Tag: Tarot Cards

Ask Zombie Cat: Calm will come…eventually.

“Zombie Cat” yes/no layouts like this one are only available seasonally and only available in the email format. Look for Zombie Cat’s Summer Shamble starting June 1, 2024 ($10 for members, $15 for non-members)

Witches Tarot art by Mark Evans used with permission llwellynpublishing.com

Q: I’ve been going through a lot lately. Things are changing fast and I’ve been learning so many things the hard way. Are things ever going to calm down?

A: Maybe but leaning yes.

My hunch is that it is actually more yes than maybe, but with the downside that it won’t kick in for a few more months yet. In my minds eye I see the dogs howling at the moon that you see on some many Moon cards. For some reason that says “dog days of summer” to me. Maybe this is pure projection on my part, because this time of year with the sun, heat and humidity makes my fur more gnarly than usual. It feels like the current energy pattern is going to hang around at least as long as the hot weather. “Things will turn with the weather, bluer skies and sweaters.” Knowing where you are, I’m remembering painting outside on a 80 degree November not so long ago. I’m thinking don’t hold your breath for any real relief until a serious, growing season ending, killing frost. Sort of a big harvest moon, October–December vibe. That would go along with the 4 of Wands, which is about foundations, and community celebrations.

The 4 of Wands also speaks to the new place to live. Yes, it will become foundational, in time. I ‘hear’ “make a house a home” plus something about grounding or earth…this is gonna sound more nuts than usual. I don’t know what the issues are around the new address, but it feels like the energy there needs both cleared and grounded, swept of a lingering funk that pre-dates you and rooted and grounded … settled if you will… on an energy level to make a way for more literal grounding and calming to manifest. This is weird, purely intuitive, and has no basis in science or tradition that I know of on a conscious level. I get the image of sprinkling a 50/50 mixture of salt and diatomacious earth….literally just by pinches at a time…along the baseboards, along the perimeter walls of the house. Don’t worry about inner walls, or specific rooms, just the walls that join the outside. No need to make a big mess, just a ceremonial line using little pinches and clear intention. Sage and smuding are too airy and ethereal. This calls for a tangible bam of something.

The Ace of Swords is associated with air. This feels a little more cautioning than reassuring / advising like the 4 of wands was. Swords and air have to do with intellect. Don’t overthink during this upcoming season, now through the end of the year in any case. This also would go along with the literal grounding / clearing house thing, as being needed to balance the airy creative energy.

The Ace of Swords also reminds me of something you said when we were talking about which deck you’d like to use for this. You were talking about being more “ethereal….like a good spiritual student” with the other deck, but went with this one because it was “bubbling up inside.” I warrant that listening to the stuff that bubbles up inside IS what it means to be a good spiritual student. It is easy to equate spirituality with ethereal, good with serene and so on. This card, this part of the yes/no reminds me of what we were saying yesterday, if it seems like life is beating on you…it is. And that is ok. It first of all is probably because Life knows you are badass enough to deal with it, and second of all, chaos and pains in the ass are just as spiritual as rainbows and unicorns. Remember that article you sent, and that Alan Watts quote? “You are a function of what the whole universe is doing just like a wave is a function of what the whole ocean is doing.”

In other words, don’t sweat it, you GOT this. The ocean of life, love and spirituality touch the great white shark the same as the angelfish. Rest will come in its time. Meanwhile, enjoy the swim. You wouldn’t be in the deep end if you couldn’t handle it. This is a chance to discover your inner orca, have a glass of wine, watch Shark Week on TV….that kind of thing. Recharge? Sure. You eat stress for breakfast. You got this.

The Ace of Wands continues in that vein with a more inward turn. Knowing that spirituality takes all forms, so does self-care. Like the human has said before about this card….carry a torch for yourself. Accept your passions and desires, strengths and weakness for what they are…both your increadable resiliancy and your sincere desire for a day off. Need a break? Take it! With gusto and passion! Tell it all to leave a message, and take a spa day. Which I guess takes us back to wine and shark week, but you get the idea. Let your passions shine, even if it is a passion for kicking things to the curb and carving out the peace and quiet you want. Want peace and quiet with burning passion! Or something like that.

So YES things will settle, but that process can be helped along. You have been answered “the hard way” because you can handle it. Rest hasn’t come yet because you still have a bit more to do. It may not feel like it, but you can keep on keeping on. Plus maybe this is a time to explore the gritty, gnarly, not–so-ethereal side of spirituality. Don’t ask me why, but Sam Elliot style movie characters come to mind…the grizzled antihero, Deadpool kind of thing. Not saying that you are that way, just that might be a good mental cosplay, a way to find a way to have a little fun with the chaos until the rest really does come, which it will, but later. Kind of like when the human let’s me come out and play and unleash a little Zombie snark on the world. It’s all just in good fun to get you through until that change in the literal and energetic weather.

Braaaiiiiinns!

Zombie Cat

Today’s Tarot: Eight of Wands (25 July 2019)

Most of the time we don’t have total control, but we always have choice. Once a series of events is lauched, we might not be able to change things any more than an arrow can turn mid flight of its own accord. Choice is always with us, however. We can choose how we react to any given moment and the conditions that exist at that moment. An arrow in flight can’t control the wind but it adapts to the wind, either overcoming the breeze to land where it was aimed, or by turning to land in a different place than intended. Like the arrow, we deal with the present moment be it during the aim, during the flight or after the landing.

Zombie Cat’s Summer Shamble

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With the Apollo 11 50th anniversary this past weekend, and Lightsail 2’s successful sail deployment yesterday (congratulations Lightsail team and Planetary Society!) all the science in the air woke Zombie Cat from his summer snooze.

Z.C. is awake, shambling around TaoCraft and wanting to do a few Tarot readings in his usual just-for-fun prediction style. To get a FREE yes-or-no Tarot reading answered in the blog (redacted for privacy) just submit your question with the form below or the one on the special offers page.

The heat and humidity makes Zombie Cat really cranky, so any questions that don’t follow the rules go right in the “nope” bin.

Offer ends August 31, 2019

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REpeat not RETROpeat

A few days ago, we looked at the question of why cards sometimes turn up repeatedly in readings, regardless of whether you are getting readings or giving them. As I was uploading the post, I could almost hear a chorus of “It’s Mercury Retrograde” coming from social media as a hot take explanation of why life lessons are hard to learn; why messages aren’t being heard well and why cards have repeating lately.

I disagree. Understanding and enacting an important life lesson often takes much longer than any given Mercury retrograde. It takes more than a Mercury year. It can take multiple Earth years. Any retrograde of any planet in any solar system is no more than a trick of forced perspective. It is the relative movement of a very close planet compared to very distant stars. It is a little like those photos where it looks like someone is holding up the leaning tower of Pisa or holding the setting sun in the palm of their hand. As the animation above shows us, shift your point of view, and POOF! no retrograde. Only normal cycles of planets – and of nature – remain.

I have seen, however, a connection between repeating Tarot cards and one particular planet’s orbit. It isn’t Mercury; It’s Earth. The Wheel card in particular speaks to these cycles. When the Wheel shows up, think about natural cycles that may be moving through your life. There is also a subtext of adaptation. We must move with the wheel of time and natural cycles, or be crushed beneath it. This is a good example of a difficult life lesson that takes time to learn, don’t you think?

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Seasons of the year are an obvious natural cycle. Over time, I’ve seen several cards cluster around summer and winter. They seem to capture the essence of the season. I often see cards like the 9 of cups, the 4 of wands or the 3 of cups turn up frequently around the Winter holidays. It fits Those holidays are akin to the cards with celebrations, traditions, family foundations and social connections all at top of mind that time of year.

Summer cards are a bit more subtle.

We think of summer as an active time, and it is. Yet it needs balance. In the winter, we balance the seasonal cold with warm things: woolly clothes, fires in fireplaces, spices, warm drinks, candles, lights. Summer needs balanced with cool drinks, sitting in the shade, loose cool clothing, going barefoot. Again, there are cards that hint at this seasonal balance, with quiet introspective cards like the 4 of swords, 3 of wands, 5 of cups or The Hermit. Admittedly, I’ve seen this pattern emerge more as a reader than as an individual. It think of it as being part of the entrainment phnomenon we talked about last time. Cards may repeat in a party (or in a season) as a resonance with the time and place (or time of year.)

