Tag: relationships

Today’s Tarot: What Does It Take?

The Ten of Cups is one of the most idyllic cards in the deck. It is about as rainbows and unicorns as it gets. Good news all around, especially if you feel optimistic and forward looking. This is a card you want to drop into your future. This is where you want to be headed. Especially when it involves the love, romance and relationship suit of cards, right?

It is also where you want to be right now. I can see how this card can be a pin prick to people who have suffered losses. The card can be a hopeful sign of where you are headed, or it can be a painful reminder of what you don’t have. As with everything, perception plays a large role.

What is missing? What would it take to make your present moment into a Ten of Cups moment?

Filling a need and getting something you don’t have in order for life to be happy can be both difficult and risky. What will you do if you get your whatever-it-is, but still aren’t happy?

Here is your real challenge: What would it take to turn your present moment into a Ten of Cups moment without adding anything new?

Timeflow

Blursday. The 98th day of Maraprilay in the fifth year of the great quarantine of 2020.

I dunno who came up with the “Blursday” thing on the interwebs, but they deserve a pulitzer or something for capturing the flavor of this whole thing in one word. 

It’s not a negative thing to my mind. I like Blursday. It’s my new favorite day, mostly because I was trying to freelance from home long before all of this started. I don’t mind having my all adult fam here. Free pickup at the grocery store is frosting on the 24/7 comfy pants cake. 

No great cloud is without its silver lining, and not great benefit is without its minor asspains. When I was working, even short handed and on call, time management wasn’t that big of a deal. You work your hours, execute some sort of basic hygiene, and if there was any time left there were plenty of things to do. Pick one. Sleep when you can. Easy.

Creative and freelance work is the exact opposite. Following the white rabbit of inspiration when it comes along is part of the job description. With greater flexibility means more effort is needed to manage time, even before Blursday came along.  I’m not super neat or organized in the first place, but I do like to contemplate plans for the day over morning coffee. How else can plans get blown to heck and force a person to adapt if you don’t make some semblance of a plan in the first place?

Even now, in my completely not humble opinion, the five card Modern Oracle card layout is the best all-purpose layout. I designed it to empower choices with a side of validating the path you are on. I wrote it mainly because I couldn’t find another layout that did quite that thing. No one layout can do everything. How do you make a choice when you aren’t sure what the choices are? How do you start down a path when you aren’t sure which direction to take the first step?

I’ve been looking for a good get-organized card layout. Owl and Bones Tarot had one that was close with their “embrace – face – erase” layout. They are brilliant at creating layouts (check out their Instagram feed) Triage is a lot to ask of any Tarot reading. Necessity being the mother of invention, it seemed time to write another one. The “TimeFlow” layout is simply this:

  • Let It Rest: This points to something that may have been getting a lot of your time, energy and attention that needs some space and rest. This isn’t to say that you should ignore it entirely, but maybe dial back the intensity. I want to compare it to a good southern brisket or pulled pork. You season it, then there is nothing more to do for it except low heat and plenty of time. You’ll know when it is time to bring it back out and get it ready to serve.
  • Let It Go: Some things are just plain over. Done. It no longer serves you. It it fresh out of joy to spark. Maybe this is a thought, habit, or thought habit that has grown stagnant if not outright unhealthy. This is something to consider sweeping out the door entirely.
  • Que It Up: This is about preparation and timing. It is the “on deck” circle to borrow from baseball. This is the next issue or idea to come into the spotlight. This is like the brisket in the first card that needs prepared to serve because it is almost dinner time. Think in terms of “not yet, but soon”
  • Let it Roll: Go! This card is the starter’s gun in track meet. This is number 1 on the list. This is where energy is already flowing in your favor. Don’t let the window of opportunity close on this one.

I’ve been working with this layout for a short time. I’ve already learned a few key points about it. First, it isn’t something to do often. Nothing other than a one card daily meditation should be done too often.  Follow your instinct, but don’t second guess, don’t keep asking again and again. As with any Tarot layout, the message gets muddled and confusing if it is over done.

