Sage Sips blog is Tarot in the time it takes to sip your coffee.
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Tarot readings cost more than money, even when they are free.
Nothing gets people’s underwear in a bunch quite like money. When you mix that up with America’s tendency toward, let’s say, theocracy – then you can get a radioactive conversation that is probably best left for another day.
Let’s just say this –
Tarot is an art form worthy of compensation the same as any other art form that speaks to our heart or lifts our emotions. Purchasing a Tarot reading is the same as buying a book, a concert ticket, or museum admission.
Tarot readers deserve compensation for their time and skill the same as anyone else. It’s the same as donating to a church or minister for spiritual guidance. Tarot readings can ease stress. I’ve seen it happen time and time and time again. At the end of a reading, a client’s shoulders often lower, their brows become less furrowed, they lean back in their chair or take a deep breath. It is arguably inexpensive folk therapy, just like the fiction trope of buying a drink and talking through a problem with your local bartender.
That’s just the money side of it. There is always the chance of running into a scam with no intention of artistry, creativity or offering help. Sure, there have always been people in the business of Tarot readings who are in it solely for quick and easy big money, ego props and fame. But there are other costs. Other risks, really.
If you get a Tarot reading, you just might get honesty in return.
And that is a HUGE risk if you get a reading with me. I’m simply a translator, not some spiritual voice from on high. I’m not here to tell you what the future holds or what you should do. Oh no, it is something much, much worse.
I translate spirit and energy into words honestly – I give you the mental images, mental words, ideas, concepts, impressions and food for thought as I get them.
Period.
I’m not here to blow smoke at you or make you feel good. I’m here to translate your message. And that is IT.
If the message is one you like, great. If it is what you expect or what you hope for, even better.
If it upsets you or makes you angry – that’s good too. Listen to those emotions. They are telling you something important, too. GET pissed at the reading. That will tell you where the problem is. That will lead you to your answers. Tarot is a living, healing thing. Tarot is often a process and part of a healing journey – not a pretty answer tied in a bow and handed to you on a silver platter.
Tarot is a tool – a tool for healing, growing, learning, and deepening the quality of life. Tools involve work. So does personal growth and problem solving.
Tarot’s qualities are inherent to the practice itself. Tarot’s validity, artistry, insight, wisdom, inspiration, comfort and humanity are all present in a reading, regardless of whether you pay for it with money or not.
The highest price of admission to a Tarot reading is knowing it might be honest with you. The real cost of a reading is understanding that your future is up to you. The real cost of a reading is accepting the risk that the reading will impact your thinking and decision making. The greatest risk of getting a Tarot reading is being told hard truths that you may not want to face.
A Tarot reading gives you insights and ideas. Your reaction to it is your own. The choices you make and the actions you take are in your hands alone.
Tarot isn’t about telling you what will happen in life. Tarot helps you figure out what to do when life happens.
“If turbid waters are stilled, they will gradually become clear.”
Tao Te Ching, Victor Mair translator
It is hard to see the way forward when emotions are running high. The suit of cups, in addition to close romantic or family relationships, symbolizes emotions in general. Cups are connected to the element of water, so water analogies are common, especially here with the Ace. Ace cards carry the essence of the suit. Today, the energy is more akin to water-emotion energy than its water-intuition connotations. Water can be the depths of our human psyche but also deep emotion.
Churning water stirs up all sorts of dirt and debris from the bottom of a stream. Stormy waters are dark. Raging rapids and a broad ocean is far beyond our ability to still them. Sometimes, as with real storms, we have to metaphorically take shelter until the storm passes, and the waters become quiet.
Still waters run deep it is said. We have more emotional resilience and maturity after the reflex response has passed and we’ve calmed down. When churning water becomes still, all of the dirt, sand and silt can settle out of it. Emotions settle down, debris settles out of water, both become more clear.
Nothing about this energy is suggesting suppressing or artificially quieting emotions, any more than it suggests you could (or should) stop a hurricane. By the same token, it isn’t suggesting that we should let emotions rule and ride the pure impulse of the emotions roughshod over the whole situation, either.
There is a middle way.
