What's the best option

When people come to me with an important choice,  I like to know nothing more than the label - Plan A or Plan B.  That way,  my own biases don't come into play. 

So a woman in her late twenties comes to me with two work opportunities and and I say,  let's shuffle and think about Plan A.

She draws  4 wands / King of Swords / 8 of pentacles. 

And then we look at Plan B

7 pentacles reversed / hanged man / 7 of swords. 

Knowing nothing about either options, it's clear that Plan A is the better option - it's more stable,  it has a smart organized male energy and it gives career vibes.

Plan B was more hanging in the wind and betrayal. 

Turns out Plan A was moving to Canada and take a position there and Plan B involved staying the more familiar New Jersey.  She was scared of the big change of moving countries,  but she too could clearly see it was the better option.  Sometimes fears hold us back,  but with a little reassurance,  we can burst forward. 

Where the spirit meets the bone

I'm not a real swiftie.  I barely know who she dated (yes,  I know she just got married!) and I like her songs,  my car is almost permanently on Taylor Swift Radio,  but I don't know all her lyrics by heart or all her songs.

Then I started listening to the Swiftie and the Scholar,  on youtube.  It's a deep dive (about an hour an episode and each episode covers only one song) on random songs. 

I'm not listening to them in any order,  but I've been watching about one a week.  

Last one was about Ivy,  I song I realized I barely knew.  I had listened to it once or twice on Evermore,  but it hadn't gotten it's hooks on me, though some of the phrases I really liked. 

I had noticed the phrase,  where the spirit meets the bone,  it's so evocative.  And then the poetry professor tells us it's not unique to Taylor,  it comes from this poem:

From The Ways We Touch: Poems. 

Isn't that a beautiful phrase in a beautiful poem? And I love the song so much more now!  I didn't realize the Emily Dickinson connection and was fascinated to learn about it. 

So if you want to do a deep dive,  this is a fun away to while away an hour... 

Dreams

I've lived in London and New York.  Last night I dreamt that I was in midtown,  NYC,  and trying to get back down to Tribeca but I was walking through all these weird neighborhoods and couldn't figure out where I was.  In the dream I realized I was in Bond St and didn't know where that was in relation to Tribeca.  I was becoming increasingly agitated,  and then tried texting my husband to ask him the name of our hotel, so I could give up on walking and just cab there,  and then I remembered he was dead. 

That jolted me so much,  I woke up.  And awake,  I said to myself,  you were in London, silly,  that's why you couldn't find Tribeca.  Then I was asleep again,  and still looking to get to Tribeca while in the middle of London,  and still confused and very upset that my husband couldn't help me anymore.

Then I woke up again,  fully this time.  There's nothing wrong with being in London,  it's a fab city.  But if you are searching for New York landmarks,  you won't find them in London.  Widowhood is so disorienting,  all the familiar landmarks gone,  and the person you used to text for help and advice,  well, you can't reach him anymore.  

I guess I just have to accept that I can't go back to the past,  I have to make my way forward.  But I do so miss him.  I'm grateful that I have someone to miss, that we had such a good life together.  I also feel for dream me, lost in the wrong city,  unable to sort myself out.  Luckily awake me can see things a bit more clearly... 

saw this on line and it made me smile

 

We need more Women In STEM 

Sorcery

Tarot

Energy

Magic

Good fields to be in... 

My current favorite tarot deck

I frequently look at Tarot cards,  to find new variants,  to see if a new image will spark a deeper interpretation. 

And I just came across the marvellously named Fat Folks Tarot.  And it's true that tarot cards rarely have less than perfect figures on them,  unless they are trying to say something specific.  So it's great to see all the cards have these plump interesting figures in them,  and give us fat folk some representation. 

The Deck has a variety of artists who worked on them,  so they can look quite different.  Look them up on Instagram and see some of their variations. 

I particularly liked their version of the 5 of pentacles,  which shows such a beautiful and true way of feeling excluded and out in the cold... 

4 of pentacles vs 9 of Cups

I'm finding I'm explaining these 2 cards,  the 4 of pentacles and the 9 of cups,  again and again to people lately. I really feel we are living in a world exploiting our feelings of not enoughness,  feeding our dissatisfactions, wanting our envy.

I came across this anecdote:  At a party given by a billionaire on Shelter Island, Kurt Vonnegut informs his pal, Joseph Heller, that their host, a hedge fund manager, had made more money in a single day than Heller had earned from his wildly popular novel Catch-22 over its whole history. Heller responds, “Yes, but I have something he will never have … the knowledge that I have enough."

And it seems to me that the super rich right now have no idea what enough looks like.  And the world of instagram and trad wives and holidays abroad are all about needing more, exploiting the feeling of the 4 of pentacles,  where our financial needs and wants hang over us. We feel tight for money,  tight for time,  tight. 

