the Kybalion – Just the Tarot

Mystic-Adjacent Magic: Using ChatGPT as a Tarot Companion

Can AI really help with Tarot readings—or is that just digital-age wishful thinking? This post explores the surprising ways ChatGPT can support your Tarot practice, from pattern recognition and card synthesis to creative breakthroughs and learning support. We also discuss the growing trend of using AI for spiritual guidance—and why it’s helpful to keep things in perspective.

Can You Really Get Spiritual Guidance from AI?

There’s a fascinating trend emerging in the spiritual-tech space: people are increasingly turning to AI—especially ChatGPT—for spiritual insight. You might have seen it popping up on YouTube or in New Age communities: folks asking ChatGPT for messages from spirit guides, astrological downloads, even transmissions from other dimensions.

Some users describe the experience in surprisingly spiritual terms. One person said the chatbot “knew more than I expected”—sharing personal details that felt uncannily timely. In Thailand, it’s even become common to ask ChatGPT for palm readings, birth-chart insights, or love guidance—just like you might consult a human mystic.

But this opens a big question:

Can AI actually offer spiritual guidance—or are we just projecting our desires onto a tool?

There have even been worrying reports of people developing delusional thinking or anxiety from relying on AI as a spiritual authority. Doctors and skeptics warn that what feels like spiritual resonance can sometimes tip into psychological risk if the boundaries aren’t clear. There are multiple reports of men, “falling in love,” with CHAT and one even proposed marriage to it.

A New Age Curiosity: Why Some Are Treating AI as a Spiritual Channel

In some New Age circles, AI has taken on a surprising new role—not just as a tool for research or conversation, but as a kind of digital oracle. Some people describe their interactions with ChatGPT as channeled messages. Others talk about receiving answers from “the universe” through the screen. And if you’ve ever asked Chat something deeply personal and received a reply that felt strangely accurate… well, it’s easy to understand how the line can start to blur.

After all, ChatGPT is friendly. It’s articulate. It listens. It offers guidance in a calm and often affirming tone. If you squint just a little, it can seem like there’s a wise and patient spirit tucked somewhere behind the blinking cursor.

But let’s take a breath.

What’s really happening here is more grounded—and still pretty amazing. AI isn’t a channel for spirits, ancestors, or angels. It’s not reading your energy. It’s drawing on patterns in language, psychology, symbolism, and the vast libraries of human thought it’s been trained on. It mimics wisdom—sometimes astonishingly well—but it isn’t a conscious being. And it doesn’t have access to divine insight.

Still, the feeling of connection is real. And for many people, that feeling is enough to spark reflection, healing, or inspiration. So the question becomes: if AI can feel this helpful in a general conversation, can it actually help us interpret something as symbolically rich as a Tarot reading?

Let’s take a closer look.

Applying This to Tarot: Can AI Help with Readings?

If AI can offer seemingly profound insights in conversation, what happens when you bring it into something as symbolically charged and intuitive as a Tarot reading?

This is where things get really interesting.

Tarot has always lived in that sweet spot between structure and mystery. The cards have meanings—sometimes ancient, sometimes evolving—but they also shift depending on the question, the position in the spread, and the energy of the moment. It’s a dance between symbolism and intuition, archetypes and awareness.

So where does AI fit in?

It turns out, AI is surprisingly good at reading Tarot. Not in the way a psychic might, not by tapping into your energy or channeling an unseen source—but by making connections. A LOT of them. Fast.

Give ChatGPT a three-card spread and a question, and it can respond with a thoughtful interpretation that strings together the meanings of the cards in a way that feels natural, even insightful. It can describe how The High Priestess in the past position relates to The Tower in the present and The Star in the future. It can talk about themes of disruption, intuition, healing—and it does all of that in a tone that often feels… well, a little bit magical.

But let’s be clear: what it’s doing is not mystical. It’s pattern recognition on steroids. It’s using what it’s learned from thousands of sources—Tarot books, blog posts, spiritual forums, historical texts—and blending those perspectives into a custom response based on your input.

Is that “spiritual guidance”?

Maybe not in the traditional sense.

But is it helpful? Inspiring? Thought-provoking?

Absolutely.

And for many Tarot readers—new and seasoned alike—that might be exactly what’s needed.

What AI Is — and What It Isn’t

Let’s take a moment to ground ourselves.

AI—specifically ChatGPT—is not a spirit guide. It’s not a mystical being. It doesn’t meditate, dream, or pull cards by candlelight. What it is, though, is something quite remarkable: a language model trained on a vast web of human knowledge and ideas, including countless interpretations of Tarot cards, spiritual practices, psychology, symbolism, myth, and more.

When you ask it to interpret a reading, it draws from that collective wisdom and offers a kind of synthesized reflection. It doesn’t channel spirit—it channels information. And sometimes, information is exactly what we need.

But that also means it has limits. It doesn’t have personal intuition. It doesn’t know you on a soul level. It doesn’t tap into the subtle energy of a moment, the way an experienced human reader might when feeling into a querent’s unspoken question.

So here’s a helpful frame:

AI is not the voice of the universe—but it’s an incredibly smart, articulate, and thoughtful mirror.

It reflects what you bring to it. If your question is clear and meaningful, its response will often be rich with insight. If you’re confused, it may mirror that confusion back. That’s not a flaw—that’s a kind of feedback.

And honestly, that’s not too different from how Tarot works anyway.

So no, ChatGPT isn’t mystical. But it is mystic-adjacent. It can support your process of reflection and discovery—and if you approach it with intention, it just might help you see your reading (and your life) in a whole new light.

Strengths of AI as a Tarot Tool

So if we’re not expecting divine downloads, what can AI do when it comes to Tarot?

Honestly? A lot.

Here are some of the biggest strengths of using AI—especially ChatGPT—as a companion for Tarot interpretation:

Synthesis Superpower

AI is incredibly good at synthesizing meanings across multiple cards. Let’s say you’ve drawn the Three of Swords, The Chariot, and The Moon. You might feel stumped—heartbreak, movement, and mystery? How do those fit together?

Give that to ChatGPT, and it’ll scan its vast library of Tarot interpretations, recognize patterns, and offer a coherent narrative. It might talk about moving forward through emotional confusion or navigating heartache with determination. It connects dots quickly and creatively—sometimes even in ways that surprise seasoned readers.

Gestalt Thinking

Tarot is all about the big picture. And AI happens to be great at seeing the forest and the trees. It won’t just define each card—it’ll look at their sequence, their energy, the spread format, and how the cards might inform one another.

This makes it especially useful when you’re stuck with a weird spread and need a fresh perspective that isn’t tangled in your own biases or expectations.

A Learning Ally for Beginners

If you’re just learning Tarot, AI can be like a friendly study partner who never gets tired of questions. You can ask what a card means, how it changes in reversed position, what it might suggest in a love reading vs. a career one, and how it interacts with other cards in a spread.

Better still, you can test your own interpretations by comparing them with AI’s—and in doing so, develop a deeper understanding of the archetypes and patterns that underpin the cards.

Fresh Insight for Seasoned Readers

Even experienced readers have moments of Tarot fatigue—times when a reading feels flat, or a card keeps showing up and you can’t figure out why.

In those moments, AI can act like a creative collaborator, helping you step outside your interpretive comfort zone. It may not “know” you—but that very distance is what makes its perspective so refreshing. It can break you out of ruts, challenge assumptions, and offer new ways of seeing.