Sit still. Feel the feels however painful and difficult they may be. Abide your time. Waves can’t stay high unless energy is added to them.
Don’t feed the upset.
Sit still.
Just as gravity and friction and time will eventually quiet a stirred up cup of water, as long as you don’t keep stirring the cup, emotions can naturally get quiet too.
Hurricanes are an apt analogy too. On the leading edge, winds are high. Things caught up in the storm and pushed by the wind cause damage. Go to shelter. From the quiet eye in the center of the storm you can see what you need to do next.
The song “Don’t Dream It’s Over” by Crowded House comes to mind with the lyric “trying to catch the deluge in a paper cup.” Let the deluge pass, and your paper cup can be filled in a puddle instead of destroyed by a wave.
Or, in the words from The Crow starring Brandon Lee – “It can’t rain all the time.”
Sit still, abide. It’s hard – but this too will pass. Stillness results in the calm and clarity you are looking to find.
A behind the scenes look at the philosophy and thinking behind Tarot readings
I love pithy advice.
So naturally, I’m a little bit of a Ben Franklin fan.
Through his Poor Richard’s Almanac he tells us that “haste makes waste.” He also wrote that “Well done is better than well said.“
I agree – except for Tarot readings. In that case, well done IS well said.
Written or spoken, words have power. Why else would we be talking about some pithy little aphorisms from the 1700s? Actions do speak louder than words, but it is often words that crawl into your head and live there rent free.
That is especially true when the person speaking or writing the words are afforded some sort of authority or expertise. Filler writing from a nearly 300 year old almanac might not get any attention at all if the author wasn’t also a revered figure from American history.
It doesn’t have to be that magnitude of authority. The inept rantings of a random stranger on the internet can impact your mood if you let your guard down and stumble across a troll at a vulnerable moment. Ill-intended, ill-considered words can, regrettably, have power too.
In the world of Tarot, both in-person and online, the psychic reader is assumed to have special knowledge, a skill or expertise that we have not developed in ourselves. Not in any real power or control sort of way, but their words are given that tiny bit more credence. Their words hit a little harder and can get in your head a little easier.
Tarot is all art and heart, not certification and certainty. Whether any one reader is a good match for your personality, your nature, your needs is up to you, and only you, to decide.
One factor in that decision is time.
Tarot is an art. Writing a book takes time. The Mona Lisa wasn’t painted in a day. Quality takes time. If you can find it in yourself to make an advance appointment or spend an hour in conversation with the reader or wait a day for an email reading you’ll get much in return for your time and money investment. Thoughtful Tarot is often the best Tarot.
That is where my side of the Tarot table comes into play. It is up to a professional reader to take whatever time is needed to do a good reading. It is up to us, the professionals, to set time, set boundaries, set working hours, make transparent policies, set clear intentions and manage expectations. It falls to me to let you know that a quick 10 minute at a party is all fun and giggles, while giving my fullest attention to a hour-long private session.
I’ve worked for online psychic services. I’ve called as a client to the old school 800 services. A couple of those impulse phone calls were the precise right message at the precise right time and I’ll always be grateful. But the key is again, time. The call may have been spur of the moment on my side, but the artful words I received were not. Those wise words were given by practitioners who were there for working hours, unhurried and ready to serve.
The instant gratification of getting a reading right away during a time of emotional upheaval has its place. By the same token, Tarot isn’t a crisis hotline. Tarot isn’t an emotional emergency room. Tarot’s real power lies in inspiration and empowerment. Tarot’s long term superpower is guiding your choices in a way that steers your whole life in a better direction. That takes time. A lot of time and effort on your part. In the short term of any one reading session, it still takes a little time to listen to spirit and to choose the best way to say something that we can.
So please pardon the odd little pauses silences in the conversation while we do that. Or, in the case of email, if it takes more than an hour to get a well written reading to your inbox. Wise words are worth the wait. Choose the ideas that live in your head rent-free carefully. Evict the ones that no longer serve you well.
Tarot is all art and heart and haste can waste your time.