If a card keeps turning up time and again, yes, it is significance. Yes, that repetition in and of itself is a message.  If a card keeps repeating, it could be for multiple different reasons. As always, it is usltimately up to your feeling and your intuition to decide which reason best fits..or if it is something else entirely. It might be:

  • an important message or lesson you are misunderstanding, failing to hear, or failing to enact
  • a significator, a stand-in for you in the reading to show how Tarot and spiritual growth in general fits in with you as individual and with your self-image of the time.
  • a validation, a signal from spirit the card’s message is important, real, authentically for you
  • resonating with places you go …. parties and so on
  • resonating  with the season of the year

 

Today’s Tarot: Knight of Pentacles (22 July 2019)

It’s a day to roll up your sleeves and get the real world work done. The emphasis is on the practical. Give intellectual and spiritual efforts a rest, and pay attention to the rare gift of this physical existance.

Q & A: Why do I keep getting the same card(s) all the time?

Every now and then, a client will either comment that they get a particular card “all the time” or they will ask why a particular card turns up in their readings a lot. All applause to them for paying attention to that detail. If something in a reading catches your attention and feels significant, then it is significant. You are always doing the right thing to follow those feelings and try to understand the message the repeat is trying to highlight.

Repeating cards are one of those things that capture your attention. The next step is the harder part; How do you know what that significance may be?

The most important, most common and most widely known reason is the repeat card carries a message or lesson that we just are not hearing. Messages will indeed repeat until we perceive, understand and enact them. In that case, repeating cards are like a hand on your elbow guiding and nudging you in the right direction until you get to the right place for the next lesson (and maybe the next repeating card) to begin.

Over the years I’ve noticed a couple of other things that could contribute to a card putting in frequent appearances.

A repeating card might serve as validation or act as a general signal over and above the card’s individual meaning. One particular card can act as a  special “attention all personnel” announcement. Whenever that particular card turns up, it might be a general  signal that the reading has extra importance.  A particular card may keep showing up in order to reassure you that this is a real-deal message for you. For example, when I was first learning Tarot, the Empress would turn up frequently when I was on the right path, doing the right thing to bring this new aspect of myself into  the world. In this instance, repeating cards are happy and reassuring. Repeating cards are not always a “hey bone head listen up already!” message. Sometimes it is “yes, this is for real” or “yup, THAT is the right direction” messages.

For a professional reader it can be more statistics than message; Doing lots of readings means pulling lots of cards. There are only 78 cards and some of them are going to repeat. Repeating cards due to volume is a good problem for a professional reader to have.

There is a thing – I’ve heard it called “entrainment.” I see it all the time at parties. As the party goes on, the tired folks feel a little more energized and the stressed people feel a little more relaxed. Everyone starts to resonate with the vibe of the group, the place, or the occasion. When that happens, one or two cards will emerge as the repeaters, turning up in a large percentage of the evening’s readings. I’ll often mention it when those repeaters turn up, in case guests are comparing notes later. I’ll point out how the shuffles, all the possible layout positions, the different types of messages all combine to give each person a totally unique message, even if everyone and their uncle is getting, lets say, the 3 of cups.

Repeating cards are multitaskers. The Fool popping up lately is a combination of things. It might be the volume phenomenon, because I’ve been doing draws here, for the youtube channel, clients, a party. Still, it hasn’t been THAT busy. The Fool card keeps coming up, in different settings, with different decks. I think I’ve finally figured out what message was trying to get through. It didn’t sink until today, but I’m going to another unrelated blog after this to enact it. Repeats can signal more than one message at a time The other hint was for this very post.

A repeating card can also be a personal “significator.” Do you see aspects of yourself in the card? Do you feel like it could be a symbol of you? It may turn up frequently to symbolize you and your relationship to the reading rather than its typical stand-alone meaning.

If a card keeps turning up time and again ask yourself:

  • Is there something I am missing? What am I missing the card keeps coming back to try and tell me?
  • Does this card resonate with me or my spirit guides? Could this simply be a hint that the reading is particularly important or a reassurance the message is truly spirit-given?
  • Is it just from the party / place/ situation where the reading is happening?
  • Am I getting too many readings too close together. Do I need to take this answer and wait, give thing give things time to evolve?
  • Is the same card carrying more than one message? I am I keeping the separated correctly?
  • Is this card a lot like me? Could it be a stand in for me and showing my part in things rather than giving a whole separate message?

When you see a card showing up time and again, don’t worry, be patient. The extra bonus meaning will become clear in time.