Also like every other Tarot reading, it is more about ideas than concrete physical details. It won’t tell which project to pick up neck. It is better with intangibles. It seems to excel at pointing to the area of life or to the broad topic that most warrants your attention (or needs to be set aside.) For example if someone is frustrated at work, a coins card might say to let career rest, a swords card might ask them to let go of the idea of impressing a certain boss, cups might direct their attention toward a relationship whose time has not quite come, and finally, a wands card might point out the urgency of managing stress and feeding the inner spiritual world right now. It seems to organize within a single topic, too, when the topic is intangible.

So far, I’ve only read for myself with this card pattern, but I’m hoping you will help me change that. If you are interested in a FREE TimeFlow reading by email, please visit the special offers page and use the contact form there. That form is the only place that the free reading is available. I hope you will be patient…I don’t yet know how fast these will turn around or what the interest will be. I also hope you will send your feedback about the reading. I’d love to hear what you think! Don’t wait…the offer expires Blursday, the 98th day of Maraprilay in the fifth year of the great 2020 quarantine…

YouChoose Interactive Tarot: Leading Indicators

 

“There is no such thing as a problem without a gift for you in its hands. You seek problems because you need their gifts.” – Richard Bach

It’s not the no-pentacles thing.

Do you feel it? It isn’t over. The whole pandemic energy is still there, not the buzzing initial panic, but a low key, solid comfortable existential dread. From a place of both logic AND intuition – the switch flipping open the economy folks are insane. It is not time to go whole hog. We need to keep doing what we are doing a few more weeks. Even then there should be limits and cautions and this is nowhere near over until there is a vaccine.  

There is a leading indicator shift in the energy, akin to the resonance of panic and the foreboding ping that came in February and the run up to stay at home orders. This is advance planning. This is a nudge to think about what you are going to do or not do when official restrictions change. Trust me, the work from home freelancer….you don’t HAVE to go out if you don’t want to.

This reading, as a group of three, is about the good things this problem of staying in has brought, and once again this is more for the privileged than for those essential workers in the thick of this. They have bigger fish to fry than the getting and giving of Tarot readings. This is about “This is your chance to appreciate this while you have a chance before this opportunity goes away” This group of cards remind us to take whatever small gifts and good memories from the quarantine with us when it is all, finally and later, over.

Left: Two of Cups. This card, in normal times, is about marriage and other meaningful long term relationships. This is about holding on to long distance friendships that may have been forged online during social distancing. This is about the relationships that were strengthened or stretched to the limit being quarantined together. Think about what relationships have proven themselves to really matter over the past couple of months and think about which ones, if any, have proven themselves to be unnecessary. In short, trim and nurture where needed, cherish the precious from now on.

Center: Knight of Wands. Act on your passions. The rah-rah “toxic positive” vibe was way ahead of this curve. You still l don’t have to achieve or do anything except make it through, day by day. It wasn’t time yet, for many people, to do that spring cleaning or do their equivalent of Shakespeare writing King Lear during the plague. If you have some pet project or dreams to pursue, the energies are turning more toward that. Comfort yourself and those around you, yes. You will need that strength later. But the energies are shifting so it is easier for us to shift from hold-and-survive to once again chasing the dream.

Right: Eight of Swords. We are still trapped. It isn’t time to fully move yet. Now is the time for planning and creative problem solving. The energies may not have started to shift for you. If you have been thinking of these times as prison, now is the time to see them as protection. What do you need to guard that you haven’t seen? Where have you let your guard down….either getting your shields up too late, or dropping them too early?

Want a reading just for you, not from the public youtube / blogaverse cyberspace? You can get a private reading just for you, in a format that suits your taste and style: 

  • Email – typed doc with photo of your unique cards sent as an email attachment – no appointment needed
  • Video – your unique cards with verbal interpretation that you download with a unique (and private) link that comes to your email. (the files for the bigger readings are too large to attach directly) No appointment needed.
  • LIVE phone reading (by appointment only – prepayment required – schedule with the contact form HERE)
  • InkMagick Tarot is old school, and as magic as the name implies. The written word is powerful and tangible. This is a unique keepsake reading rarely offered. Experience a Tarot reading that you can touch even as it touches you.

