Category: card meanings

Doing a One-Card ‘Yes/No’ Psychic Card Reading for yourself using Playing Cards

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First let’s take a minute to consider what is meant by this word, ‘psychic.’ It comes from the Greek word psychikos (‘of the mind’ or ‘mental’) and the Greek word ‘psyche’ means ‘soul’ or ‘breath.’

That’s pretty vague, but we’ll broadly understand what we’re talking about here. It is the (sometimes spooky) experience of feeling you know something, without knowing how you know it or why you feel it, and then getting the proof, and finding out you were right, though you still don’t know how.

Wiki Moon card.jpg
The Moon from the Gilded Royale Tarot, Ciro Marchetti

Everyone is psychic to a degree. It’s fascinating, but it’s natural. It might be uncanny, and often it is. It really, really is, but that doesn’t mean it’s supernatural. It is you. It is nothing to do with the occult. It is nothing directly to do with religion or witchcraft, though these activities are connected to or derive from that aspect of the human mind/psyche.

It’s about your innate animal intelligence, your instinct and intuition, and is simply a more acute manifestation of these natural functions of the human mind -your sensory capabilities. Intuition is acutely heightened instinct. It’s built in to your software, maybe even your hardware and is a key element in your survival tool-kit.

Jung was interested in the archetypes of Tarot.

So you took an instant dislike to someone but you don’t know why? Don’t simply dismiss that feeling; the reasons may become apparent later. Meanwhile, give it the benefit of the doubt but tread with care.

So you feel an overpowering reluctance to do something, but you don’t quite know why? Trust yourself. You have your reasons.

Feelings can be wrong, of course, in which case we can always reassess the situation or our reactions, and change our minds. But far more often they are right, and they work faster than conscious reasoning. Far, far faster, and it is this very speed that can save our life. That if something feels bad, it probably is.

Avoid.

But if we’re all psychic, why do people pay to go and consult someone else, or go to a professional psychic practitioner for readings?

They are looking for a service, and that depends on skill and a specific kind of experience.  Professional psychics can not rely solely on their intuitive ability in order to deliver a service on demand. Psychic experiences happen when they happen, but the psychic reader needs to respond on demand, and to do this they have trained their abilities, developing specific skills, possibly involving many years of individual study, time and practice so that they can deliver insights that are relevant and that mean something to a total stranger, right here, right now.

But everyone had to start somewhere, and that doesn’t mean we can’t try it for ourselves.

Sometimes we might find ourselves undecided whether to go route A or route B. Using the playing cards might well give us a response that simply reflects what we already knew, or guessed, or suspected, but that is largely the point of doing such readings, and validation can itself be helpful in letting us know we read that situation correctly, whether or not it’s what we were hoping for.

Points to consider

Professional psychic readers are not permitted by law to take payment, reading for people aged under-18.

Or at least, it is not allowed in the UK without the authorization of a parent or guardian. There are good reasons for this, to do with maturity and vulnerability, and a word of caution applies here too, in reading for yourself if you are under 18.

There is a risk is you will not get it right and misunderstand the message. Beware wishful thinking or fearful thinking. Calm your mind. Try and place yourself in a neutral frame of mind.

You may for instance draw the Death card and get frightened, interpreting this as a prediction of imminent death. What is far more likely is that the Death card is reflecting back at you something that has been on your mind lately. Perhaps there has been a death in your circle or perhaps you have been thinking of leaving a job or ending a relationship or other connection, or leaving one area to move away. Professional readers do not always get it right either. Until, and unless you are getting correct answers more than 55% of the time, your results are statistically no better than lucky guesses. Getting it wrong doesn’t mean you don’t have psychic ability, but this ability builds with practise and confidence.

Stay humble or you will be riding for a fall. This is not about power. No-one knows it all, and no one likes a know all. No-one has a 100% accuracy rate.

Is is unwise to make decisions based solely on the turn of a card.

The cards are to be regarded as an opportunity to pause, reflect and maybe think again. Start with easy but specific questions that you can quickly and easily validate, e.g. ‘will it be sunny here outside my window at 10.00 tomorrow morning?’

You might not understand or like the answer.

This is the very real risk in consulting with oracles, even your own – or especially your own. It needs discipline. Words matter. Be clear in your mind what it is you are really asking. Avoid repeating the same questions over and over in hope of getting the answer you want. You may get that answer in the end, but this is not conducive to accuracy, and if it becomes a compulsion, and you find you are doing it A LOT, or if you are experiencing, or have lately experienced depression or anxiety, you will be well advised to leave such activities alone for the time being. It could make matters worse.

Now let’s look at how to get an advisory yes or no answer using just one playing card. That’s all it is, an advisory answer; no court of law could treat this as admissible evidence.

The One-Card Spread

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Ordinary playing cards have been used in this way since at least the 1600’s and probably longer. A deck of playing cards is readily affordable and easy to obtain in many shops and online if you do not already have a deck.

The One- Card Spread is the simplest spread of all, but can do the job perfectly well, delivering an accurate yes or no answer.

First, for simplification and for the avoidance of confusion, remove the Joker. The Joker is a complex card. It correlates to the Fool in the Tarot and may mean a yes, no or maybe depending on a number of factors, so is not ideal for our purposes today.

You need somewhere quiet, no distractions. Some people like to use rituals, smudging, candles etc. I don’t use those myself in doing card readings, but this is purely a matter of personal preference.

Doing the reading

First you need to decide the code or system you will use for your one card spread. How are you going to interpret the answer?

Classical cartomancy uses this system:

Any red suit card, Hearts or Diamonds, will mean yes, irrespective of its meaning

Any black suit card, Clubs or Spades will mean no, irrespective of its meaning

There are no rules except that you decide your system and then stick with it.

Consistency and repetition is crucially important. This is what professional card readers do. They ‘self-programme’ by telling themselves that this card means X and this other card means Y until with repetition and practise – it actually does.

They do it till they make it so.

Consider the question. It needs to be clear and unambiguous, asking for an answer that will serve your highest good, harming none.

You remain in charge, using the cards for advice only. You could, for example, ask questions along the lines of, ‘Is it a good idea/plan/will it work out well at this time (meaning is it in my best interests) to go here, go there, speak to, do this, do that…?” etc.

Now shuffle the deck, keeping the cards blind, asking your question aloud or just silently to yourself.

Draw a card whenever you feel ready. There are no rights and wrongs here, but it is this act of stopping and choosing a card completely at random that is actually the psychic activity involved in the reading.

You have here a deck of 52 cards but you are drawing just one, and expecting it to be meaningful and relevant, more so than all the other cards that you didn’t draw, that have remained in the deck. The cards that are missing may be just as significant in answering your question, as the ones that appear.

What have we got here?

A red card or a black card?

No further action is required or even desirable at this point. Simply log the card. Make a note and allow time to discover if the answer is correct.

If you would like to go beyond the probable yes or no answer, and look at the reasons why you got that answer, you could look up the actual card meaning for additional feedback, to treat that as an extra comment or piece of advice, referring to this very basic key below.

Playing Card Suits

  • Hearts (Cups) = emotions, health, offers, invitations, friendship.
  • Diamonds (Pentacles) = money, health, house, career, communications.
  • Spades (Swords) = intellect, law, IT, planning, challenges.
  • Clubs (Wands/Staves) = action and creativity, travel, marketing, study, ideas, inspiration

Card Numbers

In general, the higher the number of your ‘yes’ or ‘no card, the stronger the answer, except for Aces, which are the lowest number, 1, but are the strongest cards. So the strongest yes answers would be the Ace of Diamonds or Hearts, or the 10 of Diamonds or hearts. The strongest no answers would be the Ace of Spades or Clubs, or the 10 of Spades or Clubs.

  • Ace – new beginnings; the pure energy of their suit.
  • Two – partnerships, attraction, balance.
  • Three – co-operation, connection, growth.
  • Four – security, stability, foundations, inaction.
  • Five – imbalance, challenges, change, adjustment.
  • Six – sweet victory, harmony, attainment and peace.
  • Seven – spiritual discernment, magic, wisdom, turning point, options.
  • Eight – movement (or lack of it), organization, prioritizing.
  • Nine – Growth, understanding, integration, realization.
  • Ten – Culmination, completion, transition, endings, beginnings.

The Court cards (portrait cards)

Knaves/Jacks represent news or new situations, or young people below the ages of around 25.

  • Knave of Hearts – romantic, emotional, sweet-natured.
  • Knave of Diamonds – curious, grounded, sensible.
  • Knave of Spades – witty, clever, focused.
  • Knave of Clubs – active, adventurous, risk-taker.

Queens are adults, actual people; usually female but not necessarily.

  • Queen of Hearts – kind, empathic, nurturing.
  • Queen of Diamonds – practical, down-to-earth, good in a crisis.
  • Queen of Spades – truth-seeker, honest, straight-speaking.
  • Queen of Clubs – ambitious, strong communicator, passionate.