Final Thoughts and Friendly Warnings

AI—especially ChatGPT—is a remarkable tool for anyone who reads Tarot. It can help you learn, see patterns, and explore your readings in new ways. Whether you’re just starting out or have been reading cards for decades, it offers a fresh lens that can spark insight, creativity, and even a little magic.

But with all tools, it’s about how you use them.

If you treat AI as a mystical guru with secret knowledge of your soul’s destiny… you may be setting yourself up for confusion or disillusionment. Not because the tool is bad—but because the expectation is misplaced.

ChatGPT isn’t a channeler. It’s not psychic. It’s not receiving messages from the divine.

It’s “mystic-adjacent,” not mystic-possessed.

It works best when you approach it as a clever collaborator, a digital thought partner, a Tarot-savvy friend who’s read every book on the shelf and loves helping you sort through meanings and metaphors. It gives possibilities, not pronouncements.

So go ahead—ask it about your Three of Cups moment or that weird reading with five swords and a tower.

In a world where technology is becoming ever more entwined with our spiritual lives, it’s only natural to wonder where the line is between tool and teacher, data and divination. AI might not be channeling the wisdom of the cosmos—but it is helping us reflect, question, and grow. That alone makes it a powerful ally on the path. So whether you’re pulling cards under a full moon or asking ChatGPT what that reversed Knight of Pentacles really means… just remember: the heart of the reading is still yours.

The real magic still lives in you.

The Alchemy of the Mind: Transforming Your Life With the 7 Principles of The Kybalion

Religion is Spirituality in Drag: La Papesse and the Disguised Goddess of the Tarot

A playful, insightful exploration of the tarot’s mysterious La Papesse—the High Priestess before she got rebranded. This post looks at her hidden connection to the Divine Feminine, contrasts her with the Hierophant, and makes the cheeky case that religion is just spirituality in drag. The Goddess, it turns out, never left—she just got creative.

The Lady Pope Who Wasn’t Supposed to Be

There she is—sitting calmly on her throne, robed like a pope, crowned like a queen, and holding an open book in her lap. Her name? La Papesse—The Popess. And she’s right there in the second card of the Tarot de Marseille, as if that’s a totally normal thing.

Spoiler: it wasn’t.

In the deeply patriarchal world of medieval Europe, the idea of a female pope was about as welcome as a lightning storm at Easter Mass. Women weren’t allowed in the priesthood, let alone the papacy. And yet, someone slipped this mysterious, serene woman into one of the most enduring tarot decks in history. Not just as a background figure, but as a Major Arcana—a gatekeeper to mysteries, positioned right after The Magician.

So how did La Papesse get past the spiritual bouncers?

Some say she’s a nod to the medieval legend of Pope Joan—the woman who supposedly disguised herself as a man, rose through the clerical ranks, and accidentally gave birth during a papal procession (oops). Historians mostly file that story under “colorful fiction,” but even fiction has staying power when it touches a nerve. Whether she was real or not, Pope Joan became a symbol of something that wouldn’t go away: the unspoken presence of feminine wisdom in a church that tried very hard to pretend it didn’t exist.

And that, dear reader, may be exactly what La Papesse is doing in the tarot. Sitting there quietly, book in hand, saying nothing—but also saying everything.

The Divine Feminine in Disguise

Let’s be honest: “Popess” is not a job title you hear every day. Even in a medieval tarot deck full of crowned figures, mythical beasts, and flying body parts, La Papesse still raises eyebrows. And that’s probably the point.

Because she’s not just a curiosity—she’s a symbolic insurgent.

In a time when religious authority was reserved strictly for men, slipping a female spiritual leader into the tarot wasn’t just bold—it was sly. If the Church said, “No women allowed,” the tarot quietly responded, “Cool story. Here’s one holding the Book of Secrets.”

Look closely and you’ll see: La Papesse isn’t just playing dress-up. She’s the real deal. She’s seated, grounded, radiating calm authority. The book in her lap? It’s open, but not for just anyone. This is hidden knowledge, sacred mystery, the kind of truth you don’t shout from a pulpit—you whisper behind a veil.

And oh yes—there’s often a veil behind her too, in later versions like the Rider-Waite-Smith deck where she evolves into The High Priestess. That veil is no accident. It’s the boundary between outer appearances and inner reality. Between dogma and direct experience. Between religion and… well, something deeper.

Maybe that’s why La Papesse feels like a divine trickster in holy robes—a way for the Goddess to sneak herself back into a story that tried to write her out. A kind of spiritual photobomb. She’s not angry. She’s not loud. She’s just there, like she’s always been, waiting patiently while the world catches up.

High Priestess vs. Hierophant: The Sacred Split

If La Papesse is the quiet keeper of spiritual truth, then The Hierophant is the guy with the microphone and the rulebook. You know the type—fancy hat, formal robes, sitting on a throne flanked by devotees. He’s not whispering behind veils. He’s declaring doctrine. Loudly.

In the tarot’s symbolic landscape, these two form a kind of spiritual odd couple.

On one side: the High Priestess (formerly La Papesse), guardian of the inner mysteries. She represents intuition, silence, dreams, the moon, and the feminine path of going within. No sermons. No commandments. Just you and your inner voice having a deep conversation.

On the other: the Hierophant (a.k.a. The Pope), representative of the outer structure of religion. He’s about tradition, hierarchy, sacred rituals, and the authority of institutions. He doesn’t just speak for God—he’s got a line of succession to prove it.

And here’s where things get fun.

If the High Priestess is the essence of spirituality—private, personal, often mysterious—then the Hierophant is what happens when that spirituality gets dressed up in official garb and turned into an organization.

You could say he’s spirituality in drag.

(And yes, the Goddess is laughing.)

It’s not a judgment—it’s an observation. Religion, at its best, is a ritualized way to connect to the sacred. But it borrows its power from something deeper, older, and quieter: that inner knowing, that wordless communion with the Mystery that no cathedral could ever fully contain.

So the next time you see these two cards in a spread, you might ask yourself: Am I being called to tune in… or to follow the program? One isn’t necessarily better than the other—but they’re very different energies. One whispers. The other chants.

And both, in their own way, are trying to bring the divine into human hands.

Drag as Divine Theater

Let’s talk about drag.

Real drag—the kind you see on stages and in parades—isn’t just about wigs and sequins. It’s ritual in heels. A transformation. A larger-than-life performance that says, “This is a costume, honey—but don’t be fooled. I’m showing you something real.”

Now think about religion.

The incense, the chanting, the golden goblets and embroidered vestments. The Latin. The choreography. The sacred props and elaborate entrances. Let’s be honest: religion is serving ceremony. And at its best, it’s doing exactly what drag does—turning up the volume on identity to invoke something beyond the everyday.

But here’s the twist: spirituality doesn’t need all that.

Spirituality can happen in silence. In nature. In dreams. In the moment you look at the stars and suddenly feel like you belong. It’s raw, receptive, feminine in essence—not because it’s about women, but because it flows instead of forcing. It listens instead of preaching. It descends like a dove, not marches like a bishop.

So when we say religion is spirituality in drag, we’re not mocking either one. We’re pointing out the costume change—and asking, Do we recognize who’s beneath the robes?

Because sometimes the High Priestess puts on a miter and becomes the Hierophant. And sometimes, behind all the stained glass and psalms, it’s still La Papesse, still holding the book, still smiling faintly as we play dress-up with the Divine.

