Tag: sage words tarot

Learn With Me: Oracle Dice, Collector of Selves part 1

Learn with me: Oracle Dice continues. Now that we have our 7 learning dice, we add another layer of meaning.

I’m presenting and learning the dice the same way that I’ve studied Tarot over the years for two basic reasons. First, I know this methodology works. I’ve used it. Been there and done that. Second, by learning the dice with me you can also get a behind the scenes peek into reading Tarot at the same time. There are parallels here. The oracle creator has created Tarot decks. Really good ones. If you’ve read this blog for a hot minute you know how much I like the Alleyman Tarot. I just bought the guidebook to his previous deck the Normal Tarot because it has the best cover art of any Tarot book ever – but more on that another day.

The oracle dice works so well with this method of learning because it was created by hands familiar with Tarot. The dice have all the depth and insight and use-ability of a 138 card Tarot deck.

Tarot is more than memorizing individual card meanings. There are layers, complexities and nuances. In the past it was called gifted. Psychic gifts are really more a matter of skill and practice. It’s like sports. Almost anyone can learn to play a sport – tennis for example. If someone has a natural gift for tennis, they are never going to get anywhere with it unless they learn the rules and swing a racket. Someone with no natural talent whatsoever can play tennis with learning and practice. The person who put in the time and work and practice would easily beat a person with natural talent who was playing their first game. Combine a small seed of Talent with work and practice over time – that can seem like some sort of special gift. No all of us can make it to Wimbledon, but any of us can certainly bang a ball around at the local park.

This series, this blog can’t teach Wimbledon level Tarot reading. It can’t teach you to read for other people, but you can learn some banging DIY Tarot reading for yourself.

But it take time, and blogging unfolds at a different pace. We could do this face by face together and move on to the next thing four months from now.

I don’t think you need that.

You’ve seen how this works.

Hurl dice at the table, get your hunches, mental images and intuitions about it. Combine that with the reference book and there you have it.

Now we are going to add another layer to it.

Seven Dane Asmund has given each dice its own topic and lord card. The topic is analogous to the the suit in the Tarot deck as I see it. Instead of the RWS Tarot’s four minor arcana suits with 14 cards each and the 22 card major arcana, we have basically 22 suits with six ‘cards’ each. In this second edition of the dice, the nuance is expanded and supplemented with the Lords of the Dice cards. The dice’s “lord” is a sort of symbolic spirit guide or guardian for that dice. The Lord card serves a similar purpose to the artwork on the ace cards of Tarot’s suits. The Ace in Tarot holds the core essence of the suit. By the same token, the lord card gives us insight into the essence of the individual die.

Interestingly, the influence flows both ways. After this, the ace cards feel even more important than they did before. I never thought of them as being potential guides and guardians before. But it works, at least for the number cards. The court cards in Tarot (page, knight, queen and king) have their own thing going on. That too, is a conversation for another day.

But that sets us up for the next little series within the series. We’ve looked at individual dice faces and at the same time chosen our seven learning dice out of the set of 22. Now instead of face by face, we’ll go die by die and look at each dice’s topic and lord card.

There really isn’t a good way to be very random about this, so that makes the active video pretty boring. For this next section of posts, I’ll be working from static photos of each die with its card. For YouTube, I’ll just share the tictok instead of filming the dice roll. It’s just more visually interesting at this point.

Please join me tomorrow when we pick up the “Collector of Selves” in more detail in part 2.

video / photo by the author of Publishing Goblin’s Oracle dice second edition, used with permission.

Middle of the week update-update

Another quick tour of Sage Words Tarot

Hi everyone!

First and foremost, as always, thank you so much for reading Sage Sips blog on Sage Words Tarot.

As I sit here sipping a real world cup of tea and as my coffee cold brews for morning I want to say hello, say thanks, and give you all a quick tour around the website now that I’m taking a break from changing and tinkering. Things will stay like this for the rest of summer at the very least.

