9/13/13

The High Priestess reversed/Judgement reversed.  The High Priestess (Water; the Moon, feelings and emotions, illusion, imagination; Gimel, the camel who safely crosses Da’ath, the Abyss, and thus, has the secret of life; and the Path between Tiphareth, the hub of the creation process where energies harmonize and focus to illuminate and clarify, and Kether, the source, limitless possibility), is one-half of the Major Arcana representation of the Sacred Feminine, with The Empress being the other half. The High Priestess is the source of the power of The Magician, the feminine version of The Hierophant, and the Keeper of the Mysteries.  She reminds me today that having an intense connection to my intuition is only good if I am keeping a positive frame of mind; after all, I attract to me what I think about.  I should probably also strive to be crystal clear today in how I present myself and my ideas.  Judgement corresponds with Fire (hot/separates and dry/shapes, and spontaneous, impulsive and energetic change), Pluto (power, metamorphosis, cycles of dying and becoming), Shin (fang), and the Path between Malkuth (the physical world of action and physical, outer reality) and Hod (provides analysis and communication) in an upright position represents an opportunity to tally up and pay the bill so we can have a fresh start.  Again I am being reminded through my reversed Judgement card that clarity is important, and I can’t rely only on my instincts when summing up today.  All events matter, even the most mundane, and I might be tempted to take shortcuts today.  Those shortcuts might not have good results.

My Thoth card is the Four of Wands.  “Completion” is Crowley’s keyword for this one, but it does not mean that all is done.  Four of Wands, flavored by the King of Cups reversed.  The Four of Wands (Venus, beauty, allure, relationships, in Aries, “I want,” action oriented, assertive, enthusiastic), is about building enough to become established, about the results of harmony and effort and creativity combined.  This is often considered a fortunate card because it tells of an effectively planned and manifested foundation already in place.  Perhaps this, my only upright card, is the most important message for me today.  Pause, look around, enjoy the fruits of my labors and the harmony and serenity available to me.

My Legacy card is Judgement reversed (again), flavored by the Ten of Swords reversed.  The Legacy Judgement card reminds us that sometimes it is not enough to release the past.  Sometimes we must call those past events back into the present so we can face them once more, in order to bring true closure.  Only then can we “put out the trash.”  Today this may not be a productive task; reviewing the past could end up producing a bit of discomfort, too much discomfort to allow a clear view of the events that need dealing with.  My reversed Judgement is being flavored by the Ten of Swords, also reversed.  The Ten of Swords (the Sun, the inner core of a person or situation, in Gemini, “I think,” curious, sociable, dual, talkative) in an upright position tells of the perception of the complete manifestation of interference, powerlessness and restriction.  The reversed card tells of power and confidence, but it also reminds me that burning bridges is not an option.  Even if at the moment, things don’t appear to be happening the way I want them to happen, a happy ending could be just around the corner.  Perhaps rather than rushing to Judgement, I need to pause a bit, as per the recommendation of the Four of Wands above, and focus on what I have accomplished, rather than on what I tried to accomplish but did not succeed.

My 6-digit date number is 8, the number that tells of the conscious and deliberate response to the pause and approach of degeneration of the number 7.

My horoscopes: “There may be a bit of restlessness due to strong forces urging you to take action, Sagittarius. A dynamic feeling is in the air and calling on you to get up and get moving. Take this opportunity to push through some of your new ideas. Make strides toward the completion of your goals. Don't let your emotions get in the way of your mental processes.”

And: “Whatever tasks you choose to focus on today are likely to be helped along by an increased level of logic and efficiency. In addition, insights into more ingenious methods of communicating and carrying out your ideas should enable you not only to get things done more quickly today, but streamline your efforts in the future. Don't be surprised if you have similar insights into the thoughts and feelings of those around you. Make the most of them!”

My Shadowscapes Insight is regarding the Seven of Wands.  This card is about defending what is important, and taking a stand against all who seem to be against me.  I need to stand my ground, despite opposition, and I need to choose carefully the situations that will benefit most from having the courage to bend with the winds. 

I’m hoping to spend lots of time in my beloved garden tomorrow. 

Happy Friday the 13^th!

