Weekly Forecast: October 16-22
Sometimes it can be hard to recognize a gift when it arrives in our lives. Accepting a gift means change and change means loosening our attachment to control. We can't grow if we don't give ourselves space to unfold. We can't let in the new, the unexpected, and the magical when we hold ourselves to a narrow vision of the future.
Sometime we're trained to see limitation and obstacles when life presents us with something new. The cards for this week show how that something new, the gift that the Ace of Pentacles represents, can be the missing ingredient - the cherry on top of the sunday of fulfillment if you will. It's glorious, it's unexpected and... it's frightening?
Fear is an interesting emotion. It's deep and powerful, a primal reaction, and yet it's also comfortable, a baseline that's so human and so animalistic that we can't help but be familiar with it. In its own way fear operates on a different level, below our rationality and empathy. Honed in a different time, it's a powerful response meant to protect us at all costs. It's just that sometimes it tries to protect us from the good as well as the bad.
Something about this blossoming (I love the floral imagery that Jonasa Jaus' tarot has given us today) is making us uneasy. Does it feel too conspicuous or ostentatious? Is it activating a sense of shame or "having too much"? Or maybe it seems too simple and doesn't match up with our vision for the future. Do we feel like we need to suffer to earn our happines and our accomplishments?
Whatever these gifts brings up in us it's activating our fear responses with a siren song to retreat and withdraw. It's important, however, to look around before running the other way. Is something else going on? Maybe it is safe after all. Maybe the blossoming is beautiful and something we deserve.
Of course it can be overwhelming, too. There's plenty of room for that. The Eight of Swords shows that overwhelm, yet its tendency is to get swept away with it and back into harmful narratives. In these swordsy situations it's very helpful to connect with other ways of being - the grounded physicality of the pentacles, for example, and the free-flowing emotion of the cups.
Allowing our thoughts and fears free reign to dictate our actions is no way to lead a blanced life. The cards for this week are asking us to be tender with ourselves and peek out after our initial reaction to withdraw. The gift can just be a gift. The success and fulfillment can just be something beautiful we know we've worked hard to create for ourselves. And it's safe to step out of our worried minds and enjoy the life that's presented to us.
We can stop and smell the flowers we've grown for ourselves. They're blooming right now.