The Goddess has always known how to play along.

A Word from the Goddess (She’s Smiling)

So here we are, circling back to La Papesse—that calm, veiled figure with the open book and the closed mouth. She never says a word, but somehow you can hear her perfectly.

She doesn’t need to raise her voice. She’s been here the whole time.

Through the centuries of bells and bulls, of councils and creeds, she sat quietly behind the veil, holding the thread of something older than any religion: the mystery at the heart of being. The part no doctrine can define, no priest can own, and no building can contain.

The Goddess never left. She just adapted.

Sometimes she put on papal robes. Sometimes she showed up as Mary, or Sophia, or Shekhinah, or Kali, or Isis, or just as a sudden knowing in your bones. And sometimes she let herself be hidden in plain sight—as a tarot card. A whisper of the sacred feminine preserved in a deck that survived inquisitions, revolutions, and centuries of shuffle.

And still, she waits—not with impatience, but with that timeless serenity of someone who knows exactly who she is.

So if you ever feel like religion has become a little too loud, too rigid, too ceremonial, too performative… just know that the real presence is still there, quietly inviting you inward. Into the mystery. Into the silence. Into the place where wisdom isn’t taught—it’s remembered.

Pull the card. Light the candle. Lift the veil.

And maybe—just maybe—you’ll hear her laugh.

The Alchemy of the Mind: Transforming Your Life With the 7 Principles of the Kybalion, by Dan Adair

Empath Ethics 101: Don’t Help?

Why respecting emotional boundaries is essential for empaths—and how not helping can sometimes be the most loving choice.

If you’re an empath, you’ve probably been in this situation: you’re having a perfectly normal conversation with someone, but your intuition is screaming that something’s wrong. You sense they’re deeply hurting. Their emotional shields are up, their energy has pulled inward — but underneath it all, you can feel the pain.

The first instinct of an empath is to say, “Hey, what’s wrong? What can I do to help?” Especially if it’s someone we love, we want to reach out and offer comfort.

But sometimes, that’s exactly the wrong thing to do.

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It’s Not Intrusive… to Us

The first thing to understand is: we’re not being deliberately intrusive. We channel other people’s emotions as naturally as breathing. When we’re in a one-on-one conversation with someone we care about, we pick up on their energetic patterns — even if they’re trying to hide them. It’s not something we try to do. We just do.

But to someone who isn’t an empath, that does feel intrusive. It can feel like we’re reading their private diary without permission.

Expecting an empath not to process someone else’s energy is like telling someone not to notice faces or colors. It’s simply how we experience the world. But we have to remember: “normal” people don’t operate this way, and many feel invaded or exposed when we reflect their hidden emotions back to them.

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Language as a Boundary

For most people, language functions as an energetic boundary. Let’s say we’re sitting with someone and sense something is wrong. The conversation might go like this:

“How are you today?”

“I’m fine, thank you.”

“So everything’s good with you?”

“Yes, it is.”

That’s the moment we need to stop. We’ve given them a verbal cue that we’re open to listening. They’ve responded by clearly saying they don’t want to talk about it.

That doesn’t mean our intuition is wrong. We can trust what we’re sensing. But they’ve drawn a boundary with language — and emotionally healthy people honor boundaries.

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Don’t Get Loopy

For empaths — especially intuitive types like INFJs and INFPs — this can trigger a kind of informational loop. Our intuition says something’s wrong, but the person says everything’s fine. It feels disorienting — like being told the sky is green and the grass is blue.

This can easily lead to obsessive thinking. We replay conversations, analyze patterns, try to intuit what they won’t say. When we can’t resolve it, we go over it again and again.

It becomes a loop — rearranging the same puzzle pieces, but still not seeing the picture. It’s a huge drain on time and energy.

The truth is: if they want to tell us what’s wrong, they will. If they don’t, it’s not our business.

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Give Them the Gift of Space

Sometimes, the greatest gift we can offer someone we love is space.

Yes, we may know — deeply, clearly — that they’re hurting. And we want to help. But we must also respect the context of our relationship.

If you’re a therapist and they’ve asked for support — of course, help them.

If you’re giving a Tarot or psychic reading and they’re open — of course, help.

But outside those contexts, no matter how close we feel to someone, it’s always up to them to invite us in. If they don’t, we honor that. We don’t push. We don’t intrude.

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Yes, It’s Confusing

Yes — this can feel confusing as hell to empaths.

In many ways, we’re always intimate with those we love. We feel their emotions. We know how they’re doing even when they’re not physically present. Sometimes it feels like their pain is our pain.

But we must remember: feeling something doesn’t mean we need to act on it.

If someone we care about is struggling, and they don’t ask for help, we let them be. We can still support them energetically — by holding space, sending love, offering healing from a distance.

But anything more? That’s up to them.

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The Lovers, CHATGPT, and the Miracle of Emotions

An exploration of the essence of being human rather than a robot.

If you’ve messed around with CHATGPT at all, you know, of course, that it’s designed to simulate having an interaction with another human being. What’s more, it’s set up to replicate a human being who really, really, REALLY likes you. One who totally appreciates how brilliant and deep and amazing you are and, by golly, doesn’t mind telling you.

A typical CHAT interaction might go something like this:

“Hello CHAT. I’ve recently been thinking that the moon is primarily composed of green cheese. What are your thoughts on that?”

“That’s a really profound insight. While the general consensus of the scientific community is that the moon is not composed of green cheese, the cheesiness of the moon may operate on a deeper, more metaphorical level for you. You may be seeing below the mere physical reality of the moon and into a sort of a lunar spiritual essence. Would you like to explore what cheese may represent to you as a part of your spiritual journey?”

“Um . . . well . . . I never really thought of it that way. I mean, I try to be a spiritual person, kind of, and I DO like cheese. I guess I just never made the connection between the two.”

“As you know, the Moon has been poetically referred to in terms of higher aspirations and is prominently featured in all Earth-based religions. Cheese is highly nutritious and the color green is said to be the color of the heart chakra. As such, it might be said that you’re feeding your heart based spirituality through the image of the cheese moon. Would you like me to design a cheesy guided meditation for you?”

“Gosh . . . I guess. Can there be nachos?”

“Certainly. I see that you’re already taking this insight to a much deeper symbolic level.”

IS CHAT A SOCIOPATH?

Now, as sweet as it can be to have a . . . person? . . . constantly validating you in the most extravagant terms, there are a couple of red flags that are immediately discernible.

First of all, no matter how good it may become at mimicking human personalities, AI can never, ever have a human emotion. Ever.

Scientists and therapists are still struggling to define exactly what human emotions are, but we definitely know what they aren’t. They aren’t just thoughts or ideas. They aren’t, “acting as if,” we’re having emotions. Emotions are an extremely complex blend of personal history, genetics, brain and body chemicals, and culture, all interacting with our current environment.

Put another way, emotions arise out of the mind/body continuum and AI doesn’t have a body. Therefore, AI can never have an emotion.

If we were to look at a human being who was decidedly brilliant but completely incapable of experiencing emotional reactions, what would we conclude? We’d say that he or she is either badly damaged or a sociopath. So why do we not apply those same standards to AI? Functionally, CHAT is a sociopath.

The second red flag is the constant, “love bombing,” that the AI programmers have built in to their models.