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Nine of Cups/The Hermit reversed.  The Nine of Cups (cusp of Aquarius, “I know,” friendships, the group, cause-oriented, and Pisces, “I believe,” feelings, duality, suffering, soul growth) is about emotional satisfaction and the ability to find pleasure in my feelings and in my expectations for the day.  This is one of the nice cards of the deck; after all, the number 9 is about completeness (not completion!) of experience, and the suit of Cups is about feelings and emotions, so this one is a good card.  The Nine of Cups is called the wish card because of the sense or perception of bounty associated with it.  However, we do need to remember to be careful what we wish for, because we just might get it! The Hermit corresponds with Earth (cold/binds and dry/shapes, and material, practical and stable energy that is slow to change), as well as Virgo (“I serve,” practical, analytical, work and service oriented, orderly), Yod (open hand, touch), and the Path between Tiphareth (the hub of the creation process where energies harmonize and focus to illuminate and clarify) and Chesed (the place where forms and structure are stabilized and nurtured), and is about searching within for a deeper meaning.  I do like The Hermit even if the concept that he presents can be a bit uncomfortable.  However, my Hermit is reversed, so for today, I might do better if I don’t isolate myself.  This means that I get to enjoy the good feelings of the Nine of Cups, without guilt.  Oh Kay!

My Thoth card is The Star reversed.  “Find thou thyself in every Star.” The Star (Air, hot/separates and wet/adapts; Aquarius; Qof, back of head; the Path between Malkuth, the physical world of action and outer, physical reality, and Netzach, the stimulating factors of emotion and inspiration) is the “good will to all” card.  The Star is about optimism and faith, and it is a reminder that spiritual insight is always available, even if it seems that circumstances are conspiring against us.  There may be disappointments today, but I need to remember that even if things don’t go as planned, there is always a silver lining.

My Legacy card is the Four of Swords reversed, flavored by the Four of Wands reversed.  Two reversed 4’s!  The number 4 is about depth and stability, which can at times be a good thing, as long as we don’t strive to maintain the quiet of the number 4 beyond its usefulness. The Four of Swords (Jupiter, expansiveness and growth, justice, fortune, in Libra, “We are,” partnerships, balance, cooperation) in an upright position can represent a pause or truce, but that’s not what I need today.  This day just might be more about adjustment rather than truce!  The Four of Wands (Venus, beauty, allure, relationships, in Aries, “I want,” action oriented, assertive, enthusiastic) in an upright position is about building enough to become established, or celebrating the successful efforts of the Three of Wands.  My Four of Wands is reversed, and it is flavoring my reversed Four of Swords; we might not be celebrating accomplishments today, but we should be able to make the necessary adjustments so things keep moving in the right direction. 

My 6-digit date number is 4, the number of depth and stability, but also of increased potential for stagnation. 

My horoscopes: “You're likely to face conflicting reports today, Sagittarius. Information may be tainted with emotion, so be careful about going with the choice that shouts the loudest. You may be getting secretly pigeonholed into a place where you don't want to be. Heed the internal warnings you receive. This is a good day to do things passionately. Take care of any detective work that needs doing.”

And: “A day like today should give you the perfect demonstration of an old truth: people quickly forget the difficulties they have had in life and remember periods of happiness for a long time. You will be brimming with energy. The question now is: what are you going to do with it? There are many domains you could spend your energy on: you pretty much have to start from scratch.”

My Shadowscapes Insight is regarding the Knight of Swords.  This is a card of honesty and openness taken to the extreme.  Is that a good thing?  It may be, if the Knight is the rescuer, but he can be a bit too big for his britches, or he can act too quickly.

Today is Friday the 13^th, a day that even my husband sees as unlucky.  To me, however, it is a good day.  I love Fridays, because they are filled with the potential of the rest of the weekend, and to me, the number 13 is a good one.  Actually, 3 + 1 = 4, the number of depth and stability, so I am going to enjoy this day.

I will be shortly beginning my next task.  Once I finish up on this round of the alchemic Great Work, I am going to explore astrology.  It will be interesting to see where this exploration leads me!

Oh, and I heard from my publisher at Luna Station Quarterly; my book on The Emerald Tablet is moving along nicely!  Watch for the release date, soon!

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King of Wands/Ten of Cups.  The King of Wands (cusp of Cancer, “I feel,” sensitive, nurturing, moody, and Leo, “I am,” passionate, dramatic egotistical) is is a natural leader who not only creates new strategies through hard-earned knowledge, experience and wisdom, but puts them into effect as well.  He is reminding me that I have worked hard and learned, and so I have the authority to make things happen in a creative way.  The Ten of Cups (Mars, action, spontaneity, aggression, drive, in Pisces, “I believe,” feeling, duality, spirituality, suffering and growth) offers the manifestation of happiness and fulfillment. I should feel real good about the way I handle issues today, and could end the day with a sense of being blessed with contentment and serenity.  Great way to feel on a Friday!