Email Tarot readings are OPEN all summer! You can order a private Tarot reading by email anytime, 24/7, no appointment needed. It’s still just me doing this, and I live in the US eastern time zone, so it may take a hot minute to get your reading to you if you order nights, weekends or US holidays. Most of the time I get a reading to you inside of 24 hours, but it can take longer some days. I’ll be in touch whenever you order and give you my best estimate about when I can get the write up to you.

Ask Me Anything is OPEN. Just like the name of the page says (tab at the top on laptop, scroll down on mobile). You ask. I’ll answer in one form or another, maybe a Tarot reading, probably in the blog. You have my promise that no identifying information will ever be used in a blog post. If a post is inspired by and actual question, I change and redact it so that it could be a question from anybody that can help everyone.

The “reading room” tab has two pages, “frens and fam” is a list of links to people I know and trust around the web. Some of it is Tarot related, other not, but they are all good folks, real people in the real world that I trust. The reading list is just exactly that – my favorite reads over the past 30 or so years.

In-person Tarot readings and online readings are available with appointment and prepayment with the secure PayPal invoice that I’ll send to you along with the appointment confirmation.

Sage Sips membership on ko-fi get exclusive content, discount email readings, and free one card readings (one per month please) all for $5 / month. The exclusive content without the discount readings is available for $3/month through this blog and the Substack newsletter.

How to Find a Psychic You Can Trust is an excerpt from the free ebook “TaoCraft Portfolio” available in the ko-fi shop along with my other ebooks.

Sage Sips blog you know. Mondays have a three card energy path Tarot reading for the collective, general audience energies. Wednesday (including tomorrow) has “Learn With Me” as I explore other oracles or who knows what. These are free for the summer of ’23 , but may move to paid subscription this fall. Right now we are exploring the Publishing Goblin’s Oracle Dice, used with the permission of the oracle’s creator Seven Dane Asmund of Publishing Goblin LLC

Friday’s on the blog are my version of “Weekend Update” – at least until I can come up with a better title. There we’ll revisit the week’s energy path and see how it is – or isn’t – unfolding.

Other posts, cards, quotes and assorted other topics will post randomly as time and inspiration allows.

Thank you all.

I’m grateful for your support. The free Tarot content on Sage Words Tarot and Sage Sips blog / newsletter is fueled by your private reading purchases, memberships, and virtual coffees. Your likes, subs, free blog follows, and social media shares are always greatly appreciated!

Energy Week Ahead: Flow, Recharge, Think

Pathway Tarot reading for the week ahead

I’ve got adulting to do.

I’m not saying Tarot isn’t adulting. Learning, questioning, applying, doing all we can to be a better person; that’s actually the adultiest of adulting we can do.

I’m talking oil changes, errands and helping family kind of adulting. Tomorrow is shaping up to be a busy day, so here is your energy look at the week ahead a little early. I plan on taking this batch of advice myself, as I often do.

If these posts ever seem wrong or off or not for you….you can do like I do. Either draw a different batch of cards for yourself to get a more targeted individual read. If you aren’t the DIY type, no worries. Email Tarot is always open and I’m happy to help. Even when it’s busy, I can carve out time to pay attention to an email reading. It’s my strength. Just like our current energy card.

The fading energy card is six of pentacles.

Sometimes the six is about literal generosity, giving and sharing money or other tangible resources. Sometimes it talks about the intangible, speaking of a generous nature or a generosity of spirit. Today, the card brings in elements of both, reminding us give and take, ebb and flow. It feels like a reminder that we get out of life what we put into it. That in turn brings to mind the 90s song “Get What You Give” by the New Radicals.

Physical or philosophical, now is the time to find your flow before attention needs to shift to other things.

The other thing our attention my shift toward very soon, if it hasn’t already, is Strength. Just like the major arcana Death card always talks about change and not literal death, the Strength card always talks about strength of character and fortitude. This feels very simple and straightforward. Tap into your inner strength, endurance, and courage now while you can.

@bobthewritingcat is one of my favorite Instagram accounts. Bob the cat, through the opposable thumbs and internet access of his human Jenny Graves, often tells us to “gird our loins” against the inevitable approach of yet another Monday. That is the feeling here. The Strength card is like that today: gird your loins, spool up your best people skills, batten down any loose hatches, there might be a minor kerfuffle on the horizon.

