Big change - what now?

You guys, I've deactivated my Facebook account! It's not the first time I've done it. A hiatus from Facebook for me usually lasts about a year. Then when I go back on, slowly but surely, I spend more and more time on there until I realise it's taking up nearly all my free time, and so I deactivate. I deleted the account once and stayed off for a couple of years. I might do that this time, too.

Thought I'd do a read about it:

What am I leaving behind (or what do I think I've left behind)?
What am I really leaving behind?
What are the three choices ahead of me, my 'points of power'?

(Spread was found here. Sorry, I don't know anything about this site; stumbled upon by googling 'spread for a big change.')

Tarot de St Croix, Lisa de St Croix, Devera 2013

By deactivating my Facebook account I 'think' I've left behind Ace of Wands -- a source of inspiration, a place where I can make a difference. I was all into political stories and memes and petitions and so on, there. In addition to my kitten videos.

But what I'm really leaving behind is the Emperor -- Good lord, could I really have been 'working for the man' by using Facebook? I guess I was, really. I mean, I know Facebook saves everything about me, and alarming connections are made, like if I browse an item on Amazon or elsewhere, ads for it turn up on my FB feed or in the sidebars. There are even scarier ways Facebook (and Google, but one thing at a time, people) control and track us, that I don't even know about. So that's what I'm really leaving behind.

Now, what are my power points? Six of Swords, Four of Wands and Queen of Cups. Just for kicks, I'll string together the interpretation suggested in the Tarot de St Croix LWB:

I'm led 'out of the dark dungeons of my mind' and find my power through 'creating ritual and space' where I 'accept the flow of all emotions.' Once again I have a powerful card about capturing living water. I also like that the LWB describes it as 'flow'. Actually, these are the exact reasons I wanted to free up time by leaving FB.

Another thing I like about these power cards is how they are all facing to the left -- in opposition to the Emperor, who seems to be trying to point them toward the right. F*** you, Emperor! Not only are we going the opposite direction, we're ready to crash right into you in a clash of wills -- or fight for our souls, perhaps! We are gonna do what we want without your input. (Also -- see how the wand is pointing in the same direction the power cards are going? I thought I was going that way but I wasn't!)

That's 'now what'!

Bearded mystic -- 4 of Swords in Fountain Tarot

We have another curious take on an RWS image in today's draw from Fountain Tarot (2014). I can't quite make out what's happening in this image. At first glance, I see a yogi of some sort wearing a very large turban, sitting in half lotus position, and it seems as if he might have his hand behind his head with his elbows out, but if that's what he's doing, he's got some really long arms. Or rather, his right arm is super long and his left arm would be quite small and in comparison. So when I peer at it longer, he doesn't seem to have his arms up at all, but rather in his lap in a more traditional pose, with perhaps a meditation blanket tucked over his arms and around him. That would make the elbow-like shapes seem more like shrouded figures looming behind him peering over his shoulders. So actually, I'm not sure what the hell is going on in this image! Maybe it's not shrouded figures, but just artsy shading and reflections or a shadow on the wall or some such. The swords are the typical ghostly transparent ones we have seen before in this deck, and they must be made of light, because that lense flare effect is happening here, shooting rays upward and outward. Perched atop the sword in the foreground is a little black bird. It doesn't look much like a crow to me; if it is, it's a tiny one.

Traditionally, the 4 of Swords brings to mind the need for a rest, a break, a hiatus, and some readers look upon it as the need for mediation and instrospection, a retreat. For me, this interpretation comes out stronger with the Fountain Tarot image than it does in the RWS image, which depicts the tomb of a knight in a cathedral. A tomb represents a pretty darn long break! But I can see how lingering around such a monument could be considered respite from the bustle outdoors of the big city surrounding the cathedral -- it's the space itself that's comtemplative, not the knight.

In this image, the bearded mystic looks off to his right, toward the floor. Maybe he's going through the traditional motions just prior to a session of sitting meditation, where you shift back and forth from one butt cheek to the other, lift your back up straight by imagining your head is a helium balloon and your spine is a string lifted up by the balloon (or some such business). Then if you're like me, you start straight and sloooowly slump forward and things go blurry and several minutes later you realize you're not meditating but humming the theme tune to 'Game of Thrones' in your head and thinking about what to make for dinner, so you get up because your feet have gone to sleep anyway.

