Tarot Journal #20: Nine of Wands (Strength)/7 of Cups/2 of Disks (Change)

Posted on June 11, 2022 by randomyriad

Balancing on the Beam of Now

I am in the anticipatory stage of moving out of the apartment I lived in for 7 years, most of that time with my now not living partner and off and on with my adopted grandson, who is now back with his father. I have been living here on my own for 8 months in which I have been developing some mindful practices and adjusting my attention to the present moment. I am getting better at maintaining a balance, not over-planning for the future or forgetting the nuts and bolts logistics that keep my life in the present stable and open to possibilities. I have come from a very dark and chaotic place of isolation and trauma into a relatively calm space in which I am able to manage my feelings as they come up and make plans based on reality not fear of loss or added trauma. I am feeling stronger emotionally and physically than I have in years.

The main reason for this improvement in my way of approaching my life has to do with maintaining balance and paying attention to thoughts and feelings as they arise. Mostly it has to do with remaining attentive to the present moment, responding and engaging rather than reacting and guarding. I have been exercising my whole being so that I can be open and confident with change, which is the constant state of life even at its most stable. So I am both stronger and more flexible, more proactive and less fearful, setting open-ended goals that leave space for developing relationships. Mostly I am learning to hold possessions, feelings, thoughts, and fears more lightly, not rejecting them, but letting them go if I will be able to operate with more ease and engagement with each moment.

I will need structure and flexibility, strength with the honest assessment of weakness, engagement and solitude, activity and calm all these opposites pulling. I will seek the balance in each moment that suits me and keeps me awake and aware, ready for the next moment coming just now.

Posted in All part of the process, Being Human, change, Chaos and Order, discovery and recovery, mindworks, my life, my mystic toolbox, paying attention, philosophy, Self-Experiments, thinking in words, Works in Progress | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Tarot Journal #19: 10 of Disks

Posted on June 9, 2022 by randomyriad

Keeping the Important Pieces in the Right Places

I have been preparing to move for a while. I just began looking at housing options, timelines, and scheduling. Just kind of setting parameters and narrowing down strategies. Yesterday plans and little nagging worries began to pile up in my mind. I felt like there was no way to handle it all. Then I realized I was the only one I had to please in this situation. As long as I continue to arrive at work most of the time and stay connected with my external life, if there happen to be a few glitches in the process that I don’t foresee, it may be a little frustrating and I may end up having to leave some things behind but worrying about it will probably make the situation worse. I am almost sure something like this will happen because I am not very good a logistics and organization. I tend to do some planning and worry, but end up procrastinating and have to go through a flurry of furious motions at the last minute, usually dropping a few small balls in the process. That is my way. I usually maintain most of my sanity and possessions with minor losses.

My life is going pretty well at this point and I am trying not to hold on so tight to things and visions of the future so I decided to adopt a, not necessarily careless, attitude, but one of acceptance for a reasonable amount of loss amongst so much recent prosperity and the general chaos that is moving. In other words, I decided that not everything I possess or even care about has to make it with me to my final destination. If there are a few bumps or last-minute late-night maneuvers that have to be negotiated, I will deal with those as they come up, just like I always do.

I plan to be diligent within reason, take advantage of opportunities to increase my life connections, and maintain my current increasing level of joy and openness to whatever presents itself to me while I move my life to a new home. I will move, and almost all of what I want to keep in my life will come with me. My focus will not be on fear of loss, but on maintaining my sanity and maybe even developing an increased feeling of belonging to this community as well as a new address.

Posted in All part of the process, Being Human, change, Chaos and Order, Fools Journey, House and home, mindworks, my life, my mystic toolbox, paying attention, Self-Experiments, thinking in words, whereever you go there you are, Works in Progress | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Tarot Journal #18: 5 of cups(Regret)/IX The Hermit

Posted on June 7, 2022 by randomyriad

Shining a Light on Loss and the Myriad Possibilities

Last night as I was going through my bedtime routine a sudden unbidden memory of driving to my sister’s house in the coastal range of Oregon east of Coos Bay. I was listening to a book by Jonathan Franzen called Freedom. In the part I was listening to a man had made a series of mistakes in his relationships based on his obsession with saving songbirds from predatory house cats allowed to roam free. He had taken a noble cause and ruined his life with it as well as causing misery to most of the people he cared about, driving them out of his life. Instead of allowing himself to regret some of his behavior, he doubled down on it and isolated himself more.

I have done this a few times with some relationships instead of feeling regret and acting to correct some action or attitude, I found it more important to be right, to win the argument at the expense of other people’s and my own feelings. It is a very dark place to be. As I was acknowledging the memory. I experienced the regret of a future in which I will never go back to that particular house my sister and her husband lived in or even that part of Oregon due to the limited amount of time I have left to live and the fact that my sister and mother moved south to California in the last couple of years, and I have no particular reason to go there. But there was such a pang of loss embedded in the thought. I am pretty sure it had to do with having a purposeful connection with a beautiful place that caused that deep feeling of future regret.

