Tarot Tuesdays

Tarot Tuesday: The Hanged Man

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PlayshopBanner Well, hello there!

Some of you folks that follow our twitter may have already caught when this guy last came through town (and our pulls). However, on this cool morning with the sun peaking through the clouds, hanging out somewhere between the Summer and Fall seasons (of the year and my life) I couldn't think of any better wisdom to leave here in the playshop.

Tarot of the Sweet Twilight

The Tarot of the Sweet Twilight comes with short poignant explanations of the cards. It's size has encouraged me to travel with it and pull from it in the places in between my destinations. As I return to the deck's introduction I see now that this occurrence is about so much more than convenience.

"Tarot decks, are in part, about balance. They are tools that help you find a connection between you and the Universe. They are doors that you can walk through into different worlds. The Sweet Twilight is certainly this... and more. Twilight is the place between places and time outside of time. The images speak to the sad knowledge that while twilight is between day and night, it is moving toward night. They also are filled with sweet naivety- whether you think that comes from the day before or the hope for the day to come is up to you!" 

The Hanged Man card in The Tarot of the Sweet Twilight is particularly beautiful. I can't help but feel that while the Hanged Man holds an important lesson in any deck, the magic of twilight makes him significantly powerful in Cristina Benintende's interpretation. As I sat at an airport gate traveling between two places and as I sit here at my desk trying to move back into a regular schedule his reminder is just what I need.

"The Hanged Man tries to possess beauty and truth. Only after he is himself transformed does he know that you cannot possess truth and beauty; you must become them." 

Just in case you're hanging out reading blogs today and you needed a little reminder I thought I would share.

In search of becoming,

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: Andi Grace

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playshopbanner Good Morning COM|PASSionate Community, you beautiful, rambunctious, playful group of divine beings!

How has your week and your healing been going?

Today, we have such a special treat! A visitor has traipsed through the playshop by way of BC! Andi Grace, Poet, Facilitator, Author, Intuitive, and Social Justice Advocate, of Andi Grace Writes (And, formerly, of Moonlit Moth) offers the very special gift of a Tarot Reading to our COM|PASSionate REVOLT Community!

Thank you so much for the reading and guidance, Andi! <3

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In preparation for this reading Traci and I worked together to determine what questions would make up the spread. After some back and forth we settled on these questions:

  1. What is our community's greatest strength?
  2. What shadows do we need to be aware of?
  3. What guidance/awareness should we hold for the present future?

There are many different spreads you can use for a reading. Personally, though I know several standard threads, I prefer creating my own spread with personalized questions. I feel creating my own spread allows me to really get down to the heart of the matter and this gives me greater clarity in deciphering the meaning of the cards. The spread is a roadmap that your intuition gets to walk down, so the clearer the points of reference (the questions) are, the easier it is to find clarity in the process.

Before starting the reading I burn white sage I recently wildcrafted. I open a window and let the smoke blow over the cards and over me. I reflect on the questions, take a few deep breaths, ground.. and then I begin to shuffle the cards. As I shuffle I wait for a sense that the cards are ready to be pulled from, a subtle sense in my body that it’s time to stop shuffling. With this reading the feeling of being done comes quickly. I cut the deck into three piles and pull from the pile I feel most drawn to.

Here are the cards I pulled:

{Image Credit: www.andigracewrites.com}

The first card I pull is the community’s greatest strength: Six of Swords. Six of swords is a card about putting down your weapons. It’s a time of reprieve during a fierce battle. It is a sign of hope that rises during an often very draining struggle. Swords are cards about air, mental acuity, understanding with our minds, and internal struggle. These sometimes scary looking cards are often tied to anxiety, shame-based-wounds, internalized oppression and self doubt.

I feel that the cards are saying that Compassionate Revolt’s greatest strength is your ability to find a sense of peace, compassion, hope, reprieve and safety within a world that is constantly trying to destroy that which is sacred. If we understand the world to be an oppressive place and a place that we must navigate in order to exist in this life, then we understand our lives as necessarily being invested in finding skills that bolster resilience in the face of oppression. And through all the busyness, all the pain, all the wounds and wandering and loss and confusion, there is always much to do. Always a sense that we haven’t done enough. The 6 of swords is a reminder that we are whole as we are. That people love us. That there is peace in stillness. It tells us that we don’t need to feel guilty for wanting and needing to access that place of peace sometimes. We can use that place, cultivated in community and within ourselves, as a means of finding much needed spiritual nurturance. It seems that your community offers this kind of reprieve and permission to it’s members. This work is your greatest strength.

The second card I pulled is the shadows you need to be aware of: Five of Swords.

And here we see the pain and anguish that the six of swords offers reprieve from. The five of swords is card about self destruction. It’s about pain and conflict and feeling torn apart. The swords are strewn about after a battle and the worm is cut in pieces. Worms are capable of surviving after having their bodies cut apart, but in this process something is lost that can not be returned.