Kings are adults, actual people; usually male but not necessarily.

  • King of Hearts – approachable but reserved, wise, calm.
  • King of Diamonds – wealthy, hard working, shrewd, lover of luxury.
  • King of Spades – analytical, calculating, dispassionate.
  • King of Clubs – leader, inspirational, temperamental, sees the big picture.
English pattern playing cards

Tarot divination: How does it work?

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Image: Public Domain; The Tarot de Marseilles

Have you ever had a Tarot reading with someone else, or pulled cards for yourself, and been surprised, mystified or even spooked because the cards were so relevant it was downright uncanny?  How does that happen? After all, there are 78 cards in a Tarot deck. For those few cards you chose entirely at random, the others all had to stay in the deck.

The Basics

Tarot is only one of many systems of divination. Others are far older in origin, including astrology, palmistry, the I-Ching, runes and reading bones/entrails etc as in Rome, where Spurinna, the haruspex predicted the assassination of Julius Caesar. The popularity of card games took off after Mamluk game cards were brought to Western Europe from Turkey, and the earliest known set of tarot cards was created in the 14th century. The Tarot, also known as the Tarocchi or Tarock, began as a game of chance in the courts of northern Italy but did not become seriously associated with fortune telling or other psychic divination until much later, by the mid 18th century.

Physically speaking, a Tarot deck is little more than 78 pieces of illustrated, numbered card-stock.

The meanings in the cards need a reader to make them come alive. Study is required. No faith is required, however. No religion, no need to commune with any ‘spirits’ than the spirit of Mankind. I have read for Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Chinese and Jewish clients, as well as for atheists, agnostics and downright skeptics. No problem at all. The imagery in the Tarot crosses cultural boundaries.

But in communing with some ancient, but ‘higher’ part of ourselves, superego, not id, perhaps we are communing with the Divine, depending on however one wishes to define it. Or else tapping into our ancient animal knowing. That we muted or traded in exchange for the great advancement to language.

I see it as a transcendence or suspension of the everyday self. When I am doing a reading for another person, I need to free myself, try and take myself out of the equation, me and my worry about getting it ‘right’ or ‘wrong’; me and my ego.

I sometimes joke as I shuffle the cards, ‘OK, now my ancient inner animal is going to have a little talk with your ancient inner animal.’

We are going to converse on at (at least) two levels, consciously, and via telepathy, enabled by the imagery of the cards.

psychic pig
Marcus the psychic pig, accurately predicted the result of the EU Referendum, and The US Elections

Suspension of self and ego notwithstanding, delivery of a professional level of service means I, or any other reader need to do as well or better than the pig.

The reader draws cards blindly and at random, and lays them out in a pattern or spread, using the placement of the cards, the imagery and associated meanings of that card. Why choose this card and not that one? Well, there is the mystery. The central nervous system has a mind of its own, and dictates my movement, in determining the instant at which I stop shuffling. I can think of no better explanation. The choice to stop shuffling is not remotely deliberate.

The reader then interprets the cards, sharing what they sense about a given person, situation or question, past, present and possible future.

This stuff is not omniscience. I don’t KNOW anything. I just say what I see and feel. The thing that amazes, and can even startle the person being read for, and the readers too at times, is the total, immediate and undeniable relevance of cards drawn blindly and at random, and then organised into a pattern or spread for interpretation.

The cards were drawn at random,  but the results do not seem random at all.

They fit.

OK, but shaddap! How exactly does this stuff WORK?

Well, OK, OK. But there is no one single, neat and tidy answer.

The reader  has ‘uploaded’ a ‘programme’ by learning the meanings and associations of the cards. With much repetition and practice, just as with learning to play an instrument or indeed any kind of rote learning, this programming becomes almost second nature, and the cards may act now, not only as technical support but as a springboard for insights prompted by lateral or associative thinking, backed up by instinct.

This provides them with their starting point, and then their own ideas, empathy or intuition supplies further comment. The cards provide a spring board for the reader’s intuition, but the associations of the cards supply the details enabling greater precision of interpretation. Associative thinking, or lateral thinking helps me a lot in arriving at ‘psychic’ insights or ‘hits.’

I look at the card and there is a kind of a ‘ping’

For instance: I drew the Six of Wands, and this card generally means progress, promotion, a trip but on this occasion, something about the artwork made me say something I had never said on previous occasions, drawing the self same card, and I asked the client, ‘are you thinking of going to Siena?’

And she was, or rather, a place just outside Siena, but how did I arrive at that guess? Firstly, I had already established that we were looking at a travel destination. Secondly, something about it suddenly made me think of the Palio.

6 wands legacy divine tarot
palio
The Six Wands from The Legacy of The Divine Tarot, Ciro Marchetti

At other times the six of Wands has told me about motorbikes. Once it ‘showed’ me an upcoming sporting event, a big one and I asked the client, was this correct, and learned he was going to the Paralympics as a reserve member of the wheelchair rugby team. Most recently I drew this card, and said to the lady that it looked as though she may be meeting a man who was into speeding vehicles, but his job involved teamwork. She recognized this description and said he was a firefighter. In this instance then, the six of Wands denoted a fire engine.

Same card, three entirely concrete, different yet related interpretations, talking about the real, modern world.

Synchronicity

The psychologist Carl Jung never learned to read the Tarot himself but was fascinated by its ability to reflect what was going on. Jung theorized that Tarot works by means of a phenomenon he called “synchronicity”, or meaningful coincidence.

Jung was also fascinated by what Tarot could tell us about real people we know as pictured through classic story archetypes, e.g.; The King, The High Priestess, the Wise Man (Magician) the Hermit, and for its insights into the conscious mind working in tandem with the unconscious mind.

quote-synchronicity-a-meaningful-coincidence-of-two-or-more-events-where-something-other-than-carl-jung-52-5-0551

The ‘coincidences’ of the Tarot’s commentary, relating the enquirer/clients own story back to them are so frequent and particular that the enquirer/client strongly feels that they have been heard by some mysterious invisible presence. The reader feels it too.

The reader  has ‘uploaded’ a ‘programme’ by learning the meanings and associations of the cards. With much repetition and practice, just as with learning a language or to to play an instrument or indeed any kind of rote learning, this programming becomes second nature, and the cards may act now, not only as technical support, but as a springboard for insights prompted by lateral or associative thinking, and we may go up into the realms of the psychic stratosphere.

The clues in the cards

Each card has many keywords attached. These are the basic building bricks of the reading.

The Chariot card, for instance, has these meanings attached; a vehicle, a driving test, a garage, a road trip, travel, ambition, project, a partnership, teamwork, discipline, and also the zodiac sign of Cancer and the dates associated with this sign (June 21-July 22)

So, let’s imagine I draw this card. Which meaning is the right one here and now?

John William Waterhouse - Sketch of Circe, 1911-1914
Circe by Waterhouse

John William Waterhouse – Sketch of Circe, 1911-1914 (public domain)

How does the reader

1:  choose cards which so appropriately describe things you have not yet told the reader?

2:  choose which of the many possible card interpretations to go with?

Well, the context of the card is a clue. What are the surrounding cards? The reader studies these with care. Beyond this, the short answer is, the reader doesn’t know. They make a judgement call and go with their first impressions, trusting the unconscious process, then making it conscious again, putting it back into words.

This is presumably working on empathy.

Intuition is one’s inner tuition – one’s instinctive understanding. It’s necessary for survival, and we all possess it to some degree.

Using a learned system such as Tarot helps us give it words.

Sometimes these words are so specific, many call it ‘psychic’ and psychic ability and intuition are often seen as “supernatural.”

But anyone can learn to read Tarot cards, while the degree of proficiency attained depends on a certain natural talent, but also depends to a very great extent on study and practise. Lots of people start learning, but give it up again without ever finding out all they might be able to do with it.

In Summary

Tarot is an art not a science. It is a form of language. You clearly see there’s a process at work. The mechanisms are both apparent and inscrutable. One sees the physical actions of shuffling, drawing and arranging the cards, and then upon card knowledge, feeling and sensing and finally, the right, apposite and meaningful word choice.

Becoming proficient at reading the Tarot, such that one can read to a service level feels like a big responsibility. Well, it is, and it demands a heck of a lot of practice, and the more you work with the Tarot or whatever system of divination you might want to work with, the more confidently you will be able to tap into your intuition, but you do not need to think of yourself as psychic in order to learn to read the Tarot, or to become fluent and proficient.

There is a native understanding beyond your conscious awareness and control. Whether you think that proceeds from your subconscious, the collective unconscious, God, your guides, or your higher self doesn’t matter.

The results are the proof. Sometimes these can be put to the test, observed and validated immediately, as when a reader says something that they could not possibly have known, but the client knows to be correct. But when a reader comments in respect of events many months ahead, it might be turn out to be pie in the sky, or it might prove accurate, but only time will tell.

Is the information potentially usable, actionable or workable here and now?