And what we want,  what we should all be striving for is the 9 of cups,  the card I call the fat and happy card,  where you don't have everything,  but you have that most special of all things,  enough.  You are content with what you have.  There may be a cup or two missing,  but you don't let that spoil the cups that you have.  You let yourself have joy with what comes your way,  and let yourself be rich in the ways of Joseph Heller,  and know that you have enough.

That's my blessing to all of us,  may we know the value of what we have,  and let us feel contentment. 

saying of the week

Sometimes someone says something to me in passing during a reading,  and I have to stop them and repeat it so both of us could hear it properly,  and I know I will be saying it to others. 

I spoke with a young woman recently and she quoted to me something her mother often says - Just because you could be doing more, doesn’t mean you’re not doing enough - and I thought, what a wise,  wise mother!

Let's just sit with that for a moment.  We could always being doing more in this culture,  but here is a breath of calm wisdom - just because we could be doing more,  doing mean that we are doing isn't enough.  It's a version of my oft quoted don't let the perfect get in the way of the good,  but it's another way of looking at it and it unlocked something in me to hear it,  so I'm sharing it with you... 

Modern Wedding Vows

I never wanted to write my own vows.  We had a traditional wedding and I don't think either of us said very much.  But the weddings I am going to now are much more eclectic. I think there's a power in the traditional words, but then I came across this one:

You cannot possess me for I belong to myself.

But while we both wish it, I give you that which is mine to give.

You cannot command me, for I am a free person.

But I shall serve you in those ways you require,

And the honeycomb will taste sweeter coming from my hand.

I pledge to you that yours will be the name I cry aloud in the night,

And the eyes into which I smile in the morning.

I pledge to you the first bite of my meat and the first drink from my cup.

I pledge to you my living and my dying, each equally in your care.

I shall be a shield for your back and you for mine.

I shall not slander you, nor you me.

I shall honor you above all others, and when we quarrel we shall do so in

Private and tell no strangers our grievances.

This is my wedding vow to you

This is the marriage of equals.

By Morgan Llywelyn

Isn't that amazing!  That sounds like a relationship worth celebrating! I'd love to go to a wedding where they said those vows. 

All my readings are virtual

I lived in NYC for 15 years.  I moved to Sydney but my old clients kept wanting readings. What could I do?

For me,  the substance of the tarot reading is the cards that you draw,  from a deck that you have shuffled.  I cannot shuffle for you.  I've tried,  but I can't get clear readings from it.

So how was I to do my readings from across the ocean?  I asked my regulars to get their hands on a tarot deck - it didn't matter which one,  as long at it was a full 78 cards (some of the fancier ones have fewer cards and I can't make sense of them either.)  But if you are buying one specifically,  I recommend the Rider Waite Smith Radiant.  It's pretty and easy to read.  Then,  they could shuffle and do the first layout.  And I could do the rest. 

So now most of my clients are in the US,  though I have done readings for people in Europe and elsewhere as well.  You get to sit in the quiet and comfort of your own home,  and you get to the shuffle the cards.

We start with the Celtic Cross Layout

And then I can answer 3-4 questions depending on how fast we talk!

I also recommend that people record these readings. If you don't want it, then you can just delete it,  but if you do want it,  I can't always recall the exact sentence I said to you.  I've had people who never listen, and people who've relistened so often that I can hear my own phrases when they talk to me.  Either way is good, what works for you is what matters.  

Drawing good cards

Had a funny moment with a client the other day.  

She is having difficulties with her ex husband and co parent, and wanted to know more about it. Her ex and his new girlfriend and expecting a new child and she is worried about how that will impact their son,  who is six.  But the cards show he will continue to engage with his son,  which she is ambivalent about.  But we both acknowledged that it's healthier for children to have both parents involved in their lives,  and it's never good to push the father away.  

She drew mainly positive cards around the situation and seemed annoyed that the cards were rosier than she felt. 

I said to her that sometimes anxieties can feel overwhelming in the moment,  but the cards are saying that big picture,  things are going to be okay.   Whilst she feels like the Page of  Swords reversed today,  her outcome was the Queen of Pentacles - grounded,  down to earth and doing well financially.

She took that onboard and said she felt better after the reading... 

Life is a garden

I hate the garden metaphor!  I don't want life to be a garden.  I wanted life to be a marble statue,  once you had actually finished the difficult and terrible work,  and cleaned up all that dusty mess,  it would stay,  perfect,  in shape and timeless for centuries.  I want a Michelangelo statue of life. 

