major arcana – Page 13 – Just the Tarot

The Wheel of Fortune and the Gifts of Karma

This is about dealing with bad luck and painful times in our lives. It discusses the Tarot card called The Wheel of Fortune. It also discusses the Tibetan Buddhist concept of accumulating merit through conscious, mindful suffering.

You’re rolling along doing great, happy as a clam, your life full of blue skies and smiles and – BLAM – you get fired from your job. Or your girlfriend leaves you. Or even worse, you get fired from your job and get terrible, terrible reviews on your exit interview and you know your resume’ will be screwed up for years. Or . . . wait . . . your girlfriend leaves you for a lesbian who ALSO happens to be your supervisor and fires you and they BOTH give you terrible, terrible reviews on your exit interviews and you know your resume’, your ego and your libido will be screwed up for years.

We’ve all had those moments when life suddenly turns to shit with no warning and for no discernable reason. It happens to everyone. A rabbi named Harold Kushner even wrote a book about it called, When Bad Things Happen to Good People that sold millions of copies.

Of course, you could also write a book called, “When Good Things Happen to Bad People,” but it probably wouldn’t sell as well. Or you could write a book called, “When Good People Have Their Lives Turn into Shit Sandwiches and Then All of a Sudden Things Get Better For No Particular Reason.”

As the King of Siam said, “It’s a puzzlement.”

One of the reasons it’s puzzling for most of us is that we get that training from the time that we’re infants: if you’re good, good things will happen to you. If you’re bad, no fruit cup for dessert and you stand in the corner. It’s supposed to be a straight, cause and effect transaction that if you’re good you get rewarded, not kicked in the head.

But life is full of ups and downs, and The Wheel of Fortune is a perfect illustration of that. At best our ill fortune can seem terribly random and at worst it can seem just plain perverse. A turn of some invisible wheel over which we have no control.

As I’ve gotten older I’ve come to take a lot of comfort in the concept of karma. When a stranger decides he doesn’t like me and he’s going to make my life hell it makes more sense to me to think that I must have screwed with him in a past life than to think that he just doesn’t like my nose or my aftershave.

And if you really embrace the concept it can actually help you to get through some horrific times. “Yes, this is terribly painful and I’m going through some serious suffering. On the other hand, think of all of the bad karma I’m burning off.”

I remember the first time I had a serious discussion about karma. I was taking a tour of a Tibetan Buddhist Meditation Center and the woman who was the tour guide and who lived there said: “When we get up in the morning we try to live virtuously and if we do that we accumulate merit, which is good karma. And then we consciously dedicate that merit that we’ve earned to anyone who is suffering or in need. Which is also a virtuous thing to do so we accumulate more merit by doing it and then we consciously dedicate THAT merit to others.”

To which I replied, “Huh?”

It took me a few years to get it but the key words there are, “consciously dedicate.”

When we encounter the bad times in life – as we always do – live them consciously. Endure them with grace and dignity. Be determined to learn and to grow spiritually from them. Consciously dedicate those bad times to earning merit.

And when we’re having good times in life, consciously dedicate some of that extra energy and fortune to helping others who are having hard times.

Conscious living makes The Wheel of Fortune make sense.

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Is There a Secret Path in the Tarot?

The answer to that is probably both, “yes,” and, “no.”

It would seem to me that it’s, “no,” if you’re looking for some clearly delineated path that involves going to point A, learning it’s lessons, then being prepared to move to point B because of what you learned at point A, then moving on to point C because of what you learned at point B, and so on.

In other words, starting at The Fool and learning it’s esoteric lessons which then enables you to understand the esoteric lessons involved in The Magician, which in turn gives you the knowledge to understand The High Priestess, etc.

Occultists have been chasing their own tails trying to find some sort of linear path in the Major Arcana at least since Victorian times. Many of them linked the cards with systems of numerology or astrology. A.E. Waite was so determined to make them fit into his numerological scheme that he actually switched the placement of the Strength and Justice cards so that they’d be in accordance with his theory.

And it IS kind of tempting to try to see some sort of a pattern. At the beginning or the Major Arcana it actually looks like some of the cards fit together. The Magician and The High Priestess certainly might be male and female energy in magic. The Empress and the Emperor seem to go together, at least in name. But then that goes to shit because The Hierophant certainly doesn’t fit with The Lovers or The Chariot with Strength.

The astronomical cards are sort of grouped together, with The Star, The Moon, and The Sun in sequence. But then the Judgement card gets thrown in between them and The World, which messes that up.

And that’s the deal with the Major Arcana: if you squint your eyes and turn your head sideways you can see all sorts of patterns in them. I’ve seen books where they were divided into thirds with each third being a separate path. Or where one card was linked to the card that fell four places behind it. All SORTS of wonderful, creative schemes that pretty much seem to lead nowhere.

