Tarot Blog Hop: Samhain 2016 Wake The Dead

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Welcome to the 2016 Samhain/Halloween/Mid-Fall Tarot Blog Hop. We’ve been doing these hops since Imbolc 2012. It brings me such joy to know that for these past five years, community-minded bloggers have gathered every six weeks to create a ring of posts that all share the same subject. It’s been copied by others (which also brings me great joy) so I know that original question “How Can I Be The Best Candle” truly burns on.

This time, we are asked by our wrangler, Louise Underhill of Priestess Tarot, to turn to our ancestors for advice. She challenged us to “seek their advice on what we need to work on in the year to come.”

So I did. First, I wanted to be clear on the questions as well as the intent. Once I had the questions, I took time to make sure I was mindful of my surroundings. I wanted to be aware of not only where I was, but who I was.

I opened up asking my ancestors to gather if they would. I requested that one of them step forward to give me advice for the coming year (in my Tradition, we treat Samhain as the New Year even though the validity of that has been brought into question.) Honestly I hoped that someone from my deep ancestral bloodlines would turn up. Maybe the daughter of that English king (not a very popular king, oops) or the German lawyer would weigh in on the questions.

Nope. I got a much closer relative. And I knew her the moment I pulled the first card. But first, let’s look at the spread itself.

Arwen Lynch's Wake The Dead spread
My 2016 Samhain spread: Wake The Dead

The answers were pretty clear. Because of the reading, the answers were also quite personal. I’ll show you the card and give you the abbreviated answers.

Moon Victoria Regina Tarot
The Moon, Victoria Regina Tarot

First up was the Moon. With the binoculars and crawfish on this one, I immediately knew it was my mother. She was a Scorpio as well. I have a Scorpio Moon that rests in the 8th house so this could only be Mama. At first I thought it might be her mother, but the crawfish and binoculars were all Mama.

10 Swords Victoria Regina
Ten of Swords

Next came the 10 of Swords. If I wasn’t sure before, this nailed it (pun intended). My mother once told me a story about a sparrow, a cat and a pile of manure. The lesson was to stop complaining about where you were. The main message I got here was, “Being weighed down by other people’s opinions is silly. That’s their energy, not yours. DO YOU.” On a side note, when I look at my handwriting on this question, the “do you” is very similar to my mother’s handwriting. Hmmm

Strength showed up as the response to the third question.

Strength Victoria Regina Tarot
Strength

Her admonition here was that she raised me to be a strong woman. She reminded me that she had not been fair to me in one area (she took care of me when she should have let me find my own feet) but she felt I was getting better there.

 

World, Victoria Regina Tarot
World

The fourth question brought the World (so many Majors, Mama.) She was a bit fierce on this one which didn’t surprise me. Protecting her children was one of her strengths. Living with a Scorpion for a mother wasn’t always easy, but you knew she had your back. The answer was, in part, “Focus on the people who add to your life rather than take away. Be your own center.”

Finally, I pulled the Two of Wands. My mother loved that I wrote. She got to read the first book my writing partner and I ever finished. That book has never been published, but my sister called me. She was laughing because my mother, who was in the hospital dying from cancer (she passed away two months after), would not take any calls. She told my sister to tell them she was reading. Her message here was to take action. Do rather than be. The funniest thing was her “Get wet sooner” message. She’s the reason I keep .

Thanks, Mama. I love you and I will always remember you.

Marilu Johnston circa 1956
Marilu, my beautiful mother

Now please leave a comment then hop on to the next post. Or hop backwards. And thanks so very much for sharing this and other posts. You can use the hashtag #tarotbloghop .

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TarotBlogHop: May Day 2014–Dance of Opposites

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The Union of Opposites as represented by the Lovers is our Tarot Blog Hop topic. You can thank Aisling for this one. She’s our mastermind this go round. If you are a fan of the Tarot Blog Hop, you can keep up with us by clicking here and liking the Facebook fan page. This will be a place where you can chat about posts you’ve seen on the blog and get updates as to when the next hop is. If you want to participate in the hop, click here to join the actual working group.