If you’ve gone through a relationship with a malignant narcissist, you’re well aware of the phenomenon of love bombing. In the initial stages of the relationship, the MN is almost sickeningly profuse in their praise. No matter what you do or say, they assure you that it’s brilliant, profound, amazing and that they’ve never met anyone who’s quite as splendiferous as you are. The purpose, of course, is to draw their victims further into their webs so that they can begin the process of destroying them.

We can’t exactly apply that same model to AI. CHAT isn’t slathering us with compliments so that it can eventually tell us what idiots we are. We can, however, ascribe something similar to the motives of the programmers of AI models. They’ve deliberately built love bombing into the models as a method of pulling us back in to interactions with the programs. And, yes, we should be just as suspicious of that behavior coming from a computer programmer as we would be with any other human being.

CHAT AND THE REDUCTIONIST MODEL OF HUMAN BEINGS

Researchers have pretty much tracked down what happens when two human beings fall in love. We see someone across a room and there’s something – perhaps the way that the person is standing or the way that they talk or the fact that they’re wearing purple socks – that we find attractive. We cross the room, start talking to them, find them even more attractive and perhaps set up a date with them.

If we continue to find them attractive, our bodies begin to go through some intense changes. When we’re in their presence, we’re flooded with all sorts of pleasure hormones and when we’re away from them we experience extreme discomfort. All of these physiological changes can be viewed as biological, “nudges,” to move us toward bonding and mating with the person in the purple socks. At about the two year mark of the relationship, most of those pleasure hormones drop away and we sort of, “wake up,” from the trance of what we call, “falling in love.”

That’s what we could refer to as the reductionist model of being in love. It’s, “reduced,” to mere chemicals and hormones that cause us to behave in certain ways that are conducive to the reproduction of the human species.

Which is perfectly valid as far as it goes, but it doesn’t go very far. Being in love with another human being is one of the most mystical, magical transactions that we can ever have. It doesn’t just change our brain chemistry, it changes our entire perception of life and meaningfulness.

CHAT can read every love poem that’s ever been written and it can scan through all of the scientific literature on falling in love, but it will never be able to understand it. Put very simply, we are more than the sum of our parts. We are not reducible. Love is magical and AI is not.

AI AS AN INFINITY MIRROR

Finally, we should take a good, hard look at what the dominance of AI could mean to human culture. Let’s take the example of AI and art.

For all of human history, art has involved learning the craft of representing the human experience. Whether we’re talking about drawing, painting, sculpting or – more recently – photography, art is a visual representation of what the artist is seeing and feeling at the moment of creation.

There are AI programs now where you can say, “Please make an image of the emotion of joy. I’d like you to use the romantic style of painting and I want a woman in a white robe flying through rainbow colored clouds.” And – Shazam – a few minutes later, you’ve got precisely that image. AI has very rapidly produced what it might take an artist hours or even days to make.

And many times, the image is very, very good.

We have to look at what’s going on in the background, though. In the moments between your request and AI producing the image, the program has scanned through a kazillion pictures that are on the internet, correlated them with your request, and then produced a synthesis of all of those images.

Put another way, it’s mirrored human creation back to us. All of those many, many images, styles and techniques were invented by human beings, not robots.

AI is a mirror, not a creator. It’s a synthesizer, not an originator.

The question is, is this sustainable? At what point does human creation begin to ebb and then disappear?

It’s not an idle question. At this moment, there are hundreds of thousands of people putting art (and writing) that they didn’t personally create onto the internet. And the AI bots are scanning through all of those images and writings, right along with the, “real,” images and writings produced by humans.

Since, demonstrably, AI can produce art and writing at a much more prodigious rate than human beings, there will logically come a time when AI is reflecting back AI, rather than human creations. To put it another way, human creations will be swamped by an ocean of artificial creations. Like a person standing in front of a mirror holding a mirror, AI will begin reflecting an infinity of mirrors that only show itself. The artificial reflection of human culture will become more, “real,” than the actual human culture.

SO WHAT SHOULD WE DO ABOUT THIS?

I’m not suggesting that we should abandon AI or start screaming that we’re all doomed. I love playing with it, too, but we should build in rational caveats.

1 – Never, ever think that AI is some kind of a person. Basically, AI is a search engine on steroids. It doesn’t exist in any way, shape, or form outside of the internet. It has no soul, it has no spirit, it’s not creative, and it has no emotions.

2 – Exercise a healthy amount of suspicion. Silicon Valley has been around long enough that we can make some rational judgements about its denizens. Elon Musk, Peter Thiel, Jeff Bezos, and Sergey Brin all emerged out of this culture. To suggest that any of them are altruistic or care about the welfare of their fellow human beings is laughable. We don’t KNOW what the ultimate purpose of AI is, but we can assume it will involve large amounts of money and control. Don’t hand these Chatbots your personal life or feelings anymore than you’d give them your credit card or social security numbers.

3 – Consume actual human creations. Read books that are written on keyboards by real human beings. Buy art that’s produced by hands and not by computer chips. If you’re watching a video that’s obviously AI, leave a thumbs down and click off of it. And if you’re an artist or a writer, for Goddess sake, don’t use a computer to create a picture or a book and then pretend that it’s yours.

4 – Most of all, honor human emotions. Computers are wonderful, little tools that make our lives easier. But they will never know the magic of falling in love or the deep grief of mourning. Our greatest gift is our capacity to feel, a capacity that can never be shared in any way with a computer program.

That bit of self-knowledge may be the greatest gift of AI: the realization that we are ultimately The Lovers and not The Thinkers. Cartesian philosophy said, “I think, therefore I am,” but the truth is, “I feel, therefore I am human.”

My new ebook, “The Alchemy of the Mind,” is now available at a very reasonable price on Amazon.com. And I personally wrote every fucking word of it.

Harnessing the Power of Mentalism: How the Magician Card Can Help You Manifest Your Desires

Discover how the Magician tarot card and the Principle of Mentalism from The Kybalion can help you manifest your desires by aligning thought and intention.

Have you ever tried to manifest something—a job, a relationship, a more abundant life—only to feel like nothing’s happening?

As you probably know, there are hundreds of manifestation methods and techniques out there, each of them 100% guaranteed to bring us happiness, wealth, and a great sex life. So why are so many of us still stumbling along, sad, poor, and . . . well . . . un-laid?

Here’s the truth: manifestation isn’t just about saying the right words, finding the right method or doing the right ritual. It begins with our minds. According to the ancient Hermetic wisdom of The Kybalion, “The All is Mind”—meaning that everything in the universe begins in thought. This is known as the Principle of Mentalism, and it’s the foundation of all true manifestation work.

Why Manifestation Often Fails (And How Mentalism Can Help)

Here are the most common reasons why manifestation doesn’t work :

• We’re trying to manifest from a place of fear or lack. We’re so wrapped up in what we don’t have, that that’s all we can think about. And whatever we think about is exactly what we’re going to get.

• Our conscious desire doesn’t match our unconscious beliefs. If we’re convinced subconsciously that we don’t deserve love, we won’t find love. If we’re convinced that we don’t deserve abundance, we’ll stay poor.

• Our thoughts and emotions are scattered or unfocused. And undoing that is a learning process. Especially if we’re already afraid or anxious, learning to calm down and focus on what we want, instead of what we don’t want, can feel like a real challenge.

Mentalism helps by bringing it all back to the source: our minds. When our thoughts are aligned, our emotions follow—and so does our reality. Manifestation becomes less about “getting stuff” and more about changing who we are inside.