I know I could go there again for no reason except to be in that place, but I also know I want to spend my precious time with people I know and love. The choice is pretty easy, but, for that moment, I experienced a deep sense of loss. The older I get the more this happens, sometimes about not getting to somewhere I’ve wanted to go, but will for very good reasons not get to. Because life is short, I will have to make choices that will leave other possibilities to wither and fade. That is the way it must be. But, if I can wholeheartedly embrace choices that connect me with the people I love I will also experience new places and come to love them. Regret is a warning that life is short and time is limited. There are many ways to respond to regret: depression and grieving, anger and frustration, acceptance and love for those memories. The actions I take in response can lead to bitterness and more regret or to seeing all the choices available to me that might lead to a more satisfying life. Of course, life will do what it does and the choices I make will lead me where they will and I will never know which was the right choice. Regret is there to be pondered more than acted on. Will I regret more of my lost futures or past actions, if I am living an open-minded curious life I am sure it will always be there to make me think a little deeper about my actions and choices.

Posted in All part of the process, banality of evil, Being Human, can't really complain but, change, delusions of progress, developing relationships, Family, Fools Journey, imagination and reality, Loss and Leaving, mindworks, my life, Oregon, paying attention, philosophy, Self-Experiments, Telling Stories, thinking in words, time travel, visions from the dark side, Works in Progress | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Tarot Journal #17: 7 of Cups(Debauch)/VI The Lovers

Posted on June 6, 2022 by randomyriad

On the Continuum of Reconnection

Each of these cards represents its own range of a certain process. The Seven represents the range of separation of desire from compassion and sensitivity to others, and The Lovers represents a range of an individual element’s integration into relationship with another individual or group. The Seven also represents a low point on The Lovers scale moving toward or away from integration. To me this arrangement tells me I am on the right track. I am moving toward integration with others from a long series of shocks and regressions that threw me off the path. I am on the path again or maybe for the first time I have found solid footing and positive direction. Hopefully, I am facing the right direction and am able to keep myself moving toward a more connected life.

Posted in All part of the process, Being Human, can't really complain but, change, delusions of progress, developing relationships, discovery and recovery, Fools Journey, mindworks, my life, my mystic toolbox, paying attention, philosophy, Self-Experiments, thinking in words, Works in Progress | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Tarot journal #16: Queen of Wands/The Moon/The Hermit

Posted on June 5, 2022 by randomyriad

Beginning with a Weightless Step

There is a constant process of reaching out into the world, natural and cultural, drawing inspiration, breathing in and combining external material with the material that has been internalized or exists in my subconscious memories, visions and the mysterious music of my mind and heart. Often the product of this mixing comes out in my dreams. But usually, in forms so rough and haphazard, it takes me a while to figure out what, if any, I will be able to put into a form that I can integrate into a learning, and eventually, a sharing process.

The Queen of Wands tells me to always honor my true self, to follow passion with a greedy heart.

The Moon says beware the illusions contained in stories and dreams for they can lead you on paths that you cannot find when waking. Some will be true and helpful: others will be lies based on aimless desire, greed, or fear of risk of loss which exists no matter what action I take.

The Hermit is there to remind me to test any new input by carefully withdrawing from the onslaught of constant information and experience to test my way forward with a weightless leading foot like a wolf padding across a frozen river on a moonless night.

Somehow all these worked together this week and I managed to strike a balance. I was passionate and kind in my work. My dreams made no sense so I didn’t really know how to act on them, except one insistent message to keep moving after receiving my 2nd booster for covid, and I was feeling lousy. I pushed through a couple of days and felt better than I would have if I had stayed home. My inner hermit is always busy slowing me down, making me put out a weightless foot in case my headlong desires to get to the next thing should land me in the dark, icy waters.

I will always be playing with knobs, adjusting the balance on my collaborative process with the world. but I know I am only a small part of the process. I will have to learn to let go of the illusion that I have control over more than a tiny fraction of what I will have to deal with as I move onward into the unknown and for that I plan to continue to develop and nurture my mindful response strategies and keep my lead foot light when the going is uncertain, leaving the rest to the whimsy of the world.

in Tai Chi most stepping movements begin with an empty step in which one foot is put down with no weight and slowly the weight is shifted onto it, thus the practitioner is able to maintain options for movements in response to unexpected shifts in a partner’s position or uneven and shifting ground.

Posted in Abstraction, All part of the process, Being Human, change, delusions of progress, Dreamtime, Fools Journey, imagination and reality, internal landscape, mindworks, my life, my mystic toolbox, paying attention, philosophy, Self-Experiments, Teaching and Learning, The Moon, thinking in words, visions from the dark side, whereever you go there you are, working world, Works in Progress | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment