TaoCraft tarot – Page 2 – Sage Sips / TaoCraft Tarot

From the Archives: Find Freedom

Needing the attention and approval of others is a kind of servitude. Find your independence.

Adventures in Meatspace.

I’m re-reading Neuromancer. It’s an all-time favorite and has had a big influence on my blogger-life. William Gibson is credited with coining the term cyberspace after all. That’s also where we get calling the physical body ‘meat’ and the term ‘meat puppets’ I don’t know who came up with ‘meatspace’ for the offline world (Adam Savage maybe?)

The pull to Meatspace has been strong lately. I think that it is a general, collective energy for us all. We are all way past touching grass. I saw a meme on social media yesterday that said something like “I don’t need to touch grass I need to melt into the forest floor”

Personally, I’m caught between wanting to ground and take a little bit of meatspace sabbatical as I call my offline vacations – and wanting to plug into cyberspace hard and minimize some big meatspace stress I have coming up over the next few days.

I get called out by Tarot cards too. It’s not just you.

Pulled a card to write about here and found my own stress staring me in the face.

Welp, that fits.

I often sense the seven of swords in terms of a fiction character trope; a lovable scamp, untrustworthy but helpful petty thief, a character in a heist movie like Ocean’s Eleven or one of the informers in an old episode of Miami Vice.

Today, though, I’m drawn toward Seven Dane Asmund’s interpretation of carrying the burdens of our decisions. Decision making speaks to the mental, intellectual, active, air-element nature of the suit.

In other words, consider the consequences of your decision. If you choose to carry a few swords of your decisions, don’t forget they are sharp and it’s gonna hurt. But see the swords sticking in the ground? Don’t forget you can drop those babies any time you want, stick them in the ground to discharge and detox and get you back on your merry way.

The idea here is very similar to the 10 of wands except pointier, sharper, heavier. This is black belt level burden dropping stress management, not just tossing sticks that we make heavier than they really are.

Doing it all with a sense of irony and humor helps too.

I chose to do the stressful thing this weekend because the consequences of doing it are shorter term and less consequential. If I don’t do the thing, there is 100% chance of blowback. And so here I go with my hands full of swords. When you hear that big crash of dropping metal you’ll know I’m home.

Meet you back here in cyberspace for the next sip.

Sage Sips is Tarot in the time it takes to sip your coffee. Like what you read? Buy me a coffee from the “readings” menu on Ko-Fi and a portion of the September 2026 proceeds goes to the American Library Association in honor of Love Your Library month and their upcoming Banned Book Week.

Action Eases Anxiety Tarot: The Plan

Last week, in the You Have to Make Before You Can Break It post we talked about card layouts, how making an action plan is in itself an action that can ease anxiety, and that a good plan also plans on the plan going completely sideways.

A two-card is great little reset when you are tackling the twists, turns and gone-sideways adjustments you have to make but, like we said last time, you have to make it before you break it. The Plan layout is about setting direction in the first place, making the plan that you plan on adjusting (or throwing away) later.

Reading left to right, the layout positions are:

Let it rest: You have been giving too much energy here. Dial it down, give it some space, let it simmer until the time is right again.
Let it go: This is getting unhealthy or is not serving you as well as it has in the past. This is something to consider releasing for good, or at least putting into cold storage for a good, long time.
Que it up: Pay attention here. Look for opportunities that aren’t quite here yet. This is something that isn’t quite ready but may be soon.
Let it roll: This needs your attention now. Full focus here. Roll with it.

Notice how the position names mostly start with “Let” that’s on purpose. This is about allowing the nature of energies as they are, not forcing things or fighting the flow. This is about navigation directions, not a list of do-or-die achievements.

Let it rest: Two of Wands

Well, isn’t this ironic in the middle of my little rant about planing. That is exactly what the two of wands is often about…strategic planning, preparation, watching for the right time.

The message here is clear. KNOCK IT OFF. The time will never be right. The only time is now. The only place to start is here. CHOOSE and START already.

Don’t let fear of making the wrong choice paralyse you. You can learn from your mistakes, change plans, adapt, re-adapt, re-plan and generally nope out of whatever direction you want to at any point you want to.

“Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.”
Carl Jung

THIS is what Tarot is all about. It isn’t about predicting your future. It is about showing you your power, your choices, your part in creating your future. The two of wands in the let it rest position is nudging us to let the planning rest and do something. You can’t break it unless you make it. You can’t learn from mistakes until you make a few. You can’t change directions until you move in one.

Let it go: Seven of Wands

Pick your battles. Stop beating that metaphoric dead horse. Stop throwing good money after bad. Cut your losses. When you are in a hole, stop digging. Where are the costs too high?

