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Week Ahead Tarot: Look and Listen

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My first thought today was to do the usual Action Eases Anxiety layout with the usual Lenormand or RWS tarot decks.

But instinct, or intuition, or spirit or the muses – or whatever you want to call it – had another idea.

First, I felt pushed toward the Normal Tarot deck (by Seven Dane Asmund, used with permission) Then the layout seemed all wrong. Anxiety is often connected to outside conditions like *gestures wildly* everything in America right now.

At that point I hear “look within”

How very Bene Gesserit.

Look for and listen to your own deep intuition. It speaks quietly, and needs your full attention and maybe some amplification. Any microphone of your choice will do. For me it’s cards. It might be astrology, or a random song on a randomly chosen playlist. It might be that one wise snippet posted by someone in the middle of your nightly doomscroll. Whatever your amplifier of choice, look inside and listen to the spirit and intuition that is in there. Take yourself seriously.

Looking at the deck’s guide, the Drowned King is about tragedy at the hands of hubris. It is biting off more than you can chew, and then choking on it.

I am also reminded of the taijitu. The opposite colored dot in the middle of the widest portion of each color speaks to how anything in the extreme holds the seed of its opposite.

The advice is really about moderation. This is a week for taking the middle way.

Yell too loud and yes, you are heard, but you also let your enemies know where you are. Learn too far forward and you fall down. We’ve been called to action a lot recently by the Knight of Swords, but there are limits. Know yours.

When you’ve been pushing the “edge of the envelope,” you have to know when to “haul it back in” as the movie The Right Stuff put it.

Look inside and listen. You’ll know when to move, and when to stay put. You’ll know when to strive, and when to take smaller and chew so you don’t wind up like the Drowned king.

This card and the inverted star together let us know that we are where we need to be right now. Sit tight. Bloom where you are planted. Be present with here, now. Too much pushing or striving could lead to disaster.

Taking slow sips this week – see you at the next one

Worth Sharing

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I don’t often share my own Tarot card draws. It defeats the purpose of looking at the collective energy. Looking at the collective energy benefits us all because the collective energy touches us all in one way or another. Everything is connected, one way or another.

But this week I’ll share the guidance I was given for the week ahead, because I think it is worth sharing. It may not be a reading OF the collective energy, but it is a good way to deal WITH the collective energy this week.

Be still.

Keep quiet. Agitated water stays muddy. Be still to let things settle, to let things become clear as they naturally will. Gravity still works. Things will settle eventually.

Protect your peace.

It is a treasure worth protecting, and protecting it is wisdom worth sharing.

Weekend Oracle (17 April 2026)

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Alleyway Oracle of Secrets: That Which Lies Beneath

Things are not what they seem. Be shrewd, cunning, analytical – and observant. Watch a wait for the right time. Make sure you understand the situation before making important decisions or taking any actions. Decisions that have been building for a while is one thing – but avoid impulse. Wait, watch, know, be certain – especially where another person is involved. Hot takes can harm relationships.

Wishing you a quiet, watchful, enlightening weekend.

Alleyway Oracle of Secrets by Seven Dane Asmund used with permissions Publishing Goblin LLC

Reasonable Second Chance

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Today’s Tarot: Judgement

The past is the price we pay for the second chance each new moment gives.

And it’s a reasonable one. The past doesn’t disappear, but how emotionally attached you are to it is up to you. If it is a cherished memory – then by all means cherish it. If it is a painful, harmful one, you are perfectly free to let the attachment go.

I’ve always wrangled with the Judgement card in this form, with all the christian religious imagery here. If familiarity breeds contempt, my evangelical upbringing has bred a great deal of contempt for that ideology. The only good thing about the political climate in America since 2015 is now everyone can see what we-who-left have been talking about. Now everyone knows how toxic and insane evangelicals and Christian nationalists are. So dear everyone who said I was over-reacting when I said Republicans and Evangelicals were a bunch of fascists (middle finger) I TOLD you so.

BUT that is also an example in point for the energy of this card today. I can’t pretend that my parent’s and extended family’s religion isn’t a steaming pile of toxic, harmful bullshit. BUT I can choose to make my life a secular sanctuary, free from religion as much as a functioning adult living in America in 2026 can make it.

Alan Watts’ observation rings perennially true “You are under no obligation to be the same person you were five minutes ago.”

And THAT is the aspect of the Judgement card that steps forward today: Second Chances.

The judgement has been made (you have decided some aspect of past experience is unhealthy, or somehow unworthy of including in your current circumstances)

The dues have been paid (you lived it, learned from it and made the reasoned choice to shift your perspective)

Another chance is in hand (every moment is a fresh start and a chance be a different person than you were five minutes ago.)

Here is to reasonable second chances.

