Four Aces Spring Equinox Reading

4 Aces Spread for Spring Equinox, Cosmic Tarot 1998

This is the 4 Aces Method  as I learned it from Jonathan Dee. The aces in the central column represent the priorities in your life right now. The left column is your hopes and fears about the central ace. The right column is the reality or actual outcome of the central ace. I decided to do this spread for my Spring Equinox reading. 

Right now I am most concerned with my emotional, interpersonal life, my reactions to life and my relationship(s). It would seem that I hope to be a strong, enduring, maternal force--or that I hope to find a sense of being mothered, nurtured or cared for. I'm looking for a mother hen, perhaps. But the reality is that I don't really need nurturing because I am strong enough on my own, and I can overcome any obstacle through the forces of kindliness and confidence. 

It looks like in my thought life, I am facing a choice, or rather looking at things as being quite 'either/or', where the truth of the matter is that everything is a shade of grey and a balancing act, and there is no 'either/or' at all. 

As far as actions, I am putting action much lower on my current priorities (I can attest to the truth of this!) and looking upon it as an inevitability that I will slow down, or that perhaps this is a temporary tide that may turn. The truth is that a teacher or mentor might be of great value to me right now to help get the momentum going again. 

And at the very bottom of my priorities, matters of the physical body, finances, and health. It would seem I feel that attention to these matters has had to be sacrificed, as if the ordering of this in importance in my life is something beyond my control. The Star suggests I need to look for entirely fresh perspective on these matters, to look for inspiration in unexpected places. 

In summary, this draw is telling me to stand up for myself, believe in my own strength, but also keep on the lookout for fresh sources of inspiration and role models. 

Temporarily trapped but on the right path

It's Friday at last and today's card from Legend: Arthurian Tarot is 8 of Swords, Guenevere at the Stake. Of course the first thing I notice is that she isn't surrounded by swords, but at least there is an inset showing eight swords, so that's better than nothing. Why is Guenevere being chained to the stake? Because in the medieval mind, for a queen to commit adultery was considered treason and punishable by death. Treason, for a marital infidelity. The person of the king was the very land and nation itself, and if his body were betrayed, the land and nation was betrayed. So, though Arthur did his best to overlook and keep secret his knowledge of Lancelot and Guenevere's affair, once it was made public the matter was out of his hands (apparently). Ferguson in her companion book blames this situation on the 'new religion' (clearly she's been influenced by 'Mists of Avalon'!) Lancelot and a band of his men hack their way to free Guenevere, but of course when he cuts down so many of his fellows of the Round Table, bitter blood feuds bent of revenge are started, and the whole fellowship falls apart, leading to the downfall of Camelot.

But anyway, the card itself usually means feeling trapped in a situation in which you are not really trapped. That would not seem to be the case here, because Guenevere is in fact trapped and bound and about to die. However...why is she about to die? She's being bound and trapped by a LAW, by an abstraction, by concepts, and those are not real, they exist only in the minds of men, and are only real for as long as enough people agree to keep believing them or upholding them. So in a way, she is trapped but not trapped. She is dying for nothing, really. No one deserves to die for what she did. (And it's my belief, that while some people might deserve to die for certain crimes, no one has the right to take another person's life, regardless of how much they deserve to die. But that's a thought for another post.)

I'm a bit trapped at the moment because I find myself caught up in an area of my work where I am unsure how to proceed, so until I get the right information, my hands are tied. I don't want to carry on with it until I find out the right answer, because if I've got it wrong, there will be less for me to undo and put right. However, like the figures in the traditional card, I can easily slip this temporary trap, and even more like Guenevere in this card, I will be rescued from this situation by an outside force (who knows the answer).

Today I am on the Deepening Path -- the path that leads to the Grail Castle. It allows for the deepening of 'awareness, emotion, triumph and joy' -- so perhaps today I will begin to feel that I am on the right track. Perhaps I will get the answers I seek today, and can finish up the work that I've been trying to figure out. 'However you perceive the sacred vessel, whatever it means to you,' says the companion book to the Camelot Oracle, 'it will always represent the brightest and best of yourself.'