So I don’t think we can say that there is a path in the Tarot, at least not in the sense that the classical occultists like Waite and Levi and Crowley would have loved. But if there isn’t A PATH there are some definite trails which we could call Doctrines.

The Fool, for instance, contains the truth of being intoxicated with the spirit world. The Magician embodies the occult maxim of, “as above, so below,” and reminds us that we create on the astral plane what comes to be in the material plane. The Wheel of Fortune is a perfect diagram of karma operating in our lives. The World reminds of the truth of rebirth and reincarnation.

There are a lot of truths contained in the cards and, taken together, they point us to a different way of experiencing the world and a different way of living. To make a path out of them, though, we have to connect the dots ourselves. Ultimately, the path is in us, not in the cards.

The Judgement Card

The meaning of the Judgement card in the Tarot. Definitions for the reversed and upright positions are included.

An angel blows a horn and people rise joyfully from their coffins which appear to be floating on water. An icy mountain range is in the background.

Upright: This card looks kind of creepy – probably because of the gray people jumping out of their coffins – but it’s not. This card is about judgements of all kinds but especially about self-judgements.

When Judgement shows up in a reading it indicates that a very significant part of a person’s life is coming to an end. Moreover, the questioner is in a place where he or she can sit back and examine how they behaved during that phase of their lives and whether or not they are satisfied with what they did.

I’ve seen this card come up frequently with home health care providers, for instance, after the loved one they were caring for had passed over. They had devoted months or years of their lives to caring for another person and then it was time to reflect on the experience and evaluate what they had done. You can apply the same thing to any important phase in a person’s life, whether it’s the end of a long career or children who are moving out of the house.The basic questions here are what did it all mean and how did I do? When the card is upright it indicates that the questioner has done well and feels good about it. And there is also the obvious theme of being reborn in this card. I’ve finished that phase of my life, so what do I do next?

There is also, of course, the more mundane matter of legal judgements. If you’ve been involved with some sort of a court case you can expect a positive outcome.

Reversed: The same scenario as with the upright card but when reversed it implies a negative judgement. The questioner is feeling far from satisfied with his or her own behavior and wishes that she had done better. Again, this can be applied to any life event that’s coming to an end, whether a relationship or a job.

Pending legal matters will not go well.

If you have questions about this card or its meaning in one of your readings, please don’t hesitate to leave a comment. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.

A Few More Thoughts About the Judgement Card:

“You’re judging me!”

“Don’t be so judgemental.”

“That’s a value judgement.”

Not to mention visions of crabby, constipated old men in black robes banging little wooden hammers on their desks.

There’s no question that the word, “judgement,” carries a lot of emotional baggage with it. It, “feels,” like we’re talking about one person condemning another person, something most of us aren’t totally comfortable with. Hell, I’ve known Buddhists who refused to serve on juries because they were so adamant about not judging another person’s karma.

As I said in my book, “Just the Tarot,”though, the Judgement card is really more about self-judgement. It’s about taking a hard, dispassionate look at your life and deciding whether you did good or you fucked up.

And then moving on.

We’ve all known people who were in dysfunctional relationships where one person was doing all of the heavy lifting and the other person was letting him or her do it. I knew one man who was married to a woman who had been brutally raped when she was younger. About five years into their relationship their sex life pretty much disappeared because she was having flashbacks to the rape. He was a very sensitive, caring man who was deeply in love with her and so he went along with a sexless relationship until it started to make him crazy. He tried to talk to her about it and got nowhere. He suggested that she see a therapist and she refused. He suggested that THEY see a therapist and she refused.

He finally ended up seeing a therapist himself and discovered that, sadly, a lot of marriage counseling is actually divorce counseling. After two years of trying to make things work he filed for divorce and they went their separate ways. He still loved her but he realized he deserved a life partner who could love him back.

I mention that particular instance because it contains all of the elements of the Judgement card. 1 – Being confronted with a large problem in your life. 2 – Working hard to deal with it or solve it. 3 – Seeing very clearly that it involved a phase of your life which, for better or worse, is over and walking away from it. 4 – Making a Judgement about your own behavior and evaluating how you did before you move on to the next phase.

It happens all the time. Women who live with abusers and try with all of their hearts to believe that the man will somehow change until there’s one too many beatings. Home health providers who take care of parents with dementia until they’re emotionally and spiritually exhausted and just don’t have anything more to give. People who endure terrible jobs with terrible bosses for years and finally have enough.

The self judgement is sometimes positive and sometimes negative. Sometimes we can look at ourselves and say, “Yeah, I did really good and I did everything I could have.” Sometimes we have to admit that there are things we wish we could have done better or wonder if we should have tried a different approach.

In either case there is strong self-knowledge that it’s OVER. That chapter of your life is closed out and you’re moving on to the next chapter, hopefully a wiser and more compassionate human being.

Time to be re-born.

“Just the Tarot,” by Dan Adair – a kindle ebook available on Amazon

The Sun Tarot Card

The meaning of The Sun card in the Tarot, including definitions for the upright and reversed positions.

A young, nude child sits astride a pony with flowers and feathers in her hair while a bright, red banner waves in the air. Behind her a wall is topped with sunflowers and a huge sun shines down upon the scene.

Upright: Joy, fun, happiness! This is a wonderful card and indicates that everything is going just right. It indicates that warm, comforting sense of existence when you’re going through a period where you’re satisfied and happy.

The child on the pony obviously indicates youth, both in the way the questioner feels right now and in her actual physical environment. New children or grandchildren may be on the way or perhaps the neighbor’s kids will show up to play. Life is good.

Reversed: The weather forecast is for a cloudy day with the possibility of clearing. Good things may be on the horizon but that’s not assured, yet, and it’s important to keep a positive attitude.

Possibilities of problems with children or pregnancies. Perhaps the neighbor’s kids show up to play and they’re REALLY annoying.

If you have questions about this card or its meaning in one of your readings, please don’t hesitate to leave a comment. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.

A Few More Thoughts About The Sun

If you’ve ever done any Inner Child work you’ve got to love The Sun. It’s all there: the laughing child (riding a pony, no less) in a warm, walled in garden filled with sunflowers waving a banner or flag while the sun shines down.

Let’s focus on the flag for a little bit because it’s the one thing in the composition that just doesn’t belong there. And things that don’t belong tend to be the most interesting.

We can see first of all that the flag is WAY oversized for the child. It’s huge and would be appropriate for a large man or woman, not a child. Secondly it’s red, a color commonly associated with power. So combining those factors we’ve got a very small child controlling a large amount of power, which is a fascinating concept.

To say that our society is anti-child might be an overstatement, but it might not. Consider these common insults:

Do you have to be so childish?

Why don’t you just grow up?

I guess I’ll be the adult in the room.

Quit being such a brat.

You’re just a cry baby.

And on and on and on. The word, “puerile,” is from a latin word meaning, “boy.” Also juvenile, infantile, immature.

Most Inner Child work could more accurately be defined as, “Injured Inner Child work.” It’s all about working with that ego construct that we form as a child and which tends to be emotionally abused by parents, teachers, preachers and other authoritarians commonly known as grown ups. It’s about recovering and healing that part of us that was told that he/she was stupid, noisy, pesky, insolent, too big for our britches, and a general pain in the ass. Shut up and sit down or go stand in a corner and think it over until you’re willing to be, “good.”

And, yes, we tend to think of Inner Child as being weak, powerless, delicate, violated. But if that was all there was to it, what would be the point in trying to recover it or heal it? After all, it’s just a dumb kid.

The fact is, though, that there is tremendous power that flows out of the Child. Julia Cameron, author of, “The Artist’s Way,” places creativity squarely in the child ego state, as do many others. Here’s what Cameron had to say:

“Remember, your artist is a child. Find and protect that child. Learning to create is like learning to walk. The artist child must begin by crawling.”

Picasso said, “Every child is an artist. The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up.”

Amber K, in her wonderful book, “True Magick,” says:

“ . . . the Younger Self is a valuable ally to the conscious mind. . . it is in charge of emotion, memory and sensation . . . it is a powerful generator and channel of psychic energy . . .”

I know a therapist who is fascinated both by deaths and births because, “those are the moments when the veil is thinnest, when a Soul is coming into or passing out of the world.”

If you conceptualize it that way, Child is much closer to the Divine, to Spirit World than Adult. Each child is a traveler who just stepped off of the Astral Plane and is approaching the Baggage Claim area to pick up it’s new bag of karma. Each child is still magical.

Until we can talk her out of it.

The Moon Tarot Card

The meaning of The Moon Card in the Tarot. Definitions for both the upright and reversed positions are included.

A bright moon hangs in the center of the sky, it’s unhappy face showing both the full and quarter moons. Beneath it a dog and a wolf howl at its’ light while a cray fish crawls out of a pond, claws extended. A shining road runs off into the distance between two towers.

Upright: This is a card of illusion and self-deception. Think of seeing the world under the light of the moon rather than the sun. Shadows and light blend into one another and our eyes and mind see things that aren’t really there. Or maybe they are.

There is a tendency for the unconscious, unexamined contents of our minds to come forth when The Moon is present. The craw fish is a primitive, almost prehistoric, creature and it reminds us that our emotions are ultimately based in the very ancient and equally primitive portion of our brains. That theme is repeated with the presence of both the dog and the wolf. The dog is our modern companion, tamed and loving, but its’ genes and brain rest squarely on it heritage with the wolf.

