“Gaze into the fire, into the clouds, and as soon as the inner voices begin to speak..surrender to them. Don’t ask first whether it’s permitted, or would please your teachers or father or some god. You will ruin yourself if you do that.”
― Hermann Hesse
We ask for guidance from inside, from outside but do we accept it when it comes. Do we write, do we fight the words that come. Are we numb to their meanings rejecting, deflecting protecting ourselves. In wonderful rationalizations we avoid the temptations that they offer thus conditioning does make cowards of us all. What deities or beings or inner higher selves may whisper what we need to hear? We care and we fear but do we dare?
I open myself to the guidance of all and I will fear not but my own discernment.
Blessings, G
Wise leader of men
You teach us to tend the earth
Who can know your heart?
Welcome to my home
Surrounded by woods
we can walk in nature
with no neighbours to disturb us
Yes my garden is beautiful
and the landscaping the best.
They work hard
as I have
to get where I am.
Oh luck has been there as well
but I’ve played the game well.
Come inside! Enjoy!
That’s what its all there for.
Can you make our guest a drink?
Sit down and relax
Now hold a minute while I take this call.
— G A Rosenberg
The suit of Pentacles refers to the element of Earth and of practical matters such as money and partnerships both of a business nature and of the home. They can also represent nature, the Earth itself as well as our bodies. Kings are the leaders, the shakers, the initiatory force or person that get things moving. The King of Pentacles is a provider and source of the material. He is the patriarchal businessman who has achieved his success and now wants to help others do the same. He is solid and stable and very aware of both what he has and how he got it. He has weathered many storms and has shown courage in the face of adversity and yet his adventures have mainly been in the business arena. He has social position and wields it in a very relaxed fashion.
The King of Pentacles knows how to enjoy and take pleasure in what he has rather than feeling the need to explore things in depth. He enjoys nature and the outdoors tho he is more for walking in his fields and gardens rather than exploring paths unseen. He is generous of spirit yet finds pleasure in his interior life without the need to go deeper into that as well. He is at his worst when frustrated in his desires to rise to his natural place.
Astrological Correspondence – Astrological Correspondence: 21° Leo – 20° Virgo Elemental: Fire of Earth – Mixes the self-confidence and leadership drive of the third decan Leo with the generosity, discipline, and focus of the first two decans of Virgo and success is almost inevitable. People who are influence by this energy are at their best once they have achieved this success wielding in a very natural fashion the discipline and charisma that got them there. They are fantastic organizers and care for people around them both in the general philanthropic sense but also on the one-to-one level. They may be late-bloomers tho they utilize everything that they have encountered on the way to bring them to the top.
I Ching Correspondence – 62) Hsiao Kwo – Preponderance of the Small –
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The Trigram for Thunder is over that of the Mountain. — Thunder is louder when it is in the mountains as the sound echoes and more focus and attention on detail is needed to avoid landslides and lightning. This Hexagram recommends that success comes when attention is focused on details rather than on large grandiose stunts. There is a hint in here of the story of Icarus who with his wax wings attempted to fly into the sun only to have them melt. The flight itself was an amazing success. Thus if the focus is on step by step achievement of what is possible than success is sure to follow. With attention to right action at the right time, everything is possible.
The King of Pentacles in a reading may often signify someone in a position of power who can help us either financially or with strong practical advice. This person may be found either in the board room or out in nature. He may be someone who is remote or difficult to know but who can be counted on. The card may also mean that play time is over and it is time to attend to practical matters in a detailed and disciplined way. The King of Cups may also mean it is time to enjoy our carnal sensuous side more, almost in a work hard and play hard kind of way. The card often refers to a need to find more enjoyment in every area of our lives as what we enjoy and pay attention to thrives.
The King of Pentacles reversed may indicate someone who feels inaccessible to us whom we were counting on to help. It may represent either someone who is thwarted in their ambitions and has become bitter and resentful or may represent this quality in ourselves. The reversed King of Pentacles may refer to someone who has developed a drinking problem. It may also refer to someone who’s empathy is too deep and has given way to despair.
