{"id":57428,"date":"2012-05-27T14:26:38","date_gmt":"2012-05-27T18:26:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/?p=57428"},"modified":"2012-05-27T14:43:52","modified_gmt":"2012-05-27T18:43:52","slug":"the-weekend-tarot-reading-sunday-may-27-2012","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/reading-tarot\/the-weekend-tarot-reading-sunday-may-27-2012\/","title":{"rendered":"The Weekend Tarot Reading — Sunday, May 27, 2012"},"content":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0Sarah Taylor<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

The message of this week’s reading feels simple: a lack of connection to something greater than us can make us feel separated from inner wealth and contentment, no matter the outer appearances of our lives.<\/p>\n

\"King<\/a>
King of Pentacles, Nine of Pentacles, Five of Pentacles from the Rider-Waite Smith Tarot deck. Click on the image for a larger version.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

All three cards today are Pentacles — Pentacles representing our manifest world, and the things with which we interact with our five senses. As the last suit in the tarot, they are the most concrete<\/em> in terms of what they represent and how they feel.<\/p>\n

Here, that sense of concreteness has fallen out of balance to the point where our life, in some way, has become so focused on the outer that it is holding us to ransom. Take a look at the King of Pentacles and the Nine of Pentacles — such an apparently obvious pairing in terms of masculine\/feminine, shared colours (the preponderance of yellow, for a start), and shared imagery (most notably the grapes), that I have had to stop myself from referring to the Nine as the Queen of Pentacles. For the Nine of Pentacles is most decidedly not <\/em>the Queen of Pentacles, even if she might appear to be the King’s partner at first glance.<\/p>\n

So let’s look closer and see what these two cards, side-by-side, might be saying once we have looked past the obvious. The first thing that comes to me is that the King and Nine are the visual equivalent of taking a swim in chocolate cake. At first, the whole thing looks lovely — appealing; then, I am met with a sense of something being too good to be true; finally, I start to see the imbalance in the pairing, the scales tipping so far in favour of the material that the whole thing runs the risk of sliding off and out of the picture.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The reason for this hinges on the Queen of Pentacles — or, rather, her absence. The Queen is the visual and energetic complement to the King. Unlike the King, her robes are simple, hers is a world of blooms while the King’s land is predominated by vines and grapes, and her throne is framed by a creeping rose which encloses her while the King is open to the sky above him.<\/p>\n

Both King and Queen hold a single pentacle, which sit in balance with each other. Nothing more is needed, because the King and Queen understand that they might be custodians of their pentacles, but that this is in service to the world around them: they are custodians of the natural as well as material worlds, and both are connected. In the pairing of the King and Nine of Pentacles, the pentacles have grown in importance to the point where I feel like my eye is drawn to them over anything else. Where are the priorities in this partnership?<\/p>\n

I have written about the Nine of Pentacles in a few articles before this one, remarking on the overriding impression I have of the woman being trapped by her circumstances. Yes, she seems to have everything she needs; she is the epitome of affluence; this card is often seen as a positive one where we can enjoy the fruits of our labours. But is the price we have to pay worth it?<\/p>\n

The woman is beautiful to look at, but what has always interested me more is the way her head is turned to the falcon that is perching on her left hand. Falconry was a symbol of affluence and leisure — she has the time and money to devote to pastimes that are sporting but not necessarily growth-inducing. All play and no work makes Jill a dull girl. The falcon sits on her hand, tamed and hooded. They are as trapped as each other. It is the snail — the tiniest of details at her feet — that has free rein (reign?) in this picture. To all intents and purposes the coupling of the King and Nine should work. Does it, though? Where is the focus?<\/p>\n

My eyes move past the Nine of Pentacles, in the same direction of the woman’s gaze, and on to the final card, the Five of Pentacles. The Five of Pentacles is concerned with deprivation and neglect. The couple in this picture are in ill health; their clothing is torn and insufficient to protect them from the harshness of their environment; they walk together but they do not seem together. Their circumstances have created a sense of isolation from each other as well as from the world at large.<\/p>\n

What stands out in the Five of Pentacles as something of beauty, symmetry and vitality is the stained glass window behind the couple. For they are walking outside a church, and the warmth emanating from the window is an invitation in to a place that offers shelter, support, sustenance. They, however, are oblivious to it, and their suffering continues.<\/p>\n

The Five of Pentacles asks us to focus on our own healing. That healing can be physical, but here it almost certainly also speaks of spiritual healing in the form of a connection to something that transcends the physical world. In these three cards I have an image of the creation of something that seems to have so much going for it, but which has trapped those involved in a cycle of obligation to something that has thrown them off balance. Too much matter; not enough spirit. That is at the heart of it. When our world is defined solely by what we can see and hold in our hands, we might look the part of royalty, but our lives can feel barren and meaningless. It is up to us to turn within and find what has been calling to us, inviting us into an encounter that has the ability to transform our lives in ways that might not be immediately visible, but which renew our connection to ourselves and each other.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

If you want to experiment with tarot cards and don’t have any, we provide a free tarot spread generator<\/a> using the Celtic Wings spread, which is based on the traditional Celtic Cross spread. This article<\/a> explains how to use the spread.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0Sarah Taylor The message of this week’s reading feels simple: a lack of connection to something greater than us can make us feel separated from inner wealth and contentment, no matter the outer appearances of our lives. All three cards today are Pentacles — Pentacles representing our manifest world, and the things with which we … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":470,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"generate_page_header":""},"categories":[183],"tags":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57428"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/470"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57428"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57428\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57428"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57428"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/planetwaves.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57428"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}