Friday, December 13, 2019

Trusting my subconscious

The Fountain of Trabazon: An Oracle Deck by Julie Pepper

Earlier in the Autumn, I attended the Paradise City art festival in Northampton, MA. It's a beautifully curated art show with a wide variety of artists and craftspeople. I usually wander, doing a lot of 'window shopping' and comparing notes with other ceramics artists, but this time, I stopped short at a piece of art that was filled with color, energy, and narrative.

It turns out that the artist - Julie Pepper - is a local Central Mass artist and that we know folks in common.

Her paintings were also available as the illustrations in a 56 card oracle deck and I bought it.

I had learned a bit about Tarot reading for a novel I wrote some years ago and find reading the cards to be a way to free my subconscious and help me in my creativity.

This morning, I pulled out Julie's deck and prepared to do a past/present/future spread. The question in my mind as I shuffled the deck was about my writing and how to move through the resistance I've felt all year.

Here is my interpretation of the reading, using the Divinitory Guide as a starting place.

The leftmost card represents the past.

Card 31: South Africa
Listen
Spirit is telling you to listen to your body. 
Can you be open to your body's changes?

There have been so many changes for me over the past year. I'm in menopause - a time of great transition both physical and emotionally. In addition, I've been dealing with some nagging health issues. It makes sense that my creative energy has been sapped by the demands of my body and its changes. I've been working hard to accept where I am and embrace this new phase of my life. In many ways, I am stronger than I've ever been, notwithstanding my nagging knee and wrist pain.

The middle card represents the present.

Card 48: Ophelia
Believe
Wearing your heart on your sleeve?
Trust yourself.
Can you believe in your intuition?

It's been a strange year. The year I didn't write. As a writer, perhaps I should have been far more distressed about that than I have been. Instead, I've been focusing on other creative pursuits - knitting, crochet, and yarn spinning, ceramics, working on our farm. And I have been content. I feel a deep sense of being home in my self. Seeing this card and its interpretation is right on the nose for where I am now. My subconscious has known all along that I'm on the right path.

The rightmost card represents the future.

Card 32: Choice
Dance.
Pick your own music, choose your own steps.
Have you forgotten you have choice?

The question on my mind as I prepared the cards was how to return to my writing discipline and will I find that joy again.And considering this card, it occurs to me that my question was one created from a place of fear. And fear is not a healthy place to cling to in making choices. I don't need to be afraid. I am picking my own music and choosing my own steps. Fear doesn't need to trap me: I have the power of choice.

This is what I will tell myself, when the fear rises up again.

Be patient with yourself - so much is changing in your life. You can trust in your own power and intuition. Your choices will take you where you need to go. 




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2 comments:

  1. What a great reading!

    Never forget, by the way, that you need fallow times (in *any* art) in order for the art to grow. You told me that, a while back, and were very correct.

    LOVE YOU!

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