Tarot Dige s t Is s u e 2 Healing All written content by Jim Larsen
June, 2017
A word from the Editor
Why do we walk around day after day with pain inside of us? Maybe we get so used to the pain that we don’t even notice it anymore. Maybe it builds so slowly that we don’t realize it is happening until one day we have an experience that reminds us of how we felt without the pain, and we finally say, “Hey! What’s going on here? This isn’t cool.” Then we can endeavor to heal it. Or maybe the pain hits us so hard with such blunt force that it stuns us to the point that we don’t even remember life before it. Wherever the pain comes from, it is to our best benefit to endeavor to examine it, understand it, and get past it. What’s tarot got to do with this? Every tarot card represents an aspect of who we are, what we experience, and what we feel. Embedded in this is the joy and the pain we experience. Tarot gives us a language to understand ourselves. As we understand tarot and how they relate to our inner self, we are gifted with insights into the human condition. As you understand a card such as The Devil and it’s relation to the shadow side of life, you can be reminded of your own shadows as you examine the Devil card, and ask yourself, “What lurks in my shadows? What did I tuck away there that is resurfacing now to create this pain I am in?” Then you can explore your shadows, find this, and endeavor to heal it.
- Jim Larsen www.foolspathtarot.com
Choosing the Right Card
There is no wrong way
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hat is the “right card” to choose when choosing cards during a reading? As we are drawn via synchronicity to the right card to deliver the message we need to hear, how do we know in a 78 card deck the card that is meant to deliver that message? As you look at the back of the cards fanned out in front of you, they all look the same, don’t they? How do you know which is the one you need to see? Trust that your intuition will draw you to it, however your intuition speaks to you. Don’t expect it to be just as somebody else may describe. Your intuition will speak to you in its own way. One way to choose the card is to shuffle the deck. As you shuffle, expect the card with the strongest message for you to fly out of the deck. There it is. That’s the message for you, delivered by some divine hand. Another way that works for some people is to scan the cards with your hands. The card you are meant to find will radiate heat. Some people see a certain glow around the edges. The card you need to see may shine a little brighter or perhaps be a little dimmer than the others. Or it could be that your gut tells you which card to select. There is no wrong way. There is only the way that feels right, so when picking a card in a reading, do it that way.
The Hanged Man and the High Priestess Examining and Accepting Truth
Find the truth of whatever pain you are in so that you can heal it.
To be enlightened means to have the ability to discern what is important from what is not. To be enlightened is to have the ability to discern what is necessary from what is not necessary. How does one discern such things? By being willing to examine things from a variety of angles. By accepting the absolute truth of what you discover even when it might not be what you were hoping to discover. In this way, you activate your inner Hanged Man and interpret what you find with your inner High Priestess. Remember, the High Priestess will speak of the absolute truth in any situation. She has no concern for what you want to hear or what you think you need to hear. Her concern is for what is true and absolute. Sometimes to get down to the root of what is true and absolute, you must see a situation from different angles and let your High Priestess explain them to you. To be able to do this is to be on the Path to Enlightenment. To do this, is to find the truth of whatever pain you are in so that you can heal it. As the Hanged Man examines the pain, extraordinary discoveries may be made. You may discover that what you believed to be the source of the pain, may actually go much deeper, or be something else entirely. Pain can be tricky this way. We feel it and our minds want to identify its source. The truth is, our minds will probably only scratch the surface. We need to keep in mind the idea of triggers. What we are feeling in this moment of pain may the emotional memory of a pain instigated long ago. There was a time before we lost trust. We believed in certain and unconditional love. Then something happened. It might just have been a small, unintentional, unnoticed thing, or it may have been something much bigger. Whatever the case, something happened, and this something hurt us. This happened at a time when we were too young or simply unable to process it. So it got hidden in the shadows. Things hidden in the shadows do not simply vanish. No, they stay tucked away until they are triggered again. And when they are triggered again, they come back in full rage, forgotten and misunderstood, but powerful none the less. We feel the pain all over again without remembering where it came from. The Hanged Man must recognize this fact and hand it over to the High Priestess for analysis. Now that The Hanged Man has determined that the pain is not from a recognizable source, but rather something hiding in our shadows, the High Priestess can work on figuring out what the source of the light is that casts that shadow. What was the original source of wounding? What can be done to heal it? The High Priestess won’t let you settle for the simple answers. You may come to one conclusion, but she will say, “Are you sure?� Then she will encourage you to dig deeper. She will keep you digging until you reach the original source of the wounding. This may or may not be exact, for if it is before your memories begin, how will you know? The best you may be able to accomplish is an approximate semblance of the original wounding, but the High Priestess will let you know if it is close enough. Once this is accomplished, you can go about the ask of healing. This is how the Hanged Man and the High Priestess work together to help you heal pain. The Hanged Man examines it, and the High Priestess helps you to find it and heal it.