That is a pragmatic reading. It is my experience that most people welcome an element of pragmatism when they are at a crossroads. The Tarot is no less ‘spiritual’ when it psychically detects a problem with the drains.

Fortune Teller, Albert Anker, 1880

We can, and do know more than we know. All of us, and without necessarily knowing HOW we know it. Perhaps there are biological algorithms at work here, and why should this be surprising?

We don’t even know how old we are as a species. Not really. Until 2015 we were told, based on the available evidence, that humanity had been practicing organised agriculture for 12000 years, but subsequent discoveries by the sea of Galilee suggest humanity has been experimenting with crop eugenics for at least 23000 years.

We don’t know everything there is to know about Time.

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Six million years of Mankind. 200 000 years of ‘modern’ us. We’ve got nothing on the scorpions, with their 350 million years. Still, we are more ancient and mysterious, it seems, with every new archaeological discovery.

Till next time 🙂

A Lunar Eclipse: The Crab, the Sultan and the Wolf

Tweeted Friday January 10

“Tonight is the first full moon of the new year, nicknamed the Wolf Moon. As winter bit down, hungry wolves came down to the villages in search of food.”

January and February is wolf mating season, and their howls haunted the nights more than usual, both in Europe and in North America. This nickname was shared by Europeans and Native Americans alike, though this full moon has other nicknames too, including the Snow Moon and Ice Moon.

British Wolf Hunt Public Domain

Also Tweeted

“Tonight’s lunar eclipse full moon in Cancer rises at 15:50 GMT (UK) or 2:21 ET and sets at 07.53 GMT (UK) Last night’s almost-full moon was spectacular. Excited cat playing & pouncing on things. This ‘watery’ lunar event typically signifies big changes at home. A letting go.”

That evening I said to Il Matrimonio, “I wonder who we will be hearing about tomorrow, who has ‘let go and left home’?”

Very many people will have ‘let go and left home’ of course. 2 people go out of this world every second and 4 come in, or if we want to be statistically exact, 1.8 go out, and 4.20 come in.

“The unborn are banging on the gates of the dock. What’s the limit on the shipping lanes?”- KT Kearns

But who would we be hearing about?

Which crab would quit his rock-pool?

Who would the wolf moon carry away in tonight’s meteor shower? (The Quadrantids)

It was the Sultan of Oman, Qaboos bin Said Al- Said, 79, a ruler for 50 years, ally of the UK and US and the longest ruling monarch in the Arab world.

Publicly at least, apart from three years of marriage which ended in divorce, after which his wife remarried, he lived to all intents and purposes as a hermit (crab) But his personal life has remained entirely private, protected by his shell of court and state.

Qaboos bin Said Al -Said

Excerpts from an Obituary in the Middle East Eye: (Link provided below)

“The sultan took the throne of an extremely underdeveloped country with a history of civil conflict and oversaw its transformation into a politically stable middle-income state during his half-century reign. Under a model of modernising absolute monarchy, he largely managed to steer Oman away from the extremes of consumerism of neighbouring Dubai and the religious conservatism of Saudi Arabia.

The concentration of political power and wealth in the sultan’s hands, combined with the absence of a clear route to succession, had led to fears that there could be a leadership crisis following his death.

The appointment of Haitham bin Tariq, Oman’s culture minister and the 65-year-old cousin of the late sultan, on Saturday appeared to put to rest lingering uncertainty over the country’s succession process.

Under Qaboos, political parties were banned and laws of lese-majesty created an all-pervasive system of surveillance and repression that ensured no organised opposition could emerge.

Still, there is no doubting the genuine affection in which the sultan was held by many Omanis and expatriates, seen as a visionary leader who had secured the welfare of Omanis and expatriates alike by leading the nation through its modernisation, and leaving a legacy that his successor will be hard put to equal.

Oman’s Sultan Qaboos is pictured at his palace in Muscat on 14 January (AFP)
Oman’s Sultan Qaboos is pictured at his palace in Muscat on 14 January 2019 (AFP)

The Sultan inherited a conservative, highly religious country riven by armed insurrection and tribal divisions, Valeri wrote, and over several decades, reduced the influence of the tribes, while incorporating their leaders in the political process.

Qaboos also championed the advance of women, gradually opening the way for many to enter education and the labour market in increasing numbers, despite Oman being a conservative society that traditionally segregated women in domestic roles.

Qaboos was also a big supporter of the arts with his government sponsoring the country’s first societies of artists and traditional music. As a lover of classical music, he played the organ and the lute, composed music and founded the Gulf’s first symphony orchestra in 1985, its players recruited from the towns and villages of Oman.

Qaboos was careful to maintain diplomatic ties even with those states, such as Iran and Iraq, which were in conflict with his western allies. As he explained to an Egyptian newspaper in 1985: “There is ultimately no alternative to peaceful coexistence between Arabs and Persians, nor to a minimum of agreement in the region.”

One of the world’s longest-serving heads of state, Qaboos began tentative moves toward a constitutional monarchy in the late 1990s and early 2000s, with the introduction of an elected consultative assembly and municipal council elections. However at the time of his death he remained head of state and prime minister, and commander in chief of the armed forces. 

Qaboos’s successor will face the growing question of how to quell rising expectations of a new generation of internet-savvy young people no longer satisfied with the repressive paternalism that prevailed under half a century of Qaboos.

Excerpts from the Middle East Eye: Read more HERE

Now. Here is a very interesting piece of information, linking the Full Moon In Cancer with the Sultan Qaboos, or at least, I find this interesting. If not downright spooky.

Your Moon sign is an expression of your temperament and style of doing things. The natal chart of the Sultan shows that he was born with his Sun in deep and secretive, watery Scorpio and his Moon in the sign of almost equally deep and secretive sign of Cancer the Crab.

That was one enigmatic man of deep waters. That was one tough shell.

Two tough shells.

Now consider this image of the Moon card from The Gilded Tarot Royale, from the illustrator Ciro Marchetti, and the full moon uniting wolf and crab.

Or should we say, reuniting.

Until next time 🙂

Capricorn, the Cosmic Sea-Goat

An introduction to the astronomy, history and, mythology of the zodiac sign of Capricorn…

 Most of us know our zodiac or sun sign, but what does it look like in the night sky, and what’s the story behind it? This month it’s the turn of Capricorn…

Common associations

Symbol:

Date of Birth: 21 Dec to 20 January

Ruling planet: Saturn

Lucky Day: Saturday    Lucky Numbers 2 and 8

Energy: Yin

Element: Earth

Quality: Cardinal (the start of the season of winter)

Key phrase:  I build, I use

Body:  Skin, knees, skeletal system

Birth Stone:  Red Garnet, Black Onyx

Herbs/Flowers: Wintergreen, Ivy, Carnation

Tarot card:  The Devil (Pan/Nature, Mystery, Fascination, Obsession, Entrapment)

The Devil card wiki.jpg
From The Gilded Tarot by kind permission of Ciro Marchetti

The Astronomy

Capricorn stars wiki 256px-CapricornusCC.jpg
Public Domain

The constellation of Capricornus is located in an area of sky known as The Sea or The Water, containing other water-related constellations including Aquarius, Pisces and Eridanus.

Its name is Latin for “horned goat” or “having horns like a goat’s”, and it is commonly represented in the form of a sea-goat: a mythical creature that is half goat, half-fish, like Pricus, the son of Chronos (Time) king of the mer-goats of Greek myth. This seems to have been an evolution legend.  The children of Pricus left the sea to dwell on mountains, leaving him alone in the oceans with no-one to teach any more, and Pricus was a great teacher. Zeus placed him in the Sea of the Stars so that he could see his children again, and they could look up and see him.

Capricornus is the smallest constellation in the zodiac, with no first magnitude stars. Even so, the brightest star, Delta Capricorni A, is a white giant with a luminosity 8.5 times that of the Sun.

Capricornus has three stars with known planets and contains a Messier object, Messier 30, a globular cluster 28,000 light years distant,about 90 light years across in size.

The cluster is approaching us at the speed of 181.9 km/s. It was one of the first deep sky objects discovered by Charles Messier in 1764.

There are five meteor showers associated with Capricornus: the Alpha Capricornids, the Chi Capricornids, the Sigma Capricornids, the Tau Capricornids, and the Capricorniden-Sagittarids.

Like other constellations of the astrological zodiac, Capricorn was first catalogued by the Greek astronomer Ptolemy in the 2nd century.

The planet Neptune was discovered in the constellation Capricornus, near Deneb Algedi, the brightest star in the tail of the goat, on September 23, 1846.

This perhaps explains or illustrates a strong astral and psychic mythic connection between Capricorn and Pisces the Fishes.

History and Mythology

Though Capricornus is the second faintest constellation in the sky after Cancer, its imagery is very ancient indeed, associated with myths that go back to the 21st century BC and several of which centre on various sun gods nursed by a she-goat.

All myths of astrology have their roots in Earth’s seasons. Goats, and their relatives, ibex, were depicted in Ice Age paintings, and later immortalized in myth as Capricorn.

