentic, and trust my gut the energy on the website for the luvva….

(insert spirit guide eye rolling here)

So what have I learned from this little experience?

Tik Tok was not a good idea, but I did the right thing keeping post comments closed and protecting the blog/website from trolling. Web sites are sites. They are places in cyberspace that carry energy and intention just as much as any room in meatspace. It is a mistake to ignore that energy. It may not be a mistake to try, but it would be a mistake to continue to ignore the vibe. This is the time and place for fierce authenticity, remember? I fully realize that I am about the next level personal growth kind of Tarot readings. I am no longer willing to compromise quality in pursuit of quantity. I need clients, always. They will come in time, with process. Don’t forget to trust the processes of authenticity, just as you trust the processes of intuition that brought you to authenticity in the first place.

Even when you are crashing around mindlessly caught up in the nuts and bolts of life….like trying to run a successful service and artistic business…the right spirit message will eventually land in your lap. The trick is being willing to listen to it when it does.

All of that being said, see how the symbolism, words, images all lead to practical, usuable language? That is what I do for clients. I translate the cards into real world advice. In this case it isn’t about predicting how my business will do, or predicting if Tik Toc will be a good source of clients. In this case it is about personal growth advice: Get off Tik Tok and be true to yourself.

There is another layer of message here….it reminds me of the message I get time and time and time again in relationship readings. This too shows the wisdom of don’t chase, attract. Be a magnet, not a search and destroy mission.  Be happy here and now, and the rest will come. Be happy and the right people will come into your life. Like attracts like. I want clients that want my style of reading. So I have to be true to my style of reading. A prediction of how many clients I’ll get won’t do a thing for me. But by steering me away from Tik Tok, I can make new choices. I don’t know how many new clients I’ll get, but I’ll be a LOT happier along the way. I’ve chosen my path and built a better future, even if it is different from the original intention or expectation of getting more clients with the Tik Tok feed. See how that works? That is exactly what my readings for clients are like too….not predictions, but a translation of spirit into usable, practical advice-sentences. Not everyone is ready for that kind of thinking. Not everyone is ready to let go of old hurts, to heal and to grow. But for those who are, I’m hear to help….not over there posting on the selfie-palooza app.

Justice reversed, Three of Swords, Five of Cups, Six of Wands, King of Cups make sentences suspended in time; You are doing something boneheaded, so just stop. Use your street smarts. Let it go. Be at peace with your true self, and the rest will fall into place. Guidance will always come – whether you know you need it or not.

 

 

 

 

Five Card Tarot Reading

Q: Open reading, please!

A: Thank you for being so open about this. I’ve always gotten the best readings that way, and they feel like they have more energy behind them when giving them. It’s like letting a car roll a little instead of riding the brakes, if that makes any sense as an analogy. In answer to some of the “how does this work” questions I get every now and then, this is an example of how all my readings work, really. This is exactly what you get with an e-mail distance reading. Think of it as a written transcript of a video, phone or in-person session. It doesn’t matter to my intuition whether I give the information with my voice or with my fingers on a keyboard, it all comes out the same. But again, thank you. Let’s take a look at your cards. I shuffled 4 times, keeping my mind on “the highest and best for ****”. These are the cards that we got.

For *****

May 26, 2019

Your Cards Today Are:

  • Lessons from the Past: Three of Pentacles (Coins)
  • Current Situation: Death
  • Moving Forward: Three of Cups (reversed)
  • Advice / Choices: King of Wands (reversed)
  • Alternative Path: The Emperor

General Pattern

Are you familiar with the Tarot deck? On part of the deck mirrors the modern game playing deck with aces, numbers, kings, queens etc. That is called the minor arcana and over time, as I read them, these card are more day to day guidance. There are 22 other cards, called Trump cards or the major arcana. These cards have more wattage behind them energy-wise, and they tend to have a bigger message, something that may ask you to take action or make a serious decision.

In your case you have two majors (Death and The Emperor) the rest are minor arcana. In a layout this small, that is enough of an edge that it gets my attention. This may be a cue that you are in a time of high energy (or stress). It doesn’t give a good sense whether this on the horizon or in progress (remember, Tarot never predicts the future….it helps navigate you to it and through it). If I were to take a guess, things have been busy and this may be a hint that you will have a lot of things on your plate for a little while longer. There is also a feeling that you might actually like it that way….as if you are much more stress tolerant than you give yourself credit for being. You might get bored or feel stagnant if there wasn’t some energy and change bubbling up every now and again.

Of your minor arcana cards, three of the possible four suits are showing. That balance among the suits also hints that if there is stress, in is on the second half and you are closer to return to normal than peak change. Or, if you aren’t feeling particularly stressed, this would underline tha notion that you are a person that is very tolerant of energy and change…a very good thing.