The Moon shows that the questioner is involved in a very murky area of his or her life. There doesn’t seem to be any definite goal or destination right now, just a road running off into the darkness.In terms of a relationship, The Moon shows that the questioner may be involved with someone on a very primitive, unconscious level and that there may be deception on the part of the partner or, more likely, denial on the part of the questioner. There is a lot of emotion present but it may not be of a healthy, evolved nature.

If finances are involved, The Moon gives a huge warning that things are NOT what they seem to be. Slow down, delay, wait for better light to illuminate what’s going on.

Another, somewhat vexing, aspect of this is that the Tarot may just be telling you that this really isn’t a good time to do a reading. Things may be a bit murky and uncertain and it might be better to try again a little later.

Reversed: Pretty much the same as the upright card but probably on a slightly less serious level. Think of one of those irritating periods in your life when your friends are lying to you for no particular reason, nothing is going quite right and you keep losing your car keys, and you’ve got The Moon reversed.

If you have questions about this card or its meaning in one of your readings, please don’t hesitate to leave a comment. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.

A Few More Thoughts About The Moon:

The designers of the Tarot sort of crammed all of the astronomical cards in at the very end of the deck: The Star, The Moon, The Sun, The World. Only The Moon had a bad reputation.

The Sun, of course, brings life to our planet. It gives us warmth and light and makes seeds germinate into plants. It’s power has been recognized and worshipped in nearly every culture.

The Moon, on the other hand, is a much closer body but it’s magic was poorly understood and frequently frightening to primitive humans. True, it provided light, but it was a wavering, false light, so unlike The Sun, and provided neither warmth nor comfort. Moreover, it changed mysteriously, appearing as a sliver, growing into a silvery golden ball and then gradually diminishing until it disappeared. What could be so ephemeral and fleeting as a creature that was born, grew to full life, and died, all in a few weeks?

Even the most primitive peoples, though, recognized its’ powers. It seemed to pull the waves high out of the oceans and control their movements. It caused women to bleed from their wombs and men built, “moon houses,” so that women might live apart from other people when they were, “stricken” by the beams of The Moon.

Worse, still, its’ energy seemed to drive some people insane and turned others into werewolves and monsters. The words, “lunacy,” and, “lunatic,” still live in our language and hearken back to a commonly held belief that the Moon could make some unfortunate people quite mad.

There’s a certain amount of truth in the old tales. Cops, firefighters, and emergency department nurses will all tell you that things get worse when there’s a full moon. Many farmers still plant their crops according to the cycles of the moon. If you’re a psychically sensitive person you probably know what it’s like to be knocked ass over tea kettle by The Moon.

There is something about its’ power that calls to the most primitive part of our brains and souls. The Moon card shows a cray fish – a VERY primitive organism – rising from the depths of a pool of water to contemplate a full moon, a perfect metaphor for the way that it affects and transforms us.

Fairly modern Tarot decks like the Waite deck usually depict both a wolf and a dog baying at The Moon to emphasize that its’ power still holds sway over us, no matter how much we may have evolved. And, as in the Temperance card, a long road stretches off into the distance, as if showing the way out of the Land of Lunacy.

The older decks didn’t bother with the wolf/dog metaphor and there was no road leading to salvation. There were just two howling beasts and a folk art moon with a fancy collar flinging out psychedelic moon beams.

And perhaps that’s more fitting. Madness is a part of the human psyche and – in measured doses – is just as important to our existence as sanity. Madness makes us question reality in the same way that The Moons’ light makes us question what we see. Is it a rope lying there in the darkness or is it a snake? Is it a bush or is it a bear?

When Magellan said that the world was round and not flat people told him he was mad. Quite, quite mad, darling.

Time travel back to the early 1950s and tell someone that one day we’ll have computers that fit in the palms of our hands and we’ll be able to talk to anyone anywhere on the globe if they have one too.

What are you nuts?

It’s never comfortable having The Moon in your reading. It feels like things are confused and muddled and don’t make any sense. Still, sometimes we need that. If we didn’t have those periods of mild insanity we might never change, might never fall in love.

There’s a great line at the end of, “Zorba the Greek.” Zorbas’ boss is a very proper Englishman who would never, ever do anything out of the ordinary. Zorba looks at him and says, “I like you too much not to tell you, boss. You have everything a man needs except one thing. Madness. A man needs a little madness or else he’ll never dare to cut the rope and be free.”

The Star Tarot Card

The meaning of The Star card in the Tarot, including definitions for the upright and reversed positions.