Male ibex started fighting and mating during early winter, December and January, coinciding with the later days ascribed to Capricorn.  In the early Bronze Age, Capricornus marked the winter solstice and, in modern astrology, as distinct from astronomy, Capricorn’s rule still begins on the first day of winter. The constellation itself is actually overhead nowadays during Aquarius, due to the wobble of the Earth, an effect known as precession, but the sun sign named after Capricornus retains the dates accorded to it by Ptolemy.

Before 1000 BC the Sumerians knew Capricorn as the goat-fish, or SUHUR-MASH-HA, but the constellation is nowadays more widely associated with two mythical creatures from Greek legends: the deity Pan, and the she-goat Amalthea who suckled baby Zeus, although these legends were based on far more ancient stories involving kindly she-goats and baby sun deities.

The forest deity Pan has the legs and horns of a goat, like Krotos, his son, who was a great archer and devotee of the Muses, and is identified with the neighbouring constellation Sagittarius.

Pan, so the legend said, was placed in the sky by Zeus in gratitude after he came to the rescue of other gods during a time the Olympian gods sought refuge in Egypt following their epic battle with the Titans, when the monster Typhon, son of the Titan Tartarus and Earth, sought revenge.

Typhon was a fearsome fire-breathing creature, higher than mountains and with dragons’ heads instead of fingers. The Olympian gods sought to escape his vengeance by adopting various disguises: Zeus, a ram – Hera, a white cow, Bacchus (another version of the myth suggests Pan) a goat.

Zeus was dismembered by Typhon, but was saved when Bacchus/Pan played a sound on his pipes, ‘panikos,’  from which we get the word ‘panic’ – and he panicked  the monster long enough for an agile Hermes to collect the supreme god’s limbs and carefully restore him. In gratitude, Zeus transferred Bacchus/Pan to the heavens as Capricornus.

Another legend says that while the souls of those about to be born descend to Earth through the constellation of Cancer, via the Beehive Cluster, the souls of the dead return to the cosmic sea, ascending through the gate of Capricorn.

Capricornus.jpg

Public Domain: Celestial Atlas 1822

The Astrology

Capricorn is the tenth sign in the Zodiac.

There is no such thing in reality as THE Capricorn personality and the same goes for all the zodiac sun signs. Your sun sign is an archetype, a keynote but of course it is not and never could be the whole story.

The archetype of Capricorn is shrewd, wise, and even Gnostic. They are profound thinkers, often deeply enquiring, and with a wry sense of humour, self-reliant, stoic in the face of adversity, hard-working, determined and resilient.

They have high standards, and expect much of themselves but also others which, depending on other aspects of their astrological portrait, can make them demanding or even overbearing task-masters,

They are known for a dry rather than a joyful wit, and if Saturn gets too prominent, they can be downbeat, cynical and suspicious, seeing traps and problems everywhere, viewing the enthusiasm of others as premature or naïve.

Capricorn is no-one’s fool, but Capricorn carries its own weight, and the weight of others too from time to time, and Capricorn climbs the mountain to see the world, not so that the world will see Capricorn.  

Marlene.jpg
Public Domain

“Duties are what make life most worth the living. Lacking them, you are not necessary to anyone. And this would be like living in an empty space. Or not being alive at all.”- Marlene Dietrich, born Dec 27, 1901

Season’s Greetings!

Deal or No Deal? Brexit Brouhaha 11

A cartomancy update on the prospects for Brexit

Update on a reading initially posted on this site May 2019, comments based on cards drawn last night, 10 PM, 30 September 2019. I will post the images later today. for readers interested in the cartomancy.

It is looking unlikely that Jeremy Corbyn will be PM after the next General Election, whenever that date will be. Still possible, certainly, but not likely.

It is looking unlikely that Jo Swinson will be be PM after the next General Election, whenever that date will be.

Of the two, Jeremy Corbyn seems to have the better chance.

Brexit, and the referendum vote to leave the EU bloc may seem almost dead in the water, but it isn’t. Despite repeated and further planned attempts to strangle it slowly and surely to death. A pro-Remain Parliament is dead set against it, and no longer making any bones about this, citing fears of a so- called No Deal (WTO) exit while, as evidenced by Jo Swinson’s letter to Mr Juncker trying to ensure there will be no deal by 31 October. The pro-EU element has a majority in Parliament, regardless of the mandate on which many Remain MP’s were originally elected, and seems to hold all the cards as of 14 September.

But Deal or No Deal, I don’t know more than anyone else, and certainly do not claim to. I am a card reader, not a politician, but looking at this through the lens of cartomancy, the twists and turns are far from done, and Brexit may still happen by that Oct 31 deadline. It is looking more likely it will not, and could slip then till Jan/Feb 2020, but it will still happen. This is the big picture. Brexit has now become a juggernaut loaded with constitutional dynamite, and chaos is the alternative to delivering on the referendum result of 2016. Too much has happened, and political reform is now required it seems, whatever the outcome, and whenever that definitive outcome is finally announced to an angry, weary nation in which no-one is happy and Mrs May’s three years as PM, with her ostensible attempts at compromise seem only to have muddied the waters, compounding the difficulties.

Let’s look back at the cards drawn in August and May.

Tweeted 20  August

#Cartomancy Will UK leave EU by/before 31 Oct 2019? Chance is higher than 3+/5. Read L-R. 8 Spades, stuck state. Joker Rx, ie, new PM. (Gemini) Crux card= 9 Hearts. Red suit indicates yes. King D and 9 D. Money talks last minute. Ace Clubs. A deal. New start. GE?    

Halloween Brexit twitter

So then, what does it look like? Will there be a No Deal Brexit, ie, an exit on WTO terms? Will it be a rehashed Withdrawal Agreement?

The so-called No Deal departure is the anathema of many Remain voters and the preferred option of many, though by no means all Leave voters, whether these are Labour voters or Tory voters. Meanwhile the Brexit Party has demonstrated its muscle, not only in the EU Elections, but in the UK sufficient that, although the Leave vote was split in Radnorshire, the very splitting of that vote also demonstrated the power of the Brexit party, even though this worked against both the Tory Party and the Brexit Party, such that the Lib Dem candidate was selected.

Be that as it may, what cards do we get?

Will it be a No Deal Brexit 22 August

Does this look like a No Deal Brexit?

Not really. If it is a NO Deal departure, then there is a special European deal on the side. This is not looking like a straight WTO exit. Or if it is, there is also some kind of a special trade deal with the EU. No, this is a beast of some other form. Is it Leave and is it good news for the UK economy ?

Ultimately, yes. It looks that way. Yes for both, 5 Clubs and Queen of Diamonds.

This reading starts as a classic Line of Five spread, where the cards are read left-right like a storyboard. For a yes or no answer, my system is the classic colour system that says more reds than blacks = a yes answer. More blacks than red = a no answer.

How and why does this work in practice? It’s simply a convention of self-programming. I could do it the other way around, blacks are yes and reds are no, and that would work just as well. But this is how I have programmed myself to read them, and with much repetition, like learning to play an instrument, this is how it actually starts to work and deliver accurate results. Perhaps the brain builds new synapses.

The results will not be accurate every time, any more than with any other form of forecasting. Of course not, and prescience is not omniscience, or anything like it, but this is the basic mechanics of how card reading is done.

So, back to Brexit and what it will look like, what did we get?

1 red suit card

1 Joker

3 black suit cards

The short answer is, cartomancy suggests there will very likely be at least some kind of trade deal with the EU, so that it will not be a complete WTO exit.

Does that mean that it’s going to be a rehash of the Withdrawal Agreement then, presumably minus the Irish Backstop? BRINO? Brexit in Name only?

No, it doesn’t look like that either.

This is looking like a trade- only deal, so far as I can see, possibly because the Backstop issue is resolved adequately for Parliament(just) and Mrs Merkel feels she has obtained for EU members some adequate measure of economic surety.

Let’s look at the individual cards for further comment.

That one red suit card, the 8 of Hearts, is representing the status quo, and the power of the Remain lobby in Parliament.

The Joker– cue the catcalls here from those out of accord with the new PM, (says a former Labour voter)- but this is a destiny card, and does not simply describe an actual Joker or clown or buffoon. But if it did, then take another look at the Joker. See the smile. Watch the eyes. They are serious. So is the skill. As an opponent, he is not to be underestimated.

The Joker is a card of surprises. It is the most powerful card in the deck, symbolically. Turning points in a nation’s destiny. My deck contains two Jokers and both have made an appearance in this 9 card spread.

Astrologically speaking, and rather curiously, this is also the card of the new PM, Boris Johnson, as a Gemini subject three times over. The Joker is Gemini. It suggests that, whatever he does in the end, he is completely in earnest  when he says he wants us out. And he is not afraid of the EU, unlike Mrs May, and where she had Ollie Robbins, he has Dominic Cummins, one to be knighted, the other held up to public opprobrium. Mr Johnson is intellectually and politically agile, mercurial even, and not averse to sleight of hand. This is meant neither as criticism or a compliment. The stakes are so high, the situation demands nothing less than utmost cunning, or as others would call it, utmost strategic thinking.

