4/26/13—Checking In On That Place No One Can Touch

Today's Draw Classic*: The Nine of Cups in the Pros position from the Maroon Tarot and the Deck of 1000 Spreads. Are you aware of a place inside you that no one else can visit, touch or destroy? What possibilities exist in this place? And if you had to gauge the health of this place—how often you feed and exercise it—what kind of shape would it be in?

The Nine of Cups is tarot's "wish card". If you're wondering if you're going to get that job or find that apartment or meet that man, this is the card you want to show up for you. Your wishes will come true. The "Pros" position (opposite of Cons) definitely affirms you'll get your wish. You tell that to someone in a reading, though, and they'll think all their bad days will over and life will coast from here on on. But we've all gotten our wishes before and wished we had wished better, right?

Something this combo made me think of today is that, in the absence of anything else, we always have our hopes and our dreams. We always have that place where we can conjure perfect worlds fulfilled by wishes. We always have that garden of abundance that man is sitting in. And we always have a capacity for gratitude that can bring us to tears. 

This is a weird confession and something I don't think I've ever told anyone else. When I was a child, I used to contemplate the possibility of being taken captive and put into solitary confinement, or for some reason having to wander the earth on my own. Could I survive that? Could I live without interacting with people? I weighed these questions heavily and usually came out cautiously optimistic that I could withstand extreme isolation if needed.

Now, I have NO idea why this thought would ever cross my mind, but it actually did quite often. Maybe it was because my mother would often find any excuse she could to send us to our rooms...just to get us out of her hair. She was also prone to forget that she'd sent us to our solitary confinement...haha. So an hour later or whatever, we'd creep out of our rooms, peek down through the railing and cautiously try to gauge the situation...perhaps even quietly call out to her to see if she was paying attention. 

So that could be it. Or it could be some past-life memory from a time when I spent extended periods alone. In fact, I once had a past-life regression where I was a solitary hunter person with no tribe. I basically died frozen and starving. 

Or it could be because I really kind of like being alone. One of my brothers and I were the introverts in a family of extroverts. There were six of them and just two of us. We were generally the only ones that got our own spaces—me because I was the youngest and too young to share a room with my sisters. And my brother because, like Gollum, he was happy to inhabit any dark, damp corner of the house, just so long as you left him alone there. 

The reason why I thought I would fare well is because I'm really good at entertaining myself, thinking up stories and shutting the outside world away. In reality, as an adult, I know I need some interaction. But back then, I didn't really know it. I was a generally lonesome child, slow to make friends and we moved every two years, so I never had much chance to form attachments. Of course, you wouldn't think this of me from the outside looking in, but we're all lonelier on the inside than we are on the outside, aren't we?

But there was something else. From this young age, I also somehow knew that we all had a place within us that others can't touch or control or ever take away from us. We could be sent to our rooms indefinitely, we could be mocked and teased at school, have our world uprooted every two years, conform to rules of propriety and get shoehorned into some vision of normalcy by society, but one thing nobody can ever touch is that personal place inside us. That place where we can escape into ourselves. That place where anything is possible. 

What I was really weighing back then was the strength of this place against all the slings and arrows of life. As a child I thought it would be hard, but that the spirit of hope and magic and possibility would always win. That its little oasis of abundance, comfort and peace would always hold arms wide open. As an adult, I can see where this place can be snuffed out of a person in extreme conditions—through psychological terror or torture of some sort. But I still believe it's indomitable. Eternal. 

Some might call it the "self". Some might call it the "soul". But it's our greatest weapon—a gift from the universe to help us withstand what can often be a cruel world. And it seems to me that it can get lost under the debris of everyday life, numbed by our obsessions and compulsions and neglected as a "childish thing". But it could one day be the rope that saves us from falling into the abyss. So if you haven't seen yours lately, go and open up that creaky door, oil the hinges and let the poor sucker come out into the light once again. 

*Taken from a post on 1/28/13

1/28/13—Checking In On That Place No One Can Touch

Today's Draw: The Nine of Cups in the Pros position from the Maroon Tarot and the Deck of 1000 Spreads. Are you aware of a place inside you that no one else can visit, touch or destroy? What possibilities exist in this place? And if you had to gauge the health of this place—how often you feed and exercise it—what kind of shape would it be in?

The Nine of Cups is tarot's "wish card". If you're wondering if you're going to get that job or find that apartment or meet that man, this is the card you want to show up for you. Your wishes will come true. The "Pros" position (opposite of Cons) definitely affirms you'll get your wish. You tell that to someone in a reading, though, and they'll think all their bad days will over and life will coast from here on on. But we've all gotten our wishes before and wished we had wished better, right?

Something this combo made me think of today is that, in the absence of anything else, we always have our hopes and our dreams. We always have that place where we can conjure perfect worlds fulfilled by wishes. We always have that garden of abundance that man is sitting in. And we always have a capacity for gratitude that can bring us to tears. 

This is a weird confession and something I don't think I've ever told anyone else. When I was a child, I used to contemplate the possibility of being taken captive and put into solitary confinement, or for some reason having to wander the earth on my own. Could I survive that? Could I live without interacting with people? I weighed these questions heavily and usually came out cautiously optimistic that I could withstand extreme isolation if needed.

Now, I have NO idea why this thought would ever cross my mind, but it actually did quite often. Maybe it was because my mother would often find any excuse she could to send us to our rooms...just to get us out of her hair. She was also prone to forget that she'd sent us to our solitary confinement...haha. So an hour later or whatever, we'd creep out of our rooms, peek down through the railing and cautiously try to gauge the situation...perhaps even quietly call out to her to see if she was paying attention. 

