Rip it up and start again: A Foolish ritual

"Let go of big questions and sophisticated plans, stop worrying about the past and the future and issues far removed from your reach, and just live." 
                                -- Yoav Ben-Dov, The Open Reading

Here's your homework for today:

Sit down and make a list of the big questions you've had on your mind lately, and the things from the past and future that have been worrying you. Put a big messy star by each one that is 'far removed from your reach'. Then write down a few of the irons that you've had in the fire lately that have become 'sophisticated plans' -- ie, overcomplicated goals, self-imposed to-dos that feel like drudgery for its own sake, rods you have created to beat your own back with.

Take a good look at the list. What would the Fool say to it?

Now get a tin or a plastic container or a jar and a Fool card. (If you don't have one, sketch one.) Rip the list up into tiny pieces and put them in the jar. Drop the Fool card in there with them. Put the lid on the jar and shake them all up together. Imagine how the Fool would respond to seeing you do this. Laugh with him. Make a song of it? 'Shake shake shake shake, shake it up! Shake shake shake shake, shake it up! Shake shake shake shake, shake it up! Shaaaaaaaaaaake it -- UP!'

Then, open the jar, take the Fool out and prop him up so he can watch, and throw the bits up in the air like confetti. Dance around in the bits like 'Footloose' until you're good and sweaty. Sweep the bits up and flush them down the toilet. (Or burn them, or fling them triumphantly in the bin.)

There. You're done with them. Toddle off to your day. If anything off that list tries to sneak back in, laugh at it. 'You're confetti, you are. Ha!'

Daily Draw with the Mosaic Dream Tarot

Mosaic Dream Tarot by Bridgett Trejo, 2014  

Do this: 9 of Wands
Today I will have to go back to the drawing board with something, but I also need to remember that the hardest part of the battle is over. The resolution is nearly there and I should persevere. I must look to my strengths (9 of Wands is known as Lord of Strength) to assist me.

Don't do this: King of Swords
Today I must avoid being too coldly logical and expedient. The King of Swords would sacrifice himself or others to do what's 'right', but this is not the day for that.

Outcome: Fool 
If I am willing to do the painful work of a do-over, and I don't stick doggedly to what appears to me to be the best and simplest way (regardless of people's feelings about it), then unexpected solutions, cooperation and vistas will open up.

All good news. In actual fact, I am having to go back to the drawing board with something at work today. I've got a meeting to discuss it. No matter how hard-nosed I feel about it, I must not let that overshadow proceedings. I should dig deep and find my more subtle strengths of empathy and compromise.

Tarot and the 12 Steps: 1-3

Introduction

This is the first in a series of 4 posts in which I examine how (if at all) the first 12 tarot majors fit in with the 12 steps of Alcoholics Anonymous (and thus all 12-step recovery programs.)

1. We admitted we were powerless over _______, that our lives had become unmanageable.  

Tarot readers usually think of the Fool as representing  positive energy and possibility, and often overlook his very harmful shadow side. The Fool can equally be impulsive, reckless, heedless, ignoring advice, indiscreet, stupid, lacking in judgement, childish, making bad decisions, and in dire peril of harming both himself and those around him at all times. The Fool can easily embody the bravado and overconfidence of the addict who thinks they've got it all under control, or that no harm can come to them, or that they don't really care whether something harms them or not, and who take no notice at all of the impact of their actions on others, helplessly watching them put themselves in danger.

At some point, the Fool may look down and realise...'Oh my god, I'm taking a step off a cliff! I'm falling off a f**ing cliff! How did I get into this position? Where can I turn? What can I do? How can ever, ever get out of this stupid perilous position I have got myself into?'

The Fool will have admitted that he is powerless over the impulses that got him where he is, and that yes, absolutely, where he stands now, his life has become unmanageable. (Is his little dog codependent, that's another question!)

What are my blessings?

Today really is the first day of the rest of my life. The cards I've drawn to day from Sirian Starseed Tarot (Cori 2012) answer the question 'What are my blessings?' They seem to directly refer to this morning's task. It's the first day of a new thing, one of those outside agencies I wrote about earlier in the week, the very first day. It's a new start, the beginning of putting things back together again. Well, that started as soon as things were blown to bits, but you know what I mean.

The Sun (or Solar Deity) will shine his light into the dark corners, refresh the pilgrim spirit, and new perspectives will be seen.

Three major cards, a big deal.

Cori writes of each:

Solar Deity - 'When this key appears it is a hallmark of great things in the works. It is a gloriously beautiful new day.' 

Starseed - 'When this card appears in a reading, it implies that the querent is off on a new quest, unconditionally, knowing that a new experience, an unknown, is about to unfold and become manifest.' 

Hanging Man - 'Hanging man appears to be waiting to be reborn, as many of us describe it, into to a new spiritual consciousness.'

It is a lot to ask of a 1.5 hour meeting, but there is nothing to lose and much to be gained by trying. I feel hopeful. Each day has been the beginning of healing, of course. This day appears particularly auspicious. And even if these cards refer not to today but to general life (because after all, I didn't ask about today, I asked 'What are my blessings?) they are good tidings. They show me good things. Whatever the outcome of this situation, however it turns out, I still have these blessings.

