So, um. Welcome, to the tens of people who might at some point read this. How’s it going?
It should be noted, I think, that sometimes I struggle to find clever things to say when I begin writing. It should also be noted that this affliction often continues well past the beginning.
As 2011 winds down, I realize that I feel adrift in some important ways. Adrift, and somewhat scattered. There are reasons for each that I will likely natter on about at some length sooner rather than later, but for now I’ll simply say that these things are true, and leave it at that.
I’ve been thinking for a while that I’d like to craft some kind of a regular intentional practice. I’m not sure I’ll call it a spiritual practice, because that term feels like I should be doing something more important than rambling in a blog (even if it is a blog whose title and URL that I spent an embarrassing amount of time pondering). So it’s not that I don’t feel like this is an important thing – I do…or at least I feel like it can be potentially important. My reluctance hasn’t been a lack of motivation, exactly, but rather a nagging, irrational worry that one of two things will happen. Those worrisome things include:
- When I inevitably fail to meet my internal standards for said practice (and really, it is inevitable that I will do so at some point), I will feel shame for my momentous failure and simply cease trying.
- Regardless of my success or failure, I can’t help but wonder if anything I try to manifest along these lines will really be important. It somehow feels like such a thing should be something…I don’t know. Momentous, I guess, and I don’t particularly imagine myself doing that.
I’ll avoid the “spiritual practice” label, then, because…well, just because. But an intentional practice –that feels like something that can be important to me even if it isn’t Important in the larger sense. This past weekend, I came up with the rather surprising idea of doing a regular tarot draw, just one card, and writing about that card, what it says to me, and the process of doing this regularly.
Why tarot? Well, that’s a little complicated. I’m kind of surrounded by people who know more about the tarot than I do (which is to say, they reliably know more than, “Hey, that’s a pretty picture,” which is about where I am much of the time). I certainly have no great insight into the tool, and I’m not particularly drawn to develop any deep expertise in it. Like astrology, or personality tests, or any of a number of other predictive or descriptive tools, I think there’s a lot of “eye of the beholder” going on here. With tarot cards, as well, there’s also the inherent randomness of shuffling the cards and drawing one. While journaling a bit about this notion over the weekend, I wrote:
“The universe is random, but my soul is not. A single card drawn from a deck of 78 is random, but what I see in that card is not.”
Or, you know, maybe it is. I have no idea what I’ll find to be true for me here, whether I’ll develop a deep appreciation for the cards or uncover a hidden talent for interpreting them (that, I can pretty much assure you, will not happen) or if I’ll simply get a couple of weeks into the process and say, “Huh. It turns out I really don’t know anything about this after all. What a completely unsurprising development!”
In any case, I’m kind of excited to get started. Of course, I somehow managed to forget the fact that I don’t actually own a tarot deck of my own. I could borrow one, I suppose (there are at least 3 in my household that I can think of) but I don’t know. It feels like if I’m going to be writing about some number of cards before I get distracted by a shinier project, I should own a deck. Last night, I visited that great home for spiritual development, the Commonwealth of Amazonia, and ordered a deck (standard Rider-Waite deck, for anyone who’s curious. I know there are a lot of other options out there (many of them freaking beautiful) but I know that I tend to process visual information pretty literally, so simple is better for this guy.) As I am a Prime Member of the Amazonian Commonwealth, said deck is winging its way to me as we speak and should arrive tomorrow evening.
8 replies on “By way of replacing the placeholder post”
I am totally stealing that quote from you when I do readings. I hope you don’t mind. Best of luck to you in this endeavor, and I am really excited to read your thoughts. (P.S. I applaud your choice of deck.)
“…universe is random but my soul is not…”
Soul: experience, understanding, circumstances, choices, emotions, aspirations, challenges–identity.
I look forward to reading how all of this and so much more come to bear on how you read the deck, one random card at a time.
Perhaps more interestingly, I look forward to how it will look when you draw the same card on a different draw.
“Perhaps more interestingly, I look forward to how it will look when you draw the same card on a different draw.”
Precisely my thought, actually. What will happen if the same card comes up twice in a row? We shall see. 🙂
Out of curiosity, why a standard deck?
My deck I picked for resonance, echo, woo woo -but mostly cause it had dragons on it.
Good question! For me, it comes down to learning style (okay, I know people are saying that auditory/visual/kinesthetic learning styles don’t actually exist, but I don’t care about that right now). I am extremely skewed to the auditory style – I most comfortably interact with the world through words and stories. When looking at something visual like the image on a card, the easiest way for me to make sense of it is by telling myself the “story” of what I see. I seem to be able to do that more easily with pictures involving people than with pictures involving dragons, or faeries, or more abstract (to me) images.
Totally logical 😀
I’ll be curious to see, as you travel your road to see if the “starter” desk becomes your primary tool or if at some point you’ll be moved by a particular image set to migrate to a different deck.
I’ve known a few people who’ve kept the same ratty deck forever ;D
Cool! I look forward to reading more. I have always enjoyed your thought processes on things. Says the Gemini, lol.
And if it helps, even with deep-dive exposure to Tarot (and Astrology, and Chakras) I still never feel like I really know these systems. Good luck and happy non-spiritual-specific intentional practicing. 😀
LOVE your quote! And, I very much enjoy your writing, nattering or otherwise. I’m excited with you as you start this new thing you’ve started!