Today the entire service I work for is convening in one room for a staff development day, which we are not allowed to call a conference, and which the big wigs have dubbed 'Creating Customer Connections.' So I am thinking a lot of vague staring off into space will be done before the day is through.

A happy Tuesday to all!

Gather your thoughts - 4 of Orbs in Sirian Starseed

I love this image from the Sirian Starseed Tarot. It's such a lovely evocation of what it's like to be in meditation. There are moments, fleeting, between listening to sounds, between wondering if you're doing it right, between resisting the urge to peek at the clock, between hoping your feet don't go to sleep so deeply that you fall down when you try to stand up--there are moments when you really do disappear into yourself, and join the wash of the waves of the universe and feel a kind of alignment through the spine with the heavens above and the earth below.

This is so much more powerful to me than a medieval tomb in a relic of a cathedral.

The card tells me today is a day for quiet introspection, hibernation, meditation. It is not a day for solving problems. It is a day for retreat, for gathering oneself in, for recharging in preparation for dealing with the problems. The problems will wait. They always do.

Hello bird

Shining Tribe Tarot, Pollack 2001

'Monday Monday 
Can't trust that day
Monday Monday
Sometimes it just turns out that way
Every other day of the week is fine
But whenever Monday comes
You'll find me cryin' 
All of the time...' ~ Mamas and Papas

The Shining Tribe Tarot offers 4 of Birds to me today. How appropriate. To me the woman on the cliff side looks as if she's been climbing the mountain and just couldn't go on anymore, so has stopped here, baking in the merciless sun, with curious birds circling around her. Of course, it's Monday and back to work, so I would see it sort of like that. But I need to look closer...

Rachel Pollack's companion books says the woman is resting on her way up the mountain on a vision quest (which explains why she is wearing a mask). I thought she was carrying a bag, but apparently she has one hand resting in a pool of water. There she receives her vision, the birds.

The meaning of this card is that you can't get enlightenment through striving for it. 'The card promises truth and healing in those moments when we stop struggling,' Pollack writes. She continues by contemplating the masculine concept of power - moving out to overcome - contrasted with the more feminine version of power - making a space and drawing the power to you. Well, that is beautiful.

This card, like many of the minors in Shining Tribe Tarot, actually has a great affinity to traditional RWS meanings, just with a glorious Pollack twist.

For today, may we cease our striving. May we just breathe, rest, and allow.

I want a duvet like this

Spiral Tarot (US Games 1997)

Yes, I'm using my newly-arrived replacement copy of the Spiral Tarot. You may recall I bought this last July and in a fit of spontaneity, cut the borders off. I instantly hated it. At last I've bought a new one. The weird borders offend my sensibilities, but the images themselves are so appealing to me, I had to have the deck. This is a deck that NEEDS to be republished - a larger size, plain inoffensive white borders, no extra colours or embellishments, and a pliable, matte cardstock. In my dreams. As it is, I will have to live with a rather small, highly laminated US Games edition with very ill-advised purple and white marbled borders and inexplicably chosen red and white inner border with strange white on red cartouche card title. (Was the designer colour blind? Or maybe just plain blind?)

Never mind, look PAAAAST the ugly outer bits to the glory within.

(There could be a huge lesson there, now that I've just typed that sentence and stared at it for a few seconds.)

I love this image for 4 of Swords - a lady relaxing in her chaise longe, all wrapped up in a big duvet decorated with huge poppies. The afternoon sun slants in through the windows. The candle she's been staring at, possibly meditating, possibly in a sort of trance state, has just finally burned out, and sends up its little last hurrah of smoke. She'll feel so rested when she wakes up after this power nap.

Four of Swords is 'Lord of Truce' in Golden Dawn tradition. It is a respite, a time of rest and recovery. I thought I'd get out Aleister Crowley's Book of Thoth and see what he has to say about it this morning. That was a silly idea. As usual, what he says makes no sense to me. He was probably high anyway. I thought I'd quote it for your amusement:

The number four, Chesed, is here manifested in the realm of the Intellect. Chesed refers to Jupiter who rules in Libra in this decanate. The sum of these symbols is therefore without opposition; hence the card proclaims the idea of authority in the intellectual world. It is the establishment of dogma, and law concerning it. It represents a refuge from mental chaos, chosen in an arbitrary manner. It argues for convention. 