The Growing energy is the three of swords. From the decks that I’ve seen, it is always a dire looking card. Like every other card, it has different shades and threads of meaning. The word “petty” is really stepping forward today, along with “quintessential ‘karen'” Be on the lookout for inane squabbles and back-stabby sort of pettiness “from all the usual sources” It might work your last nerve, but that’s where the strength and flow from earlier can come in handy. If you can see the petty squabbles as just that, and deal with the week from a place of strength and flow and calm, it will be easier to get through this particular burp in the energy flow. Girded loins will prevent frayed nerves if you’ll permit that really odd way of saying it.

Overall the feel of the week right now isn’t bad or foreboding as much as just plain weird and potentially annoying.

Assuming the adulting goes to plan (HA!) next up is Wednesday’s “Learn With Me” now that we have picked 7 random dice to learn with, we’ll get a little more meta with it and look at the general meaning of each individual die and it’s “Lord Card” which gives each one of the dice it’s own subject or realm, akin to the arcana and suit meanings in Tarot. In this series of posts, I explore the Publishing Goblin’s Oracle Dice and learn to use it in the same methodical way I taught myself to read Tarot back in the day and over the years since. The process gives you a small behind the scenes peek into the intuition development process.

Thank you for reading! This free Tarot content is fueled by your support through private Tarot readings, memberships, paid subscriptions, and ko-fi coffee. Likes, blog follows, and social media shares are always much appreciated.

See you at the next sip!

This free Tarot reading is fueled by your support: Your likes, social media shares, blog follows, paid memberships and virtual ko-fi coffees are all very much appreciated!

Weekend Update: Connect and Do/

Update from the last Energy Path Tarot reading

Email readings are OPEN. You can order 24/7, no appointment needed. June 23 – 27 might experience some delivery delays. I’ll be in touch with estimated delivery times when you order.

Since you can’t copyright titles, I’m using this one. Consider it an homage to one of my favorite Saturday Night live segments. I would never claim to be as good as theirs, but in the spirit of SNL’s update, I do intend to keep these Friday or Saturday posts light and short. I’m enjoying the end of week check in with Monday’s pathway reading. Instead of focusing on any particular card, I thought it might be fun to take a peek back at the whole layout to see how it is unfolding, if it is unfolding or if it has totally veered off course.

No veering this week.

The contemplative energy around the four of swords has dropped off the radar, but the two of swords and four of pentacles are very much intact. The Pentacles are the brighter of the two energies. The two of swords still is very much connected to the “mystical unity” shade of meaning we talked about during Monday’s reading.

Now is the time for a practical, down to earth point of view and frame of mind. Practical, budget friendly actions. Take the stairs to save electricity level of things. It doesn’t feel like a weekend to spurge or be overly restful. It feels like a good time to invest action into things that will conserve money and resources later. Kind of like making lunches for the week that will save you time and money later. Very much a mow the lawn, catch up the laundry kind of vibe right now.

I don’t mean to sound like your mother, but do stuff now so you can enjoy the July 4th holiday or whatever else you have planned in the near future.

That being said – enjoy the weekend in spite of any chores that need attention!

Next up – Energy Path reading for the week of June 26-July 3 (should post Monday afternoon)

See you at the next sip!

Give As You Claim

Six of Pentacles and quote from freethinker Rober Ingersoll

Quote via goodreads.com

Robert Ingersoll was a nineteenth century writer, speaker and lawyer famous at that time as an agnostic and freethought advocate.

The Six of Pentacles is about the flow of abundance and generosity. It often speaks about generosity of spirit as much as it talks about money or physical things.

Oracle Dice 5

A big thank you to alert reader L.K. who caught that the dice from yesterday’s Learn With Me post was hard to see because of the video text!

See? I don’t bite. The comments are open, let me know whatever questions or feedback you have. Then I’ll post answers and make adjustments so that Sage Sips can be as relevant and useful as possible.

Ask me anything! Get an answer here! In true Zombie Cat style, all answers are 100% guaranteed to contain words!