3 of Swords: Crack Open Your Heart When you feel that your heart is broken, be okay with that
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ometimes you have to crack a heart open to to really know what’s inside of it. Sometimes you have to break it to understand it. Sometimes you have to bore a hole through it to see what makes it tick. Hearts are funny that way. Until they’re hurting you might not even notice them. It pays to remember, our pain instigates growth, so sometimes it is necessary to crack into your heart to see what is there. Then you know what you have to work with. What growth instigators are locked away in there? How can you put them to work for you? How can you transform the pain you are feeling into positive growth? You won’t really know until you crack open your heart and take inventory. From pain to bliss- this is the objective. How can you plot the path to bliss without fully understanding and appreciating the starting point? If you don’t know where you are starting from, you are just going to meander about aimlessly hoping to somehow arrive at your destination. But if you know where you are starting from, you can much more easily plot a course to where you want to be, which is a place of happiness. So crack open your heart to see where you starting from. When you feel that your heart is broken, be okay with that. Don’t take it as a defeat. Use it as an opportunity to grow and to find enlightenment. By examining what’s in your heart when it breaks open you are afforded a unique chance to understand your own path to enlightenment, for if it didn’t cause you pain, you might not realize there is an issue to be worked on. We all have issues to be worked on in order to achieve our personal perfection, and if you never look for them or examine them, you will never benefit from healing them. So when your heart breaks, when your heart is cracked open, do some exploring. See what’s in there that needs working on. Then work on them. Don’t tuck them away back into the shadows, because if you do, they will only fester there. Instead, work on them. Endeavor to heal. When you do, you gain strength that you will carry with you forever.
The Tower
Pinned Beneath the Rubble
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he classic depiction of the tower is of the tower being struck by lightning with people falling from the top to their certain doom, suggesting that what we have tried to build was not stable. It was not meant to be. It is being wiped out because it is a false projection of what is meant to
be in your life. This lightning strike makes us think that we have built our towers too high and we will meet a miserable fate from plummeting from the top because of it. But what of the rubble when a tower collapses? What happens if instead of falling from the tower, the tower falls on us? Some Towers have a basement, and that’s where you might be when the tower falls. It is possible that you can become crushed by the weight of the debris.
