November 28, 2016: Nature, Experience and Balance

My Dreams of Gaia Major Arcana card for today is card number XXIV, Faith, in a reversed position.  The keywords for this card are faith, self-belief, confidence, Divine connection, trust, serenity, and surrender.  This card is not just about Faith, as in religious faith, it is also about personal faith, about having the self-confidence to endure, and to even overcome life’s challenges.  This card is an Influence card and thus its energies influence me today.  Faith is powerful although it is intangible or invisible, and indeed having faith in oneself can create miracles.  Faith also tells me that I am not alone; I have the support of other loved ones, and of Deity; I am part of something larger, and those connections are valuable.  Because my card is reversed today, there is some disconnect to the concept of Faith, perhaps an inability to understand that I am valuable, or an inability to see others with kindness, or even a difficulty with letting go of past mistakes (either my own or the mistakes of others).  I guess I need to remind myself today that the process of surviving discomfort can offer valuable learning experiences.

The Faith card is also my significator card for this deck.  A significator is a card consciously chosen via a specific method to represent the seeker.  There are all kinds of methods for choosing a significator, including appearance, age, gender, or astrological sign.  Some people choose a Court Card or a Minor Arcana card, others choose a Major Arcana based on the situation being addressed by the reading (for instance, if the issue involves parents, The Child, The Youth, The Mother, or The Father in this deck would be appropriate).  I chose to use a Major Arcana card for this deck, and threw my significator before beginning to work with the Majors.  The Faith card is so right for me at this time in my life.  I am gradually becoming The Crone in every way; I’ve been in menopause for years now, I don’t work full-time out of the house any more, and we are preparing to move into our home in Cape May, which will probably be the last home we have.  My spiritual life has become hugely important to me, and I try to allow my Wiccan practices to infuse every bit of my daily living.  Having Faith show up reversed does not disturb me today, because my focus has recently been on the physical world.

I am at the end of another great Thanksgiving weekend in South Carolina, visiting friends.  We ate waaaaay too much all weekend, and tomorrow I will be getting back to a healthy plan of eating and yoga.  But all of our meals involved interactions with much-loved friends.  It is this sense of connection that is very soothing to me right now, and I will be remembering the meals and conversations of this weekend with fondness.

More and more, I am reconnecting with my inner peace by doing two things, by refraining from judging others harshly, and by connecting to the energies of nature around me.  No matter where I am, whether I am in a city or a suburb, whether I am in a car or a plane, or I’m sitting in front of my computer, taking a moment to connect with the energies of nature around me seems to be grounding me, feeding me, and allowing me to let go of things that don’t serve me in a positive way.  Just taking a moment to look at a pretty picture on FaceBook has a healing effect.  This connection with nature and the workings of my environment leads me back to Deity, and this is appropriate because nature IS Deity.  More and more, physical possessions are not that important.  Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy having a comfy place to live, having a delicious meal, reading and interacting with friends and family on social media.  But my goals are less and less about what I want to obtain, and more and more about what I want to learn, to experience, to share with like-minded individuals, with the Entities and Guides who are assisting me, and with Deity.

I still feel as if I am teetering between the Yellow Phase and Fermentation, see-sawing back and forth, but at this point I am just allowing that to happen.  I will know when it is time to fully commit to moving forward.

4/22/15 the Ten of Cups and The Empress reversed

Today I chose to go back to my Llewellyn Welsh Tarot, and I threw the Ten of Cups and The Empress reversed. 

The Ten of Cups (Mars, action, spontaneity, aggression, drive, in Pisces, “I believe,” feeling, duality, spirituality, suffering and growth) in an upright position offers the manifestation of happiness, simple joys, and fulfillment. The number Ten is about the completion of a cycle or manifestation, and the suit of Cups is about emotions, feelings and the inner self, so this card offers the bounty that comes with the successful experiencing of all the lessons of the Cups cards.

The Llewellyn Welsh Ten of Cups is a lovely card.  Children play along a stream near a small bridge, surrounded by green grass and protective mountains, with a house in the background, an embracing couple in the foreground, and a rainbow arching over all.  Everyone in this image is blessed with love and happiness, obtained without money or fine clothes or a fancy home.  All those outer embellishments aren’t necessary for happiness!  All you need is love!

The Empress (my significator card, which corresponds with Earth (cold/binds and dry/shapes, and stable, material, practical energies that are slow to change), Venus (beauty, allure, pleasure, relationships), the Hebrew letter Daleth (door or womb) and the Path between Binah (female receptive energy and the origin of form and structure) and Chokmah on the Tree of Life (dynamic male energy and the origin of vital force and polarity)) is one half of the Major Arcana representation of the Sacred Feminine (along with The High Priestess), the half that is about creativity, fertility of all kinds, a deep connection to Nature and the nurturing of others, and an enjoyment of the senses. My Empress, who is the mother of form, tells of creative intelligence; she reveals the concepts guarded by The High Priestess, and she encourages me to immerse myself in the manifestations of the physical world. 

The Llewellyn Welsh Empress sits on a throne, clothed in green and blue and white, embroidered with red flowers.  In her lap she holds a scepter (symbol of royalty) and an orb (symbol of feminine energies or traits); a shield embossed with two swans shaped in a heart (symbol of love) rests at her feet.  This is a fertile card, filled with verdant growth and living creatures, and a queen who is kind and capable.   Because my Empress is reversed, there may be a bit of turmoil in my day that will shake my serenity. 

That Ten of Cups makes perfect sense to me, because I am preparing to spend a weekend with close friends, celebrating a wedding!  We will all be gathering in the name of love, and the fancy dresses and fine foods are not what will bring us happiness; it is being amidst friends and loved ones that will make us all feel blessed.  I need to remind myself that the extravagances and decorations, no matter how beautiful, are not the important thing, and I need to remember that this weekend is not about me and my pleasures, it is about my guests and the family of the bride and groom. 

As a side note, The Empress has been appearing reversed quite often lately.  I wonder if I am being told that it is finally time to release The Empress as my significator card.  She has been my “representative” for a decade now.  Just for the heck of it, I picked up my Llewellyn Welsh deck again, thinking about which Major Arcana card might be my significator.  I began to shuffle after asking for guidance, thinking that I would just keep turning cards over until I came to a Major Arcana card, and I’ll be damned!  There, in the middle of the deck, was one card turned upright.  Ask a question, and you will get an answer!!  My new significator: The Hierophant!!

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