new deck, on action

Working with the Golden Tarot of Klimt this week. The deck is a lovely one...sadly, due to the nature of the gold gilt, scans can never quite do it justice... :[

"Life is very short and what we have to do must be done in the now."
- Audre Lorde

“In each age men of genius undertake the ascent. From below, the world follows them with their eyes. These men go up the mountain, enter the clouds, disappear, reappear, People watch them, mark them. They walk by the side of precipices. They daringly pursue their road. See them aloft, see them in the distance; they are but black specks. On they go. The road is uneven, its difficulties constant. At each step a wall, at each step a trap. As they rise the cold increases. They must make their ladder, cut the ice and walk on it., hewing the steps in haste. A storm is raging. Nevertheless they go forward in their madness. The air becomes difficult to breath. The abyss yawns below them. Some fall. Others stop and retrace their steps; there is a sad weariness. The bold ones continue. They are eyed by the eagles; the lightning plays about them: the hurricane is furious. No matter, they persevere.”

- Victor Hugo

“There are many ways of going forward, but only one way of standing still.” 

- Franklin D. Roosevelt

moving forward with the wheel....

many things spinning and moving, on the precipice of change...a definitely appropriate draw, here...

Yes, changing indeed. A school year is drawing to an end. If I can just get this one last THING done, a period of serious difficulty will mostly be drawing to a conclusion. My current living situation is going to be changing soon. The seasons are changing. My plans for the summer, for next year...so much flux, spin, uncertainty...

The concrete wheel at the forefront, the one made of gold, of things that you can shape, influence, perceive clearly...and behind it, in violent, the wider spinning, the cosmic wheel over which you have no power...the things, positive or negative, deserved or undeserved, that will simply happen... The rise and the fall, some things improving, and others deteriorating...always the spinning of wheels... Nothing can remain as it has been, static, for very long...

Still have those decisions to make, many of them. Have been moving forward and yet...slow-walking it, still uncertain, unable to concretely commit. It's the opportunity cost issue, really. WANTING something so badly and yet, uncertain that in going after it, I'm not giving up the chance to do something I might necessarily want, but which I perhaps NEED. And yet, feeling the chances of getting those needed things are so low anyway...

Jupiter and the Air. A time to fly into the wild, the unknown, the amazing. Perhaps...

You cannot dawdle forever, cannot try to stop the inevitable spinning. The fool, with his green garb, with his power of optimism, of faith in the new, says...just do it. Stop with the questions that have no real answers. Go with the flow of the forward movement. Make it yours, this unstoppable change; shape it. Make it what you want, and not what you would regret. Yes there is danger, of wrong decisions, of things blowing up in your face but...there is always danger, isn't there? Circular, oval rings here too, not a circle but more a spiral...you never quite get back to the same place that you were in, once you leave it and yet...you will return to a similar position, and perhaps the experiences that you gain as the fool will help you proceed forward in other ways as well, eventually, in ways that you cannot see currently...

Yes, a time to leap more enthusiastically. A time to commit, to stop second-guessing, to make my choice and just go with doing the things I need to do to make it happen. A time for prudence, pragmatism right now too. I MUST finish the things I still need to wrap up - that very late paper that has been murdering my brain, exam - and start on all the logistics of moving and packing and cleaning and trying to get things for myself done...so much to do in a short time, if I want commit to this possibility. So many flowers to gently enfold in leaves. Sun in Virgo...optimistic energy directed in pragmatic, material ways. Everyday matters that must be taken care of. Responsibilities and obligations to fulfill, roots to care for...

pondering opportunity costs

You may try to tell yourself differently sometimes, convince yourself that you can have it all, do it all, that you can hold onto all the strings and still accomplish everything you want..but the truth is, everything has opportunity costs. Everything involves trade-offs, even if they are only implicit ones, theoretical . Taking on something necessitates sacrifice - if not of something you are already committed to, then of the energy needed for more.

That's the thing, you see. You tell yourself you can keep on going with all of it, that you don't need to put down the old sword to pick up the new. Another class? A new job? Another set of burdens when you already have so many others on your plate? A new project? Sure, sure why not. And stubbornly you insist that you can hold onto all of it, that you won't have to set anything aside...and maybe you won't, technically. Maybe you really do have the upper body strength, or the masochistic pure force of will to keep holding both of those swords high above your head through the night... But the extra toll it takes, to keep those swords raised? That exquisite kind of tired-muscle pain? All the concentration it requires, to keep that perfect careful balance, that precarious sense of equilibrium? That is a COST too. That takes something from you, out of you...