Shrek: No! Layers! Onions have layers. Ogres have layers. You get it? We both have layers
from “Shrek” copyright 2001 Dreamworks Pictures, quote via imdb.com
Layers mean complexity. Layers apply to all sorts of things that are actually more complex than they seem at first glance; ogres, onions, cakes and – you guessed it – Tarot.
Reading Tarot for yourself is actually quite simple. In a couple of hours I could teach you to do good DIY readings for yourself. (Related: PeaceTarot ebook)
Reading for other people is another story. High level professional readings are, like onions and ogres, more complex than it seems on the surface. That’s the whole point of them. A professional reading can gives you extra layers of insight and experience that you can’t get alone. Two heads are better than one. Two eyes give depth perception (related post: parallax) The two of us working together gives your reading another layer of understanding.
Sometimes layers talk about authenticity. Sometimes you have to peel back a few layers to get to the real heart of the matter. We’ve talked about authenticity and public Tarot practice before, after my Modern Oracle Tarot work was re-branded to TaoCraft Tarot and re-branded again to Sage Words Tarot.
That’s all well and good, but consider another aspect of layers: growing new ones. Interestingly, actual onions grow on the inside. New layers are added at the core while older outside layers get dry and thin and ultimately fall away. In this, onions give us another useful metaphor.
In the medical field, and no doubt many other professions, continuing education is required. You have to keep learning and keep current if you want to keep working. Whether it is required or not, whether it is career related or not, lifelong learning is a respected mark of excellence. Learning isn’t just formal education. Learning comes from experience and experimentation and the living of life. Artists’ work evolves over time. Any person’s point of view can evolve over time.
As I’ve learned and gained experience, the original “Modern Oracle” layout has evolved too. I’ve re-named it as it changed and changed it back to “Modern Oracle” as my website and blog evolved.
Back in the early 2000s I wrote the initial Modern Oracle layout meanings to create a bridge from old fashioned, predict-the-future, fortune telling layouts to a more modern advice, guidance and empowerment reading. I wrote the layout specifically to show the power that your choices have over your future. Cards that once were called “past, present and future” in older readings became “lessons from the past, current situation, and moving forward.” Predicting the future evolved into making an action plan.
Now it goes one step further. The reading is about dynamic energy flows, not a concrete road through time. Now, the layout is both about your choices and a read of the energy conditions ahead. Think of it as being like a GPS traffic update with a weather report. It is a guide to help you decide which way to travel and a general idea of the conditions you will most likely be travelling in.
Card 1, lessons from the past, became Fading Energies, symbolizing energies that are decreasing in influence and things that need less of your attention than before.
Card 2, the current situation, is now Current Energies. This reflects the energies that are strongest, and deal with things that need your attention most needed in this present moment.
Card 3, moving forward, is Growing Energies, reflects the energies that are growing, might need more attention soon or are gaining influence in the path you’ve currently chosen. It still isn’t predictive. It is information for decision making. Just like with gps driving condition updates, if you know about a traffic jam ahead then you can choose another road.
Card 4 will remain Choices. It is still placed under the current energies card and at the center of the layout because that is still the place of power. Empowering your choices is still the heart of the reading. In the GPS analogy, this suggests a better road if traffic is heavy ahead, or it can encourage you to stay the course you are on if conditions are good. Either way, you are still the driver. In the end you are the one who chooses where to drive and how to get there no matter what the GPS or the Tarot cards say.
Card 5 is still Alternative Path just like before, showing the most open alternative path you if you decide a change is needed.
Card 6 Helping Energies and card 7 Potential Challenges are just what the name says they are. Change the five card Modern Oracle layout into the 7 card TaoCraft layout that is only available seasonally.
Over the years. the five card layout has proven its value. It’s useful, insightful, practical,gets right to the point and is affordable. It has the best balance of quality, detail and affordability.
Ogers and onions are complex, but they are always evolving and growing new layers. Reading Tarot is the same way. There are complexities, but sometimes the best new thing is taking off those old outer layers to reveal the green and fresh life underneath.
This is the summer of simplification.
Starting in May 2024 my private readings will have 4 formats, 3 layouts and 2 levels of availability.
Four Formats:
Email: my specialty
Pre-recorded video: private – only you will get the link to the video.