There is a saying, that if you love someone they can do no wrong, but if you don’t like someone they can do no right, and this clearly holds true, and has been setting the tone of public discourse since 2016, to little benefit. Where all civility has gone, violence will surely follow.

So, the next card. The central card in that top row. And we have the 2 Spades. Split. Severance. Divorce. This is a Brexit divorce, so if there is an element of ‘fudge’ or compromise, it may not be as significant, or be the trickery into indefinite entrapment that Leavers fear.

This is reinforced by the next card, the 3 Swords. This is in itself a deeply negative card with grief and mourning attached. Our family of nations is unhappy, angry and uneasy. But here, it is also a 3 way plan and again, it signifies a parting of the ways enacted in law. I feel it represents Mr Johnson, Mrs Merkel and M Macron today, and that Mrs Merkel and M Macron will not be in accord re the best way to proceed. The news media suggests this is probably the case even as we speak.

The outcome card, the 5 Clubs…so what does that mean? Clubs is the suit of government and business. 5 is the number of change…and also conflict. This change is uncomfortable.

But as you see, red suit cards translate as yes in cartomancy, black suit cards translate as no, so my cards, rightly or wrongly, have produced that same card as I drew in May, suggesting some kind of trade deal with the EU either before we leave, or immediately upon exiting.

The central card is key, so I use it as my start point for drawing a new line of enquiry reading top to bottom now, asking, well, if it’s not a straight WTO Exit, what will it look like?

The 7 Swords is negotiation and intense effort. It is the card of the ‘workaholic.’

There seems to be a story line here of Mrs Merkel saying in so many words, we can’t risk the No Deal scenario, this would be crazy. (Joker Reversed) The risk has to be detected as real enough and actually, it is. It looks as though Mrs Merkel will say this if she decides Mr Johnson is not bluffing. And I don’t feel he is. But if he could offer a way out that would be more acceptable to the Remain MP’s, he may take a pragmatic view on that, or cynical as some might say. To get the thing over the line and try to heal divisions, which right now are more of a yawning abyss.

That 5 Clubs card is also a reminder that the UK is the 5th largest economy in the world. Mrs Merkel is naturally, acutely aware of this, and she does not let personal pride or vanity get in the way of her judgement.

This last comment is based on the cards. Mrs Merkel is being shown to me as the eminently pragmatic and shrewd Queen of Diamonds, and the 9 Diamonds says…money talks.

Incidentally, Diamonds is the suit of electricity, and may sometimes suggest a health problem of nervous origin. Nervous as in , signals misfiring in the body, such as with Parkinson’s.

OK, let’s try out a pendulum divination, ie; asking my central nervous system to use a movement to indicate its non-verbal response to a verbalised question.

On what basis does this hocus-pocus work?

Well, it ain’t hocus-pocus. It works on the basis that the mind does not reside entire within the brain, and we know things at a deeper level than language, so the challenge is to distract the conscious mind, notice body cues from the CNS, and turn those into language. This language is of necessity, restricted to yes, no or maybe, in varying degrees of emphasis or intensity, depending on the size of the swing, and the speed of rotation of the swing.

Dowsing board

Will the UK leave the EU on No Deal/WTO terms?

The pendulum moves to YES, wobbles a while then moves towards NO and starts swinging rapidly back and forth.

Will the UK leave the EU based on some adjusted version of Mrs May’s Withdrawal Agreement?

Again, the pendulum moves to YES, wobbles there awhile, then moves towards NO and starts swinging rapidly back and forth.

OK. So that Ace of Clubs card. I also drew it in May. Classic meanings. A new business agreement. Trade Deal. A new Government. A General Election.

Will there be a General Election BEFORE the UK leaves?

It is swinging to NO. But I don’t know. I keep thinking of that Ace of Clubs card. I don’t see one occurring in September or October and that timing would be exceedingly tight. But, swinging the pendulum again, there’s something here, suggesting however unlikely, there may be one either concluded or announced before Christmas.

When will Brexit be declared as having occurred?

The pendulum is swinging between Scorpio-early Sagittarius

Corresponding dates 22 October-21 December

But the arc stops well short of the later end of this date range. But I can’t shake off the feeling there is a twist to come, or a surprise. The Joker hints at surprises. Something may happen earlier than expected. And that Ace of Clubs can mean a General Election hoving into view, and if that’s correct, it suggests that Boris Johnson has already made a decision in respect of the next GE.

Update: I believe this coming twist was at least in part, the announcement made on 28 August, 8 days following the reading, declaring the proroguing of Parliament in which case that 5 of Clubs card, in addition to its more general meaning, specifically denotes the time frame; 5 weeks. That is, four weeks of the annual conference season plus another week.

In summary, What can I deduce from this cartomancy portrait?

There is a gap here, begging some question not directly articulated. It is very often the case in Divination, that one has to read between the lines and look for what is NOT present in the cards. As a reader for a client, I draw my cards, share my impressions and then I ask the client for their question. Context is crucial for interpretation, and I am but an instrument.

Public discussions have centred on whether Parliament will permit Brexit to proceed, or cancel it, defying the referendum result, which in many cases, would mean MP’s defying the majorities in their own constituencies. And assuming it proceeds, discussions have centred on whether this will be a Deal/No Deal Brexit.

But in terms of cartomancy, what is being sensed here I think, is that there is a third possibility. Another route out.

Excerpt from a much longer article in The Spectator by QC Marcus Howe, Chairman of Lawyers for Britain:

“…to achieve meaningful changes to the WA would require the EU to be willing to accept a massive loss of face. This seems unlikely to say the least. So the only viable route to leaving the EU with a deal is to leave May’s WA unratified in its box and bypass Article 50 altogether. This can be achieved via a free trade agreement (FTA) similar to Canada’s but with enhanced mutual recognition of services, as well as security and criminal justice cooperation.

Since it would take time to negotiate and conclude such a deal, we would need short-term bridging arrangements to keep trade flowing freely in both directions while the details of the long-term FTA were being hammered out. The UK and the EU would continue to recognise goods and services as conforming with their standards, unless and until relevant laws are changed. Most of these bridging arrangements could be implemented (at least in the short term) through the UK and the EU using unilateral powers under the umbrella of a political agreement, as opposed to needing a formal legal agreement.” – 25 July 2019

Lawyers for Britain

Things are mighty peculiar. They are at the same time intransigent, and yet moving on apace. 

Back soon with more cartomancy   🙂

Until next time!

Original Post, May 2019

Brexit, hey? Where next? Your guess is as good as mine but let’s take another look at it through the lens of my playing cards, drawn three nights ago, May 4.

Will there be a second referendum, as called for by Labour, The Lib Dems, and a number of high profile campaign groups?

Or will we leave without a second referendum and if so, what does it look like from here?

Brexit May 4 2019

#Cartomancy reads the rows of cards left to right & also sometimes top to bottom, noting the ratio of red: black cards before looking at the individual meanings of the cards containing extra comments.

ROW 1 Will there be a 2nd referendum?

Probably not. There is a ‘new’ king about to come into play. This is not Mr Corbyn. This is a king of Diamonds, an electric communicator with acute money sense and I always draw Mr Corbyn as a King of Hearts. So, is this is a candidate to replace Mrs May as PM, or it is Mr Farage and any effect of the new Brexit Party, or is both these things, and the same card is standing for two significant (new) figures coming into play (again).

I suspect so.  A second referendum would kill Brexit, which would be the aim, and this would be achieved by the ballot design, which would be designed to split the Leave vote as per an idea currently under discussion, but that 8 Spades is a pretty conclusive ‘no’ card.

ROW 2 Will we leave following a successful fourth attempt by TM to push through the deal already rejected on three previous occasions? After all, time and energy are not inexhaustible. Note the Queen of Spades which is clearly here representing Theresa May; a woman consulting  the ‘legalese’.

Well, based on these cards, and however crazy it might seem,  a deal is still looking possible, and is looking more likely at this point in time than NO Deal; and perhaps this is hardly surprising, since the No Deal negotiating option removed from Mrs May’s tool box.

But WHAT deal? The four of Spades is a tomb, a rout, a retreat. This prospective fourth deal or new deal is not Mrs May’s.

Those Nines surrounding the Queen of Spades represent both the failure of completion on 29 March, and Mrs May’s intense desire to get this deal passed. The 9 Hearts is the ‘heartfelt wishes’ card.

The cards indicate that Mrs May sincerely wants to find a way to (or to be seen to at least) to bring the UK out of the EU (not Europe) but the terms of course, are the issue, as we all know, except for those for whom it is not a question of the terms, but more the determination to see Article 50 Revoked altogether, and the whole thing put back in its box, and the lid slammed shut never to be re-opened. The threat of this seems very real right now, or the hope of this, depending on how you feel about it. But it doesn’t look to me as though it will happen.