Could you make it shallow so that I can feel the rain?

It's Halloween week and this year I'm featuring the Wicca Moon Tarot. To me, it's an ideal deck for this time of year, very atmospheric, nature-centred, full of leaves and trees and images of people wearing pointy witch's hats. Plus, it has a pumpkin and a black cat on the cardbacks!

Today's card is The Fool. It's quite a departure from the RWS Fool. Instead of a jester type stepping blithely off the edge of a cliff with his little dog trying to warn him to watch out, here we have a pointy-eared bloke in a camouflage cagoule, holding a shovel over his shoulder and wearing a panama hat and shades. He stands on a hill made of lilies and crystals, and his companions are a fox and a crow. He holds a pink-tinged lily in his hand instead of a white rose.

For some reason, this guy makes me think of a grave digger. It's surely the shovel combined with the crow, the bare, icy trees, the dark night and the lilies. Come to think of it, that's a lot of reasons. Now, what does a grave digger have in common with the Fool?

Well, both are associated with the beginning of an important spiritual journey into the unknown, a journey that does not have a true set progression nor finite outcome. That's a profound enough connection for me on a Saturday morning, having gone to bed at 3.45 AM and gotten up at 4.50 AM. I hope I get a nap later this morning. This sleeplessness is going to do me in.

Messing about in boats

Today's draw from Roxi Sim's Pearls of Wisdom Tarot (7th House, 2008) is The Fool. Dressed as a court jester and in a boat called 'Serendipity', the Fool here is doing the impossible: floating upstream while going downhill. Heading right toward a rock, the Fool is oblivious, although the dog at least seems to be paying attention. The Fool carries a sack printed with the alchemical symbols for earth, air, fire and water, a detail that can be seen in the close-up of the sack featured in the frame of the card.








Roxi's usual personification of nature can be seen in the card: the tree seems to have a face (although it looks more like the scrunched up faces of the trees in 'The Wizard of Oz' than the sort of happy tree one might expect to find on the Fool card. But then, trees are wise, so maybe he knows something the Fool doesn't know.). In the background, to me, the hill looks like a woman asleep on her side, facing away from us. The water is her hair, then you can see her green shoulder, dip of her waist, and then her hip. Nature is often depicted as a sleeping woman in these cards. Perhaps it is meant to speak to the benign presence of Gaia. She's always there in the background, no matter what action-packed adventures may be going on in our lives, and she knows none of it is anything to get too over-excited about.

So there's certainly an element of danger and in the card, but it is outshone by the positivity of the imagery. Yes, the Fool does seem quite ridiculous and foolish! But she is trusting that no matter what things work out for the best. That's why her boat is called Serendipity. The full blazing sun and the rainbow are very positive and full of promise. The bumblebee is a nice touch. There is a myth that 'science has proved the bumblebee shouldn't be able to fly', while of course the bumblebee can fly. And this has come to take on special meaning to people, the idea of doing the impossible because you don't know it's impossible. (For more on the bumblebee myth, try Flight of the Bumblebee, Lasers Illuminate Flight of the Bumblebee, or Is it aerodynamically impossible for bumblebees to fly?) Wherever I see bumblebees on Roxi's Pearls of Wisdom cards, I take this message. Things that seem impossible may not be impossible. You don't know until you try. Then of course, there are the more familiar butterflies standing for transformation and growth.

All cards in the Pearls of Wisdom deck contain runes.  On The Fool, she uses Wunjo (left side) and Berkano (right side--she calls it Berkana in the companion book). Wunjo is the symbol of joy and Berkano is the symbol of rebirth and renewal. To be honest, I ignore the runes when I use these cards. I haven't been able to get into runes yet, but it's something I'm interested in, vaguely.

The card carries the usual message of the Fool, throwing oneself out into the world without overthinking or worrying, enjoying the moment and the journey, and trusting that all will be well.

May all be well for me and all beings today.

Ah, a 3-day weekend

I've got a 3-day weekend coming up. Nothing booked, no real plans. Today I've drawn the Knight of Cups, 3 of Wands and Fool from the Touchstone Tarot by Kat Black (Kunati, 2009). The figure in the Knight of Cups stares straight out at us, and his body is turned toward the other two cards, receiving their energy. The figures in 3 of Wands and Fool both face in the direction of the Knight of Cups, but with their eyes cast into the distance (and in different directions from one another). To me this suggests hubby and I are going to enjoy a loved-up weekend, during which we don't bother with elaborate planning (see how the 3 of Wands figure has turned his vision away from the distance? If he were scanning the horizon, he'd mean planning the future to me, but as he's turned away, in this reading at least, I see it as not bothering so much with planning but instead focusing on what is closer, right next to him.). And then of course the Fool suggests all sorts of potential for unplanned adventure. So who knows what could happen. Maybe we'll impulsively take off to the hills for some walking, or fall in love with a car (we intend to do some more test driving) and buy it on the spot. No knowing! Looks like it will be a fun weekend, though.

Now to make it through today's work day...because the card I drew for today was Page of Swords! Oh no! Not Billy the Kid again!