An economic concept really, opportunity costs, the idea that nothing is really free. An hour spent at a public park - free, right? It costs you nothing but time. And yet...if you spent that hour working, you would make however much your hourly wage is, right? So really, the cost is there: that wage you choose to give up to enjoy the sun, the fresh air...

You become more aware of it the more frequently you find yourself in situations of...difficulty, too much starting of new things, too much refusing to let go of the old... And yet, what can you do, if those old burdens are just things you cannot give up - too dear to you, tied too deeply into the person you are, or just so ingrained you have no idea of how to even go about leaving them behind? What if the cost of NOT taking up that new adventure, that new possibility, is even higher than the cost of having to learn to balance even more?

You accept it. You accept the cost of what you might take on and what you will not be able to do as a result. Accept that you will have to find a way to somehow balance even more, hold up even heavier swords, make an even more precarious situation work...and so you do, and so it goes. At every new possibility the question: is it worth it, the cost of going this way? Is it worth it, the cost of letting the chance pass by?

What would be heavier in the end - the burden of the effort, or the burden of regret? Sometimes you do not know for sure, cannot see ahead of you. Choice and faith. Balance, balance. How heavy a set of swords are you willing and able to hold up? How long can you keep at it?

looking for a bright spot

I feel like as much as I try to maintain a bit of a cordon-sanitaire between the tarot blog and other aspects of my life...a lot of posts recently have had the theme of I Am Overwhelmed. What can I say? I am indeed quite overwhelmed by so many things...

Well. Decided to step away from the thoth and my deck of the week(s) and just...my favorite, my comfort deck. A quick one card draw: show me I bright spot, in all of this muck. Show me something to focus on when I just want to give up, give in, stop.

The fish in the cup. That little, silly fish popping out the place you would least expect it to be - that is, if you are all serious minded, no nonsense type...

Flights of fancy. Wishes and dreams and little acts of creativity. Small things that perhaps amuse no one but me...

Trying to maybe plan a trip to the Library of Congress with a friend on Saturday. That would certainly be a place to find inspiration, imagination...

Little things. Perhaps I shall wear my Ravenclaw shirt to class tonight. Lots of blue in this card. The Ravenclaw shirt is blue too. It makes me smile, every time I put in on, even if most people around me wouldn't get why.

Imagination, creativity, the little poems, ideas...I feel very uninspired in writing this paper I have to get done by tomorrow...far too tired and stressed to be inspired to do that arabic presentation I'm supposed to have done by tomorrow too...another night of no sleep, no dreams at all and yet...

The fish is still there, waiting. Maybe you are tired to really see it right now. But it is still there. If you can get through, this last big, seemingly impossible challenge...The fish that you will chat it, the way you sometimes talk aloud to yourself, in funny accents, just because. The way you sometimes amuse yourself while walking to wherever you need to go by trying to say the same thing in english, polish, arabic, french...

New things, interesting things, inspiring things...an entire ereader to fill with books, to read, so many things, fishies, wild ideas, possibilities, wonders...new things...if you can only get through, hold it together a little bit longer, yes.

(Randomly written at work yesterday. Seems appropriate to this, come to think of it...)

a time for self-discipline

The Emperor has come up several times in the last few days as part of the little quick draws I do for myself. I can't say that I don't see why, considering all that is going on...

I like this take on the Emperor. The style of this deck is very...compelling and at times, quite open to interpretation. He stands holding a rams-head wand at that maltese cross thing, pure thoth-influence there, the symbols of his power, authority, the astrological influence of Aries...but look, that emblem with the symbols of the fourth suits...is that a robe he is wearing, a part of him? Is it a podum he is standing in front of? Hard to tell, exactly... Behind him we see houses, buildings, the tangible, physical world but all of it is a jumble, a mess of chaos, a lack of clarity...and he stands before it, steady, cloaked in a balance of black and white, the laurel coming out of his crown. Ready to take command, to exert his will on what is around him, to delineate, organize, take control...

Yes, I do understand why this particular message is repeating itself for me, in different variations. I have been constantly working at it, trying to get things done. To boot, there seem to be a growing number of things outside my schoolwork that I need to deal with too. I am not, in fact, the most super organized, attention-to-detail person naturally. So many things on my plate makes me feel overwhelmed. I try to work on it, make to do lists galore to keep myself accountable, try to work out precise schedules for what/where/when I am going to do...

