https://tarotwitchery.blogspot.com/Master_List_Mabon_2019

Use these links to link to your neighbors on your Mabon Blog Hop Post:

• Alison Coals https://alisonsalembic.blogspot.com/2019/09/tarot-blog-hop-mabon-2019-what-is-my.html
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•  Raine Shakti|http://www.tarotofchange.com/2019/09/tarot-blog-hop-what-is-my-harvest-and.html|raine.clara.shakti@gmail.com|
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•  Louise Underhill | https://www.priestesstarot.co.uk/2019/09/tarot-blog-hop-w…how-do-i-find-it/| |
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• Katalin Patnaik    Katalin Patnaik, https://katalinpatnaik.wordpress.com/?p=2070
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•  Lore M (Brandi Hopkins) | https://www.messagesfromlore.com/2019/09/mabon-blog-hop-my-harvest.html |
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•  Maureen Aisling Duffy-Boose: https://tarotwitchery.blogspot.com/2019/09/what-is-my-harvest-and-where-do-i-find.html
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• Anita Stewart https://www.tarotandstars.com/2019/09/what-is-my-harvest-and-how-do-i-find-it.html 

What Is My Harvest, And Where Do I Find It? Tarot Blog Hop Mabon 2019

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The Autumn Equinox, also known as Mabon, is the focus of collecting one's personal harvest, including what you have learned, what you have decided is important and what you have decided to get rid of, your plans for making productive use of the autumn and winter months, including thoughts of the holidays that fall within this time, and your own personal viewing and self-exploration of your own inner Being. How have you changed, what are you beginning, and what have you completed, and most significantly, how have you begun to further and more deeply understand your Self?

My personal analysis of the details of a person's Being relies on the Celtic concept of the Three Realms, known as Land, Sea, and Sky, and representing Body, Mind, and Spirit. So in planning this Hop, I suggested the reading technique I am now using, I am drawing three cards for each of the Realms, nine cards total. And they will answer for me three questions, one set for my Body, one for my Mind, and one for my Spirit. The questions are:

1. What do I need to know about the current condition of my (Body, Mind, Spirit) that I am not aware of right now?

2. What is the most important thing on which I need to focus in the realm of my (Body, Mind, Spirit) as I move into the winter months?

3. What is the main content and context of the harvest of better health, new ideas, or deeper spiritual resonance, allied with Body, Mind, or Spirit, that I am going to receive if I focus on these things?

So here are my cards, and my interpretations, of what this year's Harvest consists of, and what I will be doing with it. Here we go:

BODY:  Three cards drawn are as follows:

1. What do I need to know about the current condition of my Body that I am not aware of right now?
I am being told that I need to pay attention to the useless amount of fat in my body, as well as the uselessness of some of the things I am eating and some of the exercise I am NOT doing--it is useless not to exercise. It is useless to eat things that don't help me lose weight. It is useless not to use my body so I can make it work better.

********

2. What is the most important thing on which I need to focus in the realm of my Body as I move into the winter months?

This card is reminding me that I will sabotage myself as I have done many times if I assume I will fail at what I am trying to do. I need to act and move positively with a positive attitude that says I will succeed in what I wish to do. Failure is not an option to consider.

******

3. What is the main content and context of the harvest of better health, new ideas, or deeper spiritual resonance, allied with my Body, that I am going to receive if I focus on these things?

This card tells me that much of my self-shaming and feeling of inadequacy is going to be leaving me as I begin to have a positive and active attitude about the ways I can improve my physical condition. An active and more attractive Self is waiting for me as part of my Harvest.

********************************************

1. What do I need to know about the current condition of my Mind that I am not aware of right now?
I have been too focused on things that are concerned with other people and have not even focused myself on new ideas or things I care about. This has the effect of disempowering me, as I am not paying attention to my own ideas, needs, or intuitive awarenesses. I need to be careful to realize that the harvest of the given year is MY harvest, and focus on, and think of, what matters to ME.

***********
 2. What is the most important thing on which I need to focus in the realm of my Mind as I move into the winter months?

This card is my personal reminder that I must value my own ideas and impulses and see the richness of my own ideas, instead of always feeling that other people come first and that I must have the approval of someone else before I consider working on a given idea of my own. My personal richness is, like that of everyone else, the Gift of Life, and no one else has the same mind or same ideas as any other person. So I must see my own Richness and decide what to do with it.

*************

3. What is the main content and context of the harvest of better health, new ideas, or deeper spiritual resonance, allied with my Mind, that I am going to receive if I focus on these things?

