By Sarah Taylor

Three weeks ago, on Sunday, Aug. 30, two of the cards in this week’s reading appeared in the same order, but shifted up a position. Those were The Magus and the Ace of Wands in the second and third card positions respectively. Now, they are here again, but in the first and second card positions.

Time has moved on. You and your life have moved on. What was present is now fading into a foundational energy; what was to come is now here.

The Magus, Ace of Wands, The Star from The Röhrig Tarot deck, created by Carl-W. Röhrig. Click on the image for a larger version.

It’s an interesting reading for another reason, and one that I also referred to on Aug. 30. When we have a major arcana and an Ace, we are very much in the realm of archetype. Their influence is one we have to feel into, to sense their revelation between the cracks of normal perception, and — in the case of the Ace — to reach for and to work with actively.

The one grounding presence in the Aug. 30 reading was the Prince of Disks: The Magus and the Ace would be revealed through an aspect of your personality that was coming to the fore. Today, there are no court cards, and no pip cards (Twos through Tens). The themes are significant; the influence and flow created by the three cards are nothing less than phenomenal. And yet, even more so this time, they are asking for your awareness and for your action based on an intuitive sense of their presence rather than one that is external and/or more readily available to you.

You will feel The Magus and The Star as an inner knowing or a shift in how you have started (The Magus) and how you are about to start (The Star) to relate to yourself, or to feel as a force inside you.

The Magus in the past card position equips you perfectly for the imminent arrival of the Ace of Wands into your life. His active, Mercurial presence as an aspect of you enables you to work with a quality that is constantly on the move, and which asks for your agility and grace — your sense of timing and finesse — to make full use of it.

The Star is the connection to a higher presence that is available to you once you have picked up your “magic Wand” and started to use it. It connects you more deeply into your intuitive knowing; it is the restoration of a current whose trickle you may have been following with some faith and hope for some time now. It may have, at times, had you wondering if there was anything at the end of this particular rainbow at all.

A hunch was all you had; a promise of something that remained just that — a promise, a glimmering sensation at the edge of awareness that drew you forward. A part of you has always known that it held something for you; the risk has always been that your journey towards it has come with no solid guarantees. No “If you do this, you’ll get that.”

You might have felt like you were often freefalling in “a wing and a prayer” territory. Even now, it will not feel entirely tangible. However, it is there, if these cards are anything to go by. The Ace of Wands stands right in front of you, as present as it will ever be. That same faith that kept you going might be the thing you use to reach for it to see what happens when you do.

Because you will know the presence of the Ace as a burning fire in your belly that you need to harness if you want to use it.

Like a wild stallion, if you want to use it rather than simply look at it, it is you who needs to approach it with confidence, hold its mane, and engage with it — knowing only that you are dealing with something both powerful and living at the edge of predictability. Commune with it, and you are communing with something that is living, breathing fire. Your skill and your surrender to that fire will determine your experience.

Connection to creativity, to Eros, can never happen on your terms alone. You know this already, given you’ve been moving forward in an act of faith for some time now. Jump on a stallion, and there will invariably be an element of uncertainty about how he is going to behave, and what is going to happen next. That never goes away. What can remain present are the skills and abilities you bring to your meeting with him, and your surrender to his instinct — which is really your own. He knows better; and you know better than to second-guess him.

There is a part of you that believes fully in your ability and right to dance in the flames. If you find yourself trying too hard, engaging your thoughts and your will too strongly, moving against what intuitively makes sense to you, you can move back, check in, and re-establish a more give-and-take-and-surrender relationship with what’s moving through you.

You have everything you need. You are everything you need.

Astrology/Elemental correspondences: The Magus (Mercury), Ace of Wands (the pure, limitless potential of fire), The Star (Aquarius)

If you want to experiment with tarot cards and don’t have any, we provide a free tarot spread generator using the Celtic Wings spread, which is based on the traditional Celtic Cross spread. This article explains how to use the spread.

By Sarah Taylor

These words came to me last week when I looked at the Princess of Swords:

“[H]ere you are, the Princess of Swords. You’ve come through and there is a new aspect to your experience. You’ve achieved something, even if you can’t quite yet believe it’s happened. Yep. That’s you. You’ve demonstrated your chops and earned your stripes.

“Own it, baby.

“You’re not going to get mystified by that one again — your eye-woven headdress will make sure of that. You may step towards it, you may step into it. You won’t stay there for long. It will no longer be tolerable, and you’ll be inclined to speak out, strike out, refuse to take that shit anymore.”