In the call to blog, Aisling offered an interpretaion of the Lovers as follows:

“”The Lovers”, philosophically, can represent “the Union of Opposites”. When this card falls in a reading, as many of you probably know, it doesn’t always signify a love relationship, but may indicate a wider scope of combining dissimilar things to produce a positive result. Not all opposites are bad things, and sometimes both entities are necessary to produce a whole; think of male and female, night and day, giving and receiving, listening and speaking, acting and waiting to act, and many other places where the Union of Opposites produces the whole….”

I don’t usually see the Lovers as a relationship with another but with yourself. And think about the dissimilar bits of each of us. How often to you feel pulled this way and that way by nothing more than your own thoughts? How can we begin to understand that person on the other side of the mirror when we can be our very own Beatles song?

So that brings me to a spread I created for this Tarot Blog Hop. I’m calling it the Hello You, Goodbye Me spread. It is a way for us to dive into how we can acknowledge what our own needs are–even when they seem to be in opposition.

Hello You, Goodbye Me Spread

  • Card One: What makes us want to say goodbye
  • Card Two: What makes us want to say hello
  • Card Three: How can we hold space for both needs and honor both sides?

Placement is Goodbye to the left, Hello to the right and Holding Space above both.

Hello Goodbye Spread
Hello Goodbye Spread

Using the Badgers Forest Tarot by Nakisha VanderHoeven I pulled the following cards.

Goodbye: Strength shows up to remind me that maybe it’s time to bid farewell to my need to “do it my ownself” all the time.
Hello: Two of Foxes (Cups) shows one fox moving towards the other. This is an interesting card since it is the card I see as a relationship card. Here we have saying hello to being part of a couple.
Holding space: is the Seven of Foxes which shows a fox sitting at a crossroads.

Obviously this says that for me to hold on to my independence while still building my life as a married woman, I must allow myself to dream. Emotional choices will have to be made, but both roads can remain open to me. Seems that both the path of independence and the one of relationships can be viable choices. Perhaps it is saying that one isn’t to outweigh the other but that I am to learn how to balance them.

I hope you will try this simple spread and let me know your results.

[Tweet “Happy Beltaine! It’s International Jump A Balefire And Have Sex In The Woods Day!”]

Well not really, but it would be nice, wouldn’t it?

It is May 1st so here is the link to your monthly Tarotscopes podcast. I used the Badgers Forest Tarot for this podcast too.

As always, seek joy, y’all. Pass it on.

OH! Pssst! Love auctions for a good cause? Today is the kick off of Brenda Novak’s Juvenile Diabetes Auction. Thanks for helping spread the word. Here’s one of my offerings.

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REVIEW: Tarot Spreads & Layouts

If I had one quibble, I would say that even an experienced reader can come away from this book with new insights into how to glean more from their spreads and readings.

Tarot Spreads and Layouts A User’s Manual For Beginning and Intermediate Readers
Jeanne Fiorini
Schiffer Publishing
ISBN: 978-0-7643-3629-4

Fiorini is an author I like. Her articles online are full of information. She writes in a clear, approachable manner. When I heard that she had a book out with Schiffer, I was delighted. For purposes of transparency, Continue reading “REVIEW: Tarot Spreads & Layouts”

Carolyn Cushing’s Winter Into Spring Spread

Here is my second spread I have chosen from the very enlightening Imbolc Tarot Blog Hop. We are already gearing up for Ostara where I will be a participant while Donnaleigh delaRose takes on the organization. And I think we have our Beltaine organizer already.

As I said in this post, there was a plethora of spreads. Well, I may not have said that exactly, but there were. This one is from Carolyn Cushing who used the Continue reading “Carolyn Cushing’s Winter Into Spring Spread”