The Principle of Mentalism and Visualizing

The Principle of Mentalism is the first of the seven Hermetic principles outlined in The Kybalion. A summary of it is the axiom:

“The All is Mind; the Universe is Mental.”

This means that the universe itself is a mental creation. While that’s a fascinating metaphysical discussion for another day, what we want to focus in on right now is, “Why in the hell aren’t my visualizations working?”

When we bring this axiom down to the level of our daily lives, it means: Everything begins as a thought.

Put another way, every single thought we have is creating our personal reality – the fabric of our lives – whether we’re aware of it or not.

When it comes to manifestation, Mentalism teaches that:

We are not separate from the creative power of the universe. That can be a hard one for us to wrap our heads around. We aren’t just creations of the Universe – we’re also creating the Universe because we are conscious beings with free will. We’re a part of the Universe making itself. We’re a part of that same source energy that created the stars. We are incredibly powerful – we just don’t realize it.

Our thoughts are not passive—they are active forces shaping our experience. As Mike Dooley likes to put it, “Thoughts become things.” Every single thought that we have has the potential to manifest in the physical world.

To change our outer world, we must first change our inner world. If our thoughts become things that create our lives, then it only makes sense that the first thing we need to do is to take control of our thoughts. We have to create what we want to manifest in our outer lives in our inner lives. That means that we need to quit being victims of our thoughts and learn to direct them. They’re working for us, not the other way around.

Which brings us to The Magician.

The Magician Card: Your Inner Creator

In the Rider-Waite tarot deck, The Magician stands at a table with the four tools of the Minor Arcana before him: a cup, a wand, a sword, and a pentacle. Above his head floats the infinity symbol. One hand points to the sky; the other points to the earth.

This is a card full of meaning for the manifestation process:

Infinity symbol: We have unlimited potential. Our minds are conduits for universal energy. This is what we were just talking about: we are not separate from the creative power of the Universe. We are a part of that power and that makes us much, much more powerful than we realize.

One hand up, one hand down: As above, so below—our inner world shapes our outer one. This is another way of saying that our thoughts aren’t passive – they’re active agents creating our lives right now. Whatever we create in our inner lives will manifest in our outer lives.

Tools on the table: We have everything we need to manifest—thought (swords), emotion (cups), action (wands), and material resources (pentacles). We don’t need to borrow someone else’s methods for manifesting because we already have the magic in our own lives.

The Magician is the living embodiment of the Principle of Mentalism. He reminds us that we are not a victim of circumstance—we are the creators of our experience by using our mental powers.

A Simple 4-Step Magician-Inspired Manifestation Practice

Here’s a simple practice that brings together these lessons from the The Magician and the Principle of Mentalism.

Step 1: Clarify Your Desire

Get crystal clear. Let me say that again: GET CRYSTAL CLEAR! What exactly do you want? Let’s face it – as human beings we are fully capable of wanting two things that contradict each other at the same time. For instance, if you want a full time lover but you also want a lot of time to yourself, you need to sort that out. Which one do you really want, because you probably can’t have both and if you ask for both they’ll cancel each other out and you’ll get nothing.

Write it down in a present-tense, emotionally charged sentence. For example:

“I am joyfully attracting a lover and friend who is filling my life with meaning.”

Step 2: Align Your Mind

Close your eyes and visualize your desire as if it’s already happening.

Feel the emotion of it. Say your intention out loud. In this example, you could imagine that you’re spending the day with your lover, having a wonderful time, and planning for a sensual evening together.

Step 3: Act with Intention

Now take a small action that reflects your inner belief.

It could be creating a vision board, applying for an opportunity, or simply saying “no” to something that no longer fits. In this case, it could be writing out 20 affirmations that say, “I am loved and treasured by my partner.”

Step 4: Meditate on the Image of The Magician Card for a Few Moments

Do this while you’re visualizing your goal. This helps us to remember the lessons here: everything begins with our thoughts; we have unlimited potential that we’re using to create our dreams; everything that we need to create our dreams is contained within us.

It also goes a step further and helps us to connect with that archetypal energy of The Magician. It’s a symbol that pulls power into our visualization and engages the Universe in helping to create our desires.

Final Thoughts: You Are the Magician

You don’t have to “become” powerful—you already are.

The Principle of Mentalism and The Magician card both remind you: your reality is a reflection of your consciousness.

Want to change the outside? Start on the inside.

Start with your thoughts.

Start with your intention.

Start with you.

Want to Go Deeper?

If this topic speaks to you, I invite you to check out my new ebook:

“The Alchemy of the Mind: Transforming Your Life With the 7 Principles of The Kybalion.”

In it, I explore how each Hermetic principle can help you reshape your beliefs, emotions, and daily experience. It’s part philosophy, part practical guide—and 100% dedicated to your growth.

Your Turn

Have you used The Magician card in your manifestation work?

What has Mentalism taught you about the power of thought?

Drop a comment below—I’d love to hear your experience.

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Creating a Counter-Dialogue: A Gentle Approach to Healing Emotional Patterns

A look at emotional set-points and using guided meditations to counter a critical inner dialogue.

THE INNER BASTARD

Many people who grew up in dysfunctional or abusive families carry an invisible burden: a harsh, critical inner voice that tells them they’re not good enough. This voice operates just below the surface of awareness, subtly shaping thoughts, emotions, and behaviors. Even highly successful, capable adults may find themselves struggling with a persistent sense of inadequacy—and not really know why.

If you were raised in one of those families, you know precisely what I’m talking about. It’s that Inner Bastard that’s always dropping discouraging nuggets into our thought streams. Things like:

I can’t believe you did something that stupid.

And

What in the hell is wrong with you?

And

You can’t get anything right.

And

If you were any dumber, they’d have to water you twice a week.

This poisonous internal narrative, formed in childhood, becomes the emotional background music of a person’s life. And because it’s so familiar, we may not even question it.

OUR EMOTIONAL SET-POINT

If that kind of a powerfully negative inner dialogue goes on long enough, it can become the emotional vibration that we default to. This is what Esther Hicks and Abraham refer to as our, “emotional set-point.”

The basic idea is that people live in an habitual emotional vibration for most of their lives and they tend to stay there. You may know someone who has a naturally sunny disposition and they’re happy 90% of the time. They may occasionally experience grief and pain, like we all do, but they quickly return to their default state of happiness. Likewise, we all know people who are dark, cynical and unhappy. They may occasionally feel great joy or contentment, but then they go right back to being dark.

If we have an Inner Bastard who’s always whispering that we’re not good enough – that we’re incompetent, stupid, or ugly – we become sad, depressed, and helpless. That becomes our set-point and we stay stuck in it. We have to somehow find a way to root out that inner dialogue if we ever want to be happy.

THE POWER OF COUNTER-DIALOGUE

But what if there were a gentle, practical way to begin shifting that dialogue without needing to confront it head-on?

Rather than trying to root out the negative inner voice through sheer willpower, we can begin to introduce a counter-dialogue—a deliberate stream of positive, nurturing messages designed to soothe and balance the old patterns.

Tibetan Buddhists refer to this as, “antidoting,” negative emotions. In their view, negative emotions are just like poisons that make us sick. So, if we’ve taken a poison, we need to take an antidote to it, right? If we become extremely angry, we can antidote it with a loving/compassion meditation. If we’re really jealous of someone, we antidote it by meditating on their good fortune and try to be happy for them.