Princess of Swords, Nine of Swords, The Hanged Man from The Röhrig Tarot deck, created by Carl-W. Röhrig. Click on the image for a larger version.

Well, of course: when you step up and declare to yourself, to others, and to the world that you are most certainly not going to take that shit again — what would a rational, compassionate, and accommodating universe do but help you prove that? What would it do but concoct an experience of just what you’re used to — tailored just to your experience — so that you then have the choice as to whether you want to:

a) step towards it,
b) step into it, and/or
c) decide how long you want to stay in it, if at all; or
d) walk away?

You are at choice here. Completely at choice. It may feel that you have little or no option when you’re in the thick of it, bile rising in the back of your throat, sword drawn, ready to charge into battle. Or, it may not seem like a battle. Things may be entirely courteous on the surface. Smiles and waves; voiced approvals; all the right things being said.

But if you catch yourself thinking to yourself that it has a familiar feeling at its core; or that you’re in “Same shit, different day” territory; or it looks different but smells entirely like it always has, congratulate yourself. You are earning your stripes. You spoke out and took a stand. Now you have something to take a stand against.

However —

There’s a catch, all-seeing, mighty warrior and liberator.

That battle party you’re steeling yourself for that’s waiting up ahead? It’s you. You’re the catch. A part of you is waiting for you in the bushes at the edge of the pathway and it has a trip-rope at the ready. That beautiful, steadfast, faithful shadow-fighter in you who is vigilantly looking out for you, hand on sword hilt, just itching to strike out against that next move in your direction. It has such good intentions. But this time, you know that aspect of yourself all too well: it isn’t striking out at others. It is striking out at shadows. Your own shadows.

In other words: if you feel you’re being drawn into battle with someone or something, ask yourself first if the truth is that you’re really being drawn into a battle with yourself over something that no longer exists in the way it used to. And if that makes sense to you, face that part of yourself; thank it, and then move on and round it.

You do not have to step into this noose. This time, it does not have to be for you. Self-criticism, compulsion, remorse, regret — none of these is at all necessary.

Suffering is optional. Doing the same thing, again and again, is optional. Believing that you are not free already is optional.

That sword you’re holding in your hand is sharp. You can use it constructively. How can you parse matter? How can you slice away to discern truth? How can you cut to the heart of what really means something to you?

How does your vision help to shape your world?

How can you take what you have and know, and use it, to make that world happen, and right now?

Right now, you can choose to take a different step. Knowing you have freedom of choice is the greatest freedom of all.

Astrology/Elemental correspondences: Princess of Swords (the earthy aspect of air), Nine of Swords (Mars in Gemini), The Hanged Man (Neptune)

If you want to experiment with tarot cards and don’t have any, we provide a free tarot spread generator using the Celtic Wings spread, which is based on the traditional Celtic Cross spread. This article explains how to use the spread.

By Sarah Taylor

Once again, this week’s reading has a tie-in with last week’s three cards, given the similarity of cards in the two spreads, albeit in a slightly different order.

Last week, from left to right:

1) Court (Prince of Disks)
2) Major Arcana (The Magus)
3) Ace (Wands).

This week, from left to right:

1) Major Arcana (The Moon)
2) Court (Princess of Swords)
3) Ace (Swords).

The Moon, Princess of Swords, Ace of Swords from The Röhrig Tarot deck, created by Carl-W. Röhrig. Click on the image for a larger version.

The difference is in the order of the major and court cards, which this week suggests a shift away from the influence of The Moon — as opposed to a shift into the influence of The Magus last week. This is emphasized by the Princess’s (Page in the Rider-Waite Smith deck) body-language, turned as she is towards the Ace of Swords, her right arm closing off a chapter that has been marked by the Moon’s Piscean qualities: watery, and associated with the collective unconscious — a deep-water place where all is connected, which our surface-water, conscious minds can sense but are not able to look at directly.

And what have we all been connected by recently but the Full Moon in Pisces, which happened on Aug. 29, a little over a week ago.

Something that you may not have been able to identify directly — or fully, anyway — moved you into and through a period where you were probably thinking, “What gives?!” Up was indecipherable from down; things may have felt decidedly weird. Shadows loomed, distorted. You were thrust into the potential for introspection — even if you weren’t quite sure just what you were supposed to be inspecting in there.

A word and a phrase from The Moon stand out: “Illusions,” and “End of Karma.”

This metaphorical hall of mirrors, full of its own grotesqueries, served to sever something that had run its course. Dues were paid; time to move on. In that moment of dues paid, you liberated yourself. It might not have felt quite so clean and decisive. It has quite possibly been a process of stilted, back-and-forth fraying of ropes and bending open of chains — frequently frustrating, leaving you wondering whether you were making much progress at all. Leaving you wondering just what the hell you were being freed from, anyway.