A nude woman kneels beside a placid body of water. She holds pitchers in both hands and is pouring water out onto the ground and into the body of water. The sky above her is spangled with stars and a bird sings in a tree.

Upright: This is one of the loveliest cards you can get in a reading and indicates hope and good things to come.

Her nudity indicates both an innocence and a freshness, a starting over without the trappings of a former life that may have weighed her down. Her foot in the water indicates that she is fully in touch with her emotions while the other foots placement indicates that she is well grounded. The singing bird denotes happiness and the fact that she is freely pouring out the contents of the pitchers indicates abundance.

Basically, this card means blessings and sweet times ahead. If life has been hard for the questioner or he or she has experienced poor health they can expect wonderful improvements in the very near future.

Reversed: The questioner is letting self doubts and pessimism seep into his or her spirituality. There has perhaps been a new and wonderful start but doubts are beginning to spring up.

If you have questions about this card or its meaning in one of your readings, please don’t hesitate to leave a comment. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.

A Few Extra Thoughts About The Star:

I’ve been collecting books about the Tarot for decades. One which has gone out of print described The Star as, “The Star of Hope.” I have to say that from my experience that’s exactly right.

Sooner or later we all go through one of those awful periods that are marked with the appearance of cards like Death and The Tower. Sometimes we feel totally demoralized and defeated. Sometimes we feel like we’ve been beaten right down to our knees, bowed and bloodied, and unable to get back onto our feet and move forward.

But it’s the nature of life that if we hang on long enough, if we don’t give up and become cynical and jaded, a glimmer of hope will enter our lives and we begin to see the possibility of being happy again.

One might just say, “Well, hope springs eternal in the human breast,” and leave it at that. We are, after all, a pretty hopeful species. We do tend to rebuild and regenerate after disasters and catastrophes.

I think, though, that there’s something a little more to it, at least as far as The Star is concerned. I think that there are times in our lives when we get periods of grace, periods of blessings, when we’re protected and helped by higher powers or higher realms. When we have peace and contentment, many times after our hardest struggles.

The Tibetan Buddhists have a wonderful way of looking at karma. If you’ve led a really, really good life (or many of them) and you’ve helped a lot of other Souls then you’re likely to reincarnate in really, really good circumstances in your next life.

BUT – they warn – even a large accumulation of good karma can be used up so it’s important to keep living a good life and to keep helping other Souls. It’s sort of like a karmic piggy bank: you have to keep putting some more good karma back into it or sooner or later you’ll run out.

It’s likely that something similar happens when we go through really bad times. When life absolutely beats the shit out of us and we endure the pain and suffering – AND WE CONTINUE TO HOLD LOVE IN OUR HEARTS! – then we earn that period of grace and blessings. We earn that Star of Hope that surrounds us with its’ light and protection.

The Tower

The meaning of The Tower Card in the Tarot, including definitions for the upright and reverse positions.

A crowned tower atop a peak has been struck by lightning. The crown on the tower has been knocked off and flames sprout from the windows. Two people have been knocked out of the tower and are falling toward the ground.

Upright: This isn’t necessarily a horrible card to get in a reading but it can be. If it’s effects are softened by other cards in the reading it may just show a sudden reversal of luck or the destruction of a belief system.

At its’ worst it can indicate a real calamity. It can show a huge financial loss, for instance, or a home being lost or destroyed. On the level of relationships it can show a complete loss of faith in the relationship or the person the questioner is involved with. Imagine coming home and finding your husband in bed with the baby sitter. THAT kind of loss of faith.

One of the aspects here is that the loss tends to be sudden and totally unexpected. It’s not something you can plan for, it just happens with no warning. That’s a major part of the feeling of devastation. Like the lightning bolt it’s literally shocking.

Another aspect is that it tends to shake you to the core. You question your beliefs, your faith, all of the things that you took for granted in what is now your former life.

Did I mention this is a bad card?

REVERSED: The calamity has happened and the questioner is now in the recovery phase. The question is whether he or she will find the inner strength and spiritual resources to deal with the loss and rebuild their life.

If you have questions about this card or its meaning in one of your readings, please don’t hesitate to leave a comment. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.

Some More Thoughts About the Tower:

Shit happens.

And that’s one of those terrible truths that can be so difficult to accept. You can be walking merrily down lifes’ path, whistling a happy tune and admiring the sunshine when you get run over by an out of control ice cream truck.

Shit happens. When it happens to someone we don’t like or someone who is a blatant bastard we tend to say, “Ah, HA! He certainly got what he had coming!”

When it happens to someone who is a really good person – or even worse, to us – it tends to be more of a head scratcher. We tend to revert back to that child-like state and ask, “Why did this happen to me? I’ve been good.”

And we do buy into that equation that the quality of your life is equal to the quality of your actions. If you’re a good person, then good things will happen to you. If you’re a bad person then bad things will happen to you.

