Today's Draw: Three of Swords from the Deviant Moon in the What You Can't Change That's Blocking Romance position from the Deck of 1000 Spreads. Are you pretty much decided upon remaining single? Do you have a reason why? Whether you're in relationship or not, do you find you protect yourself from the downsides of love?
My daily process is that I choose a card or three at random from the Deck of 1000 Spreads then, more often than not, I worry that the tarot deck I choose will fail to make sense in the context of the convoluted position I've established. And you know what? It always DOES make sense.
Take this Three of Swords, for example. This three-legged woman has had her heart pierced and broken by love. Perhaps it was something her partner failed to say, or insisted upon doing...or was incapable of feeling. But there she stands, a storm looming in the distance, distressed and with a single black tear issuing from her eye. She touches the tip of one sword—can she bear any more pain? Has she now lost her capacity to love forever?
A couple of weeks ago I went to a meeting with a man and woman and, on our drive over, the topic of conversation was whether or not it was even worth it to couple anymore. As they lamented all the work and heartache that went into building a relationship, just to have each successive one fail, they were preaching to the choir. All three of us had full lives without partners. And they were 15-20 years younger than me and invested in building their careers.
I found it interesting that these two, very attractive specimens of the "younger generation" were discovering what I discovered at their age—I'd rather be content and balanced as a single person than subject to the expectations and heartaches of coupledom. But I also felt a little like I should warn them...warn them that you become so comfortable after 20 years of solitary living and casual flirtations that you can become somehow "unfit" for relationship...haha. I mean, if you think it's a pain in the ass when you're 30, wait until you're 50.
Further, when you're thirty-something, there are still casual encounters to be had...there's still a pool from which you can draw. That pool gets narrower and harder to find the older you get—and still narrower and harder to find the more set in your ways you get.
Still, I don't lament my choice. It was absolutely right for me. And my life's not over yet. There may still be a "love of my life" to eclipse whichever man I would consider so today.
But when I think back on what started my "relationship apathy", I guess I'd have to say that I was just tired of investing my time and energy into relationships that eventually left me hurt and healing. Let's say you're with someone for a year or so and it takes a year to recover enough from all the dashed dreams (I'm a slow healer...haha) before you're actually anxious to go out on another date. You have to look back on all of that and ask "were those two years I spent out of balance—first in the excitement of a new love, then in seeking balance with a new love, then in riding the disagreements, then in the decline of the relationship and then in the post-relationship healing—worth the good times I had?" For me, the answer kept coming up as "no."
The thing about love is that you can't avoid having your heart broken. Even couples that have survived 50 years of marriage and are still in love have had their share of heartbreaks along the way. So if you let heartbreak deter you from romance, it's always going to block your way. You can't change the fact that there will be hurt, feelings of betrayal, etc.
When I look at the enviable relationships around me—I was blessed by parents that hung in there till death did they part—they all worked through these disappointments and heartbreaks. It's not because their relationships WEREN'T challenged that they lasted so long, it's because they WERE.
I can't speak for my young colleagues, but I can see where the prospect of disappointment, pain and heartache are blocking romance for me. I mean, if Prince Charming came along and was so magnetic and persistent that I couldn't say no, like you see in all the Lifetime movies, then I would probably dive in. But you've watched Lifetime movies before, right? They're, at best, loosely based on reality...haha. So for now, I'm not really interested or prepared to accept someone in my life. And, like today's draw has pointed out, until I'm ready to accept the inevitability of disappointment, pain and heartbreak mixed in with all the rest of what a romantic relationship can be, I'll never be.
Today's Draw: Conquistador/Vanity of Victory from the Rock and Roll Oracle in the What's Blocking the Heart of the Matter position from the Deck of 1000 Spreads. Could the battles you fight in your daily life be distracting you from seeing the war? Could fighting those battles actually end up being a losing proposition? If you pulled back and viewed the greater war, might you then uncover what you're really fighting?
Today I had a particular matter in mind when I chose the cards and when you consider that all these cards were chosen at random...well, that's the magic of cartomancy (or fortune telling by cards.)
