tarot reading – Page 5 – Sage Sips / TaoCraft Tarot

Weekend Oracle: Fade

The ‘Waning Moon’ card is about gradual change. Today’s message lives in the Venn Diagram overlap between intuition and real world science. That is often the case with moon related Tarot and Oracle cards. Obviously – the cards reflect thoughts and emotions inspired by the literal, physical, objective real-world moon. No wonder the moon is a favorite of the science minded and the spiritual minded alike. No wonder the Artimis 2 mission captured America’s heart in spite of the political catastrophe that we’ve become.

Copy – moon joy.

In his Animal Wise Tarot deck, Ted Andrews strongly ties the Moon card to natural cycles. The physical natural world has much to teach us, but so does the metaphysical and the spiritual. It is as natural as the rest. As a lovely point of sychronicity, the moon tonight as I write this is a waning crescent which seems to emphasize the notion of fading.

In my mind’s eye see ombre hair color, again bringing fading to the forefront.

But gradual change is still change.

Think Isaac Newton.

Newton’s first law of motion is the one that tells us objects at rest and objects in motion tend to stay that way. The bigger the thing is the more it takes to move it, turn it or stop it.

The racism, fascism and Christian nationalist bigotry in the US is one hell of big thing. It’s going to take every bit of all of us to stop or change it.

Inertia is a thing. It is woven into the fabric of the universe. We shouldn’t be surprised, perhaps, if the right-wing extinction burst is the slowest in a bazillion year history. But it doesn’t mean it isn’t happening just because it is happening slowly. The earth turns in 24 hours. The moon circles us in a month. Jupiter turns in around 9 hours. Neptune takes 165 Earth years to circle the sun.

Neil DeGrass Tyson famously said that the “universe is under no obligation to make sense to us.” Neither is it under any obligation to meet any single one of our hopes and expectations. Things happen in their own time. They may change slowly, but they inevitably change. That is another law of the universe in both philosophy and the physical law of entropy.

The waning last quarter half-moon faded to tonight’s crescent and will continue to fade to the dark night of the new moon. Then it will fade brighter again.

The arc of the moral universe doesn’t bend toward justice unless the full weight of multitudes and generations drag it there slowly. Hate and bigotry can fade, but only when we gradually, relentlessly do all we can to erase it.

Dilute it relentlessly with kindness, even this must and will fade.

Hellawhack Shiznit

It might be nothing.

It’s Friday. The sun is shining. It’s a nice spring day. I have the day off from work. By every outer metric things should feel as sunny as the weather.

Yet, as I thought of writing this post, I get a little niggling feeling that there is something unseen underneath it all or something vaguely looming on the horizon. The intuition doesn’t match outer appearances.

That is exactly the time when it is easiest to doubt your intuition. Which, believe it or not, is perfectly good thing to do.

After all, what is intuition? A thought. A molecule dancing between brain cells. A vague sinking sensation in the general area of those leftovers you had for lunch.

Meditation teacher Dan Harris reminds us that when anxiety sets in, it is often helpful to remember the true nature of thought. Thoughts aren’t made up of much relative to the tangible, objective world. Thinking about thoughts like this is a wonderful way to see through the everyday chatter of our minds and work with those intuitive, not-from-food gut twinges.

The Book of Secrets card from Seven Dane Asmund’s Normal Tarot deck gives the same advice – but from a slightly different angle. The card symbolizes a test of “cleverness” as the deck author puts it.

Secrets in this case hint at something unseen be it deliberately hidden by humans or hidden behind the veil of the future. Dealing with that disconnect between external reality (like our sunny day) and inner emotion takes both intuition and intellect. It takes both kinds of thinking to help us navigate anxious, uncertain, dark, obscured, secretive times. Intellect and intuition together truly are more powerful together than the sum of the parts. Synergistic is the big word for it. Intellect and intuition are synergistic, both aspects worth our attention and inclusion. Card readings are a tool of intuition. This card calls us to be clever and use our intellect. The card itself and the context points to head and heart together.

On the other hand, both still just thinking. They are the sparkling molecular consciousness of the human mind. Both are little more than a squirt of neurochemicals and a few well placed electrons, aren’t they?