That's good news for a Friday. :)

Magic warrior

Legend: Arthurian Tarot 

Today's card from Legend: Arthurian is Magician, represented of course by Merlin. I like this image of Merlin, wearing his mantle of feathers and a purply-blue hooded cloak. He walks barefoot, accompanied by a wolf ('lone wolf' that Merlin is) toward a cave. The scene has strong sense of the fey, with the running water, foxgloves, and the rocks. A mysterious figure, Merlin would often appear to help Arthur during trying times, but would disappear again into his woodland realms and not be seen or heard from for years at a time.

Everybody could use a Merlin in their lives.

Ferguson's companion book, 'A Keeper of Words,' says that the Magician card means skill, wisdom, noble use of one's talents. Harmony with one's environment. Power of influence. Wise counsel. Sensitivity to unseen powers. Independent thought. Showmanship, originality, self-confidence, risk-taking, strength of will, self-discipline to complete tasks. Diplomacy. Grace under pressure.

Wow, everyone could use a Magician in their lives, too.
I wonder how I will be called upon today to use these qualities from within myself.

The Camelot Oracle card I've drawn to accompany Merlin is Gawain. What a great image this is, the ginger-haired Gawain with piercing blue eyes, holding his famous pentacle shield and all dressed in green with a huge leather belt tied up around his waist. In tarot terms, he is much like the Knight of Wands, hot-headed and impulsive and not necessarily the sharpest tack in the box. That doesn't mean he doesn't have a kind of wisdom though, and a rough-hewn integrity. In many versions of the story, it is Gawain who openly accuses the Queen and Lancelot of adultery. He is on the whole, though, quite courteous and definitely honourable. On the path to the Hermitage, Gawain's challenge to us is: 'What alternatives have you not yet considered?'

Now if I apply this question to the Magician, I must think on what alternative types of self-discipline, risk-taking, showmanship, diplomacy and grace under pressure have I not yet considered. I don't really know.

I suppose today I need to be open to opportunities to be impulsively magician-like. (But all I really want to do is get through the day and get back home. The goal of my life lately.)

Safe beside the fire

I woke up quite groggy this morning and was having some sort of work-related dream, the details of which escape me. Last night I was in a mood of jittery unquiet, prompted by nothing in particular. I was in a fret because my new filling is uncomfortable and has ridgy bits on it, and because I have venetian blinds that get very grubby and are a pain to clean. I took one of them down and washed in the bathtub - what a palaver - and it still looks like a good place to grow potatoes. But what kind of stupid reasons are those to get ansty and fretty and depressed? I started to think about how lucky I am to lead a life wherein a ridgy filling and grubby venetian blinds could be a cause of distress. Then my guilt about that compounded my fretting. It was a stupidly hormonal evening.

But this morning I've drawn the 10 of Shields (or Pentacles), which deck creator Anna-Marie Ferguson associates with Camelot. I suppose you can't get a more idealized version of hearth and home than Camelot. It was certainly perfection, created in one night by Merlin, its great hall home to the famous Round Table, and the scene of many feasts and revels in the long, dark winter nights. To enter the beautiful hall with its colourful tapestries, blazing fires, roasting meats, minstrels, dogs, animals of many descriptions, lovely women, brave knights, and servants scurrying around -- it would have made the dangers of the cold and darkness seem very far off indeed. So I suppose the card is reminding me to look upon my secure reality rather than fear that which I am actually sheltered from. I hate the blinds - I have a bit of cash to buy new window treatments. I decide I can't live with the texture of this new filling - I can always go to a different dentist and get his opinion on it. I can fix these little troubles. The 10 of Shields helps put things in perspective.