Que it up: Nine of Swords

There is never a time for useless regrets or overwhelming anxiety. This isn’t talking about that. This is talking about stepping outside of your comfort zone. It isn’t time for emotional risk just yet, but what are you going to do when it comes? Even good things can put on pressure. Stress happens, even during good things. Something has to change for things to get better and emotions may bubble when they do. What are you going to do when that happens? Get ready.

Let it roll: Ten of Pentacles

What if….not saying it’s possible…but what if you could….

What would it be like to just be happy with things as they are now. Be happy that you’ve decided to do every single thing within your power to change every single thing you want to change – AND be happy with just having made that decision. What if, having made a choice to be happy with things as they are AT THE SAME TIME that they are changing and AT THE SAME TIME that things are in progress instead of waiting to be happen when things are done?

There is a parable about a student who asked a Zen master about how to be happy. “I want to be happy” they said. The master said to drop the “I” because that is ego and to drop the “want” because that is attachment. Then all that is left is “be happy.”

Happy? Let it roll.

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September 2026 Brew It Forward will go to the American Library Association in honor of their protection of our freedom to read and in honor of their upcoming banned books week.

Brew It Forward, September 2026

Hi everyone!

September is Love Your Library month and national library card sign up month.

Civil liberties are vital to all of us who like Tarot or any sort of not-white-christian spiritual path. Every year the American Library Association promotes Banned Book Week – a perfect fit for a bunch of tarot-types like us.

On a personal level, I volunteer and donate to my local library but for Brew It Forward I wanted to do something with more national appeal.

September’s Brew It Forward will go to the American Library Association in honor of all of the science, philosophy, spirituality, and off-the-beaten-path witchy Tarot books I’ve borrowed over the years.

In August news: The Brew If Forward donation just went out to World Central Kitchen in honor of all of YOU.

Improve Your Groove

From the archives, September 1, 2019

I love it when people talk in T-shirts.

My husband is a drummer. This morning we were watching and interview / demo video on with Stanton Moore, the drummer for Galactic. If you like music and/or drums even a teensy bit, and you don’t know Stanton Moore or Galactic, run don’t walk YouTube or his website or where ever you listen to music and check it out. It may not be your taste in music, but it is worth a listen just for the sheer skill and musicality of it all. At the moment, my personal favorite is “Ha di ka” from the album Carnivale Electricos because it totally reminds me of The Magician card from the Black Cat Tarot.

But that’s another story.

In the middle of all the music stuff he said that you can always “improve your groove” which would make a pretty good t-shirt, I think.

He’s talking about a music groove and learning / improving your skill as a drummer, but to me the non-musician, it invokes the notion of dynamic balance, comfort, ease, being “in a rhythm,” a sort of wu wei state of mind. You know, just rolling with things as they come and it’s all good.

So how do you improve on that? Why would you want to? After all it is OK for everything to be OK, at least every now and then.

Acknowledging the groove improves it.

There is a vaguely toxic version of gratitude floating around out there. I had a client one time that was going to be grateful goddammit until she got the romance she wanted. She had heard that gratitude brings the things that you want, and was essential to the spiritual Law of Attraction. Being grateful for what you have brings you what you want. Valid point – sort of. I had to wonder how grateful she really, genuinely FELT if she was as miserably laser focused on her current loneliness and that new relationship as she said.

Scott Cunningham wrote that “the feeling is the power.” Empty gratitude as an exercise to gain something can’t feel all that terrific. The magick happens when you feel the gratitude for the stuff that is right here, right now. When that happens, the gratitude brings you a wealth of good things that were right there under your nose, perhaps unacknowledged.

Gratitude is a comfortable groove. It is not some ecstasy, not something you can force or do as a means to an end. If you aren’t grateful now – OK. If things are bad – OK. Acknowledge that realistically too. You have to understand how things actually are before you can improve them, right? Gratitude can come in the form looking around and feeling that things aren’t so bad after all. As I type that, I “hear” (which is how I describe intuition that comes as sounds, words or music instead of mental images) a song by Esperanto reggae artist Jonny M, “Malacxa” which means “not awful” or “not bad”

The Magician, all songs aside, is a good card for the concept. The process of finding a groove, being in it, acknowledging it, improving it, can work a sort of magic. Gratitude CAN attract good things, but not by doing it come hell or high water to get some specific thing. The groove magic comes when you appreciate and improve the groove you are already in more than you throw your mind and energy at something that is not in your groove right now at all.

You have to make it before you can break it.

Layouts are easy. Titles are hard.