What a privilege to know that my personal Goddess, Brighid, is going to light her Fire of Wisdom in my Mind if I am only willing to work towards understanding my own thoughts and ideas. I promise I will do that--I want this Harvest! Beannacht Bhrighide!

***********************************************

1. What do I need to know about the current condition of my Spirit that I am not aware of right now?

The Goddess Isis is the representation of looking beyond the obvious, and seeing all aspects of a given situation. In the realm of Spirit, this might be a suggestion, in answer to the question above, that I have more going on in my Spirit life than I am noticing, and that it is time to pay attention to the inner voices, and hear the genuine messages of the God/desses.

************

2. What is the most important thing on which I need to focus in the realm of my Spirit as I move into the winter months?

Here is Odin the All-Powerful, hanging powerless from the Tree of Life, to encourage his brethren, the Midir, not to fear him but to come and communicate with him. I need to focus on the things and people  with whom I share Spirit, such as my coveners and my Pagan community, and I need to make absolutely sure that I am including each and every one of my community members in creating the world of Spirit which we share together. I am not here alone, and I need to create connection so that my Spirit harvest will be complete.

**************

3. What is the main content and context of the harvest of better health, new ideas, or deeper spiritual resonance, allied with my Spirit, that I am going to receive if I focus on these things?

White Buffalo Woman was the Goddess of the Lakota who enabled them to know all the many uses of the buffalo other than simply for food, and represents the way my own Spirit will become more able to see variations on things I thought I knew, understand the deeper meaning of things, and resonate with inner connection to Spirit in ways I have never known. This is a Harvest I am definitely grateful to have!!!

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Tarot Blog Hop. Litha 2019: Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?

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I have discovered, over many years of reading cards, that the timing of the spread and interpretation will, whether or not I intend it that way, definitely interact with Spirit so that the cards drawn for a given question will be vastly different depending on what time of the day they are drawn. For this blog hop, I have done a reading on a specific question for myself, and I took the deck and let it sit out under the full of the moon and then drew my cards first thing in the morning, high noon, sunset, and midnight. Same question each time, two cards each draw, like this:

"Should I, or should I not, continue as a member of ________? First card is "If I do, then this." Second card is, "If I don't, then this." Here is what Spirit told me:

First Draw, Sunrise:

If I do, then I will be discovering things about my own path that I otherwise will miss.

If I don't, something will become a disappointment to me.



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Second Draw, High Noon:

If I do, there is likely to be a chance I will not be able to do something else I wish to accomplish.

If  I don't, I will be given the courage to move forward in another path.

*********

Third Draw, Sunset

If I do, then I will not succeed, but will be defeated, at something I am already beginning to do because I am a member of _______________.

If  I don't, then I will be able to create a new foundation and move forward in a different way. 

**************

Fourth Draw, Midnight

If I do, the things I am in the process of doing for myself will be completed in exactly the perfect manner to assist me. 

If I don't, that "new foundation" I am wishing to build will hold me still, prevent me from moving forward, and I will not be able to complete the things I currently am doing.

***********

It was uncannily precise, and let me know that the time of day and what it does for my personal energy was a real component not only of what cards were drawn, but of what I interpreted them to mean. I have decided, and I know that the cards were highly instrumental in assisting me to make my decision. Hope you too can find the "right time" to get your own personal "right answer". It works.



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Tarot Blog Hop Bealteine 2019: Teaching Tarot, Learning from Tarot

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Our Wrangler for this Hop, Joy Vernon, suggested that we might wish to take a look, not simply at what we see when we do our readings, but at how we are deepening our understanding of Tarot and how we might be passing that knowledge along. Her questions, which are the topical threads for this Hop. were presented this way:

• What classes are you taking/recommending?
• What are you doing to advance your knowledge/experience/abilities with tarot?

I have been given much to think about in mentally pursuing this topic, and I have decided that some of what I know might need to be deepened, and some of what I do might need to be shared. Here are some of my own actions and intentions to make the experience of reading and interpreting Tarot be deeper and more meaningful, not just for me personally but also for my clients.