The card from the Camelot Oracle today is Igraine. I liken her to the Queen of Swords. Traditionally she is the Duchess of Cornwall, seen at a party by Uther, who uses Merlin's magic to disguise himself as her husband so he can go and sleep with her. He wages war on Cornwall to win her, and she gives birth to Arthur, who is given to Merlin in payment for that magical spell. None of that is very Queen of Swordsy, I am merely going by the card image. This Igraine has a steady, knowing look. She has been through some things and has wisdom to share -- if she decides you deserve it. Her challenge to us along the Doubtful Path to the Hermitage is 'Where will your next steps lead you?' My next steps will lead me to work, where I am hoping to finish a bit early and return to my 10 of Shields fortress to relax and enjoy the evening. (And not fret about grubby venetian blinds, fat rolls or ridgey tooth fillings. Honestly. The things we allow to bother us.)

Get movin!

It's the Ace of Shields from Legend: Arthurian, in other decks known as the Ace of Pentacles, and I think I know why it has turned up today. Some very basic body maintenance will be going on today as I go to the dentist again to see to this blasted tooth. It's not going to be cheap, I'm guessing. And I'm working from my 'original' work base today, so it will be good to see everyone at the library. Haven't seen them since the end of Feb!

This particular Ace of Shields is the Shield of Evalach, a character from the Arthurian legends. Evalach was an eastern king from Sarras, and was befriended and converted to Christianity by Joseph of Arimathea, the rich man who donated his own prepared tomb for the body of Jesus, and who according to Grail lore came into possession of the Holy Grail. Someone called John of Glastonbury wrote that Joseph of Arimathea travelled to England, arriving in Avalon (Glastonbury) and bringing with him a container of the sweat and blood of Jesus. This later became mixed in with Grail lore, and thus Joseph of Arimathea became linked to to the Grail. This Evalach, the converted Christian king, brought his magical shield with him to Avalon. On his death bed Joseph of Arimathea smears some of his own blood on the white shield, in the sign of the cross. (John of Glastonbury also claimed that King Arthur was directly descended from Joseph of Arimathea.) In other versions of the story, Joseph's son, Josephus, gives Evalach a white shield with a cross of red silk tacked to it, as a sign of protection against a foreign invader to Evalach's homeland.

I'm really not sure that any of this has any real bearing on how to read this card. I would just read it with the meanings of the Ace of Pentacles in mind, and forget the details of Evalach unless the suddenly and spontaneously leapt to mind. I certainly wouldn't try to force the reading to fit with elements of the Arthurian legend. They'd have to be 100% clear and the connection would need to leap spontaneously to mind before I'd try to fit a client's (or my) situation with the story.


Accompanying the Ace of Shields card is the Lancelot card from Camelot Oracle. There's Lancelot under the Ace of Pentacle-y moon -- holding a shield. He looks like he's wearing tartan thigh-highs, a kind of Celtic 'Pretty Woman', but tougher. Alas, though, I think that's really a chain mail tunic over a pair of Will Worthington's beloved loose-fitting tartan trousers worn by most of his 'Celtic' characters.

Now Lancelot was troubled, we know this. Extremely good and pure, but also quite narcissistic and arrogant, his affair with Queen Guinevere leads directly to the downfall of Camelot. His first appearance in Arthurian legend is in Chretian de Troye's 'Knight of the Cart' in the 12th century, where the themes of his extraordinary perfection and his adulterous relationship with Guinevere are first seen. He is not connected to the Grail until the 13th century, when he appears in the Vulgate Cycle. After the downfall and death of Arthur, he retires to a hermitage, becomes a priest, and many years later presides over the funeral of Guinevere, who has become a nun and subsequently an abbess. Six weeks after her death, Lancelot dies.

But in his youth and before all the chick trouble, he was one formidable dude. And so the card represent heroism, strength, faith, devotion, and all that good stuff, tempered with caution not to get too cocky.

And is that a hedgehog sitting on his head?  ;)

In the Camelot Oracle, one method of reading the cards is to use them in relation to the path drawn. Yesterday I drew The Doubtful Path, and so I will read all subsequent cards in relation to that, until I draw another path card. The question of Lancelot for me on the path to the Hermitage (The Doubtful Path) is 'How can you best answer this challenge?' My challenges for the day are to get my work done, get some parcels in the mail, and go to the dreaded dentist. And the best way to answer these challenges is just to DO them and not put them off. So...off I go! Get