Intellect and intuition are both molecules and miracles together that at the same time comprise both everything and nothing.

Or, to borrow a phrase from Blue Man Group in their song Rods and Cones, thoughts and feelings are “hellawhack shiznit that happens inside your brizzle.”

Honor your intuition when the feeling inside doesn’t match the circumstances outside. Honor your cleverness and intellect so that all the hellawhack shiznit doesn’t run away with you.

Here’s to your beautiful brizzle. Have a good weekend! See you at the next sip.

For more of Dan Harris’ excellent work: DanHarris.com

Normal Tarot by Seven Dane Asmund used with permission: Publishing Goblin

Two Way Doorway

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A doorway works perfectly fine in both directions.

Never mind the dedicated pressure triggered in and out doors at the supermarket, I’m talking about your ordinary door.

Threshold, portal, liminal space – its all the same basic idea here.

The collective energies have been niggling at us through the eight of cups for a while now, and it isn’t done with us yet. The energy hinted at turning a corner with it as we talked about the other day in the Standing in the Shimmer post and the brilliant @spiralseatarot on threads once again wrote the eight of cups and about holding space for good things to fill the gap where we have let go of the things that no longer serve us.

Inspired by the gap in the cups that she pointed out, I intuitively heard “portal in time.” Time is something worth exploring in connection with the eight of cups.

The card at its core is about letting go of something while at the same time walking toward something better. It looks back and ahead simultaneously from the portal, the gap in the cups, this bubble we forever live in, this present moment.

Setting mindfulness and the present moment aside for another time, let’s think of the two directions we can cast our attention with this card.

With the classic Pamela Smith artwork, we can’t see what the figure is walking toward. The future is literally out of view. The crescent and round face in the clear, cloudless sky very likely was mean to communicate moon energy, but the crescent and round shapes seem a bit of a moon and sun combination – yin and yang together. That with the clear, cloudless sky both hint at infinite potential held in that out-of-view future.

The Tao Te Ching tells us that one becomes two (the unified oneness of everything can be understood in harmony of opposites, yin and yang) and the two becomes three (I see it as an echo of biological reproduction) The three becomes five (the five classic elements) which in turn comprise the totality of the physical world to this system of thought.

Long story short, the future hold a LOT of potential with this card.

The portal to the future, the gap in the cups, the space Spiralsea advises us to hold is where we draw from that infinite potential. The gap/portal/space is this right-now moment where we make the decisions and take the real world actions that influence the way things go from here. The figure on the card is taking a step. It’s not the cliff dive we see on the Fool card. This has a deliberate quality. This is a decided first step in a new direction.

It takes courage to step in to a new and unknown direction.

It takes courage to deal with the past.

If the background of this image hints at an unknowable but potential laden future, and space in the cups is our portal to time and the sacred liminal space in which we hold our hopes and intentions for the future, then the foreground deals with the past. The ground is beige and barren, with the rest of the card filled with blue, sky and water. The cups rest solidly on the bottom edge of the card.

On one hand this card is about walking away from a bad situation, expunging something harmful or dismissing something from the past that is of no more value. You’ve heard me quote it dozens of times, this again reminds me of that quote from the movie The Last Jedi where Kylo Ren says something akin to “Let the past die. Kill it if you have to. It’s the only way to become who you were meant to be.”

A change that profound should never be made rashly.

The past may be barren, lifeless ground, but it is ground just the same. It is solid. It exists. It happened, it ain’t changing, the memories are yours forever.

When you walk away from the past, you can’t change what happened but you have absolute control over how the past affects you. In the gap in the cups, in this present moment space we hold, we choose how much of the past we allow through to the present. When we let go of the past, the past events still exist unchanged, but the effect it has on us is transformed.

We aren’t letting go of the literal events of the past, we are releasing the mental and emotional hold those event have on our present moment – and in turn their hold on the future.

The doorway in time we see symbolized here goes two ways. It is a present moment liminal threshold where we can both plant seeds for the future AND stop the past from contaminating those seeds. We can let go of the past’s hold on us at the same time we can choose a new direction.

Please feel free to explore the archives. Type eight of cups or 8 of cups in the search bar on the right side of the page (laptop view) to see more thoughts about this card from old posts.

See you at the next sip!

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.