Publishing Goblin’s Oracle Dice are used with permission by Publishing Goblin, LLC

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Learn With Me: Oracle Dice 5

Learn With Me as I explore the new Publishing Goblin’s Oracle Dice from Seven Dane Asmund

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I’m a big synchronicity fan (The Police album AND the Jungian concept)

Even after all of these years, I’ll still have days where I pull a card for the blog and get a whole lot of nothing intuitively. Luckily, thanks to the extra boost of energy from a client’s name and question / permission for an open reading – that doesn’t seem to happen for private readings. Even if it did, the solution is the same: prompts.

Have you ever seen those antique hand pumps for water? I’m not sure of the physics of the whole thing, I think Archemedes Principle has something to do with it – he was that ancient greek dude that was into sloshing water – but for the hand pump to do its thing sometimes you had to put a little water in it before you could use it to pump more water out of your well. “Prime the pump” came to mean anything that you put into something to make it work.

It’s kind of like lubrication too – oil changes for the car, oil on squeeky hinges or stuck locks – that sort of thing.

When intuition feels stuck, it is perfectly ok to prime the pump. It’s ok to look for a little extra inspiration outside of the dice or cards or whatever you happen to be using.

Look, listen and read works for me.

Look around you – does anything in view grab your attention? That might be an extra help for your intuition.

Listen – is the intuition coming through as a sound or bit of music instead of the card or dice or in place of anything visual at all? If listening doesn’t work pay attention to any scents or physical sensations that pop to mind.

Read – if nothing else works, pick up the guide book for the oracle your using or any other guides that are relevant. I have a whole collection of Tarot books, so if I’m not getting anything intuitive right off the bat I’ll browse through several to see if any of the key words hit as the right one.

Today’s dice toss was a little bit of both

My impulse impression was “infinity” because of the sideways it landed. Had a few quick thoughts that you can see in the video. After that nothing except the nagging feeling that I was missing something. The heart shape is obvious and shows Seven Dane Asmunds genius in designing these things.

Here is the Jungian kind of synchronicity here. I haven’t read the dice guidebook yet. 138 dice faces is a bit much to take on all in one go, so I’m learning the oracle dice little by little right along with you in these posts.

Just by pure but meaningful coincidence, the die lands with the image sideway, prompting the association with “infinity.” Combine that with the obvious heart shape, gives us “infinite heart.”

Go to the guidebook an the die itself is “elements” and this face means -SOUL!

(Doh! Why didn’t I think of that right off?)

Beautifully designed and communicative image – yeat again.

To quote the book “Soul, as an element, speaks to the human element of the world, and its positive and negative affects.”

Although “effects” would work there too.

The image has a light side and a dark side which also perfectly reflects human nature and warms the cockles of my Taoist philosophy loving heart.

This is the dice-face of humanity and the infinity of the human heart.

Thank you for reading!

The Publishing Goblin’s Oracle Dice is used with permission from Seven Dane Asmund (author of the Alleyman’s Tarot) and Publishing Goblin LLC

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See you at the next sip!

Upside Down From a Certain Point of View

A Tarot reading for the week ahead, depending on your point of view

Most of us have seen Star Wars. If you haven’t, stop what you are doing, put this post down and go watch. Then go read Joseph Campbell’s book The Power of Myth and you’ll understand why Star Wars is a classic, epic movie that shouldn’t be missed even if you aren’t typically a science fiction fan.

Point of view comes into play with Tarot readings too.

I’m happiest when I take the most gestalt, holistic point of view that I can muster, Tarot readings included.

Was feeling the Alleyman’s Tarot Deck this morning (used in the video with Publishing Goblin‘s permission) We’ve talked before about reversals, which is when a card turns over upside down relative to the person doing the reading. The Alleyman’s deck tends to feel a little wild and woolly and slippery and a little chaotic and prone to reversals – which makes it perfect for capturing the cacophony of big picture humanity and that collective big picture energy we read in these weekly posts.

Today, all three cards are reversed.

You could take that to mean we are heading into a gnarly catawampus upside down kind of week (which is entirely possible.)

