Fear Part II: The Storm

Welcome to the New Year everybody! 

I'm a few days late which is probably a sign. Not a bad one. Just one that reminds me where I've been this year, and hopefully how to get to where I'm going. Oh, that moment in the middle, the "how to," that's what we psychobabble yoga hippies like to call "the present." That romanticized beckoning space that begs us to "be here now." 

The thing is the "here and now" is kind of a crap shoot right now. The past year, it's there, I see it, it wasn't all easy but hey, guess who's still kicking? I'll take that as a win. The future, eh, I'm taking some deep breaths. It's the right now that gets me. It's supposed to be quiet in the eye of the storm right? The thing that well known idiom fails to mention is that whether or not it's actually quiet in the eye of the storm depends on whether we're yelling at the top of your lungs and flailing your arms demanding that someone gets you out. 

So how do we defeat fear of upheaval? Fear of change? Fear of the storm ripping up our roots and twirling us around before hurling us back towards the ground? 

Enter a little New Year message from my new Slow Holler tarot deck. That's right! If you're a lover of all things queer and tarot you've probably been lusting for this little stack of magic for a few years when they left us salivating over their kickstarter page. In the dark days of The Collective Tarot being sold out with no sign of a new run, this little beacon of light from the south promised to give my poor well loved, but water damaged, pacific northwest deck a rest (oh, the irony). 

What should appear in my first few pulls but Kai Barrow's interpretation of "The Tower" or "Disaster"-- THE STORM. Part of the Major Arcana, the 16th card appears to remind us that we're powerless in the prevention of change. We can choose to flail in the middle of the storm, or we can pause in the quiet, to take a breath, regroup, and accept our inherent agency to move through transition. 

So 2016, I see you. It was a tumultuous year. In truth we didn't all survive it, but you and I, we did.

2017, you're coming whether we're ready or not. I choose to take the next couple weeks to sit in the quiet and take a breath. I choose to welcome in "the creative winds of destruction" and open myself to the "winds of renewal." 

Align with me?

COM|PASSionately,

Traci

Tarot Tuesday: Support

Morning Revolutionaries!

We had such an amazing weekend at Catalyst Con West having "exceptional conversations about sexuality." We learned some new things, engaged in conversations about things we'd been contemplating ourselves, explored who we are trying to reach from this little corner of the universe and just what the best way is to reach each other!

We've been really lucky to have been able to have done quite a bit of "conferencing" this summer. Sure, our hearts were a little broken that we didn't make it out to Amorous Revolt last month, but between Gender Spectrum, Gender Odyssey, and Catalyst Con we really can't complain. Going to such a smattering of conferences, these little intentional bubbles of community conversation, got us thinking about how important format/structure are in our offerings.

We may want to share information but if we don't know how to get it to those we're trying to reach it doesn't get anywhere. We may want to make space for conversation but if we can't build cultures of safety and openness they aren't going to happen. We may want to offer support to others around us but if we're not mindful of how we do so we may not be helpful.

This spread is to shed some light on how to offer intentional and appropriate support to others. It reminds you that you sit at the base of any support you offer, and, therefore, that energy towards your own self-care is a worthy act. Lastly, it checks in with the "heart of the matter" and any underlying reminders or intention informing our desire to support others that we might not be aware of on the surface.

Shuffle your deck as you contemplate the concept and function of support. When finished, cut your deck for as many people or groups you are drawing a card for including yourself (for example: if you want to draw for two others you will cut three times all together). Think about a person or group during each cut and then re-stack your deck. Set out your cards as shown in the diagram. Your last "heart of the matter" card can be the last card that you draw or you can flip over your deck and take the bottom card.

I played a bit with this spread and this is what I got. My heart warmed as I flipped The Star card as my heart of the matter. I absentmindedly ran my finger over the tattoo in the crease of my right elbow that holds the words: "The Star Awaits" underneath a nod to "Disaster" or "The Tower."

In a time when I know I need to put consciousness to support the individual changes I'm experiencing as well as honoring my desperate desire to support those I love around me in ways that make sense to them-- the star card reminds me to have "hope and peace of mind." The Wild Unknown interpretation offers the reassurance:

"Even though you can't find concrete answers to life's many questions up there in the sky, you can't help but feel comforted and renewed. Such is the energy of the star card. It is not about actions or situations, it's simply about connecting to the parts of you that feel hopeful and serene." 

When I sit in places of hopeful serenity it suddenly becomes clear where I can support others, whether they need something functional or just for me to be nearby energetically, it clears up what part of support I'm truly offering for them and what parts are about my own need to ease anxiety through my inclination for service.

Support is an animal of delicate constitution in need of very specific care taking. This spread is an offering to this important healing but complicated practice.

In support and service,

Traci

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Traci {She|Her|Hers|They|Them|Theirs} is a yoga teacher, therapist and amateur tarot enthusiast! They try to believe in the power of their inner Magician, stay inspired by the Fool’s spirit, understand struggle through the lens of The Tower/Disaster and always stay reminded that, “The Star Awaits…”

Tarot Tuesday: Growth in The Tower

When I found tarot, in a functional sense, I met it with wide eyed optimism. I've heard some folks new to tarot express some fearfulness around accessing this source of wisdom and healing, and I never really experienced much of that. Looking back I wonder why I didn't. {Image Credit: http://bit.ly/1Iq974y} I was going through a period of immense change- to many around me I imagine it might have looked a bit like disaster rather than Disaster.