To recover from a fallen tower, realize that you are meant for other things, better things. With a fallen tower, the weight of the world has collapsed on you, and now you can barely move. The hopes and the dreams you have so heavily invested in have proven to be inaccurate and unattainable. Now it feels as though everything has come to an unceremonious end and there is just nothing left to be excited about. Sometimes when considering these things, it is best to not ask how it could have turned out differently, because it turned out how it was meant to, and as it was meant to was to cause pain that instigated growth opportunities. It is of greater benefit to ask how you could have handled it and thought about it differently, because ultimately, it is your attitude about it that defined what it was to you. So remember, no matter what, keep a positive outlook. To recover from a fallen tower, realize that you are meant for other things, better things. You need to realize that the tower that just fell was designed to get you to the point of realization that you are meant for these other things. You may need to take the time necessary to regroup and recover as you crawl your way out of the rubble, and once you do, you will see your own light and you will shine. You will discover, or maybe rediscover, or maybe even at last acknowledge what it is you love about yourself and the life you are living. Now you have found your star. Now you are shining. Now you found the authentic you. With the clearing away of the rubble, you will find you find yourself feeling inspired again. New ideas come to you and they excite you. You find that you are ready to pursue these new inspirations and get up and start living again. So when it feels that the weight of the world has collapsed on you, don’t feel like life is over. Appreciate that is just a signal to try something new. Then try that new thing. If it feels right, it is.
The Devil Reversed What are you afraid of?
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he devil card in tarot reminds us to look in our shadows. What is holding us back from achieving our highest potential? What beliefs are we holding fast to that do not serve us? What wounding from the past is blocking us from achieving new joy? What do we tell ourselves about ourselves that have no basis in our current reality? These are our shadows. They exist in our consciousness and keep us from excelling in our true potential. This is what we are reminded of with the upright devil card. We are coaxed into exploring these shadows and healing them. We are reminded that if we follow these shadows back to the light that casts them, we can move beyond them and become the best version of our self, no longer hindered by misguided notions. This is a very empowering message to receive, and an even more empowering action to take. We must though, choose to take it. The devil card in its reversed position, however, suggests that maybe we are not doing all that we can do. Here we are looking
We are not meant to be limited, yet, so many of us are. We hit a block and say “I can’t get around it.” at our shadows, and living in fear of them. Rather than moving past them, rather than exploring them to see what is in them and why they are here at all, rather than following them to the light that cast them, we surrender to them. This is to live in fear. This is to stay stuck in stagnant energy and never transcend it. This is not to live life to our fullest or to live up to our highest potential becoming the best version of our self. This is to give up before you even try. We are not meant to be limited, yet, so many of us are. We hit a block and say “I can’t get around it.” This is the devil inside holding you back, projecting images of fear into our mind. The task at hand is to silence that devil and to excel no matter what. Beat the devil by getting past these blocks. Do it just once, and every time after that will be a piece of cake. When the devil card shows up for you in the reversed position, ask yourself, “What am I afraid of?” Then laugh at the fear and push through it.
Featured Spread The Blockage Spread Excerpt from The Double Oh Fool Guide to Tarot Mastery by Jim Larsen copyright 2011
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his four card spread is great for identifying how we are standing in our own way of progress.
Card 1: Our goal. Card 2: What is blocking us from achieving that goal. Card 3: What action we can take to get past that block. Card 4: What we can expect from getting past the block. As an example of this spread, let’s consider the following cards:
The Goal: Ace of Cups, The Action: 3 of Swords, The Block: The Hanged Man The Out-come: 6 of Swords The Goal– Ace of Cups. The goal for the querent, it would seem, is to simply experience joy and happiness. As a goal, it does suggest that the querent is feeling depressed. If the querent weren’t feeling significant sadness, would feeling joy and happiness be such a significant goal? The Block– So, why doesn’t the querent feel joy and happiness? What is standing between them and this bliss they are seeking? The Hanged man stands in the way, blocking. We know that The Hanged Man signifies surrender and seeing a situation from another angle. It would seem from this major Arcana card that the querent is not accepting a change that has come along. Things change. It happens all the time. Sometimes these changes are not what we were hoping for. Some-times the way things were is highly preferred to what they have become. But sometimes these changes happen despite our desires to the contrary and we can not change it. All we can do is accept. Acceptance is to realign our thinking to the new paradigm. When we can do this, we can stop putting our energy towards stagnation, and start putting it towards growth within this new paradigm. The Action– But how does the querent do that? How does he surrender to this reality? He accepts this new reality by accepting the 3 of Swords situation that he is in. As you know, 3 of Swords represents heartbreak. The querent must experience the heartbreak. He must accept it for what it is and do not suppress it. Suppressing emotions does not make them go away. You may hide them, but this is only short term. They will resurface. They will continue to resurface in one form or another, perhaps even as sickness or disease, until we face them once and for all and feel what they are designed to make us feel, and to learn and integrate the lessons they are created to help us learn in order to be more complete humans. When the querent can do this, he will be released from the pain and the heartbreak. The Outcome– After having surrendered to what he can not change, after experiencing fully whatever feelings and emotions have surfaced, no matter how painful, what can the querent expect? He can expect the 6 of Swords. As you know, this card represents finding new hope and of coming out of stressful situation. This is a positive outcome for sure. No longer bound by negative thinking or to a situation that can not be changed, the querent has accepted the new paradigm and is making peace within it.