Or you could take it as a reminder that if we walk around to the other side of the table and look at this from a different point of view, then everything is right side up, just as we want it to be.

I’ve said it dozens of times, but it is worth repeating when ALL of the cards are reversed. In a private reading, I’ll follow intuition about any given card’s reversal. It might just be happenstance, the by-product of slippery cards and lots of shuffling. Or it might be a real clue about something that is blocked, turbulent, challenging, stagnant or otherwise complicated.

My hunch today is that it really doesn’t matter. It is like a double negative that gets you right back where you started. The reverse of fading energy is growing energy and vice versa.

I get the mental image of a seesaw. The yin yang symbol strongly comes to mind. Balance whatever turns up this week with its opposite. The yin yang symbol, the taijitu, is actually intended to be dynamic. The balance is in constant motion, like we’ve talked about so many times before with the Two of Pentacles (you can use the search in the right hand side of the page or scroll down on mobile to browse the 2 of pentacles archives)

My hunch is that the real carry away message for this weeks reading is to be adaptive. Be light on your feet and in the moment, willing to change and balance a situation. In order to do that, we need to remember there are 360 degrees in a circle around these cards and many points of view to any given situation.

So chalk one up for Old Ben.

Let’s look at each card. But this time I’ll let you decide the point of view. You decide which side of the table you are on. The center card is the dominant, current energy either way you look at it. But you can decide if it is blocked or not, reversed or not, complicated or not.

Fading energy reversed / growing energy upright: Two of Swords

In the classic Pamela Smith artwork and the many decks based on that, the two of swords reverses. This card, made by Sean S. LeBlanc, looks and means the same thing either way. It fits right in with the gestalt thinking and adaptive balancing that the reading as whole is giving us. The classic meaning is being “of two minds” about something. Swords are associated with mind, intellect, and action. It is hard to act when we don’t know what to do and the mind is locked into a “six of one, half dozen of the other” stalemate. The image on this card is a guillotine. Right side up or up side down, fading energy or growing energy, the message of this card is cut to the chase. Get to the point of points. Strip away all of the fluff and nonsense and distractions and get to the real heart of the matter. THEN you can decide, act and find balance as needed.

Central Energy, reversed or upright: The Sun

Sunrises are beautiful.

But so are sunsets.

The sun card is about warmth, beauty, positivity and happiness. I am reminded of that quote of unknown origin (although often credited to Abraham Lincoln) that “Most folks are as happy as they make up their mind to be.”

Although the card is overwhelmingly positive, the reversal component reminds us not to go overboard in either direction of our chosen happiness.

Forced happiness doesn’t count. Walking around in a sparkly cloud of self indulgent toxic positivity doesn’t help anything. Forget happy. Take off those rose colored glasses, see things as they are and find a way to be content in the here and now. That’s the happy that lasts.

As much as I love a healthy dose of cynicism and good old GenX style sarcasm, the Sun card flows in both directions. Sometimes you have to take off those jade colored glasses and allow a little unprovoked unreasonable joy into your life.

Growing energy in reverse/ fading energy: Four of Swords

Alleyman deck creator, Seven Dane Asmund, reads this card as “the many angles of our self doubt” … again perfect for the point of view theme of today’s reading.

I ‘hear’ “how do you heal?” Basically the feel is to do something restorative for yourself especially where self confidence is concerned. That area may have taken some dings lately and you might need some repairs. I see the mental image of that social media picture of a little kid who stuck colorful stickers all over themselves (and the puppy next to them) The phrase “bandaids for the soul” springs to mind too.

Also the word “normative” comes to mind, but not in the sense of imposing norms of behavior. It feels more like adaptogenic herbs or essential oils – something that brings a thing back into normal range from either direction. Jojoba oil is an example from aromatherapy. It can moisturize excessively dry skin while helping oily skin to produce less oil.

In short this card encourages you to take care of yourself with meaningful little things as you hit the inevitable little bumps in the road this week.

Again the word “adaptogenic” comes to mind.

I see labradorite, which is a classic stone for easing transitions through life stages and adapting to change.