I have made progress. About half of the school things I needed to do have been done. If I can get through what I need to finish by Thursday, I can pretty much relax for the rest of the semester. The little bit after that will be no problem at all...Progress, yes, forward movement. I got the 8 of wands alongside the Emperor sometime during the weekend - Saturday, I think. Mercury in Sagittarius, a card of deliberate, empowered, optimistic forward movement indeed. Here instead of flying, the wands are growing upwards, growing strong under the auspices of that rainbow, the bands of light, energy. With determination, organization, and self-discipline you WILL get through this, will make the progress you need to make, and do it well. Just go. Self-discipline to keep on going. It was a message I rather needed to hear...I spent most of the weekend trying not to cry because of intense nerve type tooth pain. And yet, nonetheless, I did get two presentations done, both of which went well. I forced myself to go to the library and work and read and meet with my group and do what I needed to do anyway, and it led to good things.

Today the Emperor showed up again, this time with the 10 of pentacles. Mercury in Virgo, this time. Taking that Magus-intellect-empowerment energy and focusing it on the pragmatic, the earth-realm, the obligatory. The 10 of pentacles is such a dual card really...on the one hand, it speaks of material success, of wealth, of accomplishment. On the other, of duty, of obligation, of the strings that bind you to others. Responsibility that comes with having what you have. The man sits, around him all that he has gathered, achieved. He is at once satisfied and utterly exhausted by his efforts. And yet, around the corner, beyond that arch, there is a child, young, giddy, ready to play. There is a castle waiting to be explored, a new adventure, if only he can satisfy the duties, the obligations he has inside...

The home stretch, this. Don't drop the ball now. Keep on with the efforts to organize what you need to do, to plan your time exactly and follow through as best you can, to work and work and work until the work is over. It will be worth it. You will have time to catch your breath. And the rest will perhaps, seem less overwhelming and more exciting once these current obligations are satisfied.

So yes, take control. Force everything else away from your mind. Bring order to that messy jumble of thoughts and ideas. Self-discipline to move foward and keep moving forward until everything you must do has been dealt with.

the freedom that comes from constraint

(so this started off with me trying to do the memory exercise again and turned into a bit of a free association ramble/pondering thing as well...)

I remember, a couple of years ago, some day during the summer...meeting up with a few friends and going skating on Governor's Island in NYC. It's a really nice place to skate and bike, a large loop around the island, smoothly paved, no cars to have to avoid... We were joking around, beeing silly. I found some kind of rope type thing, and kept turning it into restraints, a pseudo-noose, or leash, horsing around until I made them nervous enough to take the thing away from me. It was silly, all of it, but a very nice day.

For a while after that I wanted to go back, go skating there again, but all of us coordinating schedules around work and other committments...it never seemed to happen. The next summer, again, hey lets go skating sometime, and we'd agree, and then it wouldn't happen. I spent days stuck in my house, gripped  by a kind of ennui, paralysis, a certain lack of energy or motivation to do much of anything. I kept wishing that someone would please drag me out to do something fun. Finally, one day I just put my rollerblades in my bag and made the commute, took the two ferries needed to get from where I was to there, and spent hours and hours just going around the island by myself, enjoying it, enjoying that I could go on as long as I liked, until my body physically refused to go any further. I didn't have to stop, to wait around for someone else to catch their breathe, to leave before I wanted because everyone else had had enough.

Having done it once, enjoyably, there was the freedom of the realization, backed up now by experience: I can do this whenever I like. I don't need to sit around, waiting for anyone else. Being alone is not, in fact, a constraint.

And so it is, that fact about the situations that bog you down, that get you stuck. The fact about difficulties, and constraints, and limitations and obstacles, whether without or within: without them, life would be easier, more pleasant. By overcoming them, we grow. Academia is this card for me to a large part, it feels like, right now. Every time I finish something, drive myself to the very edge of physical and mental exhaustion to get something done....I turn and there is more, more still to be done. Stuck in the school library, in front of computer screen night after night...and yet, I wanted all this. I knowingly chose to go back to school, to go back to this reality.

You can learn a lot from simply reading books. I could have stayed at my unchallenging dead end, but relatively comfortable job longer, going to the bookstore up the street after work to read, read, and been satisfied with that. But...it doesn't challenge you the same way. It is pleasant, and certainly educational to read a book about a subject you do not know much about...but it just doesn't force those mental cogs to spin at their full potential, not the way that reading several different sources, and having to critically think and apply larger concepts, and create a well reasoned thesis, and argue it efficiently in a set number of pages to be done by a certain time does.

When I feel tired, sick, so stressed I cannot really eat for days, when my tooth still hurts and I have all these other things I need to deal with, and I must still show up for work...and when I have to do those academic  things...the feeling of being pushed to the very edge of capabilities...the swords, closing in around you, the binding voice that says you cannot, cannot handle it all...when you in fact do...the feeling of accomplishment, empowerment...it is something that just reading a book on your own in free time, and saying yay, now I know about this...just doesn't match.

