It’s Only a Story — Working with Difficult Cards. Shifting the Story.

By Jeanne Adwani

Hello . . . 

 How about that Moon? Spectacular. My cat, Bebzz, was beside himself for a couple of days.  He certainly had his story going on — one where he filled the house with yowls of urgency as he made pace through the house at all hours. I joined him in my dream stories (when I wasn't kept awake by his nocturnal meows), with some yowls of my own, during those couple of days as the Moon had her way with the tide of me, rolling me here and there on some beach of my subconscious imagination. 

One of the things that I love about the Tarot is the simple beauty and conflict of the stories that live within the cards — their endless invitation to dig a little deeper, to unfold a little more gently or intensely, to rearrange a story we have going on about how life IS or Isn't, as we notice something within or outside of ourselves that pokes around at our mind and heart.

““Always, I experience the cards as an invitation; an opportunity to re-story a story I have going on that doesn’t feel like it ‘serves’ my life.””

In other words, I believe we are very creative storytellers about how we imagine our lives are or are not. You have a story playing out, all the time, about one thing or another, and it paces like a cat under the influence of some celestial orb out there in the Infinite.

The Tarot is a counsel for me. The cards can ground my over-active stories, rearrange these stories in a way that allows me to shift the hold they have on me, and offer a new way to see/feel/sense the world around me. Always, I experience the cards as an invitation; an opportunity to re-story a story I have going on that doesn't feel like it ‘serves’ my life. And how might it be changed to serve my life better? How might I experience and move from and to my Highest Good, my best and most gracious self?

I am not a reader that expands on the negative in the cards that are uncomfortable to look at — i.e., the Death Card, the Devil, and almost all the Swords cards look really desperate and disturbing. For me, when I pull any card that feels like an ouch and a sorrow, I let myself have a deeper look at them, especially when I am feeling down and blue. I remember that what lives in that story of difficulty and strife also holds the duality of how the power of that energy brought me to an opportunity of great strength and courage. Not the classic tale of ‘old magic’ that says “Look out!”; “Be very Careful”; “Beware of death, pain and suffering”; etc, etc, and blah, blah, blah. That card holds only a story that can be changed when I give up my attachment to the hold that that way of feeling and thinking has on me.

“How might I experience and move from and to my Highest Good, my best and most gracious self?”

This blog entry’s ‘Invitation’ is an opportunity to look at the cards below (some of those really uncomfortable ones that you give a little shutter when you see them), and consider what gifts they give you. What else, other than what your eyes see, live in these pictures that have a story to share? Can you embrace the duality that lives in these cards, just as you might in the more joyful looking ones?  What does your heart whisper to you that you often miss hearing because the busy of life shrouds that delicate and loving voice?

Here are my thoughts in relationship to the “VIII” of Swords that might be a way to shift the energy of negativity to that of a positive outcome:

Even though I am thinking (swords is an Air element) I am bound and limited in my ability to see and express myself; to be authentic and have my own ideas, I can step forward into a stream of water that offers me some feeling of flow and heart, to drink and ease my parched situation.   And it allows me to walk into my emotions as a way away from this restriction. What ‘holds’ me within this semi-circle of swords, thoughts, and ideas that aren't mine is the opportunity to walk away from them now.  My mouth is not covered so I will need to ask for help to be unbound, tho’ the very power of my focused mind may lead to my own release. (Blindfolds can indicate the mind needing quiet and focus.) 

Haiku

Find on the hard path

Moss that calls you to soft green

Lay quiet listening

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Thanks for your visit. Please come and visit me most 1st and 3rd Fridays at Crazy Wisdom. I am up there reading cards for you from 6:30 until 9:30 p.m.

Love and Light.

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