Pen and Paper: old school snail mail, archaic but powerful
Live phone or zoom call
Three Layouts
Modern Oracle (Five Card) – $30
Eclipse (Three Card) – $15
Sage Sip (One Card – $5
Two availabilites
No appointment needed, order anytime (email, video, paper)
Choose Your Card: Collective energy readings with a personal touch
PAUSE the video
Take a breath
Decide how you want to use the card – guidance for the day, the week ahead, anything on your mind
Choose Your Card
Restart the video to see the reveal and hear a little bit about your card.
Collective energy card not resonating with you? Private one card readings are free on demand for Sage Sip monthly members and available for order 24/7 no appointment needed HERE for non-members
Judgement: Use your good judgement, reason. Head over heart for this decision. You must rationally decide when & how to begin.
Death: Something has to changed or released in order to make your start or to get a fresh start. Is this new thing worth what you must give up to get it?
10 of Pentacles: Yup. This is solid, practical, a good omen. Go for it.
“Mood’s a thing for cattle and loveplay, not fighting!”
Dune by Frank Herbert, David Lynch screen adaptation
And not for Tarot readings when you are working for other people
Moods and Tarot make an interesting Venn diagram, and it all hinges on whether you are reading professionally or privately.
Should you read Tarot if you aren’t in the mood for it? If you are reading privately for yourself (or for someone you know and aren’t charging them) then no, if it just isn’t vibing for you, by all means wait until you are up for it. Or find someone who is in the mood. Or find a professional.
If you do put yourself in the public eye as a Tarot reader and ask for compensation for your time, skills and artistic service then something else has to happen. Either you have to put your own mood aside and listen to spirit / energy objectively on behalf of your client or you have to have the self-awareness to reschedule the client until such time as you are mentally, emotionally, and physically capable of doing a good reading for them.
There is no hard and fast rule for when to read or reschedule. You have to use your own good judgement about that, just like using good judgement about any adult thing. Don’t drink and drive, don’t stick a fork into a light socket, don’t read Tarot for money if your head isn’t in the right place.
But then, having good judgement and a little wisdom is why you are a Tarot reader in the first place, isn’t it?
There are a lot – a LOT – of things to consider before going professional with your Tarot readings, and we’ll get back to that at some point, but for now – what do you do with a mis-match between mood and message?
My core approach is to be an objective translator.
I’m not some word-from-on-high gifted expert. I just speak spirit pretty well and can translate for you. I don’t have to be in a particular emotional mood to do a reading any more than I need to be in a particular mood in order to speak Esperanto or read knitting patterns abbreviations.
Lately the mood of a couple of readings have not matched my personal mood at all. It’s hard to visualize, but imagine being in a Wednesday Addams mood and getting intuitive information that sounds like the blond haired girl scout.
Sometimes people need a little cheer leading, sometimes they just need someone to hear them out, and most of the time it isn’t for a Tarot reader to judge which time is which.
All I know to do is to give the intuitive message as honestly and true-to-tone as I can, regardless of my personal mood. That in turn relies on trusting the intuitive Tarot reading process.
But that’s also why the best Tarot readings are a conversation, regardless if that conversation happens by email or face to face. All of my distance readings include a follow up email. If something just doesn’t resonate with you or feel right to you or just doesn’t make sense, for goodness’ sake just say so! Spirit and I will try to find a better word, a better image, a better something to get a more helpful message to you.
So speak up! You won’t hurt my feelings and we’ll try to get the chirpy cheerleader from the great beyond to try again. When we reach out, the energies reach back however it takes. I really believe your true message will find you, one way or another, one translator or another, one means of communication or another.
My promise to you is to give the most accurate version of the energy message, no matter what our moods may be.
Thank you so much for reading. Private readings are open and available HERE
There is a new members only special offer running until the summer solstice on June 20, 2024. For only $5 per month, Sage Sip members receive:
Free Sage’s Sip one card Tarot readings by email upon request up to 3 per calendar month.
Sage Sips is Tarot for your day in the time it takes to sip your coffee – or whatever you are sipping at the moment.
Updated today from a September 2020 post
Heart of Stars Tarot, copyright 2007 Thom Pham, used with permission
Three of Wands. Yes – again.
Different deck, different day, same card. A cool thing happened; about an hour after I filmed the card draw above, I did a private one card reading with a different deck (Steampunk, their favorite) and wouldn’t you know it – Three of Wands. This card is really trying to get our attention.
It also gives us a little insight into how Tarot can be such an endlessly useful tool for something as complex as spiritual guidance or the human psychology. The math is pretty convincing. Let’s start with a one card daily meditation reading. You have one card position raised to the power of 78 possible cards, raised to the power of all the possible keywords and meanings that have been attached to each card over the years, raised to the power of our limitless imagination and intuition.
Even if you leave out the intuition bit, and just look at card numbers, the cards are pretty amazing. Here – let a real expert explain this:
Now, let’s consider that kind of calculation for a full Tarot reading. Never mind a classic 10 card Celtic Cross – let’s just consider my 5 card Modern Oracle layout.
For five layout positions, regardless of the meaning you assign to that position, the first card could be any card from the entire deck. The first card has 78 possible results. The second position has the whole deck minus the first card, which gives 77 possibilities. The third position has the whole deck minus the first two cards for 76 possibilities and so on
If I’m using the online calculator correctly, that means there are over 2 million different card combinations for any given five card layout.
Now add all of the possible card meanings into that mix.
Then raise it all to the infinite possibilities that pure intuition can lend to the reading.
Now you know why we charge the rates that we do. The more cards in a reading, the more complex it becomes, and the more insight, wisdom and raw Tarot experience it takes to make sense out of it all for a client. When you add in ethical, professional conduct – $35 for a five card email reading is insanely affordable.
That is beside the point. The point is that when you consider the mind-boggling number of possible card combinations, a repeating card in disparate circumstances sustained over time is a card definitely worthy of our attention.
The Three of Wands is often associated with things like watchfulness, active waiting, observation, proper timing, or vigilance.
Recently, the energy seemed to flow toward the idea of watching for the right timing, watching for events to happen that would in turn prompt you to action.
Today, the energy is more toward the vigilance end of things. This feeling of watchfulness isn’t timed to a particular action. It isn’t about timing your action just right. It has a more general sense.
This is also an energy connecting the card to the idea of healthy boundary setting. First discover where your best boundaries ARE, then the Three of Wands encourages you to watch over them, maintain them and defend them. Words like “periphery” and “vigilance” come to mind. Based on current events, turbulent times are likely on the horizon. The Three of Wands card is further reminding us to guard our energy and mental health. It is always better to over-prepare than to under-react to such things, be it literal storms or political ones.
Thank you for reading this updated post from the archives. I hope you will use the search bar on the right hand side of the page (or the bottom of the page on mobile) and browse the archives. There are six years of Tarot readings here, more over on “Sage’s Other Words” so chances are you can find something interesting.
The day job is back on a typical schedule so I’m hopeful to have a new “Choose Your Card” Tarot reading for you on Monday.
Ugh…forgot to set the thumbnail AGAIN. Sorry about that. Guess your choices are that half-covered one on the right, the Flippy one in the middle, or the normal one on the left.
Am thinking about doing next week’s CYC with the non-RWS oracle-like Alleyman’s Tarot cards. What do you think? Or would you prefer the classic Pamela Smith artwork for a while? Lenormand? Comments are open if you have an opinion or any questions at all.
Ace of Swords: Head rules heart this week. Listen to your emotions but try not to let them cloud your thinking. Decisive action is needed.
High Priestess: It may feel like other people may know more than you, but they don’t know more about you. Don’t sell yourself short. You are the absolute expert about you. You know best what you need even when what you need is help or guidance.
Judgement: The boat never moves forward if people on the boat are all rowing in different directions. Use clear-headed judgement combined with courage to put the most harmful people off the boat and onshore all together. The boat moves forward very slowly if there is no one left to help you row. Use clear-headed judgement combined with wisdom to be be as generous as you safely can with second chances.
Sage Sips is Tarot for your day in the time it takes to sip your coffee
From the Modern Oracle / TaoCraft Tarot archives, lightly edited to update links, fix a few typos, etc.