But life is a garden.  Endlessly growing and changing. You plant something,  it thrives,  you are happy.  You plant exactly the same plant,  in a slightly shadier corner,  and it dies.  You clean it, it's gorgeous.  You go away for a weekend and it's full of debris and two new plants - are they weeds that need to be uprooted or are the new plants that will give joy and beauty? And who decides which?

I hate gardening.  To me it's endless work and repetition.  But I love having friends.  I don't find the tending of friendships endless work.  I don't find our conversations repetition.  So in some cases,  I can garden.  I can even look after my dog,  who is a source of such joy for me.  I don't enjoy the cleaning up after him,  but it's a small price that I am willing to pay. 

So life is a garden (sorry!)  But in this garden, you get to decide what you are going to plant,  which plants matter and how often you need to weed/clean.  While I love an elegant French garden,  I think I'm just going to settle in to my wild English garden and relax... 

Failure to Launch

My latest readings have had the same difficult theme.  Mother's coming to a tarot reading, not to talk about themselves,  but to talk about their anxieties for their young adult children.  Kids either not going to college,  just out of college and not looking for jobs,  or looking furiously for jobs,  but not finding them as their degrees start to get stale. 

It's a crazy market out there right now.  I've talked to people about finding jobs and career paths for over 30 years and this is one of the stickiest, worst markets I've seen.  The combination of AI,  world events and post Covid anxiety,  means that many young adults are failing to launch.  And their worried parents come from such a different vantage point,  that most of their advice is no help at all. 

So we talk about executive skills,  we talk about finding work mentors.  We talk about the unspoken reality that a parents contacts can be one of the biggest levers a new graduate can access.  It's really,  really hard to get a job from the internet.  At the very least,  they need some sort of contact within the company or the field.  And luck.  It's not enough to have a degree right now.  They also need some random luck to get them in the door.  And we all know that luck is fickle and unreliable. 

I will warn them that most advice is outdated right now,  because AI is changing things as we speak,  and anyone who says they are an expert on the job market,  well they may have been an expert last week,  but this week conditions have changed.

I tell people to get their resumes looked at by a specialist,  who can put the right keywords in it.  I will also tell them to get their kids into as many networking events as possible (I know, it's effortless for some people and a horror show for others.)  And I tell the adults to look to their own network,  to see if they can get some help there. 

But just knowing that the difficulties are real,  their young adults are not exaggerating,  it's really weird out there, that can help.  I don't have a quick and easy answer,  but it is a numbers game and you have to keep slogging through,  till you get the response you want.  Also,  the first job may not be a perfect one,  but it's better than no job,  and it gets you into the world of work and from there,  you can keep looking.  

And we look for the Ace of Pentacles,  a yes to work and money,  and hope that it appears!

So one of my clients reached out after I published and recommended this book.  I haven't read it, but she rates it highly - Failure to Launch by Mark McConville   I'm always happy to take recommendations.  I hope this one helps! 

Healthy Habits

All of a sudden,  with no conscious input or decision making,  I am drinking more water.  Of course,  I've known that I,  and probably you too, should drink more water.  And it's not that I disagreed with the science or had a good reason not to.  I just wasn't in the habit of it,  and days could go by and I realized that I really hadn't drunk enough liquids.

And then, one day last week, just before I sat before the computer,  I grabbed a large glass of water.  Now I'm drinking 2 - 3 of those large glasses most days.

And I wonder,  why now?  I know this is good behaviour,  but why couldn't I do it earlier and why am I doing it now?

And sometimes you don't have to over analyse your new,  healthier habits.  Sometimes you just have to get out of your own way,  and don't crush this new pattern.  Now,  every time I go the computer,  I grab a glass of water with me.  Here's hoping to cement a new lifetime habit. 

The Harvard Study of Adult Development

Every so often I do a deep dive on a cultural study/ idea that catches my attention.

Today I'm going to look at Robert Waldinger's work.  It's the longest ever scientific study of happiness, staring in 1938 and is still running today (Waldinger is the 4th and current director of the study!) 

This video is short enough (12 minutes) and describes the studies work. 

I think we all know that fame and money isn't where it's all at,  but this study uses a longitudinal scientific study to confirm what we used to know but are somehow losing that grounded knowledge - that what matters to us, to our health,  to our cognition,  to our own measure of our happiness,  is the quality of our relationships. 

 

I always say that I am a herd animal.  It's not about being extravert or introvert,  but an acknowledgement that people and my relationships to them are inherently important to me.  

I often write about friendship but I think I need to focus on loneliness a bit more.  To be in a high conflict primary relationship - either at home or at work,  takes a long term toll on your health and cognition. 

Spending time on quality relationships or time making close relationships better,  helps you feel good, both in the present and in the long term. They are definitely worth investing in and pay off better than fame or extreme wealth!