See you at the next sip

Today’s Tarot: OK Is OK

It’s ok to be ok.

We’ve had a stressful week here in the US. Even I thought we were going to all die in a flash of mutually assured nuclear destruction at the hands of the republicans. (BTW – this is a personal opinion blog and not a public business. As of today, if you are a Republican, support Republicans, want bipartisan cooperation with Republicans, are Chistian evangelical, are Christian nationalist, racist, or any variety of bigot please f**k right the hell off. That energy is not welcome here.)

THAT being said, today is a good day for a shift in focus. Things have been very yang, very outward, very existential crisis lately. It’s ok to turn off the big world news, pull in your energies and focus on you, your immediate personal space for a minute.

You…yes, you. Take just a moment away from the screen. Look around you.

So, how is it? Are you out of the weather? Hungry? Thirsty? Warm/cool enough? Sitting or standing comfortably? Is the room literally on fire? Are you in any immediate danger?

If not, take a deep breath. It’s ok to be ok for a minute.

Sometimes the best dream to chase is being OK with things as they are right here, right now. It is a dream that is forever already true.

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New Times, Old Meaning

Today we are using the Normal Tarot deck by Seven Dane Asmund in the Action Eases Anxiety layout.

What it is: The Fifth of Winter (peak of the test)

What to do: The Masterless Knight (wild card)

How to do it: The Courteous King (tragedy and compassion)

I am reminded of the old adage that “Courage isn’t the absence of fear, it is taking action in spite of it.”

This old meaning of courage is important in these new times.

These cards hint that things are just as bad as they seem. Denial serves no good purpose. The old ways are gone, beyond repair.

The only way forward is to create something new, something courageous and something profoundly compassionate. Here I ‘hear’ the song “Miss Couragous” by the 1990s band The Nixon Clocks.

Old institutions can no longer guide us. I ‘hear’ “religion must fall.” Given my personal background, this feels particularly directed at American evangelicals. May they become social pariahs.

Find your own unique way. You are the king of your own inner kingdom but with no control or dominion over other people. Rule your inner world with wisdom and compassion. Compassion directed toward yourself and toward others.

Wishing you a courageous week

Persistent Surrender

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I like to think it’s a writer’s thing.

I call it the niggles when a thought captures your creative imagination and keeps poking at you until you write it. The Ten of Swords has been a little like that the past couple of days.

Had the niggling notion to draw a card for Wednesday (two days ago) but didn’t get anything posted after drawing the card because life, day job and everything. I drew the card with the intention of expanding Sunday’s Action Eases Anxiety reading, Cresting Wave.

I originally wrote Action Eases Anxiety as a 2 card layout showing, essentially, what it is and what to do. The cards describe current energies and give a suggestion about how to best navigate them. My thought was to add a third card …. a how-to-do-it card, which would flesh out the sentence, and let the layout echo parts of speech: subject-verb-object in a vague sort of way.

The new, third card was the 10 of swords and it prompted an avalanche of random sayings and platitudes plus a bonus earworm of a song from one of my favorite albums back in the day. It all pointed toward the 10 of swords keyword surrender. Often this surrender is the wave a white flag and admit defeat kind that the dire-looking Pamela Smith artwork would indicate.

In this case the surrender word has a different connotation. It is more like acceptance but not acquiescence. There is an element of going with the flow that we see in the six of swords, but with a much more disturbing undercurrent and context than the six would carry. This card connects to the previous reading in a way the six could not.

Surrender is a way to persist.

Someone on Twitter several years ago captured the absolute essence of this card as it presents today. I can’t remember who it was, but I want to say it was author Chuck Wendig in his You Can Do Anything, Magic Skeleton era. Whoever it was, they described the Ten of Swords something like “yeah, you are laying on the floor in utter defeat, but while you are down there you look under the sofa and find the car keys you lost two weeks ago.”

Today, the so-called negative aspects of the card are only negative or bad from a hyper active, frenetic, pushing, over-achieving point of view. Sure, it’s bad from an all-yang sort of perspective. If you look at it from a more yin-balanced perspective, surrender IS persisting.

Surrender lets you understand your situation and deal with it honestly and rationally (after all, intellect is a swords thing.)

A psychiatrist at a hospital where I worked a long time ago once said that “the decision not to decide is still a decision.”

So by that same token, waiting and watching IS doing something.

Yes, it’s true that if you wait for the perfect time to do something you’ll never do it because the time is never perfect, BUT timing can be better if not perfect. Waiting for perfect is the problem – being thoughtful and strategic is not (again a swords / air / intellect thing)

Surrender and retreat isn’t defeat, it is advancing in a new direction.

“He who fights and runs away lives to fight another day.”

Adaptation is survival, and that is the key to persisting in this energy.