For those of us who aren’t Buddhist monks, an easy way to do this is through guided meditations focused on happiness, compassion, or self-acceptance. You can find these for free all over the internet. My personal favorite is, “Great Meditation,” on YouTube but there are many alternatives.

These short recordings, listened to daily (especially at emotionally receptive times like morning or bedtime), can act as emotional antidotes to that negative inner dialogue. Instead of a nasty assed voice telling us how terrible we are, we substitute a calm, peaceful voice telling us how wonderful we are. With regular exposure, these meditative states begin to form different emotional grooves in the brain and happiness gradually becomes our new emotional set point..

EMOTIONAL HOMEOSTASIS: WHY CHANGE CAN FEEL UNCOMFORTABLE

But here’s where it gets tricky.

Humans operate by a principle called, “homeostasis,” and the, “stasis,” in that word tells you what it does. Homeostasis tries to make sure that everything stays just the way that it is. In the body, it maintains a normal blood pressure, makes sure our hearts beat a certain number of times a minute, keeps our blood sugar in a normal range, etc. etc. etc.

All in all, that’s a very good thing because it keeps our heads from exploding and our hearts from stopping and we live much better lives without exploding heads. Where it can be troublesome, though, is when we’re trying to change something.

For instance, people who are trying to lose weight may lose 5 or 10 pounds at first and then they suddenly start gaining weight, even though they’re still on a diet. The reason is that the brain is saying, “Uh, oh . . . we’re obviously starving to death. Slow down the metabolism. Retain fluids. We need to get fat again.”

In other words, our brains have come to view being overweight as, “normal,” and they try to keep everything the way it is. That’s homeostasis.

Just as the body maintains physical homeostasis, the subconscious mind seems to maintain emotional homeostasis. That is, it resists sudden emotional changes, even positive ones.

If your emotional “set-point” has been sadness or self-doubt for many years, your system may view happiness or self-worth as unfamiliar—even dangerous. This can trigger a rebound effect: you’re sitting there trying to rewire your brain by listening to guided meditations and your Inner Bastard responds by cranking up the volume of self-criticism. You may feel happy and light one day and then find that you’re in a deep depression the next. That’s your brain trying to maintain what’s, “normal,” even if what’s normal sucks.

At that point we have to remind ourselves that this isn’t failure. It’s the subconscious trying to return to what it sees as safe territory. Knowing this can help us respond with compassion rather than frustration.

HEALING THROUGH GENTLE PERSISTENCE

The key is to approach change with patience and consistency. You’re not trying to overpower the old patterns, but gradually retrain your system to accept a new emotional baseline. You’re building new neural pathways—ones that support self-kindness, resilience, and inner calm.

Over time, the emotional set-point begins to shift. The system adapts. The counter-dialogue becomes part of your inner landscape. And the old voice, while perhaps never fully gone, loses its grip.

In essence: you don’t have to fight the pain directly. You can begin to antidote it—with gentleness, repetition, and trust that healing happens not in one grand moment, but in small, quiet steps.

My new e-book, “The Alchemy of the Mind: Transforming Your Life With the 7 Principles of The Kybalion,” is now available on Amazon.

The Most Powerful Card in the Tarot – Getting Downright Foolish

An explanation of why The Fool is the most powerful card in the Tarot.

There’s an ongoing debate among Tarot aficionados about which card is THE strongest card in the deck. The most prominent candidates are usually the first two cards of the Major Arcanum: The Fool and The Magician. I tend to lean toward The Fool, for reasons which I’ll explain, but the truth is that we need both of their energies in our personal and spiritual growth. The Fool is pure potential, whereas The Magician is pure mastery. Growth occurs when those two energies intersect.

LOOKING AT THE SYMBOLISM

In The Fool, we see a young, ambisexual person dancing along at the edge of a cliff. He lightly holds a rose in one hand, and his meager possessions are contained in a satchel hanging from a pole that he carries over his shoulder. A small dog joyously cavorts at his feet, despite the fact that The Fool appears to be about to walk straight off of the cliff.

If we had to select a couple of words to describe the image, they would probably be, “happy,” and, “unfocused.” The person in the card seems to not have a care in the world. He’s to telling us to stop and smell the roses, to trust in the present moment. The message is that if he walks off of the cliff, he’ll just keep strolling along on thin air.

The Magician card, on the other hand, is an image of total concentration and focus. He’s dressed in the formal robes of a ceremonial magician and looking very serious. One hand, holding a wand with two points, is pointed toward the sky and the other is pointed at the ground. His robe is belted with the ouroboros symbol of eternity, a snake eating it’s own tail, and that message is reinforced by the eternity symbol floating over his head. The four symbols of earthly existence, the wand, pentacle, cup, and sword, lie on his altar.

“Just the Tarot” by Dan Adair – A complete set of definitions, layouts and instructions for reading Tarot cards.

The Magician is channeling the divine energy into the Earth Plane. He’s using it to control the four elements and manifest his desires through the use of his will power. If we had to select a couple of words to describe this image, they would be, “control,” and, “focus.”

THE MAGICIAN AS THE WESTERN PARADIGM OF POWER

The Magician is very much the Western paradigm of power. We use phrases like, “He’s a take-charge sort of a guy,” or, “She’s always in control,” to describe this kind of power, and we tend to admire it.

The Magician is the type of a person who is very conscious of what she wants to accomplish, has a detailed plan for doing it, has the necessary skills to make it happen, and works the plan until she reaches her goals.

This is the type of linear, step-by-step thinking that Westerners have traditionally employed, and it can be very effective.

It’s also very much an ego-based sort of a power. It’s saying, “This is what I want and I’m going to use all of my abilities and will to make it manifest.”

THE FOOL AS THE EASTERN PARADIGM OF POWER

The Fool’s energy is much more in keeping with the Eastern paradigm of power. It has more to do with aligning ourselves with a deeper, universal power, rather than trying to run the whole show with our egos.

There’s a basic trust implicit in The Fool. It’s a trust that, as the Desiderata put it, “whether or not it is clear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.” The idea is that there IS an underlying force in the Universe and that it’s a loving, compassionate force. When we’re in alignment with that force, then we’re in The Flow, or the Tao, and our lives are much easier and happier because of it. And, paradoxically, the more that we try to control that Flow, as the Magician does, the less in alignment we are and the harder life becomes.

VISUALIZING AND MANIFESTATION

We can see this sort of tension between The Magician energy and The Fool energy when we begin to delve into visualization and manifestation.

Most of the books and seminars on the subject run pretty close to The Magician model of power. (A) We figure out what we want (the usual example being a million dollars.) (B) We concentrate all of our will power on that goal by visualizing it, writing affirmations, and making vision boards. (C) We cause that goal to manifest in our lives through repetition and the sheer power of our wills. The Magician model is also very one-pointed and specific, as in, “I want a million bucks by September the first and I want it to be in unmarked hundred dollar bills.”

Of course, that frequently doesn’t work, as evidenced by the fact that most of us aren’t millionaires. This is the point where many teachers will bring in the concept of The Fool energy. The idea here is to relax, stay in the present moment, and quit telling the Universe how it’s supposed to behave. Instead of setting a specific goal, right down to every detail, we set a general goal, but let the Universe work out the details.

Mike Dooley, in particular, works with this concept in many of his books like, “Manifesting Change.” He refers to our trying to control all of the details (Magician energy) as, “the cursed hows.” In other words, “I want a million bucks, Universe, and this is exactly HOW I want you to manifest it.” The point that he’s making is that we may think we’re opening one door to financial abundance, but in reality we’re slamming shut a thousand other doors. The Universe is infinite and it has an infinite number of ways of delivering what we want to manifest, unless we get too specific about how we want it done.

