On days when we get around to that not-everyone’s-favorite set of cards, I like to allow a bit more time and space because the definitions are so long. Today is no exception, but I also want to tell you how it felt to draw these three when I first go up this afternoon.
As you know by now, the card altar is in a bedroom, where my now-indoor-previously-garage-office station is set up. I begin each new 24 hour period by sitting down in there, checking to see where we’re headed today, and reflecting back a bit on what happened yesterday. I have my journaling area and one of my calendars to ponder over. And I have the cards.
Some days we just go around the rotation, and some days I am drawn to other decks. When I went to take the picture of this trio I noticed how all of them were Major Arcana. This is significant. So, it means the message is very important. Very.
“Lovers ~ VI ~ (r)
What we call love is really a whole spectrum of relating, reaching from the earth to the sky. At the most earthly level, love is sexual attraction. Many of us remain stuck there, because our conditioning has burdened our sexuality with all kinds of expectations and repressions.
Actually the biggest ‘problem’ with sexual love is that it never lasts. Only if we accept this fact can we then really celebrate it for what it is – welcome its happening, and say good-bye with gratitude when it’s not. Then as we mature, we can begin to experience the love that exists beyond sexuality and honors the unique individuality of the other.
We begin to understand that our partner often functions as a mirror, reflecting unseen aspects of our deeper self and supporting us to become whole. This love is based in freedom, not expectation or need. Its wings take us higher and higher towards the universal love that experiences all as one.
No-Thingness ~ V
….. the nothing is not just nothing, it is all. It is vibrant with all possibilities. It is potential, absolute potential. It is unmanifest, yet, but it contains all …..
Being ‘in the gap’ can be disorienting and even scary. Nothing to hold on to, no sense of direction, not even a hint of what choices and possibilities might lie ahead. But it was just this state of pure potential that existed before the universe was created.
All you can do now is to relax into this nothingness . . . fall into this silence between the worlds . . . watch this gap between the outgoing and incoming breath. And treasure each empty moment of the experience. Something sacred is about to be born.
Completion ~ XXI
This is the way of Zen, not to say things to their completion. This has to be understood; it is a very important methodology. Not to say everything means to give an opportunity to the listener to complete it. All answers are incomplete….. if someone is trying to understand Zen intellectually, they will fail. It is not an answer to the question but something more than the answer. It is indicating the very reality…..
Here the last piece of a jigsaw puzzle is being put into its place, the position of the third eye, the place of inner perception. Even in the ever-changing flow of life there are moments in which we come to a point of completion. In these moments we are able to perceive the whole picture, the composite of all the small pieces that have occupied our attention for so long.
In finishing, we can either be in despair because we don’t want the situation to come to an end, or we can be grateful and accepting of the fact that life is full of endings and new beginnings.
Whatever has been absorbing your time and energy is now coming to an end. In completing it, you will be clearing the space for something new to begin. Use this interval to celebrate both – the end of the old and the coming of the new.”
Taking these one at a time; first we look at The Lovers, in reversed presentation. I like to think that this is not direct because we are already seeing the true meaning of what the card is talking about. We KNOW that the actual essence of Love (with a capital letter) is more than the physical. Good for us, moving on then.
I really like the way this second card is explained in the guidebook. The Buddhist word for it is “shunyata” which is much more lovely, but has the same meaning. As the last line said, we are in for something big and something wonderful. Very good to hear.
And the final third, simply says so much. It is all about the continuing Universal concept of life/death, cycling through our lives. Combine this with our higher knowledge that relationships are ever-evolving, that the genuine Love of all is an open opportunity to create, and ta da! we have a validation from yesterday’s message. It’s a very comforting sign.
On the home front, and speaking of comforting, here’s Max.
It’s hot out right now,
he’s fine,
just basking.
After our pool time tonight, Dan and I went in search of some dinner. We walked, post-meal, of course. And saw two very large feathers, plus several fluffy ones, both grays and whites. We also saw this, independently of each other. And then had to tell the other one about it.
Virginia!
On our drive home he shouts out, “and what is that one with the big giant bear?” Add to these: BC (wave wave!) and Illinois. (We still don’t know what it was with the “big giant bear” but if you think YOU do, please be sure to tell us.)
Today’s Deck:
Osho Zen Tarot
Today’s Affirmation, from Louise Hay and Cheryl Richardson:
“For Prosperity
I prosper wherever I turn.
My income is constantly increasing.
I bless and prosper everyone in my world, and everyone in my world blesses and prospers me.
Life loves me, and all my needs are met at all times.
I gratefully accept all the good I have in my life now.
Life loves me and provides for me.
I trust Life to take care of me.
I am worthy of abundance.
Life always provides for my needs.
Abundance flows into my life in surprising ways every day.”
Wow, that is quite the deep draw today. Very interesting. I love how we got the reversal because we’ve learned that lesson well enough. Never heard of that for a reversal, but it totally works for me.
Very good & thought-provoking draw, IMHO.
Awww, Max just looks hot!
