Confronting the stalker cards

'Stalker' cards are those that keep turning up over and over, no matter what deck you're using, what question you're asking, or sometimes even what person you're reading for! The lovely and wise Pearl Annie shared a technique for looking at stalker cards (she calls them 'cards that haunt me') in a group on Facebook called The Tarot Readers Development and Study Group. She shuffles her deck thoroughly and then divides it into five piles to determine what plane of existence the stalker card is attempting to deal with: Fire, Water, Earth, Air or Spirit.

I thought I'd just try that with my two recent stalkers, Knight of Wands and Chariot.

Three cards into the Fire pack, I found the Knight of Wands. I placed the two cards before him face down above the Fire pack, and placed him on top of them facing up. Then after two more cards, I found the Chariot! So I placed it and its previous cards below the Fire pack. 

(It doesn't matter what order you put them, that's just the order I said out loud as I laid them out so I stuck with that, even though normally I would have done Fire - Water -Air - Earth - Spirit. It's early, and I am a witch of dismal memory.) 

Both cards have fallen in the Fire pack, which comes as no surprise at all, but you never know until you ask. Knight of Wands is a Fire card of course, being Wands, and its elemental affinity is Air, so he is Air of Fire. The Chariot is a Water card, associated with the moon and Cancer. It's action that they're calling for, both in thoughts and feelings. I should act on thoughts and feelings, and not just think or feel them. 

I thought it would interesting to take this technique a bit further. What would happen if I looked to see what cards fell in the same spot in the other packs? Would that give me insight into how to support the Knight of Wands and Chariot across all planes? How can my other aspects aid this one that wants so much to come out?

I counted down into each pack and repeated the laying out of the cards as I did for the Fire pack:

Aiding the Knight of Wands

Fire - Knight of Wands, Water - 9 of Wands, Earth - Queen of Wands, Air - 2 of Cups, Spirit - 8 of Wands (confession, the 9 of Wands and Queen of Wands came out reversed, but I turned them over for the photo, so I'm going to read them reversed). 

I can aid the Knight of Wands' manifestation by watching out for feelings of being judged by others, being more sympathetic and forgiving of my physical body and habits, sharing ideas with others, and engaging in a daily spiritual practice. 

Aiding the Chariot

Fire - Chariot, Water - 7 of Wands, Earth - World, Air - 9 of Cups, Spirit - 2 of Pents Rx (confession, 7 of Wands was reversed so I will read it that way.) 

I can aid the Chariot's manifestation, again by avoiding defensive reactions, glorying in my physical self (note the glorified naked form in the card), thinking about where I am satisfied and successful, and accepting that being alive means not always (or even usually) feeling anything like being on an 'even keel'.

In summary 

My stalker cards want very much for me to make progress. The other cards show the blockages to these cards -- possibly they are the real reasons the stalkers keep stalking. They're not waving but drowning, as the poem says. They're stymied by attitudes in the other planes. The cards are telling me to stop seeking balance and get on with things. Lighten up. Stop looking for perfection in myself or my methods. Just DO something. Knight of Wands and Chariot will be satisfied if they see me do something, anything. So stop telling myself it won't be good enough.

Good insights. 

Wait - Do I hear Ravel's 'Bolero'? Two of Cups in Fountain Tarot

Fountain Tarot, 2014

This card from Fountain Tarot reminds me of the Sirian Starseed Tarot. The thing is, I'm not sure I like it.

It's the Two of Cups, and we see here two robed figures standing in formation and making gestures toward the night sky, rather like synchronized swimmers. Two cups float above them. The bottom of the card has an oval shape, for no reason that becomes immediately apparent.

'The Two of Cups is crystal clear,' crows the companion book. 'It represents a deep, powerful connection between two energies.'

Does it?

'The recognition of synergy is unmistakable. When two spirits of this magnitude unite, the universe feels personal, and there is no telling what magic might be created.'

You think?

I don't really see a connection here. I see moving together in sync, sure, and reaching toward something higher than the two of them, but for me the Two of Cups never really meant that. These two seem more overwhelmed by what they perceive 'out there' than they do with each other, and that's not Two of Cups for me.

Maybe they're going for the 'two hearts beat as one' thing. As I contemplate the card, for some reason I just keep picturing synchronized sports -- swimming, pairs figure skating, that sort of thing. So maybe they're Torville and Dean, but Torville and Dean spent a lot of their famous routine locking eyes, that's part of its appeal. Meh.