But here you are, the Princess of Swords. You’ve come through and there is a new aspect to your experience. You’ve achieved something, even if you can’t quite yet believe it’s happened. Yep. That’s you. You’ve demonstrated your chops and earned your stripes.

Own it, baby.

You’re not going to get mystified by that one again — your eye-woven headdress will make sure of that. You may step towards it, you may step into it. You won’t stay there for long. It will no longer be tolerable, and you’ll be inclined to speak out, strike out, refuse to take that shit anymore.

That take-no-prisoners clarity is the gift that’s offered to you today. It’s all yours. Reach up and grasp it. Can you feel its beautiful, balanced heft in your hands? The sword of insight that is the Ace has been forged in this particular instance just for you. It stands in front of you, and in its presence the clouds part, the road clears, and the horizon beckons. Something new and better-suited to you lies up ahead.

Astrology/Elemental correspondences: The Moon (Pisces), Princess of Swords (the earthy aspect of air), Ace of Wands (the pure, limitless potential of air)

If you want to experiment with tarot cards and don’t have any, we provide a free tarot spread generator using the Celtic Wings spread, which is based on the traditional Celtic Cross spread. This article explains how to use the spread.

By Sarah Taylor

The Prince of Disks, The Magus, and the Ace of Wands. From planning and preparation, to ignition, to fire. This is the journey depicted in the cards in front of us this week — though a more accurate description would be “the potential journey”: an Ace, while powerful, refers to what is available, but which doesn’t necessarily have to be acknowledged or used.

Prince of Disks, The Magus, Ace of Wands from The Röhrig Tarot deck, created by Carl-W. Röhrig. Click on the image for a larger version.

There are single figures on the first two cards, and no figures on the third. It’s you, in collaboration with a force that, as The Magus, you are fully equipped to draw from, but which you may opt not to harness at all, whether deliberately or by default. In other words, the power of these three cards in combination is in your hands. No-one else’s. Or no other human’s, anyway. But we’ll get to that a little later.

The Prince of Disks is the Röhrig equivalent of the Knight of Pentacles in the Rider-Waite Smith tarot deck. He is the venturing, questing energy of Disks, or earth — anything that we experience in material form. Lying at the further end of the spectrum to Wands (fire, Eros, creativity; significantly less tangible), the Prince of Disks’ realm is one that is denser, slower to action and yet with the potential to stick around for a while.

Looking at the image on the Prince’s crown, he is an architect. He holds the blueprints, and it’s his job to go out and look for the best materials for the job. He is a visionary, and also an idealist, being younger than both the Queen and the Knight (the King). He is persistent — perhaps even stubborn. This stubbornness can serve him very well at times, though, because without this dogged pursuit of the plans in his mind, and the tenacity to see them through, nothing would get made — or nothing of much (personal) value anyway.

There is an interesting parallel between the Prince of Disks and The Magus; and a fundamental difference too.

The parallel is the light source in each picture, both associated with the figures’ crowns. With the Prince, the light is more contained, sitting at the heart of the plans of what looks like an amphitheatre. Performance; a place where one’s mettle is tested; a place where one has the chance to shine.

With The Magus, that light has turned supernova. Or, to put it another way: when taken in sequence with last week’s reading, the zero point field of The Fool has exploded into matter with the arrival of The Magus. Card 0 (The Fool) in the major arcana is now followed by Card 1 (The Magus). Binary. We exist in a universe defined by duality.

As The Magus, your plans can now be implemented because you are a master-implementer. As magician, you can draw your vision into existence. The slower methodology reflected in the more contained light of the Prince of Disks, has become fibreoptic — zipping along a creative continuum at a rate of knots that demands the kind of mental dexterity and access to invisible states of creativity that The Magus, as Mercury, is made for.

As an aspect of your personality — the one that endeavours and endures — The Prince of Disks has laid the groundwork for the current spell that lies on the crafting table in front of you. Now, as a Soul-based archetype, an aspect of you that is not limited to your personality-based, human form — The Magus — is asking to be given the space to do what it does best.

The catch? You may not be entirely in the know as to the when, how, and why of this process.

The reason for this is that an archetype acts behind the scenes and under the surface. It is not wholly accessible to our immediate state of consciousness, if at all. We may sense its presence; we may feel its energy moving through us; we may sometimes know what it is that is pulling us to some aspect of Soul work. (Sometimes we may choose to call one in or to partner with it in an act of alchemy with equally unpredictable results.)