Action Ease Anxiety: Cresting Wave

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The Action Eases Anxiety layout gives us a look at the current energy for today or the week. It shows what the energy is, then suggests a good way to deal with it. Whenever you have some small bit of understanding and an action plan, those ideas together can ease anxiety and worry a little bit. It’s no grand prediction about what will happen, but a solid suggestion how to move through this current energy with a little bit more peace of mind.

Like I’ve always said: Tarot isn’t about predicting what will happen in life – Tarot is for figuring out what to do when life happens.

What it is: New Moon (reversed) – fragile potential

What to do: Five of Winter – persist

There is much potential around you, but it can be easily thwarted. Don’t sell yourself short. Persist. Don’t bail out just when the worst is about to be over.

I ‘hear’ (meaning the intuitive interpretation comes as words or sounds instead of mental images) “It can’t rain all the time” from the 1994 movie version of The Crow.

I am also reminded or the adage to not change horses mid stream.

Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Don’t snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

It’s also said that it’s darkest before the dawn. Don’t give up just before the sun peeks over the horizon.

Just because it’s hard doesn’t mean it isn’t worth doing.

And all the platitudes and proverbs like that.

In other words, yes it’s hard. Yes it’s a mess. Hope is over the crest of the next wave. Don’t wimp out at the last minute. Dig deep you’ll make it over the crest of the biggest wave sooner or later.

shown: The Normal Tarot deck by Seven Dane Asmund, used with permission. Learn more at publishinggoblin.com

Ease Up

It tracks.

Today is a good day for the three of cups.

Cups represent emotion, and our emotions have been, collectively speaking, taking a breathing the past few months to years. The energy has been intense lately, especially here in the US. The world rightly hates us. We hate us. Terrible things are happening and if the people in power aren’t actively instigating it, they are tacitly allowing it.

Which only makes it more important to claw back a moment of simple pleasure when you can.

It’s St. Patrick’s day weekend. Enjoy the parades. Enjoy the beer. Enjoy being with friends if you can. Take a breath or take a nap and then get back at it.

Happy Pi Day to all who celebrate.

Inevitable

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Change is inherent to life. Change is inevitable. Change is at hand.

The energy in today’s reading is entirely about world events, not an individual situation – but it tells us all something we can do ease the anxieties for all of us during war, fascism and all of the overwhelming things in the world today.

The Action Eases Anxiety layout hints at what current energies ARE and what to DO about them.

What is is: The Scythe. This symbol clearly resonates with the Death card from the RWS major arcana. The energy now is ripe for making changes. In this deck’s book, Christopher Butler adds a connotation of precision. The advice here is to make smart, precise, efficient, effective changes. Be focused and targeted in what you decide to do. Do small things that you feel confident and comfortable doing….think of a magnifying glass that focuses sunlight so strongly it could ignite paper. When you are confident and comfortable, you are focused and effective. Don’t feel comfortable calling your congressional representatives? Send an email. Don’t feel comfortable carrying a big sign to a protest? Stand quietly at the protest. Quiet presence and small but persistent action counts too.

The Death card is ‘sea change’ … any big, life altering change. Like the Death card, the change isn’t always disastrous. When I was a professional reader, I saw the death card all of the time – at bachelorette parties, and even a baby shower once. Change can be very, very good change. Sure it may be the death of the maiden phase of life, but it is also the birth of wife and mother phases of life. Symbolic death of the old is necessary to make way for the new. The Scythe card here emphasizes that aspect. The Scythe clears the way for better things to come. It clears the way for you to move forward in the way that you want, the way that you must.

Here I am reminded of the powerful quote from the movie The Last Jedi where the character Kylo Ren says “Let the past die. Kill it, if you have to. That’s the only way to become who you were meant to be.” That captures the feeling of the Scythe card today.

What to do: The Whip is a disturbing image, typically associated with quarreling and conflict akin to the 3 of swords or 5 of wands. This connects to the underlying “Change…but in a good way” message here. To make positive, effective changes, old patterns are necessarily disrupted. This connects to the John Lewis “good trouble” reference.

Clearly this is a time of upheaval. I intuitively ‘hear’ “sea change” along with “good trouble.”

I also ‘hear’ “we are in the thick of it” and “this the darkness before the dawn”

My mind is drawn to the number 5 and the month of May. I don’t know why or what that’s about – but I hold on to hope just the same. May is only a couple of months away.

But that should NOT draw our focus away from the moment at hand. That is exactly what the first card warns us about. Any diffusion to our focus could keep the critically needed changes from sparking.

Now is the time to add your drop into the ocean of change, now is the time to add your weight to the work of bending the arc of history toward justice.

Thank you, as always, for reading. See you at the next sip!

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