Tarot layouts are no great secret. You can write one any time you want. We pro (retired, semi-pro, just reads cards a lot) tarot readers do it all the time. This is where you ask the questions you want answered. Basically you name what you want the cards to tell you. When you go into a reading with a clear, firm idea about what each card represents, then you get a clearer idea and a more usable message

Owl and Bones Tarot and Daily Tarot Girl are especially good at it.

Granted, Lenormand and some readers are a little more chaotic and free-form, but in my experience it pays to have a layout in mind before you start a reading. It is a foundation and reference point that keeps things anchored when you are in the flow of intuition.

If you are going to pull a message out of the aether, it pays to have some place solid for it to land.

Last night’s lunar eclipse was a potent one, associated with closure, release, and transformation. That Glasgow Witch describes it as the bookend to the September 2024 eclipse. If the past two years are a cycle, a liminal space in time, a phase of transformation, now that the second bookend has been set in place it begs the question of “now what?”

Chances are you already have a good idea about the direction things are headed. If not, however, that can spark a little worry and that is where the Action Eases Anxity layout comes into play. Coming up with an idea about what to do can reduce anxiety just as much as actually doing the thing. Action Eases Anxiety is a good, fast look to help bring things back to center when life is going off the rails

But what about making the original plan before it all goes sideways?

I wrote a four card layout for just exactly that. I tried to call it “Timeflow” or something overly clever. Now I think I’m just going to call it “The Plan”

I’m more of a Marvel fan, but I am a bigger fan of adaptability, so my planning is always going to be in the vein of DC comic’s Captain Cold:

Make a plan
Execute the plan
Expect the plan to go off the rails
Throw away the plan

So if Action Eases Anxiety is for step three when it all goes pear shaped, The Plan is for step one. This is for making the plan that you expect to eventually toss and the method for making a new one in its place.

The four cards layout spots are:

Let it rest (things to set aside for now. Come back later when the time is right)
Let it go (things release. Cut this loose and move on)
Cue it up (things that need some attention or preparation)
Let it roll (put your attention here. Conditions are good)

Another reason that Tarot works is because a picture truly is worth a thousand words. Subscribe to Sage Sips on WordPress or Substack (it’s free!) so you’ll get a notice when a post an example Reading of “The Plan” layout sometime over the next couple of days, probably Sunday (it’s Friday now) That will give you a good picture of what “The Plan” layout is like.

See you at the next sip!

If you like what you see, then please buy me a coffee on ko-fi or join the Brew it Forward membership. $1 from every virtual coffee and membership proceeds are donated to a different food security, disaster response, or public service organization each month. August 2026 will support World Central Kitchen.

The remaining proceeds go toward creating and web hosting Sage Sips so that it can be free for everyone without ads or paywalls.

When you buy a virtual coffee, it unlocks DM access where you can request a one time, one card email tarot reading as a thank you gift. Brew It Forward members get unlimited one card private Tarot readings anytime at your request. Please visit the Sage Sips / TaoCraft Tarot ko-fi page for details

Tarot Q&A: Your Advice Didn’t Work

What to do when a Tarot reading doesn’t work for you

Q: Your advice didn’t work. I tried the finger lacing and imagining, but I still feel weird and anxious and I don’t know why. Why didn’t the reading work?

Back in the days of twenty ought and seventeen, in the days of the second civil war on a bird-logo social media site (I was on the side armed with BBQ spatulas and a sense of humor) my handle was “ffs NOW what”

I’m sorry the “Vibe Check” post didn’t help in the way that you hoped it would. Tarot is an art form. I have no answer for why it didn’t “work” any more than I can say why some people don’t like cookie dough ice cream. It’s all about individual preferences. There is nothing good or bad about any of it either way.

Buuuut….I would like to circle back to the part of the post that talks about how if the visualizations didn’t quiet the noise, then it is something individual to you.

If the anxious feeling doesn’t have a clear trigger, and it isn’t a matter of vibing off of *gestures wildly* everything that is going on in the world right now, then you are up against something much harder to deal with – yourself. Honestly facing your own emotions is one of the hardest things any human can do.

As a first step, not as a whole solution, it can help to shift from “why not?” to “NOW what?” Action Eases Anxiety layouts are my favorite for this.

Grab a deck of cards, think about the vague anxiety that is bothering you, do your thing with the shuffle, and draw two cards. The first symbolizes the situation now. You can revisit the why of everything later, in a different kind of layout if needed.

The second card gives you an idea of what to DO next. Most of the time, just having an idea about what you want to do helps, even if you never actually do it.

I only do private readings for Ko-Fi supporters. If you want a second opinion on a reading you do or have other questions please feel free to use the Ask the expert form like you did this time. I’m happy to help!