So that could be it. Or it could be some past-life memory from a time when I spent extended periods alone. In fact, I once had a past-life regression where I was a solitary hunter person with no tribe. I basically died frozen and starving. 

Or it could be because I really kind of like being alone. One of my brothers and I were the introverts in a family of extroverts. There were six of them and just two of us. We were generally the only ones that got our own spaces—me because I was the youngest and too young to share a room with my sisters. And my brother because, like Gollum, he was happy to inhabit any dark, damp corner of the house, just so long as you left him alone there. 

The reason why I thought I would fare well is because I'm really good at entertaining myself, thinking up stories and shutting the outside world away. In reality, as an adult, I know I need some interaction. But back then, I didn't really know it. I was a generally lonesome child, slow to make friends and we moved every two years, so I never had much chance to form attachments. Of course, you wouldn't think this of me from the outside looking in, but we're all lonelier on the inside than we are on the outside, aren't we?

But there was something else. From this young age, I also somehow knew that we all had a place within us that others can't touch or control or ever take away from us. We could be sent to our rooms indefinitely, we could be mocked and teased at school, have our world uprooted every two years, conform to rules of propriety and get shoehorned into some vision of normalcy by society, but one thing nobody can ever touch is that personal place inside us. That place where we can escape into ourselves. That place where anything is possible. 

What I was really weighing back then was the strength of this place against all the slings and arrows of life. As a child I thought it would be hard, but that the spirit of hope and magic and possibility would always win. That its little oasis of abundance, comfort and peace would always hold arms wide open. As an adult, I can see where this place can be snuffed out of a person in extreme conditions—through psychological terror or torture of some sort. But I still believe it's indomitable. Eternal. 

Some might call it the "self". Some might call it the "soul". But it's our greatest weapon—a gift from the universe to help us withstand what can often be a cruel world. And it seems to me that it can get lost under the debris of everyday life, numbed by our obsessions and compulsions and neglected as a "childish thing". But it could one day be the rope that saves us from falling into the abyss. So if you haven't seen yours lately, go and open up that creaky door, oil the hinges and let the poor sucker come out into the light once again. 

3/26/12—Loving the One You're With

Today's Draw: Nine of Cups from the Mary-El Tarot. If a friend gave you a gift, would you thank them or complain about how it's the wrong size, wrong color and not what you asked for? How do you receive the gifts the universe bestows on you every day...with gratitude or with frustration, insisting it's not what you asked for? How are you treating the magic that is happening right now in your life?

Traditionally this card is known as the "wish card", a card where all your wishes can or have come true. But Marie White approaches this from a different direction, asking you to accept where and who you are right now with love and gratitude. It's really just two sides of the same coin.

It's kind of like that song, "if you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with." You can spend a lifetime hoping for some sort of magic to come into your life when all your wishes will be granted. Or you can see this moment—and all your moments—as magic. You can see how this moment is the one you created, the one you wanted. And if you're not liking it, you can want something different (and think/behave like you want something different). 

I mean, look at this dude. It's like he's connected to the universe by some cosmic umbilical cord. Peace and happiness are his birthright. All he has to do is just trust and receive. But thinking it's all going to be sunshine and unicorns is, frankly, immature. If you ask for a new job and then do little to find one, the universe may have to kick you in the arse and make your current job miserable to motivate you. In that way, misery in your job is exactly what you asked for—and need—to get the thing you want. 

Get it? Sometimes, but not all the times, getting what you want comes with a dose of what you don't in order to screech your momentum to a halt and get you going in a new direction. So that thing that looks like you're not getting what you asked for may be necessary in order to get it. And if you're not grateful for it or ask for it to stop, the universe may think you don't what what you asked for anymore.

I can't count the number of times in a week that my thoughts will spontaneously manifest something for me. The following things all happened on Thursday and Friday last week. I'm driving during morning rush with no coffee in my system thinking morning drivers are insane. Then I nearly sideswipe a poor woman and, a few minutes later, another woman nearly plows into me. I MADE the crazy. On the positive side, I had a Billy Joel song in my head the other day, walked into Starbucks and one of his songs was playing in the store. I was thinking about someone I don't hear from very often and they emailed me. I wondered how I was going to pay for my dog's surgery and the money came. This is just two days last week and only what I remember happening off the top of my head.

This stuff happens ALL the time and we don't notice it or we don't acknowledge it. There are people that this happens to that nonetheless walk through life with their heads down wondering why great stuff never happens to them. For one thing, their belief that great stuff doesn't happen for them makes it so that great stuff doesn't happen to them. And for another thing, the few things they allow to creep in through the cracks aren't acknowledged or given gratitude for. If you wonder why magic doesn't happen in your life, it's because you wonder why magic doesn't happen in your life. It's that simple.

So this moment is magic in motion. Even if you can't see it yet. My world isn't quite an ecstatic dance through a field of wildflowers right now. Looking at the work I know is coming in, I'm going to be very busy at work for a number of weeks. My athletic baby boy dog just had surgery and needs to stay inactive for a couple of months. My brother has a terminal disease. And, disappointingly, some people I considered friends have all but disappeared from my life. 

But magic is all around me. Being busy at work means money is coming in and I'll be feeling productive. My dog's injury happened at a time in his life when he's still young enough to heal effectively and, in a few months, he'll be stronger than ever. I'm not going to claim there's anything good about my brother's illness, but it has improved our relationship. And everything else is lessons that will lead to better things in the future. 

When you feel blessed and trust that everything happens for a divine reason, you are and it does. In that way we literally create our own realities. So think about how you feel about your life right now. What are you creating? And if you don't like it, what can you do to turn it around? Are you ready to start noticing the magic that happens every day in your life?