I feel this card is suggesting that there is a shadow of grief to address. This grief arises from circumstances that feel like insurmountable loss. It does not mean the loss is insurmountable, but it feels like it is. This is a big part of how trauma lives in our bodies - and it would seem, how it lives in your community.

This card is also about the battles we fight. The battles where it may be more self preserving to just walk away. And yet we know that just because walking away would be self preserving, does not mean it is always an option. You can’t always walk away from a cop yielding a gun. From a man harassing you on the street. From a border that you walked to because you have nowhere else to turn.

I believe that this card is asking you to address the deep grief. The grief that lies in the shadows because it feels impossible to talk about. Like no words exist. Like there is only mycelium and no mushroom. The grief that tears us apart and leaves our bodies so acclimatized to conflict and pain, that we invite more pain into our lives just to learn how to process it. Because we are used to it. Because we want to understand. Because sometimes we lose our vision that anything else can exist.

It’s time to talk about the pain that feels unspeakable. Because the truth is:  it’s there, whether you address it directly or not. Give it voice. Let the vulnerability of your admissions of fear and terror and loneliness breathe life into what it means to be alive and wounded in these times. This is your work to be done in the shadows.

The third card I pulled is the guidance and awareness to hold for the future: 7 of pentacles. Pentacles are earth. They are the ground: sturdy, home, work ethic, natural discipline and practice. The seven of pentacles is a card where we look at what we have built. Notice what we have accumulated. Evaluate what we have earned. We do this in order to decide: is it worth it? What am I gaining from this process? Have I built as much I expected I would?

Often we get caught in traps of evaluating our worth by the standards of capitalism: how much money am I making? Do I have security? We are taught to understand security to mean things like savings, insurance and home ownership. This is the rubric we are taught to understand success from within colonial capitalism, but these things do not represent deep true security. How clean is our water? How nourished are our spirits? Where does our food come from? Are we able to speak our truth and be grounded in the value of both our voice and our ability to listen? These things are just a small part of what true security looks like.

The 7 of pentacles appears when it is time to evaluate and it encourages us to understand our worth and the worth of our work to be situated within the world of the elements: spirit, water, earth, fire and air. Our souls, our feelings, our home, our passions and our truth. The 7 of pentacles encourages you to focus on deep security and measure the value of your work with these ideas in mind. These should be the guiding principles you work from moving forward.

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Thank you so much for your tarot guidance, Andi! We're so grateful for the compassionate revolutionary healing energy you've shared with our community!

If you're a tarot reader, blogger, or enthusiast and would like to share space with us here at COM|PASSionate REVOLT drop us a line! We would love to have you around the playshop!

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Andi’s writing and online tarot card offerings can be found on their website: www.andigracewrites.com.

{Image Credit: www.andigracewrites.com}

Andi is a gender-fucking-fishnet-femme currently growing food, slipping on ice and falling in love on the un-ceded territory of the Sinixt people (otherwise known as the west Kootenays of BC). They are a visitor on this land where they are making a home in a queer and trans landsteading project called the homostead. They are a settler whose family lineage descends mostly from Northern Scots (on their father’s side) and German Mennonites (on their mother’s side). They are a poet, facilitator, tarot card reader, youth worker, sex educator, community organizer,  photographer, blogger, gardener, herbalist, amateur astrologer, kitchen-witch and a formerly extroverted, former yoga teacher.

 

Tarot Tuesday: The Wild Unknown

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playshopbanner Oh, hello there, lovelies!

How goes it today, friends?

I've been getting in a little community and travel therapy this past week. My body's tired but it's been magick for the spirit!

I didn't come back with a lot of travel themed souvenirs but I did go a little tarot deck crazy. I was traipsing about the historic Pike's Place Farmer's Market and stumbled away from the crowds towards the familiar calling scents of Patchouli and Nag Champa. It's funny how a small new age/dirty hippie store looks kind of the same no matter where you go. I strolled about the small space a bit aimlessly, seeing the familiar oils, essences, and incense burners. Noticing a tarot reader in back and tarot section in their few shelves of books I took a quick gander. I then took one last grounding breath of aroma therapy and turned myself bravely towards the chaos of the market at midday that awaited outside the shop's doors.

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Luckily (or due to the Fates), I got a few extra minutes outside of the shop waiting for afternoon travel plans to solidify. I foggily gazed back at the store and noticed a Wild Unknown poster in the window. I had been eyeing this deck for awhile, knowing I could order it online, but also sort of waiting for it to find me. Intrigued, I went back into the store and sure enough, on a second glance, with a little more intention, there it sat in the display case I had stood directly over a few minutes before! I couldn't resist and I'm so happy I didn't!