My Thoth card is the Three of Swords.  “Sorrow,” again.  This card has been showing up lately, and perhaps I need to be aware that things could be happening behind the scenes.  The Three of Swords (Saturn, discipline, responsibility, limitations and resistance, in Libra, “We are,” partnerships, balance, cooperation) usually indicates the possibility that logic and the intellect could end up causing harm, or challenging my logic and rationality.  This card always makes me feel uncomfortable, but at least I am aware that things could be happening behind the scenes, and will be watching so I can head off any negativity as soon as possible.

My Legacy card is Temperance reversed, flavored by the Eight of Wands.  Interesting that I threw these cards exactly two months ago, only with Temperance upright and the Eight of Wands reversed.  Temperance corresponds with Sagittarius (“I seek,” philosophic, adventurous, blundering) Fire (hot/separates and dry/shapes, and spontaneous, impulsive, energetic change), Samekh (the tent post), and the Path between Yesod (the place where patterns and images emerge that may manifest into the physical world of action and outer reality) and Tiphareth (the hub of the creation process where energies harmonize and focus to illuminate and clarify), and it is one of the Major Arcana cards that presents the concept of dynamic balance.  But, my Temperance card is reversed today, so balance may not be beneficial or easily attained.  The Eight of Wands (Mercury, reason, intelligence, education, skill, communication, in Sagittarius, “I seek,” philosophic, fun-loving, adventurous, blundering) is a card of action, of quick developments, and of pulling it all together so things can be completed.  My Eight of Wands is flavoring my reversed Temperance card, so things could get a bit chaotic or crazy.  But that is not necessarily a bad thing, now, is it?!

My 6-digit date number is 11 (Archangel Uriel), which reduces further to the number 2, representing balance, polarity and the concept of “distance between.”

My horoscopes: “Your values could undergo a complete turnaround today, Sagittarius. Recent developments in the world, your community, among your circle of friends, and within you could make you realize, like it or not, you and everyone around you is going through a transformation. This might be a little disconcerting, but it's a positive development. Take things one day at a time and see where they go. You'll probably like it!”

And: “Some strange phone calls could come your way today. There could be a few hang-ups, wrong numbers, or even friends who forget why they called you! Communication in general isn't likely to run too smoothly today, so you may have to make the effort to choose the right words, go into as much detail as possible, and ask if you're being understood. Otherwise things could get more complicated than you'd like.”

My Shadowscapes Insight is regarding Death.  I just love the joyous way that the Shadowscapes Tarot perceives this card, which is seen to correspond with the phoenix.  From the Shadowscapes Companion: “When the phoenix sees death beckoning, she lifts her voice in a tragic song of pain, of rending, of sorrow . . .that yet cannot mask the most intense joy, for she knows that as the flames lick at her heart, the heat is quickening the egg in which her successor sleeps.  Her deathflame is its life spark; one is linked inextricably to the other.”  Death is not always bad, and in my spiritual tradition, Death is seen as the reason for the immortality of life.

Friday the 13^th!!  I actually see this as a lucky day, but not everyone does.  Here is some interesting information from Wikipedia about this much-dreaded day.

The fear of Friday the 13th has been called friggatriskaidekaphobia (“Frigga” is the Norse goddess for whom “Friday” is named and “triskaidekaphobia,” fear of the number thirteen), or paraskevidekatriaphobia, (Greek words “Paraskeví” or Friday, and “dekatreis” or thirteen, attached to “phobia,” meaning “fear”).  Every month that begins on a Sunday will have a Friday the 13^th in it, and there is at least one Friday the 13th in every calendar year.  The longest period that can occur without a Friday the 13th is fourteen months, either from July to September the following year, or from August to October the following leap year.  Friday the 13th can happen as many as three times in a single year; either in February, March and November in an ordinary year, or January, April and July in leap years.

According to folklorists, there is no written evidence for any superstition connected to Friday the 13th before the 19th century; there are several theories for the origin of this fear.  One states that the superstition was created because this date is a combination of Friday (considered unlucky since the 14^th century to modern times; remember Black Friday?), which is considered an unlucky day, and the number 13 (12 is considered a number of completeness and 13 ends the balance of the number 12; both Christian and Norse myths have created the superstition that having 13 people seated at a dinner table will result in the death of one of the diners), which is considered unlucky by many.  Some say that this superstition is rare before the publication of Thomas W. Lawson’s novel, “Friday, the Thirteenth” (which tells of a broker who takes advantage of the superstition to create a Wall Street panic on a Friday the 13^th). 