I have recently begun working with my coven, and with certain students who met me as a result of having readings, with the intent of creating a triadic meaning of Tarot spreads and individual cards. I utilize the Celtic lore of Body, Mind, and Spirit in discussing and teaching methodology for interpreting each card in a given reading as it relates to each of these elemental entities. And I have discovered a great benefit in assisting clients to look at the singular meaning of one aspect of a card, or a group of cards, individually interpreting the impact of that same card or cards on Body, Mind, and Spirit. In order to deepen my own abilities to assist clients in this kind of understanding, I myself have begun studying with a reader whom I met at a Psychic Fair last year, who is a psychologist in her mundane job, and who utilizes her awareness of the psychological, physiological, and philosophical ideas of humanity in any given situation to deepen her ability to explain the cards to her clients. I am finding that this is highly useful and adds a far deeper resonance to the knowledge the cards may already convey. In order to deepen understanding of the relationship of the cards with Body, Mind, and Spirit, I am teaching my coveners to take any card in the Tarot and decide which of the Trees of the Celtic Ogham also resonates with that meaning. We have found this a highly useful practice. 

And what I am learning is very new to me and very informative. This year, very recently, I was introduced by a friend to something I had never used, seen, or even heard of-- the Lenormand deck. I must say, beginning to study it and learn to interpret it has opened up an entirely new aspect of divination for me. I am now able, in a completely new environment, to look deep within my Self, and begin to understand, on a different level, my own thoughts, insights, foundations of understanding, and many other aspects of beginning to explain my own techniques and interpretations of the practice of divination to my Self. One of the first things I began to realize was that over the many years I have been reading, my interpretations of cards and card groupings had begun to be somewhat predetermined, and that it is simgularly essential to any individual reading to look at that set of cards as if you had never seen them before and interpret for the client from the base of the inner realm of spirit. The Lenormand brings an entirely new set of ideas to the table, and is adding much new awareness and insight to what I am able to read with this deck. I am actually just beginning to understand the inner meanings of cards and card combinations, so I am looking forward to deepening my awareness of these ideas over many months of study.

This summer I am going to be offering a class for those who wish to understand the Major and Minor arcana of the traditional Tarot with a deeper insight into modern society. More information about that will be available as I learn about it. But for now, I am delighted to discover that, even after 48 years as a reader of runes and cards, I am far from knowing all there is to know about it yet. Teaching, in my own experience, also includes learning, and in the realm of divination, I am currently experiencing both. I recommend that each of you might also benefit from this kind of practice.


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Tarot Blog Hop Imbolc 2019: Odd Associations

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This Hop recognizes the unique characteristics of the many different decks, different reading techniques, and different associations brought into play by each and every reader of Tarot and Oracle cards. In the words of our Wrangler, Morgan Drake Eckstein: "As readers and users of the symbolism of the Tarot and oracle decks, we create a string of associations with the emblems and mythology of divination. For instance, with the cards of the Tarot, a reader can associate them with events, people, feelings, places, etc. Those who dive into the esoteric systems will sometimes also have dates and locations, zodiac symbols, kabbalahistic ideas, etc. associated with the cards. Basically, divination systems are like a giant filing cabinet that we toss imagery into, so that later we can use the symbols as a hint of what is going on." And so each of us has been invited to share our personal experience of discovering "Odd Associations" as we delve into the esoteric meanings and resonances of our cards.

My own experience is connected on several levels with the Sabbat, Imbolc, that is the time of this Hop. I am a Priestess of the Goddess Brighid, and Imbolc is Her primary festival. And the associations of this Sabbat, whose name means, literally, "in the belly", have to do with the beginning of new ideas, the birth of images and connections with events, deities, and the actual energies of the person for whom I am reading. And for me, one of my primary and constantly occurring "Odd Associations" is the resonance of the aura of the person for whom I am reading with the basic meaning of each card, and the numerological associations of each card with all the others, and with the "soul numbers" of the client, which simply emerge in the process of the reading.

As an example of this phenomenon, and how the associations work, in my 34 years as a Tarot reader, I have had interactions again and again with people who are of significant "crossroads ages" in their lives, and many of them do not know the exact meaning of these guideposts until they appear in the reading. But the cards seem to be fully aware, not only of the phase of life that the person is entering or leaving, but of the new birth of ideas, events, and insights that occur "in the belly" of the person whose reading we are doing, and which need to be examined and "given birth" in order to manifest the new viewpoint and new actions that will assist the person in dealing with the events of this moment. As an example, I did a reading recently for a young man who was about to have his 22nd birthday. He wished to have a reading to give him some insights into what the next year would bring, but he was unaware of the resonance of 22 as a "Master Number" in numerology, and was also not familiar with the concept of reading someone's aura as a guidepost to the way the seven chakras of the individual were focusing and guiding the events of their current state of being. But the "Odd Association" of the cards which were drawn in this reading was that each of the seven cards we drew was one of the cards that represented a particular auric state and a threshold of change for the young man--and when they all were connected in the order of their appearance, we could link each of them to one of his seven chakras, and adding their numbers in both the suits that occurred and the Major Arcana cards, each group of cards added up to 22. Much of my interpretation of the cards had to do with explaining to the young man the numerological resonance of each individual card and the connections as we grouped them to the phases of his current threshold of being. And as we finished the reading, I shuffled the entire deck, Major Arcana and Minor Arcana, all 78 cards in one random stack, and asked him if he would like to draw a "threshold card" to answer the concept of "All right, then, what next? What do I focus on?" And he said that he would like to draw 2 cards, one that was about where he should go next, and the other saying what he should avoid doing or experiencing. And he did so--and, just to underline what the reading had already spoken to him, the two cards he chose added up, of course, to 22. 