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10 of Swords and Evolution I
t can be argued that the true purpose of our life, our presence in human form upon the earth is to learn lessons. We all do, our spirits, strive to attain perfection. So, we create situations, both painful and joyful, to facilitate those lessons. In this way, our spirits crave pain. We crave this pain so that we may work our way through it in order to become more perfect, to appreciate the true perfection we all possess. Take a look at the ten of swords tarot card, being mindful that swords represent our minds and what our thoughts can do to us. Why did the mind do this to this person? Maybe, the person wanted it. Maybe, they needed it. Having such an experience can be one of the best ways to grow. This is exciting to know. To understand why we think the way we do, and why we put ourselves through the tests we do will change the perspective we all have of the world. No longer will we be “victims” but rather “students.” Students, that is, of human form. Our bodies are but vehicles of the spirit. It is our spirit that drives the body. The trick is for the mind to fully surrender to the spirit and allow the spirit to have the experiences it has set out to have. If the mind interferes too much, it only causes difficulties for the spirit in accomplishing what it set out to accomplish, and damage the spirit’s chance to learn the lesson a particular situation was designed to teach. What happens then? An opportunity must be created whereby the spirit will have the opportunity to experience this lesson again. This will only slow down the spirit’s progress as it goes back to redo this lesson when it could be putting energy into learning and experiencing something new and different. Imagine that the spirit has a checklist of experiences and lessons it wants to accomplish in its current human form. The sooner it can check off that it had one experience and learned the lesson, it can move on to another. Is this check list presented in a chronological order that it must go through? No. It is presented in a nonlinear fashion. Each lesson represents a piece of the puzzle. The objective is to collect as many pieces as you can. Of course, our guides and our angels are guiding us towards the pieces. We must only open ourselves to their guidance and to follow, even when and especially when pain is involved. Do not fear pain. Embrace it. In this way, to endure pain is to help the human race to evolve. That is not to say to deliberately inflict pain on ourselves, no that would be ridiculous. The point here is to know that in times of pain and hardship, when the heart feels it can bear no more, these are times of growth and of lessons. Accept this. Accept it as a stretch of road on your journey towards your personal light. Consider your personal light to be the horizon you are journeying towards and that the light is the purpose you chose when you made the decision to incarnate such as you have. To endure the pain means to get through it, to the other side of it, stronger, wiser, and that much closer to your light. As we learn, the human race grows stronger. As we reach our light, the human race evolves. Once you experience The Light, you will never live in darkness again. When challenges come your way, when things seem dark, you know that the light is there. How can you not know? You’ve experienced it. It is organic to you, is it not? You know how to vanquish the dark to let the light in. The light never left. It simply fell into a shadow. The light being who you truly are, it is so much easier, and a natural thing to do, to follow this new shadow back to the light. In this way, darkness can never truly engulf you. When the ten of swords comes up for you in a reading, ask yourself, are you embracing any pain you are in? Examine the pain. What is it teaching you? What can you do to get past this pain? How will this lesson stay with you throughout the course of your life? Appreciate this, and do not push it away.
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