 

 

Vision 2020: Tarot of the Heart

Since we just wrapped up the Valentine season and the “My Tarot Valentine 2020 series” it only makes sense to start the Vision 2020 series with romance and relationship readings.

From my side of the table, relationship and romance readings are some of the trickiest to do. The intuitive part isn’t difficult. The energy is as easy as easy to interpret as any other topic, but delivering the intuitive message requires an extra dose of care and professionalism .

Generally, people don’t turn to Tarot readings when their love life is all rainbows and unicorns. That’s just how the human heart works. When a relationship is good we just celebrate it and forget Tarot, which is as it should be. When people come to the cards for romance guidance, it is for a reason. Usually that reason is not a happy one.

Often the pain of loneliness draws a client to a reading.  However the client words the question, “Will I ever meet my soulmate or am I going to die alone and miserable?” gives you the gist of it. This should never be minimized or trivialized even when it comes from a young person. The pain is very real to them. They are up to their eyes in it, and likely can’t see beyond it the way objective outsiders can.  A desperate longing for a marriage or long term partnership deserves a gentle touch and above all gentle honesty. It’s great to be able to deliver optimistic news and give a sense that a relationship is on the horizon. It is no fun to tell a person who is hurting that their deep desire is not in the cards. Many times they hear “not now” or “such-and-such has to happen first” as a flat “no.” If you are a Tarot reader, expect blow-back in those situations. A few perceptive souls can hear the “not now” kind of message. Others will go straight to anger and defensiveness. They need time beyond the scope of a Tarot session. Either the flare of anger will pass and a relationship will find them in its time and place, or they will repeat the cycle of unlearned lessons that brought them to the reading in the first place. Either way, the Tarot reader’s honesty helps them move along their life path closer to the loved one that they seek. Platitudes, predictions, smoke and mirrors are cold comforts that serve no one.

On the other side of the same coin, there are people who are already in important relationships. They come to Tarot readings when they are having problems or the relationship has ended. A few of these are relieved to be freed from a stressful relationship by a breakup or divorce, but are struggling with “what’s next?” Most are heartbroken. They are looking for ways to heal the relationship before it ends or to “get back together” after it does. This brings us to the trickiest part of a relationship reading: the other person.

There are two main considerations when a reading turns to any person other than the client themselves.

First, it just doesn’t work. It is back to hammers and cell phones. You wouldn’t use a cell phone to pound a nail and you can’t make a phone call with a hammer. Tarot simply can’t read minds. It can’t tell you if your ex still loves you or if you will get back together or why they won’t answer your calls.

The second and equally important consideration is the other person’s privacy and dignity. I find it ethically wrong to try and read anyone, whether it is actually possible or not, without their knowledge and consent. Consider what happens to that person on an energetic level, even if they are unaware that a psychic is reaching out to them. How would you feel if a stranger looked at your heart and mind and told your ex everything they saw, all behind your back?

Given all of that, I think it wisest to just not take any third party questions. Third party means anyone other than the person reading the cards and the person getting the reading. If you are reading for yourself, that means the cards are about you, and you alone.

There are exceptions, even to this rule. In some rare, wonderful circumstances that other person will voluntarily lend their energy to the reading. If that happens, of course I will say what I sense. When that happens, I view it as the third person’s consent on a soul level. Most of all it is a gift  from that third person to the client. I will always say if energy comes in on its own, but never go out and seek it. In other words, the reading always accepts energy that comes in, but never reaches out to read energy without invitation. I always instruct the client to use discretion if they talk about the reading and the energy gift with the person who sent it. The other person may not be consciously aware that their energy touched the reading, and it is impossible to guess how they might react to the idea.

Romance and relationship readings deserve special consideration. They guide as usual, but also deal with some stronger than usual emotions. Tarot respects those emotions at the same time it respects the privacy and consent of everyone involved. Through it all, Tarot has a heart as it guides you through affairs of the heart.

 

My Tarot Valentine 2020: Page of Cups

pagecups

Laugh.

Can you laugh together? Laughter is both a glue and a healing balm.

A loved one’s genuine, happy laughter will delight you to your bones.

Happiness is attracted to laughter, and true love is attracted to happiness.