The Lovers/King of Swords reversed. I love this first card. LOL! It has several meanings to me. It tells of the conscious joining of two opposites in order to create something new, it tells of conscious personal choices, and it tells of the incredible results offered by the combination of mental awareness, spiritual depth, and love. I think I am being told today that sometimes events are most effectively processed and dealt with not by a solitary and all-powerful leader, but rather through the input of both sides being affected.

My Thoth card for today is the Nine of Wands reversed. Called “Strength” by Crowley, in an upright position this card tells us that change is stability and stability is guaranteed by change. Balance is possibly being made difficult for me today because I am not allowing myself to grow and change. Sometimes life moves quickly, and we must remember that we can’t fight this quick movement or there will be hell to pay. Let go, and work with the currents!!

Oy. Just as we think we are okay, financially, before we even get the check in the mail from the refinance, we get notified by the IRS that REA must pay unemployment for its independent sub-contractor workers. *heavy sigh*

In keeping with my new-found mental focuses, I have managed to successfully short circuit my usual M.O. when being hit with distressing news: brooding. I am not brooding about this, and after a few moments of shock, I quickly adjusted. I am visualizing that things will end up to be handleable, that the results will be just and equitable, and easy to manage as far as possible payments are concerned, and since we have just passed a wonderfully powerful full moon and are at the beginning of the waning stage, I will be putting together a “lessening of the impact” spell. Yay, me! The only real way to test my progress and growth is to have a real event thrown at me, and I am responding to this one in a completely positive manner. As I said to my husband this morning, we have each other and our love for each other. No one can take that from us unless we allow it to happen. The rest is about money, and if we stand together and work together, this, too shall pass. We will be closer and our bond will be stronger because we dealt with the issue together. LOL, my cards for the day have spoken!

I am very, very pleased with how my “instant magick” class went yesterday. I will be presenting the same class this evening (at Sacred Mists we try to present classes so that anyone can attend, and we have students from all over the world), and I hope that tonight’s students will offer discussions that are equally stimulating as the discussions from yesterday’s class.

Last night, I gave quite a bit of thought to ethics, and to the many levels of responses to perceived attacks of all kinds. There seems to be a protocol of sorts, at least within my own mind. First comes shock, maybe even a few tears. Then, that shock rapidly turns to anger, and that anger always hits a threshold beyond which it turns into a counterattack. That counterattack is usually about finding fault with the attackers in an attempt to corrode the attackers’ stance or objective, or dismantle the attackers’ defense.

It is at this threshold that my awareness needs to kick in so that any further movement or response is done with consciously chosen actions and with an awareness of consequences to all.

I think the instinctive act of defending one’s position is what has allowed humanity to survive as a species; and don't get me wrong, I have no problem with self defense. However, unless our actions are taken consciously and our thought processes are balanced, and unless we have a healthy love for and acceptance of ourselves that is attained through learning about ourselves and accepting with love and without blame whatever we have done and felt and thought and experienced, these defensive acts seem to transform themselves and become about *us* rather than about our attackers. We seem to impose our own worst fears about our own justifications and validations onto our attackers, and thus strive to make our attackers appear to be what we most fear and loath about ourselves.

Understanding this has done two things for me. First, it has made it easier for me to feel less hurt from the recent attacks against Sacred Mists and against those who work to keep Sacred Mists a safe and positive place (that would include me). Second, it has underscored for me the importance of awareness and focus, and of learning about myself. I don’t like being blindsided by ugliness, no matter where it originates. Whether the ugliness comes from someone else or from within my psyche, it hurts equally. Being ethical is very important to me, and thus I know that in order to be ethical, I need to rise above the ugliness and I need to rise above the primitive and instinctive response to attacks. I need to consciously decide upon and choose my response. This is not an easy task. But it can be done.

$