And of course, there is the now-famous connection between Friday the 13^th and the Knights Templar, presented first in the 1989 book “Born in Blood: The Lost Secrets of Freemasonry,” and later in “The DaVinci Code.”

To me, Friday the 13^th is an auspicious day, filled with possibility.  After all, almost everyone else is cringing and withdrawing into the safety of their protective shields, leaving many opportunities and beneficial energy flows unguarded and ripe for the plucking.

So, Happy Friday the 13^th everybody!

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Knight of Swords/Three of Swords reversed. The Knight of Swords focuses on goals regarding intellectual and intuitive processes and communication; he brings clarity to those pursuits through the element of Air (hot/separates and wet/adapts). The danger inherent in the energies of this Knight is that sometimes he does not know his own power, until he has unleashed the whirlwind. He always gets results, but they may have a flavor of overkill. The Three of Swords reversed tells me that while the potential for the imposition of hurt, whether intentional or by accident or neglect, may be a part of the Knight’s energies today, the chances are good that with a bit of awareness and balance I will be able to prevent the hurt from occurring.

My Thoth card is the Six of Wands. “Victory” today, and I will be able to use the effects of the element of Fire (hot/separates and dry/shapes) effectively today, mainly because I have done my homework and made my preparations. But the balance of today is not a permanent state, so I need to take advantage of it while it is available.

My Legacy card is the Five of Cups reversed, flavored by the Five of Wands. Two Fives today! And it sounds like there will be lots of crazy ebbs and flows of Fiery energy available to me, without any Water (cold/binds and wet/adapts) to weigh me down. The cup will be half full for me today; I won’t be focusing too much on the empty part of the cup, and there is a good chance that my inner self and my outer self may agree with each other. LOL, that could be a recipe for disaster, or at least a few minor bumps in the road, so I need to make use of the scattering of energies today, rather than trying to fight against them.

My 6-digit date number is 4, the number of stability.

My horoscopes: “An intense, emotional dream could move you so powerfully that you awaken with the odd sense that the dream was real. Write it down, Sagittarius. Maybe it is. Efforts to overcome obstacles and advance in business could finally pay off. You could walk around in a daze asking yourself if it really has happened. It has. Make the most of it, and don't be afraid to show your feelings.”

And: “Something big happens today while you're on the job, thanks to your discipline and effort. When you decide to take that next big step on your career path, you can expect better fulfillment, praise and, probably a bigger chunk of change in your paycheck. Give yourself a victory lap -- and spend more time with those close to you who haven't seen you in too long because of all your overtime.”

And: “Your mind may totally focused on work today. You might find yourself obsessing over some rather tedious but necessary tasks awaiting you tomorrow morning, which you're dreading. This isn't doing you any good, my friend. Distract yourself by phoning a friend, or by reading a book that totally engrosses you. If worse comes to worst, clean the house! Tomorrow is soon enough to think about job-related matters.”

I feel absolutely wonderful today! I must have been fighting some kind of virus, but last night Mystery gave me a distance Reiki treatment that seemed to have firmly ushered the virus right out of my system. In a meditation, Hecate (her Patroness) told Mystery that she should try using the images of roses placed in the Reiki recipient’s chakras as a method for applying distance Reiki, and She told Mystery to make use of the color correspondences for roses as she chooses the specific image for each chakra. Well, I can attest to the fact that it worked! I could still feel some of the roses this morning; the rose in each of my solar plexus and brow chakras were still buds almost opened and filled with fragrance, and the roses in my sacral and heart chakras were fully opened blooms, just past the fragrance stage but still crisp and beautiful. The coolest thing for me personally (besides the lack of discomfort!) is that today it is just one week since Hecate Herself requested a task from me, a task that I have not been 100% successful imposing on myself, I might add. Forming new habits takes a bit of time and effort, and now I know why Hecate responded with “as long as it takes” when I asked her how long I needed to greet the crossroads of dawn (eek!) and dusk each day. I have been pretty consistent with the dawn part, but dusk is in the middle of the evening and more often than not, I forget to say the chant She provided to me until almost bed time. How gracious Hecate is to reward me already for my efforts, even though I have a ways to go in order to meet my own standards, never mind Hers.

It has been a difficult week, mainly because of the extreme lethargy that plagued me each day since Monday morning. But I am happy that, while I was not able to punch through that lethargy even for a short time each day, I did fulfill my responsibilities this week. Bare minimum, but I did my best and that is what’s important. I am hoping that like a baseball batter who warms up with a weighted bat before stepping up to the plate, my efforts this week will enable me to have an awesome weekend.

Friday the 13th; awesome power day. I love it!

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