Tarot Thrones | The Court Card Blog

Month: September 2012

  • Autumn Equinox Spread

    I opted out of the Tarot Blog Hop for the Autumn Equinox – not because I didn’t want to do it – but I am up to my armpits in Court Card exercises in the TABI Training (Group 1 – fabulous collection of students *high fives any who might be reading*) and I just didn’t have the time to devote that the Hop deserves.

    But I wanted to join in in some way – so here’s my contribution:

    I love the Autumn Equinox.  I just love Autumn and the thought of settling down somewhere snuggly with my seed catalogues in one hand and a glass of red in the other…… I might have been a dormouse in a previous life, I think 🙂

    Here’s a 3-card spread to do at this time of year.  The Equinox is alllllll about balance – the days and nights are the same length, the ying and the yang, the in and the out, the ebb and the flow…..  But we lack balance in our lives.  Or maybe that’s just me.  It could be that glass of red wine :-).  This spread seeks to redress that balance.

    First of all, get the 16 Court Cards mobilised into a single section.  I used the Druid Craft Courts simply because I had them all close to hand.

    And I used the Morgan Greer deck for the main body of the spread.

    It’s very simple. Cards 1 and 2 are laid out as if at either end of a see-saw and Card 3 goes in the middle

    Card 1:  This is where I am unbalanced and SHORT/DEFICIENT
    Card 2:  This is where I am unbalanced and OVER-ENDOWED
    Card 3: This Court brings me back into balance

    In my reading, Card 1 was the 6 of Wands – Victory. Absolutely. I’m useless at celebrating or even acknowledging my own victories in life.  Believe me, there’s a seething foam of Scottish Presbyterianism churning under the veneer of normality here 🙂

    Card 2 was the 10 of Cups – It feels a bit odd to say that I am over-endowed with family! But what I feel the card alludes to is that I make sacrifices for my family and perhaps I’m hiding/denying too much of myself in order to maintain a happy family? Yes, I can see that too.  There are lots of things I’d love to do, but I don’t do them because I feel that I’ve got to keep the status quo.  Not keep Status Quo.  Although I wouldn’t MIND keeping Status Quo.  Upstairs under lock and key.  *50 Shades of Denim face*

    So who helps me bring all this back into balance? The King of Swords.  In the Druidcraft he looks interested and thoughtful – able to think up a solution (Airy and Swordsy) and able to demonstrate it (Kingly and Fiery).

    Somehow this guy is going to sort it all out for me and over the next few days, I’m going to meditate on the 3 cards of this spread, in pairs (6 Wands and King; King and 10 Cups) and see what solutions he offers me.

    If you try the spread, I’d love to know how it works out for you!

    Happy Equinox, dear reader!

  • September | New Moon | The King of Cups

    Odin – just hanging around

    And so we are huddled once again in the darkness of a moonless night! A sliver of new moon will be upon us – and whose energies will guide me from now until the moon is full once again?

    The Father of Cups from the Haindl, that’s who.

    This deck is very special to me.  It was the first ‘fancy’ Tarot deck that I ever bought.  It was also the first purchase that I ever made on ebay!  I *know.*  I’m a veritable FONT of spiritual insight.

    The image in the card depicts Odin, the Head Honcho god of the Norse pantheon.  The suit of Cups represents the North and the Northern Gods.  Interestingly, the Queen of Cups is The Willdendorf goddess, which I mentioned earlier this month, here.

    We see Odin hanging upside down (exactly like the Hanged Man card) suspended on the World Tree, Yggdrasil.  He is reaching into the Underworld to find the Runes – you may just be able to pick them out, scattered on the ground beneath his outstretched hand.  He has been half-blinded (a payment he made to Mimir) in return for a drink from the giant’s well.  The name Mimir means memory, apparently.  I may have remembered that wrong. *boom tish – eyethankyoo*

    Odin was more than just the Leader of the Norse pack and a God of War, he is also closely associated with more ‘Cups’ orientated subjects such as poetry and magic.  I’m hoping that it’s his Cups associations rather than his warlike tendancies that are coming to the fore for me!