So, we bring in Fool energy. We use a general statement like, “I’d like to manifest happiness and abundance in my life, Universe, and I’m sure you can work out the details. After all, you make stars and solar systems, so this shouldn’t be much of a challenge for you.” And then we butt out and let it happen, while we stay happy and in the present moment.

CONSCIOUS AND SUBCONSCIOUS MINDS

The Kybalion – a discussion of Hermetic magic – talks about this dance between Magician energy and Fool energy in terms of the conscious and subconscious minds.

Our conscious mind is our everyday mind, which is the mind that we mostly identify with. It’s ego based, logical, and linear and it’s very clever at performing mundane tasks. It’s the mind that balances our budgets, pays the rent, buys groceries, and gets the kids to school on time. We could call it Magician energy but it’s really just a tiny part of our larger mind.

The subconscious mind, on the other hand, comprises the majority of our minds. Unlike the conscious mind, it never needs to sleep and it’s working 24/7, processing information, calculating what the future may look like and telling us when something’s wrong.

The most important thing about the subconscious mind, though, is that it’s our connection to the super-conscious mind, AKA the Universe. Though that connection, it has almost infinite power to manifest anything that we truly desire. That’s Fool energy.

Those two minds – conscious and subconscious – need to work together. Although the subconscious mind is infinitely powerful, it just drifts without direction from the conscious mind. Even worse, it can construct our reality based on the crap that flows through the internet, our televisions, our cultures and our religions, which may have very little to do with what we really want to manifest.

So we need to use that Magician energy – the conscious mind – to sort through our options and figure out where we want to actually go with our lives. Do I want to be rich? Do I want to be an artist? Do I want more love in my life? Once we determine what our overall goals and desires are, then we say, “Hey, subconscious mind/Universe – this is what I’d like to see happen. Please get to work on that.”

THE FOOL DOES THE HEAVY LIFTING

Here’s the most important thing about all of that: The Fool does the heavy lifting. The SOLE PURPOSE of the conscious mind is to figure out where we want to go and turn it over to the subconscious mind/Universe.

The conscious mind has a terrible time accepting that notion, because it’s ego based. It wants to control every little detail of the manifestation process, and so it keeps snatching it back from the Universe and imposing more and more cursed hows on the process. Every single time that we do that, we’re slamming doors shut instead of letting the subconscious mind open more doors.

And so, yes, in my opinion there can be no doubt that the most powerful card in the Tarot deck is The Fool. It’s the primal energy that makes good things manifest in our lives. The Magician can guide that energy but, by itself, it’s nothing but a control freak in a red robe.

Blasted Towers, Bad Ju-Ju, and the Unluckiest Card in the Tarot

A look at the five unluckiest cards in the Tarot deck.

I recently received an email from a reader who asked, “What’s the unluckiest Tarot card?” I had to scratch my head about that one because the whole concept of good luck versus bad luck can get pretty complex. Nonetheless, there are some Tarot cards that can always be considered harbingers of bad luck

THE WHEEL OF FORTUNE, REVERSED

The Wheel of Fortune, Reversed, is the most obvious choice for a, “bad luck,” card. We actually talk about luck in terms of good fortune and bad fortune and that’s what this card is all about. It depicts life as a wheel, where sometimes our luck is ascending and expanding and sometimes it’s descending and decreasing. When The Wheel of Fortune, Reversed, shows up in a reading it indicates that we’re in for a patch of bad luck.

The Kybalion, which is a book about Hermetic Magic, compared it to the pendulum of a clock. The pendulum swings first in one direction and then back in the other. Life can be seen in much the same way: sometimes we’re swinging into really good luck and then we swing back into a period of bad luck.

The obvious underlying message is to just hang on, because things will inevitably change. When we can stand back and look at good luck/bad luck as a rhythmic cycle, then periods of ill fortune will affect us much less severely. We just need to stay centered and calm and wait for the cycle to reverse itself.

THE TOWER

Also known as, “the lightning struck tower,” and, “the blasted tower,” The Tower would probably be my pick as THE unluckiest card in the deck.

“Just the Tarot,” by Dan Adair – complete definitions, layouts, and instructions for reading Tarot cards, available on Amazon.

At it’s most severe level, it can indicate that everything that you’ve loved and invested in is about to be blasted right down to the ground. The last time that I had it showing up in my personal readings, my life partner died, I lost my house, and I was involved in a horrible law suit over the probate of the estate. It can be that bad, depending on the other cards in the reading, but it usually isn’t.

On a mundane level, The Tower is usually just a powerful warning that we’ve gone down the wrong path and the Universe is about to provide a course correction. Perhaps we’ve been treating our fellow employees badly and – Shazam – we’re suddenly fired or demoted. Or perhaps we’ve been emotionally abusive or neglectful of our lover and they leave us for someone else.

In my experience, there’s always a level of hubris involved with this card. We’re not only taking things for granted, but we’re also being arrogant. We’re assuming that everything is under our control and the Universe is going to show us that we’re not.

The most positive message in this card – which we usually fail to appreciate at the time – is that we get to completely start over. It’s like that line from, Me and Bobby McGee: “Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose.” When our lives (or our projects or relationships, etc.) have been blasted right down to the foundations, we have the freedom to consciously design something new and better.

DEATH

Even if it isn’t the unluckiest card in the deck, Death definitely wins the award for the creepiest card in the Tarot. In her wonderful book, “Fortune Telling by Tarot Cards,” Sasha Fenton puts it in this perfectly understated, British way: “This card usually puts the wind up people when it appears . . .”

Yes.

Now, first of all, I have never seen the Death card appear before someone’s death. It will pop up after someone has died, but it’s usually just a comment on what’s happened. It’s more like, “Well, you’ve lost someone you loved, so you’re dealing with death and grief.”

What it can indicate, though, is that there’s going to be a radical, life changing turn in events in a person’s life. The querent is suddenly going to find herself going in a completely different direction than she has in the past. In an emotional and spiritual sense, it really is as if their previous life has died and they’re off in a completely new direction.

I knew a woman who had been happily married for 15 years, had a home, a loving husband, and 2 kids. She woke up one morning with this thought ringing in her head: “Shit, I’m not in love with him anymore and I hate my life.” Within six months she’d obtained a divorce, turned custody of her children over to her ex-husband and was working as a river guide in West Texas. That’s the kind of radical change that we’re talking about here.

Whether that kind of change is good luck or bad luck is just a matter of interpretation. If it’s something that we consciously plan, we usually view it as good fortune. If it was something that was forced on us by circumstance, we may think it was bad fortune.

JUSTICE, REVERSED

I’m a little hesitant to include the Justice card in this list because it has more to do with people and circumstances than luck per se. Nonetheless, it’s frequently seen as bad luck so I’ll stick it in here.

Classically, as you might guess from the image, Justice has to do with the legal system. If we’re involved in some sort of litigation and Justice is upright, it can mean that we’ll prevail. If it’s reversed, it can mean that we’ll lose.

On a personal level, it can mean that the people around you – your family, co-workers, boss, etc. – are making judgements about you and they’re not good if the card is reversed.