Experiences of this kind have occurred so often that when I read cards, whether the Tarot, my Ogham Oracle, or my Spirit Deck, I always apply the numerological significance of the cards and the resonance of the auric connections to my interpretation of the reading. And even though on many levels these connections represent "Odd Associations", they keep reminding me that in psychic readings, nothing is fixed and immovable, and the reader needs to ride the constantly changing tides of flux and flow, both in interpreting the reading for the client and in focusing their own insight and awareness of how the Spirit works in psychic readings. So--I don't consider these associations particularly Odd, much of the time. I am more likely to hear Spirit saying to me, "So, you thought you understood how these cards connect and how they need to be interpreted, eh? Well--here's a new one for you. Take THAT, and see what you can do with it!!" And I do, and I will, because of all the insights of psychic reading that have presented themselves to me over the years, the one with which I resonate the most deeply is that nothing is set in stone, and if I think I know exactly what a particular combination of cards means--guess what? I just found out something brand-new about it. Odd Associations are the insights which make it possible to understand the aspects of a given set of cards, and realize that even the same set of cards is going to be able to be interpreted differently, every single time. So--as a reader, every time I  teach, I am also learning. May it be so, always!

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Three Card Map of the Upcoming Week....

The TarotWitch has taken quite the hiatus, but it is time once again to begin sharing the regular intersection of body, mind, and spirit that can guide us into a productive and beneficial week. Three cards, one each for Land/Body, Sea/Mind, and Sky/Spirit, drawn on the first day of the weekend, to give us all time to look and think and interpret before we move once again into our work-week, where the message of the cards will incorporate itself into our week's actions and give us deeper understanding of how the YOUniverse is interacting with each one of us. So--here is this week's three-card guide-map to our inner life, so we can move in thought, action, and interaction with spirit. Here we go:

Land/Body: 

This is going to be the last week of 2018, and we will be looking at the state of our health, our finances, our homes and surroundings, and all the other physical manifestations of the passing year, and asking ourselves: "What has increased my good fortune this year, and how can I carry this energy into the New Year without limiting my opportunities or narrowing my perspective?" Fortune is a word having to do not simply with finances, but with the entire layout of possibilities and achievements, and this card is asking us to look carefully at where we stand right this minute in our physical circumstances, and decide for ourselves what we intend to carry forward, and how we intend to do so.

Sea/Mind:

We are seeing the inner resources of our own minds in the form of  this card, "Aeon," representing "the eternal sunshine of the spotless mind" and indicating new ideas, thoughts and mental explorations that have yet to emerge, but are waiting for us.  Aeon (Judgment) emphasizes the theme of renewal for the whole planet. When we think of the card in readings we see that this can apply to an individual as well. The card of Aeon is a powerful one. It tells you that this is a time of change. The person who receives Aeon becomes "reborn" into a new situation. This may involve a real change in circumstances--a new job, a move to a new home, a new relationship. Sometimes, the new situation is psychological, a new way of looking at life in which everything becomes fresh.

Sky/Spirit:

All too often, we have so little understanding of, or faith in, our own interactions with Spirit that we somehow feel as if, unless someone else tells us what Spirit is saying and what it means, we won't be able to understand it. This card is telling us, for this last week of the current year, the exact opposite. We already know, very simply, that we don't "know", we can simply wait to find out, what Spirit has in store for us. But this card is reassuring us that no matter what we see in our new walk of Spirit, no matter how unique or unusual or simply new, Happiness and Joy will be the result of our explorations. So--fear not, walk in Beauty, and wait to see what the YOUniverse will hand to you. It is going to bring Joy, and if you let yourself fly free in the company of Spirit, you can't do it wrong. So--just DO it. Happy New Year!!