Q: Are Tarot cards demonic?
A: No.
Hell and demons are religious ideas, so religious people might give you a different answer. As I see it, religion and spirituality are totally different things (please see yesterday’s post about religion and Tarot) I believe that Tarot is a combination of science and spirituality with religion having no part in the process. No religion, no demons.
The scientific part has to do with resonance and vibration. Think of guitar strings. Pluck one string and it vibrates at a certain frequency and makes a certain note. Twang a different size string and you get a different note. If two separate strings are tuned to the same note, then you can play one string and the other vibrates too, making a similar sound along with the first one (resonance). Tarot cards are the guitar pick, not the note. The guitar string you choose and play sets the tone for Tarot experience you have and any resonant energies that come along with it. If you focus on the demon frequency, you have a bigger chance of resonating with a “demonic” experience. If you vibrate at the “guidance” note then that’s what you’ll get. The old adage of “you get out of it what you put into it” has a sort of literal truth here. Expect hellfire, and you might get it. Expect happy, and you might get that too.
To put it into spiritual terms, all you have to do for a demon-free reading is fill yourself with love and light, or ask for protection from some higher energy / protective power. An example might be the “patronus” in the Harry Potter books. Essentially, the shape of your inner light protects you. What shape would you want your inner light to take?
Here is a powerful image from Joy Star’s newsletter (used with permission.) Think of a house on a dark night. Imagine the house filled with cheery lights and a cozy fire in the fireplace. If you open the front door what happens? Does the outer dark come rushing in and extinguish the light, or does the light pour out of the open door and illuminate the dark? This isn’t saying that the dark doesn’t exist. It doesn’t mean that houses can’t lose power or that disasters don’t happen to people who “think positive” all the time. This is the real world. Dark and dangerous beings and things exist, in both the tangible and intangible realms. Of course bad stuff happens. But good stuff can happen too. Metaphorically speaking, if you turn on the lights before opening the door then you can look out into the night darkness coming in. Fear and superstition turns your lights out. When you are afraid or angry, then dark meets dark at the door.
The spirit world isn’t all sunshine and roses. Natural forces and negative energies from ill-intentioned people do exist. You can protect yourself on spiritual level the same as you protect yourself on a physical level. We put on a raincoat during a storm and stay out of dangerous places alone at night and do all sorts of things to try and stay as physically safe as we can be. Spiritually, energetically, one of the most important protections is simple intention. Intent is a very potent thing. Before you do any spiritual or energy work, very clearly set the clear intention that what you do is only for the highest and best for all concerned. Read, arm yourself with knowledge. Get advice, learn from other people’s experience in order to explore in safety. One of my favorite resources is Psychic Protection by Ted Andrews.
You have probably heard of the ‘spiritual law’ that “Like attracts like.” If you are hopeful, you may attract something inspirational. If you are afraid, you may attract something frightening.
By the same token, if you are genuinely afraid of the cards, then don’t deny or minimize that. It is what it is. If your religious beliefs are in conflict with Tarot readings, then simply find your guidance another way. From my side of things, In my experience, people who are conflicted about Tarot have a hard time hearing the guidance that is offered. Tarot is a great tool for learning, but it isn’t for everyone. If you are seriously worried that Tarot cards are demonic, “occult” or that you’ll burn in hell for having a reading…then you need to find the right kind of guidance for you. Why put that kind of stress on yourself? For Tarot to be helpful, you have to let go of something. Either let go of the religious notions of demons and evil in Tarot, or let go of Tarot as a way for guidance. Either is fine. There is no right or wrong way to find your guidance. These two, religion-induced fear and Tarot readings just don’t mix, like oil and water.
Tarot cards aren’t demonic. It’s WAY worse than that. Tarot cards are reflective. Tarot cards aren’t evil, they are a mirror showing you life’s harsh realities. Choose fear, see fear. Choose love, see love. Choose courage and compassion and see something beautiful.
My reading style is calm, reasonable, no-drama and never occult or scary. I’ve done more first-time readings than I can count. If you would like a safe, no judgement, religion-free way to try a Tarot reading, a five-card email reading is a good choice. Very private, very convenient, very affordable. Order HERE
Zombie Cat’s Tarot reading for the year ahead 2023
Happy New Year Hoomans!