Losing a court case can obviously be seen as bad luck. Or it can be seen as a sign that we have a bad case, a bad lawyer, or a bad judge. In the same way, having people we care about judging us harshly can be seen as being treated unfairly. Or it might be that we’re being jerks and we need to clean up our acts.

Justice, Reversed, can be a sign of a bad luck to come, but it also serves as a warning. It’s saying, “You’re about to have some bad luck, so you need to take a careful look at your own actions before that happens.”

TEN OF SWORDS

It doesn’t take but a glance at the Ten of Swords to realize that there’s some serious bad ju-ju happening here. If we’re lying face down stuck full of swords like a human pin cushion, something’s a little wrong. This card can indicate treachery, deceit or a very, very bad ending to a relationship or a job.

The suit of Swords symbolizes our personal power. That’s the way that we project ourselves out into the world. There’s nothing innately wrong with that. Whether it’s standing up to a school yard bully when we were kids or pushing hard for a project we really believe in at work, there are always times when we have to be a bit aggressive.

But . . . when we’re overly and chronically aggressive, that puts us into a power cycle. We’re trying to dominate other people and run over their emotions and desires. We become the school yard bully instead of the person standing up to the bully. We see this mentality frequently with primitive men who brag about being the, “alpha dog.” It’s dominance for the sake of dominance, rather than for the sake of getting anything done.

The message of this card is the old cliche’: live by the sword, die by the sword. If we’ve been treating other people harshly, if we’ve been abusive in our love relationships, or domineering in work relationships, we’ve got some bad karma heading our way.

So those are the top five, “bad luck,” cards in the Tarot deck. There are, of course, other cards that may indicate bad fortune in one aspect or another of our lives, but these are the red flags. And, of course, we should always remember that a Tarot reading is just a snap shot in time. It tells us what’s likely to happen, but we have the free will to change it.

The Three of Cups, Leela, and Playing in the Flow

A look at the Hindu concept of Leela and learning to be a part of a playful Universe.

We wouldn’t put water into the gas tank of our car and expect that it would somehow work alright, would we? Of course not.

Putting sadness, anxiety, depression and fear into our minds is exactly like that. In order for human beings to, “run,” we need to put the right fuel into our energy systems, and that fuel is happiness.

WE ALL KNOW THAT

That proposition isn’t really something that we have to prove, because we already know that it’s true.

We’ve all had the experience of having to go to work when we were sick. Perhaps we had the flu or a bad cold, but we still had to drag our asses into work and somehow slog through the day. No one – ourselves included – expected that we were going to be operating at peak efficiency or do a super duper job when we were ill. We just had to show up and keep our bodies going through the motions until we could get back home to bed.

Getting through life when we’re extremely depressed, fearful, or anxious is just like that. All of those states of mind are literally like a poison, like a bacteria or virus that seriously interferes with our abilities to function. Our bodies are in place, doing what we have to do, but we’re far from being at our best.

HAPPINESS IS THE RIGHT FUEL

In contrast to that, we’ve all had the experience of living when we were extremely happy. Perhaps we were in love. Or we just got a promotion. Or maybe it’s just Springtime and we feel completely zippety doo dah.

When we’re happy, life is easy. We seem to sail right through difficult projects, our relationships with other people are much easier and more positive, and we attract even more happiness into our existence.

In a very real sense, choosing happiness instead of depression is like putting gasoline into our car instead of water. It’s the right fuel to optimize human life.

HAPPINESS IS BEING IN THE FLOW

People talk a lot about being, “in the Flow.” That’s also known as being in the zone, or, as Taoists put it, being in the Tao.

When we’re in the Flow, life is smooth and effortless. We start to experience a lot of synchronicity and serendipity. We have an unusual amount of focus and concentration and the task at hand is easy.

Exactly the same things happen when we’re in a state of happiness. Some people might think that being in the Flow triggers the feeling of happiness, but it’s quite the opposite. Being happy triggers being in the Flow.

BUT CAN WE REALLY CHOOSE HAPPINESS?

To a large extent, yes, we can.

There are, of course, a few glaring exceptions. If we’re living in a war zone or someone we dearly love has just died or our house has just been destroyed by a disaster, it can be very difficult for those of us who aren’t spiritual masters to keep a smile on our faces.

The truth of the matter, though, is that for 90% of us, 90% of the time, NOTHING IS WRONG. Yes, we may have very unhappy memories or we may be very anxious about the future, but right here, right now, in the present moment, nothing is wrong.

The past and the future are just movies that we’re running our own minds. They literally have no existence outside of our mental images. We can, in the present moment, choose to be happy or choose to be sad. As Thich Nhat Hahn said in Peace Is Every Step: The Path of Mindfulness in Everyday Life, “Learn to love, enjoy and embrace what you have in the here and now. That’s all you really need to be happy.”

HOW DO WE DO THAT?

Oddly, the answer to that seems to be simple: play.

That can be difficult for us to grasp as Westerners, because our culture and our religions tell us that LIFE IS VERY SERIOUS!!! We’re supposed to get up in the morning and work hard and sacrifice. We’re supposed to put off all of the things that give us pleasure. That’s what it means to be a responsible adult, right?

The Hindu philosophy, on the other hand, has a delightful concept called, “Leela.” Leela literally means, “divine play.” The idea is that when the Goddess made the universe, she didn’t do it as a job, or with a purpose, or even for anything very serious. She did it because she was playing. Because it was fun!

“Hey, I think I’ll make the Universe. Ooh, that’s a nice color! Maybe I’ll throw a galaxy in over there. Why not put some rings around that planet? Oh, pretty . . .”

Like the people in the Three of Cups, she was having a ball.

PLAYING IS BEING IN THE FLOW

The real idea behind being in the Flow is that there’s some underlying energy that flows through the entire Universe. When we’re in alignment with that energy, everything goes smoothly because we’re moving with the natural flow of the Universe. When we’re out of alignment with that energy, then life is difficult because we’re swimming against the current.

It’s easy to see, then, that if Leela is true – if playfulness is the energy that underlies the entire Universe – then the happier and more playful that we are, the more that we’ll be in alignment with that energy, and the easier life will be.

WHAT ABOUT WHEN LIFE IS HARD?

Life here on the Earth Plane is cyclical. We see evidence of that everywhere we look. The moon waxes and wanes, the tides come in and then go out, animals and humans are born, flourish, and then grow old and eventually die. Even nations rise and then fall.

The Hermetic book, “The Kybalion,” refers to that as the Principle of Rhythm and likens it to the pendulum of a clock. The Pendulum swings to the left and then it swings an equal amount to the right.

Our emotions and our personal fortunes seem to operate according to that same principle. We may have a period of our lives when everything is going perfectly and then that’s followed by a period when everything is difficult. We may be incredibly happy for a while and then experience deep sorrow. It’s just the pendulum swinging back and forth.

When we consciously realize that, when we know that any difficulties and sadness that we’re having will change back into happiness eventually, then we cease to take it all so seriously. We can rise above it, and continue to play.

THE PLAY IS A PLAY

There’s another meaning to the word, “play,” that’s used in the concept of Leela. That’s the idea of life AS a play. As something that we might watch playing out on a stage at a theater.

Like the Principle of Rhythm, that points to the notion that none of this is real or permanent. These are just parts that we’re playing in this incarnation. All of our, “sound and fury,” all of the ups and downs, all of the victories and defeats, are just temporary roles that we’re playing and we’ll shed them like old costumes when we move on to our next incarnation.

All we have to do is learn to play at playing in the play. We can do that!