So the question was about a recurring interpersonal issue that crops up in my life. And I feel like I've given this issue a lot of thought and tried changing a lot of things—the way I view I situation internally, the boundaries I draw with others, the way I enter into the dynamic, etc. And it just keeps happening. I feel there's improvement in the situation, but I think there's something I'm meant to learn that I'm just not learning yet. I feel that if I tighten my boundaries more or make other further adjustments that I'll just be going too far in the other direction from balance and "healthy".
So I guess I feel I'm a at a point where I've changed my behaviors and attitudes enough. So there's just something I'm not understanding, otherwise these situations would cease to present themselves to me, right? At least that's how I believe spiritually. So having the combo of Blocking or Covering and Heart of the Situation is very appropriate. There's something I'm not seeing past. And this Conquistador card is talking about winning the battle, but losing the war. That's exactly what I feel like is happening!
So getting this card combination has opened up a few more thoughts about the situation to me. The details of the situation don't really matter, because I think the lessons are universal. In my particular recurring "battle"I can see where I'm playing defense...either responding to situations as they present or arranging ways to ensure situations don't present. I'm letting the other team carry the ball, so to speak, and I'm blocking and tackling and whatever else that goes into play defense. But what about my offensive game?
I suppose you could liken it to the polarity of giving and taking...you can't always be giving. And you can't always be taking. You have to know and appreciate both sides. Givers have to allow themselves the pleasure of taking, and to do that, they have to get past the discomfort of taking without giving in return. And takers need to know what it means to give without expecting in return. We need to learn to play both sides of the field. And then we'll find others who know what we know and dynamics will be more balanced. So "learning to play both sides" is one "front" in the bigger war.
Another "front" in my particular war is this. You often hear people say, "I don't care what you say, it's what you do that has meaning to me." I understand that logic. But I think we can all use to pull back a little farther and see beyond the battle of say vs. do. There's a whole other level beyond that—motivation. Why is the individual saying and doing what they're saying and doing?
We can't always know the answer to that. But every action in every situation has a motivation behind it. There are many people out there who say and do all the right things just to get what they want. Maybe they were raised in an addictive, unhealthy or "survival" situation and that's the only way they know. In a situation like that, there's a lot of work that person will have to do before they can be any other way. Or maybe they have an actual pathology around it that will never change.
I'm guessing we can all look back on a friendship with someone who knew what to say and how to act. And maybe we thought to ourselves at some point, "something's off here, but I don't know what it is. Maybe I'm just paranoid." You have nothing other than your intuition to base your opinion on. Some of it may be that you want to believe otherwise because it suits you. And some of it may be second guessing yourself. And some of it may be the cunning of the other person. Regardless, you put both what you see and hear before what you "know"...or think you know...inside. That's another front in MY personal war.
And we also have to ask ourselves, "what's MY motivation?" What do I think I'm getting from this person that keeps me tied to them? Why do I stay when I want to go? Do I have a problem saying "no"? Am I afraid they won't like me anymore? Does it keep me trapped in one of my comfortable, but toxic, cycles? Why do I want to believe that what they say and do is true, over my intuition that it's not?
Anyway, I guess what I'm saying is that some repeating cycles are harder than others to figure out. And it may be because we're winning battles here and there and not seeing that this recurring cycle and that recurring cycle and the other recurring cycle over there are all part of a much bigger war—a war that's being fought on many different fronts.
So the very reason for each of these smaller repeating cycles—equity in relationships, trusting my inner voice over appearances, and staying in unhealthy dynamics too long, for example—is to lead you to fighting a much larger war called "making yourself and your needs your top priority" or "standing up for yourself" or whatever your particular thing might be. And maybe if we shift our focus to fighting at the level of "the war", all the smaller battles will fight themselves.
Today's Draw: Playing Off the Page in the What to Know Now That's Been Blocked or Covered in the Past position from Illuminate! Life Journey Cards and the Deck of 1000 Spreads. Do you have the courage to zig when others zag? Do you zig because you don't want to be a zagger? Or do you zig because every fiber of your being tells you that zigging is the right way to go?
Playing Off the Page is about stepping out of the boundaries and following your inner music. It's like thinking out of the box. But, spiritually speaking, it goes much deeper than that.