ROW 3:  A second Referendum?

This threat or hope notwithstanding, the cards indicated there will not be a second referendum, although this may not be necessary for the revoking of Article 50.  And I don’t see that, so it look as though we will leave, but when? Is there an underlying sense of what it will look like?

If Theresa May should present the exact same deal to Parliament (shown as the 10 Diamonds) a fourth time, this will jam up the works, suggests the appearance of the 4 Spades. It won’t pass, plus, she may then quit as PM, and a new PM will come in (King Diamonds?) This could happen this summer, suggests the second column as I read it top to bottom like so:

6 Clubs ( within 6 weeks from the date of this reading, or, this is a summer card.

In Summary

What is absent from this spread is the single clean strike of the Ace of Spades, that would say a less equivocal OUT on WTO terms.

Other readers and astrologers are confident in expressing their forecasts of a clean WTO Brexit, even now.

I am probably struggling more than they to see past the noise, but I draw another cards and get the Ace of Clubs. This is BRAND NEW BUSINESS with a broad geographical horizon, but lacks that more black and white binary quality of the Ace of Swords

The Ace of Clubs has another quality to it, transcending matters of business….it’s equivalent to the Tarot’s Ace of Wands. Ignition. Birth, Almost like a rebirth.

So what does this mean in plain English? Well, this cloud is still morphing, but it’s looking like a WTO exit BUT with a ‘special European add-on.’

Or it is a whole New Deal.

For the sake of transparency,  I should say that while I would perfectly calmly have accepted a remain vote in 2016, I feel the original mandate should be honoured as a point of principle, according to the self same terms in which it was clearly presented by the government in the run up to the referendum.

Execution of detail follows direction which follows principle.

However, as always, the risk in consulting with any kind of oracle is that the reader will not see what they personally may hope to see, and they may equally see precisely what they do not want to see.

I want to see that I will get outta this wheelchair and walk again one day. So, do I see that in my cards?

No.

I could be wrong, and I never say never, but meanwhile I am living with the fact that I do not see in my cards what I wish to see for myself.

You take my point. The reader asks a question. S/he may have personal ‘skin in the game ‘or not, but either way s/he shuffles and picks the cards blindly, and s/he may misinterpret, and be especially at risk of doing so if reading from a position of bias or prejudice,  but s/he cannot fudge the reds and blacks  except by doing so deliberately, and what the heck would be the point of that, when time will tell us all what’s what in due course?

Il Matrimonio, bless his ecologically right-on size 11 breathable bamboo socks, says he no longer cares one way or another. He just wants it all to stop, and he doesn’t mind how. And he’d quite like me to shut up with even trying to forecast about it.

What will happen will happen, he says.

Sure.

I have to give this forecasting thing a go, though, because divination is my line of work, and whether I get it right, or I get it wrong, so that I have to go back and figure out how and why I got it wrong with the benefit of hindsight – still, I will learn something, even if I have to fall flat on my face. So what? Life is short and…

fall flat on your face

I have done a number of readings around Brexit. I’m not being shown a clear No Deal exit, and yet, I see no sign of Remaining either. It is not going to be business as before, however this works out. The UK will not revert to the previous status quo.

We will all find out, *ahem* soon enough, won’t we?

And let us trust, it will be before each and every one of us is rendered utterly and completely….

William-Cheselden-Osteographia-or-The-anatomy-of-the-bones-London-1733-Courtesy-of

Image: Public Domain Review: William Cheselden, 1733, courtesy of the National Library of Medicine.

Through a glass of Tarot, darkly…the contest for the new PM (again)

Photo by dalia nava on Pexels.com

And here we are again…embarking on the selection process of a new Prime Minister and leader of the Conservative Party

I will be looking further in the Tarot as this new contest unfolds. We will all know sooner or later of course, and in that respect, one might say there is no need and little point in doing any Tarot reading. But this is a Tarot blog, and I am writing this for those people who are interested in divination or psychic thinking and its workings. That’s what this blog is about, getting the Tarot’s Eye view on a real life situation and then seeing how that works out on the ground.

Rishi Sunak is the obvious front runner at the time of writing, and he could well get the post. I have drawn the Nine of Cups for him  (the card means wishes granted) But I have twice in a row drawn the Nine of Wands for him, offsetting that Nine of Cups. Not an encouraging card in this context. 

The Nine of Wands is courage and stamina, but someone has dug themselves into a furrow. Are they a one trick pony? This may prove to be a reference to Rishi Sunak’s position re taxation. Whatever his support within the party, if they are keeping a sharp eye on the prospects for winning the next general election, this seems at present to be the star to which he has hitched his wagon, and it is not classic grass roots conservatism.

Boris Johnson had wanted Rishi Sunak to cut taxes in line with previous manifesto promises, and notwithstanding the economic effects of the global pandemic crisis which hit almost as soon as Boris Johnson came into office. We have all been given to understand that this had set them at loggerheads, and we now see that Rishi Sunak has been quietly preparing for this moment for some time.

It is also I feel a reference to the emergency in Ukraine. The situation won’t go away. It is a direct longer term threat to Britain’s security and the economy. There is no appeasing Putin. How will Rishi Sunak handle it?

Ben Wallace draws positive cards and is clearly very well liked indeed, but the cards drawn last night were not looking strong at this juncture for him as the next Prime Minister. The same for Suella Braverman. Penny Mordaunt drew stronger cards than either of these two potential  candidates

This however was merely te briefest look. The Tarot outlook may change. I will be watching this space and reporting further. Meantime, you can read on here for a reminder of what the Tarot had to say in June 2019 about Brexit, which was not yet ‘done’ (and arguably still isn’t completely done) and also what it had to say about the last leadership contest in 2019.

Original Posting  19 June  2019

Prescience is not omniscience. Tarot cards are used to facilitate divination via the language embedded in their imagery. Generally this means that they allow a reading of the present situation, but with hints about the past or hints about the future reading events in respect of an evolving continuum.

The puzzle of this, and not infrequently the wonder, is what the reader may pick up when reading for complete strangers, while knowing nothing or little of them, or their present circumstances.

Fortune_teller,_Albert_Anker,_1880.png
Public Domain: The Fortune Teller, Albert Anker, 1880

Sometimes the cards enable forecasting or sudden leaps of insight, not easy to account for through the standard meanings of the cards themselves. It is a conundrum that sometimes the future exists and sometimes it does not. As the saying goes, nothing is certain but death and taxes.

People may scoff all they like about the method. But this is a method that has to be learned, and we all make forecasts all the time. That is what planning is based on, and what forecasting activities are based on…projection of some pattern or algorithm. The tricky thing about ‘psychic’ predictions are generally disbelieved, even by the person making them, because unlike numerically based forecasts, they indicate a lack or break in some easily seen pattern. We don’t get to see the whole audit trail.

loro_en_bicicleta-640x640x80

Experience tells me prediction with cards is possible, though of course not infallible, while others point out that it can’t be done, full stop, and that tarot is actually a meditation or counselling tool.

I am not in the business of telling other people what to think, or that they are wrong. But  it has happened far too many times in my work to agree that tarot prediction can’t be done with an accuracy rate that goes far beyond the chances of the random hit, way beyond 50:50.

Reading the cards for predictive purposes was one of the earliest functions, if not the raison d’ etre of tarot reading in the first place, going back possibly even further than the renaissance, and as early as the thirteenth century.

Too many times, peering through the dark glass of my cards, looking into the unknowns of this or that;  the answers proved correct. This does not mean that I knew the answers. I did not. How could I? had to sit with my cards, have a look, and have a think, deciding how I felt about them.

When, as here, I am looking at politicians through the cards, who or what am I trying to read? There is no direct personal connection. How am I coming at it? What am I trying to read, actually? Future news headlines? The thoughts of people who do not know I exist, who are not asking me any question, who have not entered into a ‘telepathic’ dialogue with a reader like me?

I do not know, and I don’t ‘know’ anything more than anyone else, but of course I will give it a go, for the experience, and to learn, and test myself in new ways.

These were the cards I drew 18/19 June 2019 in respect of

-Brexit and

-the contest for the new PM.

Context: These cards were drawn forty five minutes ahead of the announcement that Dominic Raab was now out of the contest for Prime Minister.

I drew further cards after the cards discussed below. Unfortunately the photo evidence didn’t make it to my lap-top. IT glitch but the bottom line of the lost cards was that the UK will eventually leave the EU as per the referendum mandate 2016, and may yet achieve a trade only special deal with the EU. 

I drew the Ten of Cups twice, Scorpio timing, late Sept-late Oct, indicating that the UK government may deliver on its new promise to leave by or before 31 October. If not, it could slip until at least May/June 2020 (Knight of Swords =Gemini, and we are still in Gemini now, with 2 days still to go of Gemini in 2019) To what extent does this depend on the choice of the next PM?

UPDATE: So now that we know for a fact that Boris Johnson is the new MP, will we leave the EU by or before 31 October 2019?