It makes me think of the much larger 8 of swords kind of situations/issues in my life...the question of who I could be, what I could do if I somehow managed to extricate myself from all of THAT...

And yes, the freedom of learning that doing things alone does not have to be a limitation. That is also a big one for me, being a solitary sort much of the time. I am...in the process of...potentially arranging something that, if it worked out...I would be off by myself in a certain North African country for ten weeks, quite soon actually. In a way that is pretty intimidating...especially since there is so much societal messages around 'women shouldn't do ____ alone" which pretty much includes travel to foreign, developing, muslim countries....and yet, it's such a silly thing to be limited by because...where would that leave me? If I have no friends or partner that share my interests or ambitions I should simply never go anywhere interesting, when in fact I do enjoy adventures on my own? No, I don't thinks so...

So yes, the 8 of Swords scenario...perhaps never pleasant in the moment, but in the larger scheme of things, not necessarily a bad thing at all. Having spent all that time tied up, stuck in one place...how much more amazing will it feel afterwards, to be able to run?

hierophant in a more positive light

So I thought this was interesting tidbit. See, I'm not usually such a big fan of the Hierophant card, conceptually. Funny enough, but I don't have much trouble with the Emperor, perhaps because often as not I see myself in that card, directions for what I need to do, rather than an outside authority. With the Hierophant though, I definitely do perceive that as external, and it has kind of blah religious authority associations for me much of the time on some level, and yeah...

Anyway, in spite of my best efforts, I wasn't quite able to finish my Cyber paper in time for the class, given that I had to simultaneously work on a presentation for the same class, and...yeah. Not meeting deadlines is a *thing* that I really try to avoid because it gets me so annoyed with myself when it happens. I don't like the idea of making excuses, giving explanations. I knew when the deadline was, I should have made sure that I met it, and the fact that I didn't, regardless of circumstances...

In any case, it is what it is, and in this case it left me in the position of needing to ask my professor for an extra day to get it in to him. So I was sitting on a bus on my way to the class, shuffling my deck, asking for some guidance on how best to approach that conversation. This was one of a three card draw, but it was really the crux of the reading. It was interesting too in that I didn't have my usual keyword book that I like to consult when reading with the Thoth to better familiarize myself with the esoteric symbolism aspects, so it was all just intuitive.

But yeah, seeing this card, I immediately saw it as representing my professor. He's the authority figure, the one with the knowledge, and a guide for us...and yes, he is operating under certain set constraints, given his position, given the circumstances of the classroom, certain set immovable boundaries - the taurus influence - but fundamentally...he is there to teach, to guide, to direct, to impart knowledge, to make these obscure concepts clear. Assignments are assigned to teach you something, to challenge and motivate you to do the work you need to do to learn. It's not to make you miserable, and he's not teaching with the intention of being some mean unreasonable person. There to guide us, to impart the expertise garnered from his own career, experiences. And so, as long as its clear that I am doing the work, and taking things seriously...asking him for that extra day would be ok, would not challenge or contradict his fundamental motives and approach in the class.

So I did. Apologized, took responsibility for not having it done, politely asked if it would be alright if I emailed it the next day instead. He was fine with with my request, perfectly nice about it. And so here I am, finishing up  what needs to still be done and yeah. I liked the reassuring feeling of this card in that reading...it's not really one that comes up very often for me, but the insight was both helpful in getting a better perspective on that particular situation and in being able to see the idea of the Hierophant in general from a more positive viewpoint.

and on and on we go...

Nothing too long, deep, or insightful to write today. Perhaps not the most coherent...haven't really slept in like a day. Still at it, type type, read read, trying to get it all done before this evening.

Pulled this card this morning. Had a very encouraging little quick draw from my Thoth last night right when I really needed it, and this too, seems to me along the same lines. I love how very, very dynamic the princess is here. Love the goats in Thoth-influenced decks, I must say. Goats are one of my favorite animals. But yes, love how she is running with it, slingshot read, bold, ready to learn and explore by doing, out there with nature, out in the world, challenging herself. On the one hand, the metaphorical student-me I see, in this card. I always kind of associate the more studious parts of my life with this court, actually. On the other hand, with all the movement in the card, a very apt additional message indeed:

Yes, sure, you can succeed and handle this challenge. If you get to DOING it. Why are you pulling cards instead of writing now? Act act, run run, go go. Intellectual athletics this is, yes.

The details in this deck really are great, though, if you take the time to really look at the cards...

Anyway, before I go back to my goat, er, work...following up on this reading from last week...my new shiny, in a pretty case from Etsy, named Logos Tehuti (I name all my electronic devices, ha. My ipod is Aleister...)