When three suits show, sometimes it helps to look at the one missing, too, in case it has a message and is being conspicuous in its abscence. You are missing swords… the element of air, with hints of action, society, relationship with authority. By not being here, I get a feeling that this isn’t a good energy time for action, certainly nothing rash or hurried. It feels more like “sit back and let things unfold. There is enough energy here, you won’t regret it”

Lessons from the Past

Three of Pentacles

Pentacles have to do with the element of earth, the physical realm, the practical nuts and bolts of living, oftern work or career. The three in particular has to do with projects and group efforts, even though in this deck the three shows only one person, seemingly putting in late hours. The phrase “extra effort award” comes to mind here. I can’t say it is definitely work or school related, but it sure feels like it. Something needing extra work is implicit, not explicit. There is a need for a self-starter, a need for you to take initiative somehow. The reason it comes through as lessons past, feels like this is a lesson you may have learned the hard way. There may of been times in the past (the ‘past’ in question here feels like high school, teen years, a time when everyone is learning these types of things) where there may have been times you did assignments only as asked, or done only the minumum (like every teenager ever) But now you are being asked to take your game up a level. Put in the extra effort…dig a few layers deeper into things before passing judgement, before coming to a conclusion or before turning a project in. Usually this position has a lot of validation flavor to it. This does vallidate past experiences …but as a comparison for now, a lesson in what THIS time doesn’t need. The past is a lesson what not to do this time…a strong sense of “look at here and now with fresh eyes, not old habits.”

Current Situation

Death

You KNOW the death card isn’t literal, right? It is about a big change, something that changes everything. I see it all the time at Bachlorette parties….that kind of life altering change. And it doesn’t have to be a negative change. It can be very much a change for the better. Off the cuff, I want to associate this with career change…as if the extra effort energy in the 3 of coins card can bring some change in responsibility at work, or some change in self-esteem or the amount that you enjoy your work. Not necessarily wads of cash, but some pleasant benefit or doorway of opportunity for the future. Outside of work, it feels like a subtle but building, important change. Here is where loads of validation comes in. Lots of little life lessons, lots of learning, paying attention, maturing, caring, paying forward…a zillion little things have accumulated to big change. I feel like this card is saying you are not the same person you used to be, and that you are to be commended for the changes you have made little by little over time. The change will last.

Moving Forward

Three of cups

When a card turns over upside down relative to the person doing the reading, it is called reveresed. Some readers will switch card meanings when that happens. I like to consider all the possible aspects of a card anyway. If it turns over reversed then I just think of it as hinting that idea, that area of life, has blocked or turbulent energy. It’s not different per se, just a little more difficult or challenging than it might otherwise be. Cups symbolize our closest relationships, often romances, but in this case it is about your close circle of friends. It has advice energy around it. The reversal makes me wonder if there has been some distance creeping in between you and your closest friends. It could be as simple as everyone being busy, but the feeling is such it makes me wonder about tensions or conflicts. The advice feels to heal…to patch up any little spats so you can all be there for each other. Not necessarily just like before, but there just the same. A more mature group as a whole, but still a group together. Very stage of life feeling, not dire or permanent feeling.

Advice/Choices

King of Wands

Wands are fire, Kings are leadership. It feels like your choice is ennui and ho-hum vs following your passions. I want to connect that feeling of following your passions to the extra work and extra effort idea from before. The inspiration and idea to take THAT initiative my come from your innate interest and passion for something. Follow your passions and take initiatives. I thing the reversal comes from a hesitation or lack of confidence more than being an indication of outdome. The more confident and self-starting, the more of a leader you are, the more you follow your passions the better. Don’t let your doubts hold you back. Think, yes. Make good rational decisions, yes. But don’t let unrealistic or unreasonalbe self-doubt hold you back either.

Alternative Path

The Emperor

Basically, this is give yourself credit. The feeling here is that the current path card moves toward the three of cups, with that card symbolizing private, not-work life. This path, or part of the path, feels work related. When the two cards line up side by side like that, or seem related somehow, I take that to mean that you are on a good path…this card isn’t so much offering a clear alternative as it is emphasizing the cards before, especially the leadership aspects of the 3 of pentacles and the king of wands. This card is less offering an alternative than it is highlighting the idea of taking initiative, digging deeper, and having the courage to follow your passions. The Emperor is often a protector. Protect your dreams. Protect your passions and goals.

Summary

This part always seems to start with a color or color and chakra reference. For you I get rainbow flourite, with lots of purple and green together. It may not be it’s best known property, but it feels like it will give you the mental focus and clarity to do the extra work, the deeper layers you may need to do at the same time helping you stay grounded and clear. Clarity, focus, that may clear the way for you to also find any courage you need later on.

I see pine trees.

Again the purple stone….could be amethyst too.

There the energy steps back. It feels like this part wants to be extra gentle for some reason, and is stepping back with little information given…but nothing is missing “What needs said has been given”

Here I add what I call the “sigil element” You can use it in making a sigil (power symbol) for yourself if you like, or you can write it down on paper and carry it for luck, or you can just think of it as a picture way to sum up your reading. In my mind’s eye, I see wavy lines for energy and movement. The emphasis on change, and the new way of doing things with more initiative reminds me of the greek letter delta which means change in math. Three triangle together show change and flow….change, change again, constant learning and growing

Affirmation: I have the courage and mental clarity to change when needed and to follow my passions.

And there you have it….a typical Five card reading. I hope it helps!

Today’s Tarot: Ten of Cups (17 may 19)

If you define happiness on your own terms, within yourself and not based on external circumstances, what is to stop you having happiness right here, right now, right this very second as you read this?

There are those with biological mood disorders where this kind of shift in perception, this kind of re-framing just doesn’t work. We must never stigmatize or minimize their experiences. At the same time, those of us more fortunate, how can we not look to genuine, internal, not-circumstance-dependent happiness when it is just a heartbeat away for us?