If you’ll allow me a little rando fangirling, my friend Amanda (Universal Crystal Love on Etsy) makes beautiful wire wrap jewelry and has a particularly good eye for labradorite. The pictures can’t do it justice.

And there the energy steps back.

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See you at the next sip for another oracle dice Learn With Me.

Learn With Me: Oracle Dice 4

Psychic ability, intuition, “weird ass mystical shit” as the one Alleyman Tarot card calls it – whatever you name it, it’s a normal human thing. It’s a sense, like warmth or sight or hearing. In my experience, that psychic intuition exists as a mental echo of the five physical senses.

That is where we get the word clairvoyance. It means “clear vision.” There is a “clair” for each sense. The vast majority of the time my intuition works with mental images or sounds, songs and words (clairaudience.) I always explain in a new private reading that is what I mean when I say “see” for the mental images and “hear” when the intuition comes to mind as words or songs.

I love it when intuition works with popular songs, TV and music. It is a shared experience for a lot of people so it is an easy way to communicate a concept.

I’m a bit of a foodie, and I’ve studied a little aromatherapy, which has opened taste and smell as an intuitive prompts, but they much less common than the other two.

Today we went straight to the classic rock radio station. Pink Floyd’s “The Wall” was the very first thing that came to mind when I saw today’s dice image. That was quickly followed by a snippet of The Doors that says “break on through to the other side.”

I didn’t have old 60’s (or was it early 70s) classic rock on my bingo card for today, but there it is. If you don’t know the songs I’m not surprised. I only know the Doors from snippets in movies and TV and The Wall was Junior High at the latest.

Ugh…I just realized that I was not only alive but in second grade when friggen’ Dark Side of the Moon was released. Damn. I’ve earned the GenX Tarot Xpert title just by kicking around this long.

Back to the dice. Put the image and the intuitive “wall” and “break through” prompts, I would read this image as being about mental blocks, overcoming challenges. The Ten of Wands comes to mind as a Tarot analogy. Granted with over 90 dice images, there may not be a good Tarot analogy for each one, but with 78 Cards in the Tarot deck, there is bound to be overlap.

When you are very first learning any oracle at all, you may not dial into intuitive sense or impressions right away like this. It comes with practice and that is exactly what we are doing here. Let’s use a brick wall as an analogy. Walls don’t just spontaneously appear out of nothing. They are assembled, board by board, sheet of drywall by sheet of drywall, brick by brick. Not every brick is going to trigger a spontaneous impression. That’s when you go to the guide book. That’s why it is there. Two heads are better than one. Start with the guide book, then add your own impression to get your message for the day.

Day after day, brick after brick. Next thing you know you can tap right into your own psychic skills and read dice like a champ.

OK – that being said, let’s go see how far I am from Seven’s original intent for the dice.

And in case you are wondering, no I’m not looking ahead. I did this when my copy of the Alleyman Tarot first arrived. I’d read the card then go to the guidebook and I wound up even more head over heels for the deck than I thought I’d be.

What I’m trying to say here is don’t get your underwear in a bunch over which comes first. It doesn’t matter if you go right to the guide book then add the impressions the dice plus guidebook inspires OR start with your own impressions and go to the guidebook to expand them and maybe spark some more. What matters is engaging with your intuition. All the dice and cards and guidebooks are here to help that process. All of those things “Pump Up the Volume” on your intuition if you want to throw some late 80s in with the 60s and 70s music references.

To the guide book:

The whole cube is the die of obstacles. No surprise there. The name of this individual face is “Ruin.” But wouldn’t you know it? I have it exactly upside down in the video. I don’t get the feeling there is any significance to that, as there might be with a reversed Tarot card. That is just me not knowing the dice.

Turned upright, it is easy to see the classic Tower image from the Tarot with the bolt of lightning and falling bodies. But there is a little more to this. This is about “calamity” as much as the suddenness. Seven writes it as being an irreversible life changing event…so shades of the Death and Devil card to go with the Tower card.

Which means little if you aren’t a Tarot card reader…we are here to talk about the dice.

So sudden, life altering disaster.