Had my hooman pull the cards for this year for me because she’s the one with the opposable thumbs and all.
I’m Zombie Cat, black sheep of the feline family and Schrodinger’s Cat’s fictional renegade cousin who decided to come out of that famous thought experiment as “both” after the experiment was finished instead of during the experiment. Don’t think about it too hard…quantum physics will break your brain. Didn’t do much for the hooman when she made me up back in a 2015 blog post that was about Tarot, not science, so go all pedantic about it (it makes her cranky when people do that.)
Anyway, I decided to pitch in and help the hooman out so she can sit over there and knit and drink coffee and maybe do something about that hair that looks like post-explosion Veronica end of the movie Heathers. (The cat’s not wrong. 2022 finally caught up with me – I haven’t brushed my hair today and I am feeling very post-explosion Veronica. Now where is that red scrunchie…)
Ahem. My turn hooman.
Just as a brief introduction to this particular layout, here’s what is going on.
The human wrote this several years ago to be used at any time of year, not just New Year. It’s fun for birthdays, graduation, or any time really. There are four cards, one for each of the upcoming season, starting whenever the reading is done and going in order from there. It is intended to look at the direction energy seems to be flowing. It isn’t a definite prediction, but it is a guiding theme for the time period in question. Same for the fifth card which is the theme, over-arching energy or primary lesson for the year as a whole.
Or that’s what the hooman says.
I say it is what it is, I see what I see, I say what I say, you get what you get and we are all just going to have to cope with life however it actually turns out to be. But that’s the difference between us – she is the thoughtful human type, and I’m – not.
Here we go.
The general pattern makes me think there is going to be a lot of energy overall. Stuff is going to happen. You know how when you opposable thumb types are yanking on something that is stuck, and you keep yoinking on it until it suddenly gives way? That’s the feel for this year. We’ve spent the past two years trying to pull ourselves through and out of some real weirdness. 2023 might start out like more of the same but once it starts to move it is going to give way suddenly & move like crazy for a short bit until we get a new grip on it.
While there is only one major arcana card, all of the minor arcana cards are court cards. Court cards might not have the major change, major life lesson ka-pow of energy that the majors have, they still carry a little more catnip than the numbered minor arcana cards.
Winter
This covers roughly the time right now through mid-March or so. The Queen of Pentacles is the card for this season. Just like the peak pandemic times in 2020-21 there is a strong sense of practicality. Pentacles are about earth energy. Find your inner rock, find what anchors and grounds and centers you and do that. The queen is about nurturing and leadership. The king may protect the kingdom, but the queen nurtures it. This time is about taking care of business. This is close to home, hearth and family type stuff. When your efforts harmonize with the energy flows of the time, you get the most bang for your buck as the saying goes. If you try to be too expansive and far flung and boundary-pushing you might meet some resistance or have a rougher than necessary road ahead. If you focus on taking care of what you already have at hand, if you focus on care and maintenance close to the home front, the energies will life you up and your efforts go farther and need less, well, effort. Work smarter not harder so you can slide in a healthy dose of self care too. You know how health and fitness is a fad for five minutes every January? Take advantage, and take care of yourself. Who knows? You might accidentally stumble across something you actually like and can sustain all the way to maybe February this time.
Spring
We stay with the practical, earthy, grounded energy of Pentacles, but the Page of Pentacles moves it from the large-and-in-charge nurturing of the queen to a more intellectual, outreaching quality. Pages symbolize learning, which is something that can be done in the context of any minor arcana suit. The page of pentacles is softer, more practical, more application and less pure theory than the colder more incisive intellect energy we see in the suit of swords. Holistic health is stepping forward as a concept. The mind and learning aspects of sword cards is more like a modern surgeon, while the page of pentacles is closer to the mind aspect of holistic health where mind, body and spirit are one. The page of pentacles is reminding us to use our head, but not heartlessly. Spring is a time of logic and intellect, yes, but logic and intellect with compassionate practical application. Learn all you can, but you will go farthest when you put your energy into learning things that have practical, useful, helpful application.