For someone who didn't have much experience with the positive aspects of faith I realize the blindness and readiness with which I moved into a tarot practice was actually quite uncharacteristic of me. Perhaps it was the time, a particularly good fit, or just the relief of having accurate queer reflection from The Collective Tarot (my first deck and the one I still use almost exclusively) staring back at me.

Whatever the reason both my universe and my tarot pulls requested (kindly and lovingly) that I lean into Disaster or, more traditionally, The Tower. {Image Credit: http://bit.ly/1JoQkVK}

The Tower is the 16th card in the Major Arcana. It is a card about inevitable change and the way we experience it. This might be actual change around us or a shattering of our perceptions-- ways we've come to know, understand, and explain our world. The literal representation of a tower that shows up in decks is described by Jan Woudhuysen in Tarot Therapy: A New Approach to Self-Exploration:

All of us feel the need for protection from the cold inhospitality of the world. We build defences of some sort or another. We build a tower, strong enough to withstand rain and storms from the enemy with his arrows and gunpowder. We gain security, but only for a price. That price is our ability to move, to grow, to develop. p.81

Later, in the same passage about The Tower, Woudhuysen questions whether, after forced by "disaster" to rebuild our towers if we'll use the same broken stones? It immediately made me think of the Audre Lorde quote: "For the master's tools will never dismantle the master's house." I often think of The Tower as a space for new growth but also a call to check in on the soundness of the structures I'm building and/or confined within. Sometimes utter demolition is needed and sometimes it's a wake-up call to realize I live in earthquake country-- roller bearings, got it. 

There are so many levels of what we might be called (or demanded) to deconstruct and reconstruct, and it's going to take all of our attention to do so well. If we're busy struggling, trying to keep our tower from falling, are we going to be able dream and manifest a more accurate version of our safest spaces? It's going to take radical vision and innovation to live in and design institutions that hold and heal the queerest most divine versions of our authentic selves.

So, I offer you The Collective Tarot's challenge to lean into Disaster:

"You are free. A flash of enlightenment. A release of energy. Lightning of revelation, inner truth... If the mind becomes closed, so that we cannot see the world outside, then it becomes a prison of pride and illusion.... When you turn the compost, it is uncomfortable, but growth and newness awaits."

In honor of Disaster,

Traci

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Traci {She|Her|Hers|They|Them|Theirs} is a yoga teacher, therapist and amateur tarot enthusiast! They try to believe in the power of their inner Magician, stay inspired by the Fool’s spirit, understand struggle through the lens of The Tower/Disaster and always stay reminded that, “The Star Awaits…”

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COM|PASSionate Inspiration: The Wound

There's a lesser known Hindu Goddess I stumbled upon as I traipsed across the interwebs...

She's the Goddess Akhilandeshvari, The Goddess of Never Not Broken.

I don't claim her or own her- her image has not been something I've grown up with and yet whenever she graces my presence I have the innate knowledge that I have always known her. We haven't spent a lot of time together but the time we've spent has been intimate and awe inspiring. She's seen me at my most challenged, even when it was so dark no human eyes could make out shapes or lessons. From a deep pit with seemingly no way out she peaked over the ledge as I crawled and clawed my way up the sides, thirsty, dirty and bleeding with desperation and hopelessnes creating a lump in my throat  and wells at the corners of my eyes.

She didn't offer me a hand.

I fell back a few times tumbling to the bottom- more scratches, more bruises, bones broken, muscles torn. I learned in the dark where my body met the landscape. Aches and pains screamed out to me from places of myself I hadn't talked to for a great long while- the loudest most blood curdling screams came from places so hidden, off the beaten path, and without directions that I had managed to erase their existence altogether until that moment when I felt them rip open.

I struggled and my wounds spread. As my wounds spread light poured in- illuminating images of tears, and sighs, and traumas, and stories, strength and weakness, vulnerability and power. Flickering images connected one after another creating resplendent backlit stories where I was antagonist and protagonist, observer and observed, nothingness and universe. As my light grew so did hers, reflections of reflections, lifting me out of the pit which was suddenly full of pathways made visible and easily traversed.

As my wounds sealed over she faded into the distance but there remained a phosphorescent glow emanating from the path I had taken. As I looked behind me I saw the long trail of my story, lamplights hung where I needed them most.

You might not know her as Akhilandeshvari.

You might know her as Heartbreak, Grief, Suffering, Loss, The Tower or DISASTER.

She remains NEVER NOT BROKEN to remind us that "The wound is the place where the light enters you {RUMI}."

Take this darkness REVOLUTIONARIES, take these hardships, these marginalities, these struggles and most importantly these WOUNDS because (as the Collective Tarot Reminds us):

"Do not be afraid. Do not get stuck in Oppression. Coping. Trying not to change. You cannot control the disaster. The change is inevitable. It is our nature to preserve ourselves. Our dreams. Do not be afraid. The Star awaits."

In Broken-ness,

COM|PASSionate REVOLT