The cards:

Brexit Halloween

The first card, the 8 Spades, denotes a stalemate, imprisonment or benighted state of affairs and this is the start point of the answer. 1 Black suit card, the Joker signifying a need for a fresh start, and then 3 red suit cards out of a total of 5 indicates that it can be done in fact, and very likely will be.

Will it be a rehash of the Withdrawal Agreement? I don’t think so, I may need to frame that as a direct question and look again, especially in view of suspicions expressed by the Brexit Party. The 9 Diamonds promises a tough time, with obstacles and delays, but an extra comment card is an Ace, (new start) while of the four Aces, the Ace of Clubs in particular refers to a new Government or a new Act of Government. The central card, the 9 of Hearts represents the crux of the answer, yes or no, and here it is saying yes, because

A) it is a red suit card and

B) the 9 Hearts is the ‘wishes’ card, indicating that The new PM will realise, or see realised, the stated wish of his leadership contest manifesto.

Who Will be the New PM?

NB I am not asking who should be PM. I will leave that to others. I am not enquiring into the ‘worthiness’ of the candidates, only asking for signs as to whom it will be, and what might prevent them from succeeding, or what might help them, as suggested by the cards and only the cards, but connecting these to the known evidence where possible. This is about divination, not a political opinion piece.

Boris Johnson  

The Magician, The 9 Swords, The Knight Swords, FUTURE? THE WHEEL OF FORTUNE

the_magician
Image Ciro Marchetti: The Legacy of The Divine Tarot

Reflecting the current state of voting, these are the strongest cards, and this is the longest write-up for the same reason, but there is a but.

Mr Johnson is a Gemini subject, which interestingly for a reader, correlates astrologically with The Magician card. The Magician is Odin/Woden, the god of Wednesday. It is ruled by Mercury, combining agility, intellect and intuition. The Magician can get things done but is sometimes also regarded as a figure of mistrust, the Trickster. Sometimes this suspicion is justified. But the mercurial quality here means that the thinking happens so fast, others cannot follow it, and suspect a sleight of hand where actually, there was none.

Gemini is ruled by Mercury, planet of Trade. Another name for The Magician is The Jester. Mr Johnson is up for fun, can laugh at himself, or present himself as a figure of fun to many, a buffoon some say, But his mind remains separate and cool.

The 9 Swords is a horrible card of stress and sometimes sadness. There is a fair degree of stress suggested here, maybe headaches, literally. Insomnia. This situation weighs heavy on Boris Johnson, irrespective of appearances and how would it not? There is also a worry about something personal, close to his own home. Women and children feature in that picture.

Update: headlines followed a few days after this blog was posted re Mr Johnson’s domestic argument with Carrie Symonds. It would seem that the 9 Swords was foreshadowing this event, and possibly something more besides, but it really is private, and it doesn’t feel appropriate for me to speculate in public. Someone was listening in on a private conversation and by questionable means, always somewhat unsavoury.

The Knight of Swords attacks head on, but with a cool head. It’s not personal but get in his/her way, he/she strikes you down and carries on going. The objective is everything.

The Wheel of Fortune is a big card; a destiny card. THE destiny card, bespeaking forces greater than any individual’s ability to control. This is not up to him. He has been here before and it did not go his way. But the Wheel has been drawn the right way up. When the Wheel is drawn reversed, change is coming, but you’re riding the downward wheel. The Wheel is not only a major arcana card, it is a Number 10 card.

Mr Johnson has drawn two major arcana cards out of four cards drawn. That strikes me as significant. These cards are not straightforward, however.

The votes suggest this is almost in the bag, but that isn’t how it feels. This situation is, I feel, weighing heavy on Mr Johnson. Not shown here but looking on previous occasions I have twice drawn the 3 of Cups as the outcome in respect of his candidacy. A celebration. Still, there is that 9 of Swords…and a sense of perhaps entirely natural guarded reserve.

Jeremy Hunt

The 3 Coins, The Sun Rx , The Ace Coins RX,  FUTURE? THE  ACE SWORDS (?)

3 coins legacy divine
Image: Ciro Marchetti: Legacy of The Divine Tarot

The 3 Coins denotes conscientiousness, skill and attention to detail. I’d be inclined to rule out Mr Hunt’s chances of the top job based on these cards. The 3 Coins is a positive card, but here it is combined with The Sun RX (success denied or delayed) and the Ace of Coins RX (no new job, no new house) Except I can’t yet decide he won’t be in the final two, notwithstanding these cards, because of the presence of the Ace of Swords; ‘the seeds of a victory as yet unseen’ – a coup…though it could be foreshadowing a metaphorical coup de grace, the sword of Damocles, looming over the next round. Update: As we know know, Mr Hunt made it to the final two.

Cards drawn the evening of 22 July

Top Line: Boris Johnson: 1 character card followed by 4 yes cards

Bottom Line: Jeremy Hunt: 1 character card followed by 4 no cards

BJ’s Joker is picking up on his reputation of course, but in cartomancy it means ‘all change’. It can mean a risk taker. It can mean tricky dealings, or recklessness, but what it never means is stupid.

JH’s Three of Diamonds is a good communicator and team worker. But for significance it lacks the weightiness of The Joker. In cartomancy, BTW, it does not usually matter if a card comes out right way or not.

But again, The Joker seems to be making some additional comment attached to Mr Johnson’s personal life and relationship matters. Here is someone with an irregular domestic situation going on, but this is not someone who is a ‘womaniser’ on anything like the scale of a John F Kennedy, or a David Lloyd George, and by their final public record have they been judged by posterity, and in view of the gravity of their times, I’d say rightly so. Perhaps the jury of public opinion will stay out for now at least, and concern itself only with the performance of Boris Johnson the Prime Minister. But of course it won’t.

boris or Jeremy for prime minister cards drawn evening of 22 7 2019

The Other Candidates

Michael Gove 

Strength, The 8 Wands, The Empress, FUTURE? The 10 CUPS

Strength
Image: Ciro Marchetti The Gilded Tarot

Mr Gove’s cards start strong. The Strength card does what it says on the tin.  Plus it hints at a health kick. Could this card be showing us Una, taming the Lion of Britannia? As an individual contender, it is not that Mr Gove trumps Boris Johnson in terms of ability, but he does seem to have an edge in terms of a gift for teamwork. Strength is a Number 8 card, auspicious in both western and Chinese astrology; a good card of money and trade. This card trumps the dedicated craftsmanship and attention to detail of the Three of Coins of Mr Hunt. Then we have The Empress – harvest home, and the 10 of Cups.

Mr Johnson has the 10 of the Wheel of Fortune. Mr Gove has the 10 of happiness. Could it be the hearth at 10 Downing Street? Theoretically, perhaps, but it’s a smaller echo , the 1o Cups is more domestic in character, when weighed against the ‘destiny’ card, and that weightier 10 of The Wheel of Fortune.

Update: As we know now, Mr Gove made it to the final 3, amid rumours that tactical voting had ensured Mr Hunt made it through to the final two, and if so, perhaps this was done a) to remove what was seen as a chief threat to Mr Johnson’s chances and b) to offer party voters the advantage of a clear  choice between two very different candidates with different approaches to delivering Brexit. 

Sajid Javid

The Hermit, The 7 Cups RX , The 8 Cups FUTURE? The 9 COINS.

Hermit Golden
Image: Kat Black: The Golden Tarot

The Hermit suggests commendable qualities suggested in these cards; personal kindliness, a marked degree of self- sufficiency and also keen analytical abilities, and Mr Javid’s future with the conservative party seems set to continue with some senior role as indicated by the future 9 Coins. But the 7 of Cups is reversed, castles in the air. The 8 of Cups is about moving on,  and 9 Coins is about managing a sector, running a ‘hotel’ or a financial department, tending a ‘garden’. But it’s not an Ace (beginnings) and it’s not a 10 (arrival at a destination, end of a cycle, crossing the line, completion)

Update: That senior role suggested by 9 Coins and 8 Cups, running a ‘financial department’  as we have now seen, turned out to be Mr Javid’s appointment as Chancellor of The Exchequer. 

Rory Stewart (typing this section at 18.05, having just heard the results of today’s round while typing up Mr Raab’s cards.)

The Ace Cups Rx. The 2 Wands Rx, The Page Cups, FUTURE? 4 COINS Rx

ace cups reversed
Image Public Domain The Ace Cups Reversed: Rider-Waite

This was the weakest row of cards yesterday.Weaker than Mr Raab’s, and on this basis, I expected that Mr Stewart would go out of the contest before Mr Raab for all the sudden media push of positive publicity on Mr Stewart. And that expectation was wrong. WRONGGGG. I award myself a bad gold star. I thought Mr Stewart would go out before Mr Raab. And as it turned out, there was only one day between them, but there it is. Mr Raab went out first despite the fact of his stronger cards, and there may be in that, another suggestion of tactical voting at work. No matter. Bad gold star for me.

bad gold star

So what was weak about Mr Stewart’s cards? Out of four cards, three were drawn reversed.  We had the reversed Ace of Cups, meaning, ‘a cup is emptied on the ground’, while the 2 Wands RX is nicknamed the ‘sorrow of Alexander’. Disappointment in expansion and conquest. The most positive card in this spread, the page of cups- denotes a ‘new kid in town,’ and a surge in goodwill and popularity, which is certainly being borne out in the media. But in terms of the Tarot, Mr Stewart has done very well to get so far as he has in the face of this card portrait. The 4 Coins Reversed were saying, literally, as literally as the Tarot can speak ‘NOT round 4.’

