Morgan Tarot: The Dream

A fun and, well, dreamy card from Morgan's Tarot. The Dream is less easy to interpret than many of the cards I've already posted. Here is Morgan's reading for the card:


THE DREAM

The waking dream is not contained in the head of a dreamer, nor is it outside of reality, nor is it in any unknowable space.




O-kay!

So what does it mean??

Well, in this case, much depends on the rest of the cards in your spread. Lots of cards about finding one's true self - quite the theme for this entire deck - and The Dream card becomes another tool for self-reflection and questing. Yet again, in a spread with many cards about future paths, this card can take on other meanings about finding one's way in the decision of life. And in a spread with cards placed as warnings, this card can itself warn against dreaming over doing.

so what you make of this card has so much to do with how it relates to the cards around it.

A good truth about dreaming, by the way. Our dreams can call, can warn, can awaken, can invoke. The Dream's meaning grows from the realities of our life.


P.S. asked for ways to meditate with these cards, I always suggest using nice coloured pencils and filling them in as you like. Enjoy!

Morgan's Tarot: Freak!

My randomly pulled Morgan's Tarot card this week is the wonderful card: Freak!

Pulled into response to my own question about how I can become a scientist my own way, the lovely Freak card returned its own answer: My own Freaky way!

The Morgan definition for the card reads:

This card may mean that it is all right to be what you are.

Or, the situation is radically different from what it normally is.

Or, despite the fact that everything is okay, it doesn't feel that way. Refreshing influences rather than draining influences may dispel your anxiety.


Well, there you go! "It is all right to be what you are" is one of my favourite messages from the universe: an anti-wrinkle cream, anti-plastic surgery, anti-tooth whitening kinda message. Also a profoundly accepting message that we are all just fine in the eyes of the universe kinda message.

And my situation is radically different from what it normally is: I'm studying a science program at Uni. (me? science? weird!) So in that respect the card is spot on.

And finally, yes, everything being okay doesn't feel that way when situations are radically new (I check my school email account daily, worried I have forgotten something, for example.) Refreshing influences in new situations, like the proverbial open door and light at Bridget's shrine for all who come, are much needed for us all.

When I get this card in a reading I encourage my client/friend to embrace their inner freakie self. We don't encourage difference enough in this post-industrial, recession driven age. So instead of freaking out, develop your inner freak. Who knows where it may lead?

Morgan's Tarot: FROM HERE ON IT'S NOTHING BUT A DOWNHILL RUN

Morgan's Tarot Time again. I finished a tough final exam this week, and here is the card I pulled: From Here On In It's Nothing But a Downhill Run! Another wonderful card, a great one in a reading. Here is Morgan's interpretation:

It is a total coast from here to enlightenment and total liberation. Cut the strain and flow into what is. Buddha will watch over the situation.

I find it really important to note to clients that this card isn't the universe creating a wonderful result; usually this card appears after someone has worked their butt off to reach a new place (job, relationship, school, new child, new home. . .) It is great to affirm the work your client (OR YOU!) put in to get to this wonderful place.

In a world of endless striving to be better - more enlightened, more spiritual, better paid, better educated, healthier. . . whatever the struggle, this card is a reminder to relax into the stream of life.

Enjoy!

No Trips Without A Tripper Tarot Card

Another of my favorite cards from Morgan's Tarot. No Trips Without A Tripper is a nice "get up and do" kind of card, which, cheerful positivist that I can be, reflects one of my basic beliefs. Actions, I believe, do speak louder than words.

Morgan's words on this card are, as ever, wonderful:

"Sorry, but if you don't do it, it won't happen. Most ego trips require some sort of ego.

Strictly speaking, the tripper is not separate from the trip."

Translate that to "what we do is never separate from who we are." (Another famous version of this one: Galatians: 6:7).

When this comes up for me in a reading, I always advise my client to pay attention to their works. If you want to have a garden, start digging. If you want to have a relationship, turn off the computer and meet people. If you want more money, work harder or go to school. If you want to be an artist, go make art.

I, of course, am not saying that if we want to create endless success, that we can do so with positive thoughts. Come on. I still pay attention to realities of race, class, sex, orientation, ability, age and culture/language. When I wanted to have a baby, no amount of positive thought could open up my fallopian tubes, for example. On the other hand, when I moved to adoption as my trip, 3 kids followed.

And obviously where this card shows up in a reading matters, but in general, when you draw it, look to action and behavior. The best spellcasting is doing every possible action you can for a desired end. Tripping, after all, is a verb.

The Universe Is Not Unfolding the Way It Should

Back to Tarot! Here is one of my favourite cards from the Morgan Tarot!

Morgan's interpretation of the card:

"Actually the universe is unfolding the only way it can -- the way it is.

Someone once said, "The most difficult lesson we have to learn is that we are always in the right place at the right time."

The basic message here is that regret and guilt are not useful emotions."

So how is that for a message that rocks???

This card comes up for me a lot as a mom.

I want to give my children everything possible, and many things are within my reach: a good education, good lessons, a great garden (too bad they all HATE my tomatoes), good friends. When two of my children were diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorders, I know many friends and family commiserated with me, seeing their diagnoses as a huge challenge. (And sometimes the reality of autism is a huge challenge. The diagnoses, however, were wonderful because a diagnosis means getting help!) And I know, that for some in my family, autism seemed like a death sentence and overwhelming burden.

But not for me.

I've gotten my special needs kids some of the best services available in the United States, and in the process, found myself entering a new world for me - one of support, acceptance and kindness. Therapists have not always agreed with my decisions for my kids (therapists tend to dislike homeschooling), but in general, my kids have been so successful in mainstreaming that even the most public school committed doctor has had to acquiesce to my decision. And all over, teachers, musicians, actors, dancers, therapists, and other parents, greet me with huge hugs and overwhelming praise. A bit much for a former juvenile delinquent.

More importantly, I have learned with my kids that together we can do anything. Parenting has been the most healing activity in my life. This dreadlocked, nose-ringed, tattooed mom is welcome at churches, afterschool programs, and therapeutic services, when back before parenting I felt like a stranger and outcast wherever I went! (Don't forget, gentle readers, that back in the 1990's people still routinely asked if lesbians should even be allowed to adopt children!)

On the other hand, there are things I haven't been able to give my children. A loving and accepting extended family has eluded me. I can't force my relatives to accept autism, to help with the issues my children face, or even to accept me. I can't force my relatives to get some social skills training they need, and I can't stop them from feeling angry and threatened when my children get therapeutic interventions they might just need themselves. I can choose school programs, but sadly, I can't choose how everyone else deals with disability. And it is sad indeed, that for my multiracial kids in a lesbian family, the biggest discrimination we face DAILY is ableism.

So back to the universe, unfolding away as we unfold ourselves. Autism has never seemed an example of the universe not being as it should, though I want my children to confront their disabilities and learn to have as many behavioral options as possible. I am not writing here that parents should "accept" autistic kids without also finding as many interventions and giving autistic children as many choices as possible.

And yet, I have done the "I should have given them more" Mommy guilt.

When I get this card, it is a lovely and gentle reminder to me. I can and have fought autism, and ableism, but sometimes the universe continues on its way no matter what I do. I can't change everything for my kids, but I can dance within the life that is dealt us. Autism has shaped my parenting, my wonderful relationships with my fabulous children, and given me new perspectives on myself as acceptable and even embraced.

Is the universe unfolding the way it should? Well, from my limited viewpoint, it is hard to know. However, my kids and I are unfolding the way we should be, to ever more creative skills and ever more loving circles.

As " a piece of the continent, a part of the main," this corner of the universe is grooving.

Hippie Tarot for Everybody

I've used tarot personally for over 25 years, taught tarot to Pagan and Christian groups, been the tarot reader for parties, used tarot for clients, family and friends. I have a multiplicity of decks, all that I love for different reasons and needs, and recently wrote some tarot articles to introduce cards to new readers.

And I have a favorite deck, which happens to be free, online, and easy to download. It is the Morgan Tarot, a hippie dippie deck that I consider my best deck for all around use. And it remains my favorite for its mind-blowing simplicity: no numbers, no funky, hidden symbols, no wierdo lay outs. Just great cards that challenge assumptions, connect readers to themselves and others, and wickedly accurate predictions that shock my most atheistic friends. (I do have clients who need me to explain magnetic forces and psychology for them to accept a reading. . . whatever faith stance ya need. . .)

I'm gonna blog on the Morgan Tarot, connect everyone with the links to this great deck, and just give some of my personal experience with the cards. IN NO WAY ARE MY INTERPRETATIONS CORRECT FOR EVERYONE!!!!!! The best way to learn tarot is to use the cards yourself, and find out what they mean for you. (If you insist on Ryder Waite decks with me, for example, don't expect me to tell you swords are "negative" as I never find them so in readings. . . ) Since I'm writing on, and have written before about, tarot, I obviously don't eschew writing about the cards. Yup, it can be helpful to hear what the authors of the cards intend, or what others have found when using the cards. BUT ULTIMATELY TAROT IS WHAT EACH READER FINDS AND SEES THEREIN.

So I write about tarot as invitation. Come play with cards.

They are such fun.

You can download the entire Morgan Tarot. Each card has an interpretation, usually delightfully funny and serious, as well. Anyone can easily start using the cards and the published interpretations. So go for it!

I'll start listing cards here weekly, and tell about them in my experience. This is a hippie deck, so I do find it sexist at times. I add a Dianic spin, because that is what I do. I also add LGBT spins, anti-racist spins, and of course a bit of socialism. Someone else working with the deck (like you!), should add their own views.

So for the first card:

"Your Mission Is Not Yet Complete"

This is an easy card in a reading. Morgan, the deck creator, offers these words on the card:


"The great archeological discovery is yet to be made. Traditionally the entrance to Shambhala (paradise) has been in Central Asia, more recently it has been found in Mexico, and right now it is here.

Actually you are fulfilling a divine mission by following your karmic path.

This is an opinion sponsored by entity X-1513."

For me, despite the fun of entity X-1513, the most important message is that your client is indeed on a divine mission. I like the language of karmic path, and use it in my daily life, and with the right client, that language works. However, for some Christians and atheists, karma has no meaning. For Christians I quote the bible here: GALATIANS 6: 7-9 (KJV) 7 works well, in the "you reap what you sow" kind of message. For a client wanting to reap a new career, sowing some classes might be useful.

The message that we all have a divine path is especially important for a client (or yourself) to hear. It is very easy for me to lose my own sense of holiness and importance when worrying about my greying hair or when looking at my bank statements. Middle aged, grey-haired hippies are not a top commodity in advanced industrial capitalism.

Most of my friends, by the virtue of wrong-colored skin or wrong sexual orientation, wrong physical or developmental abilities, or wrong careers, are not valuable in this culture either. Making one's way through the labels and stereotypes of this world is thus an endless form of psychic attack. It's hard to remember we are each of us holy.

Here is a great card to remind your client that they are divine. Their life has divine meaning. That growing and becoming the best we can be is God's or Goddess's or Bridget's or Buddha's or Jesus' or the universe's or the spirits' goal for each of us. Tell yourself, tell your friends, tell your family/ies, tell your clients:

You are on a divine path. Keep going!



I'll write on another card next week! But please, please, go explore the deck on your own!