Minds too indolent or too cowardly to think out their own problems hail joyfully this policy of appeasement. As always, the four is the term; as in this case there is no justification for repose, its disturbance by the five holds no promise of advance; its static shams go pell-mell into the melting pot; the issue is mere mess, usually signalized by fetid stench. But it has to be done!

....Riiiiight. Thanks for that, Uncle Al. So much clearer.

Let's turn to others who express themselves better. Okay, the 4 of Swords is Jupiter in Libra. Here are some of the qualities of Jupiter in Libra:

Life for Jupiter in Libra is pretty easy! It is often popular, attractive, and taken care of. Can be lazy, reaping the benefits of the hard work of others. Jupiter in Libra tends to have a lot of lucky breaks. It tends to have it so easy, though, that it can't tolerate stress very well at all. It wants everything to be as light and easy as possible. It likes harmony and balance, and tends to detach from reality and go into a fantasy of these things if stuff gets too 'real'. It doesn't like stress and will naturally try to deflect it. Anytime Jupiter in Libra has the chance to see that life is about facing and balancing the wonderful and the terrible, they will be very fortunate. ~ As Above So Below

I like that description, and I think it sits will with the 4 of Swords card. The contemporary interpretation of this card is usually 'rest' or taking a break, taking it easy from thinking or stressing about things. A reprieve. I can see how that fits in with Jupiter in Libra.

Oh for a snooze

Spiral Tarot, Steventon 1997

Oh, how appropriate is this card from Spiral Tarot. I am so knackered I don't know what to do with myself, but alas I am scheduled to work today. Yes, a Sunday. Where's the justice,  I ask you. I would so rather be home snuggled under a blanky, relaxing and watching the complete DVD box set of Rev. (Or maybe you can see this clip here).

Well, at least I get to come home at 3.15. That's something, I guess.

Honouring the much-maligned body

Golden Tarot, US Games 2003

It's Wednesday and that can be a long day, but I think I'm a little better off than this poor chap in Four of Swords from the Golden Tarot (US Games 2003). To me he looks like he's taken to his sick bed! But maybe he's just having a rest.

The Four of Swords usually suggests we should take a break from thinking about whatever it is we've been thinking about. It's often interpreted to mean meditation, rest, relaxation, withdrawal. As a card of the day, it does seem to be a strong suggestion to continue my strategy of yesterday, to keep myself distant from grumblings and mutterings that have become a habit amongst staff at work. I also take it as a reminder to be very careful of overstriving in areas like my yoga practice. I simply must withdraw from 'effort' in this practice and LISTEN to the messages of my body. No matter what I want it to do, it can only do what it can do. Yoga is meant to be yoke or union between the soul and the universe, but I can see how it is also a union between the mind and the body. People say yoga is about control; I've heard people say yoga is about overcoming the limitations of the mind. I think they miss the point. For me, especially at this time of my life, it is about being inside my body, not fighting against my body, being aware that my body is my ally in this life and not my enemy, and that it is a vital part of me and can be a tremendously rewarding partner in the spiritual journey. But I don't think that is accomplished by ascetism or self-punishment, but through nurturing and loving and accepting the body, and feeling joy in its movement, rather than disappointment or even embarrassment at its limitations. Rest is as important to the care and maintenance of the body as work, and so perhaps this card reminds me that even though the striving part of my mind may think I'm not doing enough or working hard enough, I should also remember to honour the body by resting it as well.

Funny how a card about the mind has led to a post about the body, but I do believe, and yoga is helping me to learn, that we do ourselves a disservice when we say, 'I am not my body. I am not this crude matter.' That crude matter deserves every bit as much respect and care as your mind or your spirit.

Maybe God is Tryin' to Tell You Something

Book of Shadows, LS 2012

Today's card from the Book of Shadows Tarot: As Above, Barbara Moore (LoScarabeo 2012) is 4 of Air. In this deck, the Swords suit has its name changed to Air, and instead of swords, we see air elementals, or sylphs, used as pips. The Sword suit is usually associated with the element of Air, and with logic, thought, rationality, communication through the spoken word, the voice, and a sense of justice, fairness and right. In the Book of Shadows Tarot, the suit of Air is devoted to the practice of divination. Each pip card depicts a method of divination, 'the art or practice that seeks to discover hidden knowledge, usually by the interpretation of omens or by the aid of supernatural powers'. Some people shorten this definition to 'communication with the gods/universe'. Or even just 'God', if you like.

The 4 of Air in Book of Shadows Vol 1 depicts divination through noticing Omens, or signs. Wiccans and other pagans (and in fact many, many traditions both religious and cultural) find significance in omens. The 4 of Air card shows a man walking down an urban street at night, an eclipse of sorts in the sky above (itself often considered to be an omen), his way lit by a streetlamp (the streetlamp is a motif seen several times in this deck, actually). He has a scarf around his neck against the cold. Ahead of him, four sylphs are busy placing 'omens' for him to notice: a coin on the ground, a black cat, a crow and a four-leaf clover. These are all very well-known signs or omens, meant to represent all such omens, both those made famous through folklore and tradition, and those that perhaps only an individual attuned to such things would notice or find meaning in. The suggestion here is that such things are deliberately placed in our path in order to communicate with us. It is down to us to learn to take note of them.

Sample Super-Quick 3-Card Reading: Aquarian Tarot

A practice reading. Hypothetical querent looking for a general reading. Cold reading.

Aquarian Tarot, US Games 2006 (original 1970)

You seem to have got it in your head that there's no rest for you, that in order to create a decent home life you must constantly be 'doing' for them, sacrificing your time to their needs. You think it's only fair that the family come first and you come last. 

There is another side to 'giving' and a 'happy family' that you aren't seeing. You and your family would likely be more contented if you all spent some time thinking about others and not yourselves. Consider ways that you and your family can act together for the good of someone else. This would prove both relaxing and rewarding to all of you. 

If your first thought is, 'Oh great, here's something I'm going to have to organize and then make my family do,' then you really are mired in backward thinking! Involve them, and see what happens. They might just take the reins and you'll find yourself able to kick back and enjoy. They might even go out and leave you at home to take an actual nap.

Musings on the Celtic Tarot: Swords

Suit of Swords--Celtic Tarot, Davis  

The first thing I notice about this suit is the arcing of lightning or electricity and its various manifestations throughout. You can see the first stirrings of it on the tip of the sword in the Ace, then the big spark jumping between sword tips in the Two. It's gone in the Three, but beginning to whirl up again behind the swords in the Four, goes a little crazy in the Five, shoots a clear steady beam in the Six, becomes a full on power storm in the Seven, then is pretty much gone in Eight, Nine and Ten. The background of those cards also appears a deeper red. Why? Looking closer, you can see that there is a ball of energy in Eight, a few glimmering pinpoints in Nine, and a few even smaller ones in Ten. Curious...what could it mean?

Too knackered to budge

Harmonious Tarot, Crane & Fitzpatrick 2005

I'm so tired today, too knackered to budge, so I thought I'd show you a card from one of the sweetest little decks around -- the Harmonious Tarot, by Ernest Fitzpatrick, based on art by Walter Crane, published by Lo Scarabeo, 2005.

Like so many Lo Scarabeo decks, this one comes with white borders with the number at the top, title in 6 languages in the four corners. I detest that particular Lo Scarabeo style, and it puts me off so many of their decks. But I found myself going back and looking at this sweet deck over and over, and I finally bought it, whacked the borders off completely, and used a black sharpie to write the numbers on the tops of the cards in that handy little oval that seems purpose made for the job. IIf I had it to do over, I would use a brown sharpie, and probably sit at a table and take more time rather than doing it curled up in my chair with my feet tucked up under me.) It turned the deck from something that looked awkward and mawkish to a delicate little thing that looks as if it slipped from an Edwardian lady's handbag. I love it. The 4 of Swords card that I've chosen to represent my afternoon has the traditional meaning of a period of rest, but here we see it interpreted as three little flower maidens lounging in exhaustion after what must have been a blazing hot summer day. The long day is done, the cool of night approaches, and all they've got left in them is to sprawl out and say good-bye to the evening sun. There's a clear feeling of, 'Whew...sooo glad that's over. Let's stretch out and then curl up for a nice long nap!' That's how I feel about today. It's been a long one.

Here are few more cards...The Sun, The Fool, and Strength. I didn't get them straight on the scanner, but I told you I was knackered! I hope they will give you an  idea of the style of the deck and how the borders look with the white outer edges trimmed off. I love it. It's just so sweet.

 (Did I mention that I think it's sweet? ;) )