    I usually think of the King of Cups as a slightly laughable figure – kind and diplomatic of course, but always slightly mystified as to where he’s left his car keys.  A bit of a buffoon.  Which is terribly unkind of me and probably says more about the influence of Wands and Swords on me than the poor Father of Cups!

    Yet here he is, taking me by the hand to guide me through to the full moon.

    So – until the full moon, I am prepared to go with the flow, to surrender (Hanged Man stylee) to the Father of Cups and Life Itself (which is totally unlike me).  I will endeavour to be kind and considerate; to accept people at face value; to be diplomatic (let me tell you right now, your bum does NOT look big in that).

    And most importantly, now is the time for me to reach into my own underworld and emerge with knowledge and magic… slightly scary prospect! But if I am prepared to trust the King of Cups, this is the time to do it.

    I’ve taken to intermittent fasting (fast for 24 hours, twice a week) and have been considering a deeper fast with more spiritual endeavours….

    I wondered whether I was on the right track with my thoughts bout the King and drew another card to modify him (as I do with the amplifiers exercise).  I drew the 7 of Wands: Courage.  So I think I’m on the right track after all 😀

    What does the King of Cups mean in your life, right now?

  • Amplifiers | Child of Fire | Passion

    Sometimes a Court Card can just stump us – and our client.  No matter what we say about the energies of the character in the card, the client can’t relate it to either herself or anyone that they know.

    When that happens, I use an Oracle card to help point me in the right direction.  You can read more about this idea here and here.

    Today’s card combination really does what it says on the tin – which might make interpretations more tricky!  We have the delightful Child of Fire (equating to the Page of Wands) from the gorgeous Gaian Tarot by Joanna Colbert-Powell and the amplifier card is Passion, from Mindy Somers’ Dreaming in Colour Lumen deck.

    The Child of Fire finds joy in the dancing flames before him and he reaches out his hand – to touch it? To just feel the heat a little more?

    This card reminds me of an anecdote told by Aleister Crowley (he of the ‘wickedest man in the world’ fame. The world had clearly never met Simon Cowell).  When he was a youngster, Crowley was out walking with his father.  The duo encountered a huge patch of nettles.  His father told him to keep away from the stinging weeds, but young Aleister didn’t want to listen to the warning, he wanted to EXPERIENCE it for himself – so he ignored his dad and got stung to blazes for his troubles!

    The Page is alllll about experiencing new things and finding delight in that experience.

    But what if your sitter doesn’t recognise this person, these traits? The card pulled at random as the Amplifier is Passion.  Red tulip-like blooms blossom over the card – what does this add to our understanding of the Child of Fire?

    What does ‘passion’ mean to you? How does it affect the Child of Fire?

    I’d love to hear your thoughts on this card combo!

  • The King and Queen of Pentacles | Druidcraft Tarot

    The King and Queen of Pentacles | Druidcraft Tarot

    We’ve looked at all the other couples of the Court, now we turn our attention to the final Royal Mr and Mrs: The King and Queen of Pentacles, depicted here in the DruidCraft Tarot (Philip & Stephanie Carr-Gomm and Will Worthington).

    As the Pentacles govern the North, Winter, Midnight, the Winter Solstice and Earth (in my system), I find these cards excellent representations of these mystical, wintery feelings.

    Both are dressed in green in red, but whereas the Queen is in mainly red with a green hood and cloak, the King is in green with a red cloak – nicely yin and yang.

    Are you rather surprised that the Queen is depicted out of doors while the King is holed up, nice and cosy in the great hall – the fire roaring away behind him with the hog on the spit?  The Queen is, after all, associated with the nurturing and growth aspects of a suit – why have the King all toasty and warm?

    I think that the King has been depicted like this because the King of Pentacles also represents the luxury of success.  This is the Druidcraft equivalent of the big corner office and if they had been invented, the King of Pentacles would have been wearing red braces and smoking a fat Havana cigar.

    He is Earth and Fire (Pentacles and a King) which can be VERY productive if the energies are handled correctly – too much fire and the Pentacles energy hardens and shatters.  Controlled fire, as in a kiln, can create much that is useful and luxurious.

    The oak leaves oh his shield, by his side, tell us that he’s a wise, strong and a slow to react sort of a chap.