When an archetype does become known to us, we can either 1) ignore it, 2) try to guide or steer it, or 3) let go and ride with it. I’d suggest that the third option is the one that we are least inclined to trust or to follow.

We do so like to feel in control.

An invitation: why not sit down for a minute or two and look into the eyes of The Magus looking at you? What do you see? What does he see in you? What is his expression telling you about what needs to start, given that you’ve been planning for long enough? Where is it that letting go (of doubts, preconceptions, ingrained habits) and seeing what happens may serve you?

Because the final card, the Ace, is yet another “1” card. Baby, if you had ignition before, now you have twice the fire. But only if you reach up and take it. This can be a tricky thing to do; there is something deeply entrenched in our psyches about taking fire and the consequences associated with that (Prometheus, anyone?).

Except here, if there is balance, then the story is different. You are fully equipped to play with those matches. First, you have a meticulously planned grounding and sense of responsibility. Second, you have the activation of an archetype whose primary role is to wield a wand (and a cup, a sword and a disk, for that matter). Third, the presence of the Ace means that it is a gift that is being extended to you — or soon will be.

Bear that word in mind: “gift.” A gift in its literal sense has no conditions attached to it. It is given, pure and simple. All you need to do is to take it. The time is coming, and if you’re not sure you’ll know when that is, then maybe it’s time to stop thinking you need to know. Maybe a part of you — the one looking at you from the centre of the reading, the most tangible he may ever be — knows just fine.

Maybe that’s why it’s called magic.

Astrology/Elemental correspondences: Prince of Disks (the airy aspect of earth), The Magus (Mercury), Ace of Wands (the pure, limitless potential of fire)

If you want to experiment with tarot cards and don’t have any, we provide a free tarot spread generator using the Celtic Wings spread, which is based on the traditional Celtic Cross spread. This article explains how to use the spread.

By Sarah Taylor

Like last week, this week we have a major arcana, minor arcana, major arcana configuration — however, this time with a different quality to the majors, which makes for a different feel and emphasis to the reading.

The Fool, Nine of Wands, The Judgment from The Röhrig Tarot deck, created by Carl-W. Röhrig. Click on the image for a larger version.

Whereas last week the majors were both personal in nature — referring to the development of Self, or Soul, at the level of you as an individual — this time the majors are transpersonal in nature. Or, more specifically, one is transpersonal (The Judgment) and the other is ‘extra-personal’ (The Fool).

What does this mean in plain language?

To put it as succinctly and clearly as possible, your reading today concerns an aspect of your development that holds the tension between a part of you or your experience that is on the verge of being birthed, and an aspect of your experience that is on the verge of a rebirth. So there is going to be a quality of complete newness and unpredictability, combined with the integration of something already existing in you that needed to go through the fires of transformation and come out the other side, stripped-down and purified.

Both of these aspects or states or experiences are in some way connected, but the clear message from the Nine of Wands here at centre is this:

“Don’t confuse yourself into thinking that what is new is one-and-the-same with what is being reborn. You are experiencing two things simultaneously that may feel the same, but in truth they are simply similar, and each has something different to offer you. Each is its own gift.”

And both situate you not simply as an individual, but as a crucial part of existence. You have something to give that others will benefit from as well as yourself.

Let me explain further. Imagine both your hands open in front of you, with one shiny coin in each palm, both the same size — let’s say a US Quarter for argument’s sake. Both Quarters may look the same; but it is clear that they are not the same coin. One is brand-new; the other you’ve been carrying with you for ages — years, even — but which has been shined to an as-new condition by the experiences you’ve just come through.

The importance of this distinction is clear, because to reduce them to the same thing is to do yourself out of what is yours (two gifts, abilities, or opportunities) and to diminish the journey you’ve had to make to craft and polish one of them — the one that you may have thought at some point in the relatively near past that you had to give up on.

Well, it’s back, and it’s far more in tune with the direction you’re headed in. And you’re back, too, and if you’re not yet clear about the next step you can take, that clarity isn’t far behind.

What happens when The Fool goes on a journey to find himself?

Look back and review your life. I’m suggesting that some part of who you are will be starting to come quite clearly into focus as something you’ve been working on for a long time — perhaps unknowingly. This can now join forces with that other shiny, brand-new Quarter that’s just appeared in your other hand. One part of The Fool has found another.