It happens to the best of us.

It happens to all of us.

And life altering chaos and disaster is a wall of sorts. How do you get back to living when your old life is no longer an option? How do you move past the pain and chaos?

The thing that caught my attention was Mr. Asmund’s reminder that it is ok to feel the pain of the things in life that hurt us. Numb isn’t necessarily better.

Pain is important. Both physically and emotionally it alerts that something is wrong. It lets us know when attention is needed, possibly action too.

Pain and loss and irrevocable change is inevitable during the course of a lifetime. But that doesn’t mean that this dice or any of those Tarot cards are predicting imminent disaster for you any time soon. Don’t talk yourself into a self-fulfilling prophecy. Instead allow this to be a gentle reminder.

If disaster has happened, then you can continue, brick by brick, to recover. Things may never be the same, but they can be made better. You survived.

If disaster is happening now…why are you reading this? Go do what needs done. Take care of yourself and matters at hand.

If you are ok now, drink it in. Savor it for as long as it lasts. Right now, this present moment is precious.

Momento mori. Momento vivere.

Remember all things die. Then go, remember to live.

On that blissful note…

Thank you for reading.

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*Publishing Goblin Oracle Dice used with permission of Seven Dane Asmund and Publishing Goblin LLC

Dare to Define Your Own Daring

Tarot isn’t tied to time, even in these little readings that look just at the week ahead.

That is the whole reason I don’t do classic “past-present-future” readings. Tarot is about energy, and energy is all about flux and flow. It doesn’t keep to a schedule. Neil DeGrasse Tyson has tells us … “The universe is under no obligation to make sense to you.” By the same token, the universe is under no obligation to match our calendars and schedules.

Sometimes the best Tarot can do is to help us make our way through the unknowable chaos as best as we can.

As methodical as we may try to be about it, the way Tarot does that is by engaging our pure, raw, natural human intuition.

My method and structure for these readings is that the right side card represents energy that is fading at the moment and probably won’t have a large influence during the week. The middle card is the dominant energy, our primary food for thought or the suggested tactic for getting through the week. The left card is growing energy that may have progressively more influence as the week goes on. This is an idea or issue that is on the horizon and warrants our keeping a weather eye on it as the pirate movies say.

Sometimes intuition comes along and chucks that whole structure right out the window.

Today, the energy is less about the general flow of the week and more about individual processes. Instead of a growing energy that gradually replaces a fading one, this is more about three energies that are simultaneously present, but in different proportions. The mental image here is a sound mixing board, with all of those little slidey things that let you turn up some parts and down others. The CD player I had back in the 80s had something like that on it, and of course we all had the bass turned up to max…but that’s beside the point.

I think the real point is that we are all creating our own individual mixtape of energies this week and there is no real overarching collective zeitgeist for a change. That individuality in the middle of the collective is kind of the core message of the thing: Stand strong in your individuality. That will in turn allow you to better show up for your life and for the important people in it. When that happens, life will in turn show up for you when you need it.

Here the mental image shifts to one of those speckled quartz granite countertops, with all the pieces being part of the one smooth stone. We are individuals with individual integrity (knight of swords), yet we are all connected (three of cups)

Typically the Knight of Swords is about courage, daring, and pushing beyond your comfort zone. But what if your comfort zone IS the daring thing?

We live in – ah – interesting times.

For some, living in their true, authentic comfort zone can be a truly death defying act. For those of us who are not targets of hatred and bigotry (yet), for us to not be our fully authentic self is an act of cowardice by comparison.

In short, occupy your comfort zone. Fully. With gusto.

The internet says to show up for ourselves. When we have the courage to find our comfort zone and stake a claim to it, then we are better able to be there for other people in their quest to do the same. The Knight of Swords connects to the Three of cups.

When you show up for life in a way that is true to yourself and emotionally present for those you care about then life will show up for you. It can and will reciprocate in a deep and lasting way as symbolized by the Two of Cups.

Define your comfort zone Be fully in your comfort zone – with gusto. Then be in your comfort zone for and with others. Then life can meet you at the edges and make the comfort zone a little bigger.

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