    His bare foot rests on a plinth that depicts a goat – Capricorn – although I tend to think of him as a Taurean character – what do you think?

    The Queen sits in a similar pose to her husband and she plays on her bodrum drum with a snow-white bone – simple and effective.  It feels to me, looking at these two characters side by side, that he is more interested in high status and symbols of success (heck, even his BEARD looks fancy!) than his good lady wife, who is content to play her music outdoors to the audience of a single bemused hare.

    The hare halts as he hops past, his winter coat contrasting against the greening grass.  Hares are prolific breeders – a nod to the Queen of Pentacles ability to create (on many levels!)

    At her feet are snowdrops – the earliest herald of Spring – and the dark silhouette of a naked tree shivers behind her.  Yet she doesn’t look cold.  She is at home here.  In her element.  The Queen is Water and Earth – the creative pulse of our planet.

    While the King rests his feet on a Capricorn goat, the Queen’s throne is decorated with the Taurean bull.  What do you think of these associations – do you have them the other way around?

    Both these royals are barefoot – this keeps them close to their native element, the earth, and keeps them grounded and in tune with their roots.

    The sky behind both seem to be at the liminal stages of either dawn or dusk.  I choose to see the King at dusk and the Queen at dawn. These threshold periods are important magically and just as the King presides over the dusk and the Queen the dawn, between them they oversee our safety through the dark of the night, and also the dark of the winter.

    As a pair, depicted this way, neither of them seem particularly bothered about the other – but they appear relaxed in each other’s company.  The other way around, their heads incline towards each other, with the Queen looking a bit more interested in the comfortable surroundings of her hubby.  The King, on the other hand, continues to gaze out at us as if to say ‘yeah, I knew she couldn’t stay out there in the cold for ever.’

    What do you think of the King and Queen of Pentacles?

    Update 24/4/19 – there is an updated V3 of Druidcraft Tarot available to buy – larger box means larger accompanying book!

  • Blue Moon! The Queen of Wands | Mary El

    We had a Blue Moon the other night, the last one for quite some time (next one is 2015) so I paid close attention to my full moon reading this time.

    …and you may have noticed that I’ve not been around much – a combination of school holidays and quite a lot of work. And, if I’m honest, a bit of soul-searching too.

    This is going to be a significant card for me. I can feel it in my waters….

    Who has come along to guide me through the slightly murky waters of the next couple of weeks?  This is a slightly different slant on what I usually do with the Full Moon/New Moon cards. Usually I ask whose energies will be incoming (at a New Moon reading) and fading (at the Full Moon reading).  This time I’m looking for a navigator to the New Moon – someone to hold my hand and keep me moving forwards.

    And the card is the Queen of Wands from the Mary-El Tarot.

    I am hugely relieved because the Queen of Wands means a great deal to me and I confess to feeling a bit more like the Queen of Wands reversed recently – my va-va-voom had va-va-moosed!

    Let’s take a look at Marie White’s Queen of Wands.

    The first thing that strikes me about the card are the earthy tones – rich browns that initially feel more like they belong to the Queen of Pentacles rather than the fiery Queen of Wands.  The second thing that I notice is that she is a massive figure of a woman – filling the entire card with her generous proportions. She’s completely Willendorfian, isn’t she?  She clutches a jaguar cub, a sacred animal.

    Marie’s book that accompanies the deck states: ‘She shows you yourself, the greatest gift you can receive. She provides a safe, warm and abundant environment where you can grow from a small cub to a powerful jaguar yourself.

    ‘She helps you develop yourself into your full potential with a clear vision of yourself…your growth and creativity.’

    I really needed to hear that right now as I have been struggling (as do many of us!) with what in the HECK my vision of myself is!  I wear many hats (not literally, although I am partial to something with a broad brim that I vainly hope makes me look like Margaret Lockwood in The Wicked Lady) and I enjoy most of them. But there is also a nagging voice that tells me that I’ve lost something, left something behind, that is really important.  It feels a lot like not knowing exactly where your handbag is.

    If I pulled this Queen of Wands for YOU, in the role of helper, for the period up to the New Moon, how would she help you explore and develop your full potential?

    …and just in case you’re wondering:

    Margaret Lockwood: Never-knowingly under-hatted