To put it another way, this energy this spring is more helpful to practical engineering rather than cutting edge theoretical quantum physics.
What is that word? Hygge? Both winter and spring have that warm fuzzy sort of feel to them. Make yourself comfortable the first half of 2023, whatever comfortable means to you. This isn’t the time for pushing too hard outside of your comfort zone. 2020 & 2021 shoved us out of it hard enough already. 2023 may at last be our chance to re-define, re-establish, re-stabilize our new comfort zones to get ready for the next push, no matter whether that push come from us on the inside or from the outside of said comfort zone.
Summer
Here we pick up the spirit part of that mind, body, spirit holistic paradigm.
This is our only major arcana card, the Moon. The moon has long been associated with dreamyness, psychic ability, intuition, spiritual growth, spiritual journies and the like. First the soft jazzy song “Summertime” from Porgie and Bess comes to mind to capture the mood of the card. Then it shifts to the opening few lines from the Madonna song “Crazy For You” from the 1985 movie Vision Quest. Which is a real side-door into the concept that intuition is trying to communicate, I think. The vision question in question here is more like the genuine hamanic kind than the feel good movie 80s pop culture kind. Here my mind is drawn to the early books by Carlos Castaneda, The Teachings of Don Juan from 1968 in particular. It’s been so long since the human had read it, neither of us are entirely sure what that reference is about, if anything, other than to encourage all of us to explore our spiritual life with courage and openness. Here I see starry, moonlit night with warm wind, candle or firelight perhaps. Night steps forward strongly. Night time is particularly important during this season for some reason. It feels like sunset and night time is the most potent for you to indulge in your deepest thinking, deepest feeling, and most important spiritual questing.
Fall
Here, it seems, is where all the yoinking and nurturing and caring and questions pay off. The Knight of Swords is best summed up by screaming “Geronimo!” or doing your best Tenth Doctor Who impersonation and yelling “allonz-y.” Here is where things move fast albeit for a short time. Whether that rapid giving way results in something good or something problematic remains to be seen. But it will be seen. Here is get the word “clarity” good or bad, at the end of 2023’s burst of movement there won’t be any doubt about what the problem actually is now. It might be a brand new dilemma, or it might have its roots in everything that has been going on for the past few years.
We may not get much fixed this year, but by the time next winter rolls back around, at least we might have a clear idea what the fix is.
Year 2023
The card of the year is the King of Cups.
The message is simple, but multifaceted.
Kings are leadership. You are in charge of the whole mess. You own your own mind, body, and spirit so it is up to you to care for, nurture and respect all the facets of yourself within yourself. That inner autonomy and maturity will in turn allow you to be present, emotionally available and nurturing to those you love and care about. That intimate inner circle is the relationship that cups cards symbolize. Cups cards are about emotions and those most important relationships; romance, family, found family and more.
Cups are also about intuition so I would guess that the spiritual aspect of life will be a prominent thread throughout the year despite the other energies that may be slightly more dominant for a time. Spirituality will be the constant even as the other energies comes and go.
Taken together, the King of Cups as an individual card symbolizes a mentor, or some sort of emotional teacher. The word “guru” comes to mind here. I don’t see it as the traditional Yoda-ish meditation or martial arts master. It feels like something low key – a real person or a writer or someone somewhere that you admire in some respect and want to emulate their success. Not in a tangible or materialistic way, and not in toto as some sort of child-like hero worship. “Take the best parts” comes to mind. Little inspirations from multiple reliable sources is more the feel of it.
The color blue steps forward as a good color for this year. To my mind it looks like a lovely sapphire or cobalt blue. That would go along with supporting the third eye chakra (energy center) and the spiritual component to the year.
That’s the inner world for 2023. The outer world is anybody’s guess. Personally I’m hoping for a piping cup of hot political schadenfreude that is full to the brim of deserving indictments. I hope that the forces for inclusion, compassion, support, safety, and environmentalism own the year like Greta Thunberg owns pizza eating criminals on the internet.
With that, the energy steps back.
With that the human and I wish every one of you a safe, happy, healthy and prosperous New Year.
Sage Sips / TaoCraft Tarot 
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