We buy into that despite a lot of proof to the contrary. There are some very wealthy people who have screwed over everyone they’ve ever met. There are many loving, kind people living in abject poverty and hunger. Philosophers and religious leaders have been trying to explain that for as long as humans have existed.

The fact is that we don’t really know why catastrophe strikes one person and not another. We just know that it does. The only thing we know for certain is that personal disaster either builds character of it destroys it. When your entire world has just gone up in smoke, when you’ve lost everything that you held dear, then all that’s left is what you’ve got in your own heart. You either use the strength you’ve got inside of you or you develop inner strength in the process of recovery.

Alternatively, you can just give up. Or become a cynic who despises life. Or cry out that there’s no justice and life isn’t fair.

Because . . . you know . . . shit happens.

The Devil Tarot Card

The meaning of The Devil Card in the Tarot. Definitions for the card in the upright and reversed positions are included.

The Baphomet devil, horned and with huge bat wings, perches on a black cube. His legs are those of a goat and his feet are talons. He holds his right hand aloft and the palm of it seems to be incised with obscure symbols. In his left hand he holds a flaming torch. A nude female and male stand before him with their backs turned to him. They have horns and chains, which bind them to the cube, are draped loosely around their necks. They also have tails and the devil seems to have lit the man’s tail on fire.

Upright: There are a lot of symbolic elements in this card, so let’s take them one at a time and work through them. The man and the woman hearken back to the nude couple in The Lovers card, but there is nothing sacred or blessed about their relationship They are chained, enslaved, and reduced to their lowest levels of feeling and being.

The enslavement may be on the obvious level of some sort of twisted sexuality. Perhaps there is some level of bondage and domination going on in their sex lives that has gone way too far.

The enslavement may be on the physical level itself. A love of materialism, money, a constant need for new and expensive toys.

It may fall in the area of addictions to substances that destroy the spirit and soul, such as meth, heroin, and excessive amounts of alcohol. There’s a saying in Alcoholics Anonymous: “Booze gave me wings and then took away the sky.”

Whatever the form of bondage, it is to some extent self-imposed. Note how loosely the chains hang around their necks. They could easily slip them over their heads and walk from their slavery, yet they don’t. By not fighting for their freedom they are cooperating with their slavery.

There’s another element here that many of the New Age tarot books tend to ignore or gloss over and that’s Black Magic. When The Devil shows up in a reading it’s possible that someone is directing malevolent magic against the questioner or that he or she is engaging in it.

If this card shows up in a reading about employment it’s possible that the questioner is chained to a job that he hates but can’t leave because of financial obligations. If it shows up in a reading about relationships it’s possible that there’s going to be a lot of sex in the questioners future. A lot. Hot. Steamy. Sex.

Reversed: This shows that liberation may be at hand in the immediate future. The questioner will do something to escape the spiritual and/or physical enslavement that she is currently involved in. May show the end of a really bad relationship.

If you have questions about this card or its meaning in one of your readings, please don’t hesitate to leave a comment. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.

A Few Additional Thoughts About the Devil and . . . ahem . . .S – E – X.

It’s interesting to note that Eliphas Levi, the occultist who first sketched the goat of Baphomet that appears on the devil card, didn’t consider the devil to be such a bad dude at all. In fact, he wrote:

“The flame of intelligence shining between his horns is the magic light of the universal balance, the image of the soul elevated above matter, as the flame, whilst being tied to matter, shines above it. “

He actually considered the devil to be a symbol of balance and integration of polar opposites. And there are those elements in the depictions of the devil in the earlier versions of the Tarot.

We see here that the devil is very much hermaphroditic having both breasts and a penis. (As a folk artist I REALLY like the little face on his belly.) We can also see that this devil is much more along the lines of the christian perception of the devil and the two people in the card look much less like humans and much more like imps. Or flying monkeys, maybe.

So what prompted Waite to switch to the Levi version of the devil? Well, you’d probably have to say sex. Or sex, sex, and more sex.

Waite described the humans on the card as being Adam and Eve after they’d been driven out of the garden of eden. “The figures are tailed to signify the animal nature but there is human intelligence in their features . . .”

Their ANIMAL nature! Whoa . . .

We have to keep in mind that Waite was very much a creature of the late Victorian era. Women, for the most part, were still held up as being naturally, “pure,” and sex – if it was discussed at all – was left to the medical books and gentlemens’ clubs. One physician noted that,

“the majority of women (happily for them) are not very much troubled by sexual feeling of any kind. What men are habitually, women are only exceptionally.’

Troubled by sexual feelings . . . how terrible for the men.