At the very least, this card shows me moving in harmony with others (or at least one other) and that's a pretty good draw for the day. :) 

Whatcha doing today?

Sacred Rose Tarot 

What should be my top priority for today? 

I've drawn from one of my favourite decks, Sacred Rose Tarot (Johanna Garguilo-Sherman, US Games 1982). I love this deck because it is very sparkly and spangly and 70s-witchy-tastic. I like the tangled briar borders and the 'lens flare' and the eerie, empty eyes of the figures in the cards. The deck was started in 1977 and finished in 1981 -- so it's got that 70s vibe, a time when 'witchiness' was quite different to how it is now.

Anyway, this card tells me two things: focus on my partner today and enjoy our day together...and do the washing up. Because those look suspiciously like soap suds to me!

That was our plan for today anyway. Enjoy the day, tidy the flat. :)

What we need here is a little privacy!

Anna K Tarot, Llewellyn

Lovely card for today, the Two of Cups, a card of friends and companions. It can indicate a romantic attachment, but it can also be any type of friendly relationship, and sometimes even a business partnership.

I like this image, but I've never been entirely sure what Anna K was getting at with the curtains being held up by the two figures here. They are standing in an alcove on a balcony, overlooking a rose garden, apparently. They look into each other's eyes, toasting over goblets of wine. I assume they are drawing the curtains closed so they can enjoy a bit of kanoodling without an audience. Sometimes, though, it makes me think about the way that new lovers don't see the flaws in each other yet, and the way they are on their best behaviour, presenting to and seeing in each other an idealized version of themselves. But that's a bit cynical for a sunny Sunday morning, so let's go with version A, the kanoodling interpretation. :)

Hubby is venturing out to see a movie today (Pacific Rim - I have zero interest in it so he is going on his own) and I am meeting a friend for coffee. So perhaps the curtain is the 'spaces in our togetherness' (to quote from Kalil Gibran) and the Two of Cups card itself refers to this meeting with a friend I haven't seen since Christmas, even though we live in the same town! (I know, that is scandalous isn't it!)

(By the way, I have reconfirmed something - the best way to get a deck buggered up is to hand it to a client to shuffle. Amazes me what people can manage to do to a deck in a few seconds. I was taken aback by what someone did to my deck the other day. I'm going to back to my preferred method of only letting them cut, from now on! My Justice card is mutilated on one side. Boo!!)

Soulmates

Tarot of the Sidhe, 2010 

Today's card from Tarot of the Sidhe is Dancer Two, Soulmates. In RWS, it would be Two of Cups. We see another twilight landscape under a low-hanging full moon, a pool of water, mountains and green grass. Rising up from the pool, the water forms itself into two faery shapes, standing back to back, one female, the other male. Their arms form a shape reminiscent of heart shape. The water churns at the surface (one can imagine the surface had been bubbling and churning in the moments before pushing itself up into the faery shapes), and the moonlight forms a rather miraculous little rainbow there. A golden fish leaps up out of the water on the left, and dives back in again on the right. So there is the circle of the moon, the circle of the pool, the circle of the rainbow, and the circular route of the fish arching over the water. I like the way the shapes of the faeries are flow into one another. This is a moment caught in time, a spontaneous surging upward of the water, and it will merge back into one and sloosh back down into the pool the second after we leave the card, and calmness will once again settle over the face of the pool, reflecting the moon.

It's a wonderful relationship depicted in this card. Strong and sure and always there, like the mountains and the earth and the water, predictable and dependable like the cycles of the moon, but beautiful and amazing like the rainbow, precious and life-filled like the leaping fish. The upward surging of the water into the faery shapes is like the surges of love that can wash over and amaze us, even after so many years.

This is a lovely card for contemplation of the nature of love, or for reflection on the beauties and joys of the relationships in your own life. They surge and ebb and flow, but always they are there.

Musings on the Celtic Tarot: Cups

Cups suit from Celtic Tarot, Davis, 3rd edition 2002

The Cups do not lend themselves immediately to a continuous story, as the Wands suit does. There is a thread that runs through them, though. Each card features cups suffused in a kind of effervescent glow, suspended in front of a circular pattern reminiscent of a rose window. The groupings of the Cups and a few subtle cues in the rose window are all the clues you get, really, to help you interpret these cards.