You are wearing two different hats (quite literally in The Fool card). You are free to make use of them. When you do, something is going to shift, and quite dramatically. What may have felt blocked or unavailable to you has the potential to open up. If once it felt like a door was locked to you, try it again. Try it again in spite of your doubts or protestations — because those doubts and protestations may be the biggest obstacles of all. Throw your own caution and self-talk to the wind and take that step. That’s what a Fool does, after all.

Astrology/Elemental correspondences: The Fool (Uranus), Nine of Wands (Moon in Sagittarius), The Judgment (Pluto)

If you want to experiment with tarot cards and don’t have any, we provide a free tarot spread generator using the Celtic Wings spread, which is based on the traditional Celtic Cross spread. This article explains how to use the spread.

By Sarah Taylor

Where the Prince of Swords (the Knight in the Rider-Waite Smith deck) stood last week, broken free from his chains, we now see the Knight of Swords (the King in the RWS deck): the Röhrig Tarot’s depiction of the mature masculine in his highest potential — and here, the masculine that corresponds with the mind. Wise. Discerning. Focused. The precise, effective wielding of the intellect. Solomonic.

Knight of Swords, Queen of Swords, Queen of Cups from The Röhrig Tarot deck, created by Carl-W. Röhrig. Click on the image for a larger version.

Whereas the Prince is externally focused, a fighter — sometimes a hothead ranging into zeal with his sword of personal truth — the Knight holds the ability to be a custodian of a higher truth. If you look at his eyes, yes, they are open and a beam of light is trained on the cards next to him; yet there is an inner quality to his sight as well. His vision is held within; it is not exclusively externalised.

Additionally, the gem on the front of the circlet on his forehead is similarly illuminated. Vision is correlated with the “third eye” — the seat of non-embodied intuition. It is the masculine form of intuition — a connecting with spirit (light) as opposed to soul (the dark, the feminine).

Let’s look at some of the words on the Knight’s helm (a further association with all things ‘head’-related):

“Passion,” “flexible thinking,” “aims,” “concerning,” “ambition,” “straightness.”

The Knight of Swords is focused, but not so much on the physical ‘things’ around him as on the qualities that those things represent. Here: the Queens of Swords and Cups. The feminine counterparts to the Knight, representing the mind and the heart respectively.

All-in-all, we have three aspects of your personality that are active and taking centre stage in your life right now. In you right now — although they may also come in the shape of another or others. And the Knight is the initiator. Or, more accurately, the directed use of the mind and the ability to analyse with detachment and skill are available to you, and they are responsible for bringing light to other parts of yourself.

Through the Knight’s gaze, you are in the process of unveiling and coming face-to-face with sides to you that have kept themselves shrouded for some time now. Perhaps for some considerable time. It has taken your increased skill in putting yourself under the spotlight of scrutiny to meet the Queens. It has taken them time to feel safe enough with that scrutinising aspect of yourself — the one that used to cut so harshly at times — to reveal what they had kept closed off from you. It is a liberation that cuts across your ideas of gender, your preconceptions of relating and relatedness, your until-now inflexible ideas of who you are — of who you have been all along if you had had the eyes to see.

A receptive, intuitive mind-based knowingness, sharp in her own right — sharp as a blade — but frequently so misunderstood as to be rendered invisible: the Queen of Swords. A watery, mutable mystery that hid, mermaid-like, unable and unwilling to venture onto a land that felt inhospitable, and who, until now, had been asked to pay too high a price for safe passage: the Queen of Cups.

It’s funny how tarot works: it is only now that I notice the striking similarities between the two Queens. The other two Queens — Disks and Wands — do not resemble these at all, so it isn’t something that is common to the entire Queenly complement.

With these similarities in mind, I am drawn to suggest that what we are looking at here is a marriage of head and heart. It is as simple and as complex as that.

Your task: to stay aware of not favouring one over the other; to deny neither. And to maintain a sense of objective appraisal of yourself as you hold that gently uncompromising spotlight — or, if you are not able to do that, to seek an objective appraiser to work with you, whether a trusted friend or a therapist.

Masks are falling, no longer needed. The depths are blooming on the surface, ready to make themselves known. The mind expands, the heart opens.

You are the light-bringer, the bridge-builder as all three aspects of you working together. It is a sacred marriage, each part critical, the whole greater than their sum. How beautiful is that?

Astrology/Elemental correspondences: Knight of Swords (the fiery aspect of air), Queen of Swords (the watery aspect of air), Queen of Cups (the watery aspect of water)

If you want to experiment with tarot cards and don’t have any, we provide a free tarot spread generator using the Celtic Wings spread, which is based on the traditional Celtic Cross spread. This article explains how to use the spread.