I'm sure there will be many more Tarot Tuesdays  devoted to a lovefest with The Wild Unknown but for now I couldn't think of anything more appropriate for this little playshop space that we've built here together other than Kim Krans' opening invitation into this beautiful deck:

unnamed-2"I quickly noticed the realm of tarot is a confusing & intimidating place. There are a lot of contradicting voices out there about how to use the cards & what they mean... You'll probably come up against these feelings too as you start to give readings to yourself or others. Doubts, fears, "I can't do this", "I don't know enough".

Well here's the thing: you do know enough. You've been a person on earth every day since you were born. You've experienced all the emotions and situations these cards depict. Quiet the naysayer... don't let him prevent you from sitting down with a friend (or yourself) & using these cards to help you talk about what's going on in your life. It will be positive. It will be radical. You'll find things start to reveal themselves through the cards that have been hidden away, covered with dust. May these cards bring you moments of peace & steadiness. I would be so honored."

{Kim Krans}

In Honor of OUR Wild Unknown,

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: Clarity

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PlayshopBanner Hello again Tarot Enthusiasts, Healers, and Those in Search of Healing!

I have a little practice offering this morning in the Playshop!

This weekend I drew the Seven of Bottles (or traditionally Cups).

IMG_0436This card holds so much meaning for me both in it's classical interpretations and in The Collective Tarot's poignant queer imagery. The Seven of Bottles or Cups reminds us to get "grounded within when making choices." It is aware of the many choices that are presented to us-- some based in reality and some wrapped in illusion. It invites us to take a breath before moving if we need to. However, it also reminds us not to get overwhelmed and subsequently stuck in inactivity.

Clarity Practice

Essential Oils: Sage + Mint

You can either use a diffused spray version or dab a bit of diluted mint and sage onto your wrists, underneath your nose, on your temples, and on your third eye.

Pull the Seven of Bottle/Seven of Cups from your deck. Take a moment to sit with the card. Send awareness and attention towards decisions presenting themselves in your life. This may be a singular point of focus or just general querying around life journey movement.

Take some slow twists. Lying on your back with knees into your chest and then falling over to one side and the other allows you to be grounded to the earth as you twist out new space. However, any twists that your mobility allows for can be utilized here. In this way internal organ body and rest and digest system are engaged in your practice.

Next find a position that allows for the deepest and clearest breath. One of my favorites, supported savasana, is shown: here. This pose allows for open breath and open heart while also supported and grounded from underneath. Giving heart space to this practice is open but receiving heart space is kept safe. Some options for those with lower back sensitivity are to bring the soles of the feet to the earth with knees bent, walk the feet away from each other, and let the knees fall together gently. Alternately, if one doesn't have lower back issues, the soles of the feet can be brought together while knees fall outward (reclined butterfly or cobbler's pose). Care should be taken that a heart opener can intensify when paired with a hip opener. Our hips hold our powerful water energy that can help us sink fluidly into change. However, our hips also hold a lot of our emotional memory and can be a great source of vulnerability for many.

{Image Credit: http://playarunners.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Michelle_Yoga_Poses_588.jpg}

Again, any heart opening exercise should be done safely and with compassion for oneself. Choose one that feels good to you!

Once in your chosen position, start to take some deep breaths. Create balance for yourself by finding an even count on inhalation and exhalation. Take in the sage and mint to clear and uplift your consciousness to a bird's eye view of the decisions at hand. Allow yourself to view your potential movement with neutrality and equanimity. Once you feel like you have a good scope on the situation focus on taking your breath down into your core and making any decisions from this deep centered space.

During the process attempt to keep your breath even and flowing. Notice if your thought process starts to draw up anxiety and your breath becomes shallow. Draw your breath down and even it out. It's also helpful to be aware that many of us rush through our days without breathing very deeply. The depth of your breath in itself may create unfamiliar sensations in your body.

While this is a relatively safe practice, always follow your own internal guidance and take care of where you're at. Pause for breaks if you need to. Decisions don't have to be solidified all in one session.

After you feel your practice is completed, engage some sort of folding/turning in practice. If on your back you can draw your knees into chest and repeat twists. You can also fold forward over your knees or even lay on your side in the fetal position. Take some time to see how your decision feels in this less conscious portion of this practice. Note if you start to feel more settled or if it's difficult to let your decision sink into the rest of your body.

Hopefully this practice is helpful! Know that you can do it for as little or long as you wish. If you're someone that has a difficult time staying still or is dealing with a particularly long to do list, set a timer for an amount of time that feels right to you in your schedule so you fully focus on your breath practice and don't have to keep checking in with a clock throughout the process.

IMG_0428Wishing you clarity,

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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There are photographs in this post that were borrowed lovingly from the internet and do not belong to us. All are linked and credited to the best of our abilities in hopes of attracting more traffic to the photographers and websites who have blessed us with this imagery. The inclusion of a photograph here should not be interpreted as an assertion of the subject’s or artist’s identity or beliefs. If there is a photo included here that belongs to you and you want it removed, please email compassionaterevolt@gmail.com and it will be removed promptly, no questions asked.