But again, I’m sorry that these uncomfortable emotions are hanging around for you. I’d like to help, but Tarot isn’t the answer for everything. Some people find more inspiration and guidance in astrology, runes, meditation, Tai Chi, book clubs, listening to music, going to museums, going for a run, going to therapy, playing dungeons and dragons, taking a nap, or sitting and staring into the psychological abyss while having a hot cup of coffee or tea – the possibilities are endless. It’s just a matter of finding the right thing for you.

Keep trying, keep looking, and you will find the perfect match for you.

The Eye of August

I’m looking at the world through yin/yang colored glasses this morning. How are things going for you?

Drew a card for today’s post. It didn’t seem right. Drew again. Ditto.

When that happens, sometimes I’ll just start browsing cards to see if anything sparks an idea.

The first thing I realized is how very over the 1909 RWS deck I am. The pale colors and religiousness of it just don’t get it. Thankfully many more RWS inspired, off-RWS, and Lenormand decks exist, although I have that same pale colored, last-century looking beef with a lot of Lenormand decks too. My first and only Lenormand is Christoper Butler’s Healing Light Lenorman where the art and colors are bullseye right in my intuitive and aesthetic wheelhouse – 10 out of 10, no notes, no interest in any other Lenormand Decks.

But back to feeling uninspired which is really the whole point of this.

The only thing that caught my psychic-eye while browsing cards was the center of the Wheel in the Witches Tarot deck, which is a silver pentacle. I don’t have a graphic at hand to show you, but you can Google it easily enough.

The Wheel card did step forward for attention recently and I think it has more to tell us, but not in its typical Tarot meanings like twist of fate, or constant change, or a reversal of fortunes or what have you. My hunch was to slap on the taijitu glasses and remember the spin on this from Taoist philosophy:

Anything in its extreme holds the seed of its opposite.

When we are feeling uninspired or unmotivated, it’s natural to disengage. I’m not saying let ennui run rampant forever. But it just might be the early signal nature gives us to unplug a little.

In the matrix of nature where humans evolved, late August is a good time for that.

BUT not in a pressured way. HURRY UP and relax is one of the dumbest things humans do. During the first weeks of August I witnessed multiple people in multiple situations being absolutely vile to retail workers because they had to go on vacation the next couple of days. They were so profoundly out of step with the time, the season and what was needed it broke the space for everyone there.

And that is the message here. We need a little back to nature moment today. Nature in the energy sense. Nature in the esoteric sense.

In that naturally, evolutionary matrix – this time of year is the most intense part of the heat here, so we need intense yin to go with it. This is sip tea in the shade for a minute before the whole harvest / preserve for winter intensity kicks in. It’s eye of the hurricane time.

In Taoist influenced martial arts, like Tai Chi, calm is seen as strength, just like the low pressure eye of the storm is the powerhouse engine of a hurricane.

Combine that notion with the Tarot hint from the center of the wheel card. It’s a day to go to center. Go to the hub of the wheel where the motion and change is less than at the rim.

It’s the eye of August. Find your quiet center. That is where you will find the energy for the soon to come time when we will need to power up for fall.

Yeah, I know. Southern hemisphere. Same thing. Sip a hot drink in the doldrums of winter and gear up for spring and frenetic planting instead of frenetic harvesting.

No matter where you are in the world, go to the center. Go to the quiet. Unplug where you are. Start where you stand. Don’t break yourself and everyone around you to go relax.

Be the eye of storm right where you are.

See you at the next sip

The real river

Pamela Coleman Smith was remarkable and the 1909 RWS was revolutionary and has had profound impact on the world of Tarot. There is no way around that. BUT it isn’t the end-all and be-all to tarot. Often other decks capture the flavor of the message much, much better.

To be honest, I don’t care for the pale/pastel color palette and religious and social class imagery. Here, for example, the be-grateful-for-your-pittance, kneelingI don’t believe in higher walls, I believe in longer tables., begging quality to the lower figures on a card that is supposed to be about generosity, magnanimity and reciprocity – it just sends me in all kinds of ways.

I don’t believe in higher walls, I believe in longer tables.
Chef Jose Andres

To that end, for every virtual coffee you buy in support of Sage Sips during the month of August 2026, a portion of the proceeds will be donated to World Central Kitchen.

Prosperity is being in the flow of life. Prosperity is more than money.

It’s having enough to eat. It’s about shelter that has a safe and comfortable temperature. It’s about time with loved ones. Meaningful things like that are the real river of flowing prosperity.

Money helps get those things, but it isn’t those things.

Find your river. Flow with it. Get some, give some.