“Expose yourself to your deepest fear; after that, fear has no power, and the fear of freedom shrinks and vanishes. You are free.”
― Jim Morrison
Earlier today, I was challenged by a friend who remarked that I never talk about my own fears and that I stay emotionally safe and comfortable in most of my entries here. At first I reacted the way I normally react when challenged. “I don’t have time for this crap right now.” I didn’t send that reply because I have come to realize when I have that response, it normally means that something has hit home and I need to look at it. When I did a realization started dawning and I realized that I have a fear of expressing and probing some of my deeper emotions and what a block it has been.
When I was younger I used to lash out at people and I was intuitive enough to hone in on just what would cause them the most pain.. and would use it on them. It cost me friendships and hurt my relationships with my family… Very few people want to examine their pain. I learned all kinds of neat ways of avoiding feeling things as deeply because i couldn’t handle hurting people. I’ve learned other ways of distancing even while pretending to draw closer so that i don’t have to feel the intensity of their emotions as well.
Most of my closest relationships have been with people who have reinforced this emotional denial mostly by reacting strongly when they sensed disapproval or disagreement from me. It became easier to mask the emotion rather than express it.
In the past years, I have become a lot more open and expressive. If Pandora’s box hasn’t been thrown open, the lid has been raised and I’ve been looking deeper into it. I have found that I can express myself in a way that’s both open, realizing another’s weakness but healing, expressing it in a way that can be resolved. The journey continues.
Blessings, G
“Teach me” the child said.
I explained a new idea
He then made it real.
I’m going to make it happen
No one has thought of this before
It seems so obvious
and it’s up to me
to make it real.
I am watchful
Ain’t nobody can take away
an idea who’s time has come.
From me it will spread to others
until it lives and breathes
on its own.
I know I can do this
and I will not be stopped.
For so long unnoticed
I’ve watched them all
unaware
of what their lives have become
and how cheaply they’ve been sold
Now my plan will carry them.
Whatever it takes
This is happening.
The suit of Swords represents thought, ideas, plans and conflicts.Pages (or Princesses as they are called in many decks) represent the grounding or emergence of the energy involved. What happens when a new idea is born into the world full blown like Minerva, the goddess of wisdom in Greek mythology springing from the forehead of Zeus? There is a thrill of discovery and great enthusiasm to make it a reality. We want everyone to understand and utilize this new thought of ours. We become watchful, ready to take on any challenges or objections that may arise on the way to making our new thought a reality. We may also find ourselves vigilant to make sure someone else doesn’t come along and do it wrong. We move quickly because who knows how long our energy may last or whether we are equal to the task?
The Page of Swords is perceptive and intuitive and full of flashes of insight that he feels the need to make manifest. He may lack the maturity to make it happen however. He may at his worse have trouble finding the right words to express all that he has to say. He may be over-defensive and may find himself answering challenges with way too much contempt for those whom he feels just do not get it.
I Ching Correspondence – 18) Ku – Decay / Repair
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The trigram of the Mountain is over that of Wind. Air trapped inside a mountain range stagnates and there may be a need of a fresh breeze. When any process has gone on too long in the same way it stagnates. Ideas that were innovative in their time give way to expediency and stagnation. Unwatched, even ideals that have led to freedom may have in their turn become even more imprisoning. There arises a constant need to weed out old ideas that no longer serve us and lock us into patterns of behaviour that have grown destructive. It helps us to be open to new viewpoints and paradigms that we can test and adapt. In this way we can continue to grow and evolve.
When the Page of Swords turns up in a reading it often has to do with the need to speak our truth even though we may expect opposition. It may refer to a younger person in our environment who is bright and perceptive but who may be dismissed because of their youth. The card may also refer to news which we may resist because it has the potential to shake up our comfortable lives. The Page of Swords may also refer to someone who has taken an interest in our lives and is trying to learn more about us. It may also be telling us to clear our minds and consider our approach before we try to communicate our ideas.
The reversed Page of Swords may be telling us that we have become too hyper-vigilant and that we are jumping at shadows, seeing opposition everywhere. Too often there is a tendency to use perceived obstacles as an excuse to not move ahead in our lives. It may also be telling us that we or someone in our environment is either talking or acting without thinking things through. The card may also indicate that we have become too fearful of expressing ourselves either because we have not thought things through first or because we are unprepared.