In order for change to happen—in order for the ideals hippies sang about and Buddhists meditate on to ever happen—people have to stretch beyond what they've learned and done thus far. For the second or third time this week, I'm saying that we have to start doing the hard things...the things we resist because we hold on so tightly to the fear-based thinking of our past.
In the 1940s, Nazis gathered up everyone who was Jewish or gay and mass exterminated them. Because they didn't like them. They felt they had legitimate reasons. Jews and gays weakened the human race. And slowly they convinced others that exterminating this kind of people would cleanse the population and the world and its people would be stronger than ever before.
You'd think Americans would have learned something from the ideals we fought for when we battled the Nazis, but the fear of Communism in the 1950s brought about McCarthyism. We needed to rid American society, not just of all Communists, but of anyone who even associated with Communists. And like the witch hunts of the 1600s, word of mouth and casual proof was enough to slander a person, leading to loss of career and, in the case of the witch trials, even loss of life. Such was the fear of even coming into contact with someone who had come into contact with someone who had been identified as a scourge.
We look back at all those things and say "those days are past. We're wiser now." But what we need to know today that's been blocked or covered from the past is that it's the people who dare play off the page—the ones who are trying to to break their little corner of the world out of the fear-based justifications that perpetuate Nazi or McCarthiest mentality—are the ones that often end up being silenced. Today. And if you're part of the silencing, you're part of the problem.
Anytime you make any single person "other" than you...they're a monster, they're evil, they're archaic—you're part of the problem. Think about the way you felt about the "other side" in last year's presidential election, for example. I certainly thought the other side was irrational and THEY certainly made me angry and even fearful, because what if THEIR side won? This also happens frequently along the religious and sexuality divides. If you can't love and embrace them and look into their eyes and listen to them...if you avoid them, mock them, blackball, reject or otherwise derail them...you're part of the problem.
With McCarthyism, it went even further. If you were caught talking to a suspected Communist, you were lumped in with them. You were blacklisted. There was zero tolerance if you opened your heart and mind to someone who was an outcast. If you talked to them, you were dangerous. You, too, were supporting the Communist path. And others needed to know to avoid you. In short, if you dared play off the page, your music was taken away.
We all struggle with doing the hard things. One of the hard things I'm trying to do is venture into the world of lovingkindness, a Buddhist principle where you love and open your heart to the "least of us" in the same way you open it to someone you love. This is why I will give money to "beggars" and never once concern myself with what they might use it for. It's not my job to question their need, but to serve it when moved. I'm also kind to people others have written off. It's not my place to judge why they might need kindness, compassion and love, but to offer it when I can.
But wait, what if they're going to shoot heroin with the money you give? What if the person society has written off is unkind? Well, those are fear-based concerns. They're concerns that make those people "other". Only treating them as I would treat myself makes them one with me. Only releasing the fear that their unkindness may hurt me...only trusting in myself, having confidence in myself and trusting in the universe helps me rise above.
I say "when I can" because there will always be circumstances when I will act from fear or protection. And I won't walk up to someone threatening to shoot me if I come closer...that would be stupid. But I can push myself to do the difficult thing, even it means I stand alone. I can release my need to control what they do with the money or my fear of words they might say, little by little. And instead of cutting myself off from the chance to practice this principle by ever-tightening my circle the way McCarthy did...by making others dangerous by association...I can try to see the sameness in even the source of the "other-ness". I can try to do that hard thing, even if I fail. Because this is the only chance I think our society has to move beyond the music we've written since the beginning of time. And it's the way I choose to challenge myself spiritually on my path.
It hurts no one but the fearful. It threatens no one but the fearful. But in that way, walking this path can often feel lonely—there are a lot of the fearful out there. It can also feel profoundly free and moving. Because feeding the purest, most unconditionally loving places in our heart—as difficult and tenuous as it may sometimes be—pays back in peace and divine love in those moments when you can drop the fear of being misunderstood by the fearful, and you move confidently forward in your aloneness knowing you're doing what's right for both your own—and the planet's—evolution.
My daily process is that I choose a card or three at random from the Deck of 1000 Spreads then, more often than not, I worry that the tarot deck I choose will fail to make sense in the context of the convoluted position I've established. And you know what? It always DOES make sense. 