If you want to help me Brew It Forward, please visit my Ko-Fi page

Thanks for reading! See you at the next sip.

Q&A: Vibe Check

Q: I keep getting this feeling that something is wrong, but I can’t figure out what. It reminds me of how I felt right before the pandemic hit. Does this mean something terrible is going to happen again?

A: I dunno. Maybe

We’ve all heard/read my rant about how I can’t predict the future and neither can bits of cardboard with pictures on them a dozen different times….

At the same time, I hear you.

Depending on your political point of view, arguably something terrible IS happening. Multiple things. Really bad things.

That alone is enough to give anyone the creeps and make you feel like everything is just …. off.

The card is the Wheel. Some decks call it the Wheel of Fortune. If you look at it through an old school, predictive lens it gets very fatalistic, hopeless, victim of circumstance-y very quickly. I think the real message here is CHANGE.

Today’s card is drawing a little from the Moon card (natural cycles) and a little from the Death card (big permanent changes) but the emphasis is on change.

You are allowed to be in a bad mood. You are allowed to be tired, or worried or uncomfortable – regardless of whether you have a reason or a cause or not.

No, you shouldn’t write it off. Your instincts might be trying to tell you something. Inexplicable fears and worries might be our intuition giving us the heads up that we missed something. Use this as a cue to take another look, see if you can find a reason for this feeling that you missed before.

Writing off these feelings of unease or trying to get rid of it might not be the best idea, but neither do you have to live with it forever.

Some of my favorite second-look, figure out this weirdness strategies are very simple.

Probably the least fun one is to just let it happen. I forget who said it (Dan Harris quoting someone else maybe??) but as a general rule of thumb, emotions are very short-lived. Like 90 seconds short. That seems a bit rapid – fire to me. An emotional funk can haunt you for hours, or off and on for a day or two at the very longest. But normally, it is time limited thing. Let it come, let it go, learn from it, this too will pass. Remembering it is temporary is sometimes all it takes to turn down the intensity of worry.

One the most useful things is to make a plan for whatever is worrying you. We are living through the enshittification of life as we knew it, and it is impossible to plan in the middle of chaos, but any little bit helps. Decide what you want for lunch tomorrow. Check in with a friend, ask a family member how they are doing…anything. The Buddhists got that one right – action (and action plans) really do ease anxiety.

You mentioned COVID…

I think that’s your answer. NOT that another pandemic is coming, but remember when we talked about resonance? Remember how we said energy sensitive people can vibe so strongly with the energy environment that it feels like the fear and worry is their own and not a by-product of the energy soup we swim in every day? Just like pollen can get in your hair from just walking around outside, you can stuck energy muck too.

One of the things this feeling of unease is asking to figure out is whether the source is you, or your resonance.

Try this.

Sit cross -legged on the floor or if you are in a chair, cross your ankles. Then lace your fingers together. This seals and strengthens your individual energy on a grounded, physical level.

Now, lets bring imagination online to help your mental and emotional energies a little. Imagine you are sitting in the middle of a force field or a clear crystal ball. Get comfy in your mental hamster ball of invincibility. If it helps, decorate that mental space with things that usually make you feel happy and empowered – put symbols on the sphere, see a mug of coffee beside you, play heavy metal music – whatever you like.

Now, with that posture and those images mentally in place….what does that do to the feelings of dread and worry? Are they still there or are you pleasantly surprised to learn “HEY! IT’S ACTUALLY HAPPY IN HERE!!”

If this mental & emotional shielding exercise dials that worrisome feeling WAY down, chances are it is a function of resonance. Take a hot shower, or whatever other grounding, centering, clearing things that you like to do. My hunch is that a nice long shower with a clear-your-energy intention might just do the trick.

If the worry is coming from inside the force field, if it is inside the house so to speak…then it is back to understanding an action-planning. THAT is when an ‘action eases anxiety’ tarot layout might help.

Either way, no, this doesn’t mean something terrible is about to happen. Yes, it does mean your emotions are asking you for some attention. Either way, this vibe checks with the message I’ve heard from so many sources about the solar eclipse today, and this early August season in general: stop, watch, understand then act after the energy – um- changes on the other side of the eclipse. The mood will change, always, but you can shield and check the vibes any time you need to.

Take good care of yourself.

Thanks!

Like what you read on Sage Sips? The blog isn’t monetized. With your help, I can keep Sage Sips free and open to everyone without ads or paywalls. Buy me a virtual coffee on ko-fi and proceeds go toward just that, PLUS $1 of every ‘coffee’ goes to a food security, wellness or civil rights group. August 2026 supports World Central Kitchen, including their work with wildfire disaster relief in the western United States.