Google-fu-ing has yielded: bear-shaped plates from Canada’s Northwest Territories ( how frickin cool is that?): http://www.worldlicenseplates.com/world/CN_NWTX.html
An Arkansas specialty plate supporting their Game and Fish Commission: http://www.dfa.arkansas.gov/offices/motorVehicle/Pages/specialityPlateDetails.aspx?show=34
And another specialty plate, for North Carolina, supporting the Friends of the Smokies (mountains): http://www.friendsofthesmokies.org/plates.html
Maine and the Chicago Bears also have bear specialty plates.
~
Reversed cards just TELL me what they stand for in pretty basic terms as I sit with them. I never know what they’re going to say!
Wow. What great skills you have. I’ll send Dan over so he can see if any of these are what he saw drive by. Thank you!
(And tomorrow your phone photo will go up, tonight I had some e-mailing issues.)
J
9:19 p.m.
8-14-12
Enlarged the cards and looked for my message. What do I most want to lose myself in – my writing. In order to do that, every time I sit down to write I need to dissolve into the nothingness. This is the piece of the puzzle I’ve been missing that prevents me from enjoying the process of writing.
Curiosity sent me searching to see if there was such a thing as an atheists tarot deck? There wasn’t but there were several articles about what atheists get from the tarot.
Bring it on, madame Radio, bring it on.
~
I would love to hear what you found out about this atheist angle.
(It would benefit Hanna too!)
J
9:23 p.m.
8-14-12
I’m loving these affirmations that you’re putting at the bottom of the posts, a very nice way to finish off
~
Thanks. Louise and Cheryl really are the best in the business, and I totally encourage everyone to visit their websites. They are SO good at this sort of thing.
J
9:26 p.m.
8-14-12
“But it was just this state of pure potential that existed before the universe was created.” Nice way to think about it.
~
I thought so too.
J
9:32 p.m.
8-14-12
Three major acrcana in one draw, and for the first (or possibly the second, but I don’t think so) the messages have NO sexist tone to them. And the messages seem to be quite timely. There is a word in one of the native languages that translates to “the time between the lightning and the thunder” that I think carries the meaning of the middle card.
Nice Max picture. Solar powered dog. And I want a bear shaped license plate!
~
We need to petition the state and get you some of that Bear stylin’ on a plate!
J
9:37 p.m.
8-14-12
Corina beat me. Yes, it is the license plate for the North West Territories which is snuggled up to Alaska and the Artic Ocean. It’s cold up there Julie and dark in the depths of winter. Only an hour or 2 of daylight. Very disconcerting. The reverse for summer. I traveled up north 8 or 9 times for two years after my brother in law’s wife passed. I would start cleaning and then wonder why I was so tired by 11:30 pm. It was so light outside, it felt like noon. The Big Guy’s family is from way up north by way of Wales, they were the first settlers way back in 15–something. And now you know and too much info. It gets hotter and muggier than NYC. And the ravens are huge. Huge.
I like it when things are more lovely, don’t you.
~
After this past year, when I’ve spent so damn much time outside, I might need all of my day/night hours to be visible now. Before? Maybe not.
NEVER too much information for me. And I love your Big Guy so much! Besides, people’s histories are fascinating to me.
J
9:44 p.m.
8-14-12
Scary puzzle face!!!
Off to look up that NW territories plate.
~
Some of that artwork is pretty cool,
and some of it ….. isn’t.
J
9:58 p.m.
8-14-12
…native languages that translates to “the time between the lightning and the thunder” love this, Xenotuba.
Interesting cards, Julie. Hugs to hot Max.
~
Dan got another “warning” on his zippy new phone. We’re in for YOUR type of temperatures later this week. I’ll be thinking of you.
J
10:17 p.m.
8-14-12
Awe Maxie – basking sounds lovely.
Love the cards to day.
~
I open the door, he waddles out,
and plops down.
Very fun to watch.
J
10:23 p.m.
8-14-12
What a very powerful reading today! I feel a bit like Max, except I wasn’t roasting on purpose: I was running errands! Now I just want to sleep. But I’m awake enough to appreciate the cards. I’d love to see your office/altar room! Pics?
~
Only PART of that room is mine. The rest is Emma’s storage.
As is half the living room, and much of the guest room. And the below-stairs space, PLUS a big section of garage/backyard. No pictures until she is no longer homeless.
J
10:40 p.m.
8-14-12
“the time between the lightning and the thunder” is a very, very cool idea and moment, thanks Xenatuba! And I want a bear license plate too!
~
So, we need to take this up with the DMV in Oregon and New Jersey then. Bear Medicine people have spoken!
J
10:48 p.m.
8-14-12
I, too, like “the time between the lightning and the thunder”. Thanks, Xenatuba!
I wish I could bask and not get fried. Lucky Max.
~
He does NOT smell fresh as a biscuit afterwards, so count your own self elf lucky-er.
J
10:51 p.m.
8-14-12
http://www.vitalground.org/content/images/vitalgroundplate.jpg
Here ya go.
~
(This is Dan. And this is what he saw on Hilyard between about 22nd and 24th. J)
love that plate. but not quite as much as mine.
~
I can say, from experience now, in real life, up close and personal, that yours *IS* super awesome!
J
10:18 p.m.
8-15-12
Now, why didn’t that come up in my Googling??? That one’s beautiful! Thank you!