Tarot Blog Hop Yule 2018: Finding My Cozy

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Good tidings of Yuletide, my friends. Our wonderful wrangler, Joanne Sprott, has requested us to remember the necessity of warmth within in this time of the year wherein yes, baby, it IS cold outside. She suggested various ideas concerning ways to discuss and meditate upon how one finds one's own "cozy" during this season, and this one really spoke to me: "Create a Tarot spread around asking for ways to increase the cozy in your life right now, or if you like, you can focus on insulating against the cold (or both)." This resonates with me, because I am a snow-lover who lives in one of the best ski areas in the United States, but notwithstanding that, I am absolutely unable to remain in good physical, mental, or emotional health when I become too chilled. I NEED my "cozy", and I know there is more than one kind of warmth that will permit me to love and enjoy the snow and ice, and the feeling of death and rebirth over the winter, and yet I need to be able to connect with my mind, will, body, emotions and spirit without letting myself freeze within and without. So--here is a draw I created, simply connecting to the elemental nature of the Tarot and the ways that each element resonates within my own life. Air is thought and inspiration, represented  by Swords; Fire is inner light, personal power, and is represented by Rods: Earth is manifest reality and stability, represented by Stones; Water is the flux and flow of emotion and the refreshment of the inner Being, represented by Cups; and Spirit is the entire focus of all the angles of reality represented by the Major Arcana. So, I separated each section of the deck into a stack in itself, and drew one card from each, asking the Universe: "In my Mind, my Will, my Body, my Emotions, and my Spirit, what must I do to find and maintain my warmth in the cold, my "cozy"?. And here is what I discovered:

AIR:

I drew this card reversed, and in its appearance in that position reinforces something I have been working on within myself for many years--the concept (the IDEA) of refraining from self-criticism at the expense of your calmness of mind. Cruelty of mind, believing one's own ideas are worthless compared to the opinions of others, is one way to defeat the "cozy" and send the chill of winter into one's head. So I promised myself, on sight of this card, to welcome my thoughts and ideas with warm appreciation and hospitality of mind, permitting myself to open a light into the darkness of winter, and, huddled up within my mind, snuggle into the "cozy" of self-exploration and new ideas. It does, indeed, make things within my brain more hospitable and warmer. I will be feeding the fire of personal ideas and new thoughts throughout the dead of winter, to bring inner warmth to life.

FIRE:

Another reversal!!! I believe the YOUniverse is speaking to me, telling me what is going to stoke and feed the cozy fires of inner warmth and light, and what is going to extinguish them and leave me freezing. I do suffer the consequences of my Irish temper, often, with family and other dear ones, and drawing this card reversed was a clear and powerful mandate to refrain from conflict and to extinguish the wild flame of anger and disagreement and, well, conflict. One wishes to create the warmth of interaction with family and friends, sitting around the hearth sharing talk and laughter and intimate understanding of one another, and maybe even a warm cup of something delicious. So--to keep the "cozy", refrain from conflict and instead focus on positive interactions. I can DO this!

EARTH:

Aahh...the warmth of actual knowledge and awareness is something the YOUniverse is reminding me to awaken, use, and enjoy to create and maintain the cozy warmth of positive energy in action. I already have some "winter skills", some cooking, some beverage making, some enjoyable indoor activities, some ways to organize and arrange my home environment so that it speaks of peace, joy, love, and the warmth of family and friends. And--if I think, and read, and study, and learn, in the lovely and calm peace of winter's indoor days, I may yet be able to increase my store of knowledge and add some tools to the "cozy bag" I am currently using; Soo...time to cuddle up in front of the fire with a cup of soup and a couple of friends and family members, and share knowledge of ways to warm and brighten the Yuletide. Let's grow our cozy by feeding our minds, together.

WATER:

A smile illuminated my face as I saw what the YOUniverse had sent me to elaborate on my feelings and emotions---the Ace of Cups, the absolute focus of loving interaction. This card reminds me that my cup is already filled to overflowing, but that the more of the rich balm of love and understanding I am able to consume and share, the more the cup will refill itself, again and again. Each person, each event, each experience of my inner life during the winter darkness, will illuminate me with inner light and warmth and peace, and keep me cozy.

SPIRIT:

And here we have the wonderful culmination of the cozy spirit--the many faces and directional foci of Brahma, the spirit of warmth and light. No accident that he is a Deity of fire, holding the wand of light, and looking in many directions. He reminds me that there is always another way, another idea, and something more within to awaken my own warmth and light. Keep loving, keep looking, keep laughing, and I will remain cozy and aware of light throughout the dark time. I can DO this. You try it too, eh?

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