And they were TRULY troubled by their sexual feelings. One commonly held belief was that excessive masturbation would inevitably drive you insane. Fortunately, the Victorians were able to respond to this threat rationally and so they manufactured a safe and effective anti-masturbation device for men:

No, I’m not kidding. That’s actually on display at the Science Museum in London and models of it were being sold as late as the 1920s.

So given that background you can understand some of the changes that Waite made to the devil card. Despite his spiffy bat wings the devil is quite obviously a goat, an animal famous for its’ prodigious sexual appetites. The woman in the card is actually standing quite primly, except for being totally naked, and has her little hands pointed outwards in the same pose favored by today’s beauty pageant contestants.

The man, on the other hand, has one hand extended toward the woman and the devil is lighting his tail on FIRE!!! No doubt IN – flaming his base, animalistic, sexual drive. If only the poor guy had an anti-masturbation protector to keep that critter between his legs under control.

Alas, he doesn’t have one and so both he and the poor, normally totally pure woman with a pomegranate tail are CHAINED to the altar of the devil, slaves of their genitals! Well . . . his genitals. The woman has genitals but she doesn’t feel them. Everyone knows that.

Temperance in the Tarot

The meaning of the Temperance card in the Tarot, including definitions for both the upright and reverse positions.

An angel stands on the edge of a placid body of water, one foot on the ground and one foot in the water. She holds a chalice in each hand and is pouring water from one into the other. A shining solar disk is on her forehead and a triangle is emblazoned upon her chest. A road runs off into the distance where a crown glows like the sun just beyond a range of mountains.

Upright: This is one of those cards that’s always sweet to find in your reading. It basically means nothing’s wrong and everything’s right. You’re in the flow and life is good.

This card often appears after the questioner has gone through a difficult phase in life and has earned a period of peace through his or her hard work. It may indicate tranquility in life in general or in specific areas of life such as relationships, work, or home. Look at the surrounding cards for clues.

Above all else, this card talks about balance and peace. Psychologists interpret water as representing emotions in dreams. The angel has one foot in the water and one foot on land, indicating that she can fully indulge in emotions while staying well grounded.

This is not a card of gain, per se. The water being poured from one cup to the other is not increasing, it stays the same. The message is that the questioner has enough just as it is.

Reversed – This may indicate a period of intemperance of some sort. It could be drinking too much, partying too much, working too much, even worrying too much. The key here is to carve out a little time for peaceful reflection and rest. Do some yoga or tai chi. Curl up with a book. Take a bubble bath. Chill.

If you have questions about this card or its meaning in one of your readings, please don’t hesitate to leave a comment. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.

A Few Extra Thoughts About Temperance

Temperance is one of the most under-defined cards in the Major Arcana, so it can be kind of fun to look at. The standard quickie definition is that it stands for moderation which is probably true on a certain level since the card was, indeed, originally named, “Moderation.”

So, if a questioner draws the Temperance card you can just say, “Well, it looks like this is a period of moderation and balance in your life.” If it’s reversed you can just say, “You’re really drinking like a swine, you sot.”

Just kidding.

“You may be overdoing your recreational libations a tiny bit.” There, that’s better.

Aleister Crowley named this card, “Art,” in his Thoth Tarot deck. A trifle puzzling until you realize that he was referring to the art of alchemy. And there is strong symbolism in the card showing the mixing of two different elements in the two chalices just as the alchemists did in their rituals and experiments.

Arthur E. Waite flipped off into some weird place with his definition, stating: “All of the conventional symbols are renounced herein . . . So also are the conventional meanings.”

Okay . . . I’m guessing they didn’t know that the hell to make of it, either.

This particular image – a woman pouring water from one jug to another – was actually all over Europe prior to the first recorded publication of the Tarot.

That might be expected since Temperance is one of the four cardinal virtues of the catholic church. The usual take on it is that the woman is mixing water with wine, thus diluting the effects of alcohol and showing temperance.

But then the Tarot – as usual – does something a little weird with the image. The woman is converted into an angel, even in the very early decks. Why?

My theory – and it’s only a theory – is that the card may refer to another meaning of the word, “temperance.” As in, “to temper.”

If you want to make a metal harder or more flexible you add other metals to it when it’s in a molten state to change the composition of the material. You take it’s basic nature and you add something that changes it but builds on that basic nature without destroying it.

This card might very well refer to the adding of a, “divine element,” to basic human nature.

We’ve all seen the, “ancient aliens,” shows where they expound on the fact that something radical happened at one point in our species history. We share so many of the characteristics of our simian cousins that the link between us and the apes is undeniable. Yet, somehow, sometime, somewhere, something happened that caused us to be entirely different is so many ways. We developed agriculture, art, philosophy, science, religions, etc., etc., etc.