“My own heroes are the dreamers, those men and women who tried to make the world a better place than when they found it, whether in small ways or great ones. Some succeeded, some failed, most had mixed results… but it is the effort that’s heroic, as I see it. Win or lose, I admire those who fight the good fight.”
― George R.R. Martin
Heroes are willing to make a stand and risk it all to make something beyond them better. Perhaps they push a child out of the way of a moving vehicle. Perhaps they are firefighters who rush into a burning building because they hear a dog barking or perhaps they have learned that either the company they work for or the country they grew up believing in has been doing some rather horrible things like monitoring its citizens illegally when the country’s very foundations are based on freedom or perhaps performing illegal activities in other countries and then lying to its citizenry about it. The country in question then turns around and calls these people traitors for exposing this illegal activity. It’s good to know that heroes still exist. Tho a bit unsettling to see that villains do as well.
Blessings, G
“Your mind will answer most questions if you learn to relax and wait for the answer.”
― William S. Burroughs
I love problem solving. Give me a puzzle or a problem and I’ll worry at it like a dog with a bone or a chew toy. I’ll keep poking at it and prodding at it and looking at it from all angers. I’ll get frustrated when its not so easily solved. I might swear and walk away and then do something else and as soon as I resolve to do that, magic happens. Almost invariably the avenue to solving the problem presents itself as soon as I take a breath to do something else. It also helps to grab the dog’s leash and take her for a walk. The answers come then as well. It’s as if I program my consciousness with the known data and main avenues of approach and I start the program going and I walk away. I love that feeling when the penny hits the slot and the solution appears whole in my brain. There is very little like it. It’s just a matter of stopping. Well stopping and being open to the answer.
Try this experiment with me. Think about a question you’ve had in your mind for awhile. Anything that may be puzzling you will do. Think about it for a minute. Now get up and stretch. Still yourself.. Sh… listen, listen. Now let it go. Did a solution or a new approach offer itself? It’s amazing how often this has worked for me.
Blessings, G
“It doesn’t really matter who said it – it’s so obviously true. Bevore you can write anything, you have to notice something.”
― John Irving
If I were to write about what I noticed, I would write about the cat, one princess by name and disposition, uncharacteristically quiet (she likes to call out both her needs and my inattention from the doorway) in my office looking for the right shadow to jump at. I notice my friends online joking, laughing, complaining, healing and hurting each in turn and cycle, all teaching me so much. I could write about the easy feeling I have from a rather wonderful evening of good food and conversation with some amazing friends from which my three notes to myself read
1) Right Use of Language
2) Game Theory and Schools
3) The Ivory Tower Force
each of which could lead to a short written piece.
I could contemplate the tarot reading I did today for friends. I tried something I don’t do very often. Rather than lay the cards out in any kind of tableau, I did a synchronicity reading, letting cards come as they would. I find this type of thing works well when I am doing an online reading where the person being read for can not shuffle the cards themselves. In this case the cards came out pertinent to the situation. I don’t do readings very often anymore, preferring to use the cards for purposes of meditation and contemplation. When I do a reading for someone I are giving them access to information that they have chosen not to give themselves in another way. The information is filtered through my consciousness which makes me responsible for what the person does with the information. But some people I don’t say no to and as I said this was one I feel relatively good about.
Blessings, G
Mercurial Knight
Ready to fight with words or sword
takes on all comers
Oh yeah?
Well what about..?
I see how you can say that
but have you considered this?
There is no idea you can propose
in any direction
that I cannot conquer
Go ahead
Challenge me in any way
I can win any contest
but empathy
What use is that?
I have the life of the mind
which is a higher pursuit
Your feelings are almost
as meaningless as my own.
Don’t make me feel
This has gone on long enough
I never stay long
especially when people prattle
about things like pain or love
On to the next match.