Dominic Raab

The Chariot, 4 SWORDS Rx, High Priestess (Out)

The Chariot RiderWaite Public Domain
Image Public Domain: The Chariot, Rider-Waite

It was the 4 Swords that was warning of Mr Raab leaving the contest yesterday, 18.06.2019.  One may think I should have been expecting that? Saw that coming yesterday? Nah. Not with my everyday hat on, I was surprised to see Brexiteer Mr Raab go out so soon.

The Chariot card suggests Mr Raab could have made progress on driving Brexit forward, but those voting decided he was a horse (or the griffin) pulling The Chariot, rather than the charioteer himself, while the 4 Swords Reversed is a ‘sick’ bed, or a ‘tomb’. Perhaps pro-Brexit voters in the conservative party were not sufficiently convinced of his having the wherewithal to guide The Chariot? The 4 Swords suggests that this was based on the circumstances of his earlier resignation as Brexit Secretary.

Update: The Chariot, a weighty, Major Arcana card, turns out to denote  diplomacy and travel. Mr Raab has been appointed First Secretary of State and Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs. That High Priestess leaves him as a new Number 2. A much consulted figure.

The Four of Swords came up more than once before in previous readings, asking about the Withdrawal Agreement, and whether that would get through Parliament.

‘No’, suggested the Four of Swords back then, and we saw how that turned out.

The solitary figure of Mr Raab’s High Priestess is Number 2 in the Major Arcana whereas Boris Johnson has drawn that equally solitary figure, The Magician, is Number 1 in the Major Arcana.

One might have thought pro- Brexit conservatives would want to hedge their bets, ensuring that an unequivocally pro-Brexit ‘Number 2’ stayed in the race as back-up, but no. We are all seeing, politics at the moment just isn’t working according to what might seem to be obvious dynamics.

These are strange times and the cards are strange. I have been looking out for an appearance of The Emperor, Judgement, Justice, The Sun or The World against the name of one of these candidates.

Maybe tomorrow.

There remains a sense that the UK will eventually leave the EU as per the referendum 2016, and may agree a trade only special deal with the EU. But the battle is not over.

I drew the Ten of Cups twice, correlating with Scorpio timing, late Sept-late Oct, indicating that the UK government may deliver on its new promise to leave by or before 31 October.

If not, it could slip until at least May/June 2020 (Knight of Swords =Gemini, and we are still in Gemini now, with 2 days still to go of Gemini in 2019) But the Knight of Swords is a card sudden, speedy development and conclusive actions. Whose style is that? Mr Hunt has said that if he wins, he will have Mr Johnson on his team. And maybe Mr Hunt will yet do it, but that’s not sufficiently clear for me to feel he’s closed the gap enough yet.

Back soon 🙂

A Result and a Requiem: The Nine of Hearts and Three of Spades

I had a strange night night before last, on Friday night. Il Matrimonio came trotting into the room about 9 PM and said, ‘Tomorrow night, Liverpool or Spurs? Which is it? Quick!’

I was irritable at the word ‘quick,’ because this stuff is not like using a coffee machine.

I don’t know what is going to happen any more than he does.

I have to look and think. It’s not like I’m a…….

loro_en_bicicleta-640x640x80

He might as well have snapped his fingers.

‘I don’t *effing* know!’ I said, as he ran out again, not waiting for a further answer, either because he took me at my word, and bore no grudge (highly likely) and/or, he knew I would look, and meanwhile he was missing out on something more interesting elsewhere as I reached for my playing cards.

Next time he came in, I said I thought Liverpool to win.

Why?

I laid out 2 lines of 5 cards asking an open question each time:

‘How will Liverpool do tomorrow against Spurs?’

‘How will Spurs do tomorrow against Liverpool?’

Both teams drew 3 red cards and 2 black cards, 3 yeses and 2 nos, giving them the same chance of winning, according to the most basic rule of interpreting ‘The Line of 5’ as it is prosaically called in cartomancy.

Both lines of 5 ended with a black suit card (meaning a no)

Samey, samey, this did not look like a dramatic match.

But Liverpool’s final black card (10 Clubs) was more positive than Spurs final black card (6 Spades).

Plus, aha, a means of teasing this out, one of Liverpool’s red suit cards was the 9 Hearts

This is the wishes card. Wishes granted. Happy times.

9 hearts

Therefore I decided I thought it was Liverpool to win.

But then – I don’t know why I did this, exactly – an impulse-  I pulled an extra card asking for any further comment, and drew the 3 Spades; a card of separation, divorce, severance, heart attacks, mourning and death.

I said to myself, eh? What’s this about and put it back in thee deck.Shuffled again, pulled another card and drew the 3 Spades again.

3 Spades.jpg

I called for Il Matrimonio.

‘I just drew the 3 Spades twice, asking about the footie tomorrow.  That’s weird, getting it twice, and it’s nasty. Like there’s going to be an injury or death.’

‘An injury during the match?’

‘No, I think  it’s a death,’ I said, ‘maybe nothing to do with the match, but to do with football. We’ll find out tomorrow. Maybe it’ll be on the news.’

I wasn’t worried as such, though unpleasantly struck by the co-incidence of drawing it twice. The card felt too remote to be personal, but I had also done a fairly intense client reading earlier in the day, and I spent an unsettled night. Peculiar dreams. I don’t remember what, only that they were peculiar and unsettling.

Yesterday, Saturday, we had the plumber in. I was here on my lap-top when I saw a  piece of very sad news; Jose Reyes, a very well known footballer, had just been killed in a car crash,  leaving a wife and three children.

Jose Antonio Reyes: Former Arsenal winger dies aged 35

Read more  HERE

reyes

Source: Wikipedia

He was in a high speed car accident near Seville, driving, it is thought, at 120 kph when he was killed shortly before midday yesterday.

Jose Reyes  and 2 others.

3

Spades and Clubs are the suits that say ‘men.’

Diamonds and Hearts are the suits that say ‘women.’

I tweeted this last night while the match was still going:-

Hub asked last night re today’s footie. Gave my answer, L’pool drew the 9 Hearts, twice. Wish card, but then I drew an extra card. 3 Spades. Injury. Death. No!? NO! Put it back in the deck, shuffled again…3 Spades again. Oh no.

9:32 PM – 1 Jun 2019

Result: Liverpool 2- Spurs -0.

Il Matrimonio said afterwards, ‘how awful that you drew that card last night, and said there’d be news today. Like it was waiting to happen. Like it was destiny.’

Indeed. Truly weird and awful. And of course I didn’t know. How could I? But something was already present in the ether, sufficiently that a card enabled me to access some vibration on an invisible thread. Or else it was a complete and meaningless coincidence. You can decide. I haven’t.

The papers are saying that the vehicle left the road, hit some concrete blocks and burst into flames, with Jose Reyes at the wheel.

RIP.

Until next time.

 

 

 

England v Croatia: Cards say ‘Queen Kieran’…but all in the best possible taste

On Monday evening I pulled my cards ready for this match, and have left them out on my worktop in the study. 20 minutes in at the time of writing. I am looking at them now.

England’s cards:  2 Clubs, 4 Clubs, 2 Diamonds, Queen of Hearts, Queen of Diamonds.

Croatia’s cards: 6 Hearts, 8 Clubs, 4 Spades, 10 Clubs, 9 Clubs.

Tough one. Croatia look solid. All those sporting Clubs cards. England better be careful , or rather, better be bold, they have the better cards, but by heck, not by much, and must stay FAST. Clean, lean and very mean. Diamonds is electricity. Lightning strikes.

Why did I draw the Queen of Diamonds? Why a Queen, in the cards for England’s performance tonight? It’s not classically known as a sporting card.

I wondered about number correlations. Jacks are elevens, Kings are thirteens. Queens correlate to the number 12. All I could think looking at the cards, was that a player wearing shirt 12 might be especially significant for England during this match.

‘Who might that be?’ I asked Il Matrimonio, ‘who wears the number 12 shirt?’

He didn’t know.

‘OK, well, just watch out for a player with 12 on his shirt,’ I said.

But I hear a roar. England have scored, and Il Matrimonio has just shouted through that the striker was Kieran Trippier…and within the first few minutes….wearing the Number 12 shirt.

queen diamonds

Queen of Diamonds Kieran.

Is it enough?

Curiouser and curiouser.

Back soon 🙂

 

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