The ancient aliens take on it is that some higher species flew down in their space gizmos and fiddled around with our basic DNA to manipulate us into a more advanced species. Just exactly WHY they did that isn’t quite clear. Maybe they were on a picnic and they were bored.

An equally unprovable theory (which I happen to like better) is that human souls began incarnating in simian bodies and that the DNA changed over time to match the souls. Thus the angel mixing up a fresh brew of whatever is in those two chalices, literally adding a, “divine spark,” to the body of an ape.

Dr. Candace Perk demonstrated that our brains manufacture neuropeptides that match our emotional states and that these bond with receptor cells throughout the body. Without going into too many boring details our emotions literally manufacture our bodies cells and that recurs about every 2 months.

So why couldn’t a Higher Soul in a simian body literally remanufacture it?

It’s an intriguing question. I’d always looked at the road in the background of this card as leading AWAY from the angel and the distant crown as a goal to be achieved through the practice of moderation. But maybe that’s the road that the angel just walked down, from the divine . . . to us.

Sound too weird to be true? Hey . . . Donald Trump is the President of the United States. All weirdness is now on the table.

The Death Card in Tarot

The meaning of the Death card in the Tarot. This includes definitions for the upright and reversed positions.

This is that card that always causes Tarot readers to rush to say, “It doesn’t really mean death. It just says death.”

Doncha feel better now?

Upright: In some of my readings it actually has meant death, but it was a statement after the fact. For instance, Death appeared in my readings for months after my partner died but not before her death. The cards weren’t predicting death, they were just saying, “Okay, someone you loved very much has died and you’re dealing with death.”

In most instances, though, the card indicates a radical, transformative change that is not associated with a physical death. Rather, it indicates that the questioner is saying goodbye to one phase of his or her life which is, “dying away,” and saying hello to a new phase that will be radically different. We’ve all had those turning points in life where we suddenly walked down a totally new path and away from what we were accustomed to and Death presages those turnings.

Still, it’s a spooky, creepy looking card and no matter how much New Age Optimism you throw at it it’s still unsettling. And that’s another aspect of the card: the changes that the questioner is about to go through may not feel at ALL comfortable to begin with. In fact, they may feel downright scary and unsettling at first. They will lead to positive developments, though, so just hang on and work through it.

REVERSED – A lot the same as in the upright position but the changes will probably be more gradual and feel less like the world has been turned upside down. There is a warning that the questioner may be resisting necessary change and this could lead to a life that’s stuck in neutral.

If you have questions about this card or its meaning in one of your readings, please don’t hesitate to leave a comment. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can.

A Few More Thoughts on . . . you know . . . D-E-A-T-H

It’s interesting to note that in the earliest versions of the Tarot the Death card was the only card without a label. It was almost as if they were saying, “It’s him. You know . . . HIM. Don’t mention his name or he might look at us and then we might . . . you know . . . die.”

To a large extent we seem to share that same superstition in 21st century America. It’s cliched but still relevant to point out that we have largely sanitized death in our culture. Most deaths take place in hospitals rather than homes and we let strangers tend to our loved ones bodies after their demise.

Let’s face it: DEATH . . . FREAKS . . . US . . . OUT!

And isn’t that odd?

Death is the most natural thing in the world. Everything that is born dies. As the old blues song says, “No matter how you struggle and strive/you’ll never get out of this world alive.”

As Ram Dass put it,”Death is not an outrage.”

So why is it that we hold it in such awe and fear?

Probably because it puts an end to the little magic act that our ego performs every day. I am immortal. I will go on and on. The entire world revolves around me and my self image and my needs and wants. Hell, even if we CAN envision ourselves as ghosts it’s usually as pretty much the same body we have now only sort of translucent and vaporous.

Only, NOT. Your body is going to be . . . you know . . . D-E-A-D.

Buddhists point out that we all have a craving for permanence and security. It seems to be hard wired into the human Self. We need to feel that we’ll be happy forever. That we’ll be in love forever. That we’ll go on and on in our little homes and tragedy will never touch us. That our loved ones will never die and neither will we.

And then Death comes along and blows all of that into a million pieces. And that causes pain and suffering like we never knew we could endure.

The answer to that suffering seems to be to try to keep an awareness of Death every day. It sounds depressing and dark, but it’s really not. Knowing – truly knowing – in your heart that you have a very limited period of time lets you enjoy each moment. It lets you be aware of how amazingly precious and beautiful your life really is.

Yes, it’s the death of the ego and ego HATES that. But it’s the birth of the Soul. No real awareness of death = no real awareness of life. As Pema Chodron said:

“To be fully alive, fully human, and completely awake is to be continually thrown out of the nest. To live fully is to be always in no-man’s-land, to experience each moment as completely new and fresh. To live is to be willing to die over and over again. ”