The suit of Swords represents thought, ideas, plans and conflicts. Princes deal with the transmission and the endurance of the energy, the result of the union of the King’s Force and the Queen’s generative and nurturing of the energy. The Prince of Swords is ready to engage and discuss any viewpoint and show others exactly how they’ve gotten it wrong. He is courageous ever willing to charge into the fray to fight for what is right. He tends to put such a great amount of force into every action that he may lack staying power after the initial thrusts. He is often unaware of the affect his words and actions may have on others and can become quite puzzled when something he has said or done to champion his current cause or argument has hurt his ‘opponent’. After all was he not in fact cutting through their misapprehension and showing them the error of their ways?
In his mind they should be thanking him. But then the Prince of Swords not wishing to deal with his own emotional nature can be quite blind to the emotions of others.
Astrological Correspondence: 21° Capricorn – 20° Aquarius Elemental: Air of Air – Combine the ambition and accomplishment ethic of Capricorn with the creative intellectual and communicative abilities of Capricorn and you have someone who can intellectually convince anyone of anything. They are witty and argumentative and intensely competitive. For them winning may become everything and since they are not burdened with an excess of empathy how they play the game may be somewhat less important. This is somewhat modified by the fact that they do have an acute intellectual understanding of ethical considerations.
I Ching Correspondence: 57)Xun – Proceeding Humbly-
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This hexagram is comprised by the trigram for the Wind being doubled. The breeze when it gently persists offers the most pleasant of weather. Often victory can be had by constant and easy persuasion rather than running roughshod over everything in our path. When we can learn to tailor our path so that it penetrates and encompasses the paths of those we come across then we can win them to our point of view. In this way with humility we help them feel understood even tho we may disagree with them.
When the Prince of Swords turns up in a reading, it may mean that we are feeling criticized or critiqued in our lives at present. Someone is challenging us directly in a fairly blunt way. Do we accept their criticism, testing it against our own perceptions in an open way or do we fight back. The Prince of Swords suggests that it is best to face this criticism head on in a non-arrogant way, explaining our point of view gently but firmly. The card may also mean that we have been too passive in the face of criticism, allowing others to manipulate us by making us feel inadequate. The Prince of Swords may also be suggesting that we have been too critical of others and running roughshod over their feelings. The card may also mean depending on its placement that there is bad news in the offering.
The Prince of Swords reversed may represent someone who charges all over the place, looking for conflict and dragging others into it. He (or she) may be highly manipulative of others using their own emotional natures against them. He leaps without ever looking and charges headlong into situations like a bull in a china shop rather than using any forethought or perception. It may represent a relationship ending in an abrupt surprising way. The card may mean that it is time to go it alone for awhile m taking stock of where we are in our lives at this time. This card reversed may also indicate delays in travels. The reversed Prince of Swords may also represent someone untrustworthy who has entered into our lives.
“Occasionally, there arises a writing situation where you see an alternative to what you are doing, a mad, wild gamble of a way for handling something, which may leave you looking stupid, ridiculous or brilliant -you just don’t know which. You can play it safe there, too, and proceed along the route you’d mapped out for yourself. Or you can trust your personal demon who delivered that crazy idea in the first place.
Trust your demon.”
― Roger Zelazny
When I read quotes about writing or other forms of creating art, I often pause and consider how it may apply to the art of living itself. For aren’t we creating our lives as we go along? We may be inspired by various thing but ultimately our lives are our creations. Oh we can play it safe as Roger Zelazny here suggests and follow along either the path encouraged by others or by our younger selves. Occasionally tho life manages to surprise us with opportunities or possibilities we’ve never envisioned. Do we jump at them and take the chance or do we say, “No, this is my plan and I’m sticking to it” The choice is ours but it is always good to listen not to the voice of ‘reason’ (not to knock reason, it is what stops us from dancing blindfolded through traffic among other things, but if we did naught but listen to our reason we would miss out on so much) but to our inner voice, that inner spark that guides us. Whether we call it our True Will or our intuition or ‘Divine Guidance’, it tends to bring us the lessons we most need.
Of course, when we take the responsibility of choices made by our own inner guidance, we need to be willing to accept the consequences that may arise. Every decision has consequences tho including the decision not to act.
Blessings, G
Eye of the Warrior by G A Rosenberg
