Tarot Thrones | The Court Card Blog

Category: Oracle

  • The Cards | Being Human Playing Cards

    The Cards | Being Human Playing Cards

    Being Human cards spread in fan
    The Cards: Being Human

    Let me make clear here at the beginning that the artist behind The Cards, Chrissie Nichols, is a dear friend of mine who is not involved in the divination business at all. In fact, nobody involved in the creation of this set of cards is involved in the fortune-telling business in any way (that I’m aware of). Unless you believe that at being an NHS doctor is a more legitimate branch of what we do! But that would be the subject for a different kind of blog post! Today I’m only interested in this set of playing cards as a possible divination tool.

    What are the Being Human Playing Cards?

    This is a set of playing cards that have been designed (by two of the aforementioned NHS doctors with 65 years medical experience between them) for use in a therapeutic setting as an aid to improving mental health, for everyone. There is a standard playing card deck at the heart of The Cards – Four standard suits (Clubs, Diamonds, Hearts and Spades) running from Ace through to 10 with the courts (Jack, Queen, King) with two Jokers and seven additional cards.

    Let’s look at one from each suit first of all.

    One card from each of the Being Human suits

    The Hearts suit guides us to orientate and know ourselves.
    The Clubs allow us to give of ourselves – connect and relate, have meaning and purpose in the world.
    Spades and Diamonds help us manage ourselves by resourcing and balancing so that we can do what we intend to do in order to match our values and beliefs ***

    The standard playing card symbols are in the top left, bottom right as usual, letting the card be read either way around with no trouble. The central portion of the card has an image which is not double-ended, but has a degree of duality about it – there are two rabbits in the 10 of Clubs, but they are not mirror images. Two animals in 8 Diamonds, but different animals etc. Each card carries two words which are often the same word, but not always – 2 Hearts has Shelter and Tranquil. These keywords are all soothing (maybe with the execption of Grief? What do you think?). Writing that offers some prompts, suggestions on how to activate the card’s keyword in your life runs around the perimeter of each card. In 4 Spades (keyword: Sleep) the writing reads: PRIORITISE SLEEP * KEEP A RHYTHM AND A SPACE * SWITCH OFF * PWER DOWN * KEEP COOL * MIND THE LIGHT AND MIND THE DARK * QUIETEN * SOFTEN

    The two Joker cards are the only two in monochrome and follow the same pattern as the other cards – they both feature that most beautiful of tricksters – Fox.

    The two joker cards showing foxes and the card back from The Cards: Being Human

    The card back shown in the same picture is a selection of creature profiles found in the deck, almost like an abstract.

    The court cards feature no ‘court’ images, but continues the theme of the deck. Any correlation between the keywords on the courts and how one might interpret the Tarot courts would be by accident rather than design: these are very much stand alone cards. We’ll look at whether it can work as an oracle in a few beats.

    Court cards from The Cards: Being Human
    Clubs Court Cards
    Court Cards from The Cards: Being Human
    Court Cards: Spades
    Court Cards: Hearts
    Court Cards: Diamonds
    Court Cards: Diamonds

    Looking at the additional seven cards, these slot together to make a single image. These are ‘explorer’ cards and they invite us to go more deeply into ourselves. There is an image on one side and on the other, where the ‘back’ should be, there are a few paragraphs with the card’s essential meanings and an invitation to go more deeply.

    The 7 Exploration cards – image side up. The other side has more information about the cards

    How to use The Cards

    I am such a big fan of Chrissie Nichols work and have attended quite a few of her workshops that it’s difficult for me to drag my eyes away from the artwork to the all-important lettering that she has made around the cards!

    I’ve used the cards in a variety of ways (and The Cards website offers some creative suggestions on how to use them) so here’s how I’ve employed them:

    CARD OF THE DAY/WEEK etc
    I have added one to my small altar at the beginning of the week (where it sits with whichever Wildwood Tarot cards are active too). At the beginning and end of every day (well, at least once a day – depends how tired I am going to bed or how frantic I am at getting up lol!) I take a look at the card and try to spend a few minutes at least contemplating the keyword – what does Anchor mean to me? How has it shown up in the day? Where can I be an anchor for someone? etc

    COMBINING CARDS
    I am also trying to make Jung’s studies of the psyche relate to my own Tarot work (in my own way, for my own self) and recognising the importance of my inner world and outer world being as congruent as possible. Yeah, a first world problem – I know. It’s a luxury and I appreciate having the time, space and freedom to be able to strive for that. I’ve found drawing two cards at random and smooshing the keywords together a useful tool for encouraging more difficult, deep thought. For example – carrying on with our Anchor – what does Grateful (Jack of Diamonds) Anchor look like to me? Lots of tasty ideas to journal with!

    JOURNAL AND CREATIVITY PROMPTS
    As I read around the carefully chosen prompts and keywords, I choose one to work with in some way – journalling, short-story writing, inner reflection, poetry, sketching …. whatever way you want to be inspired to move.

    RELATE KEYWORDS TO TAROT CARDS
    The Cards helps me freshen up my Tarot work – it’s easy to fall into the same kind of interpretations for cards, but by considering the keywords and trying to map them across to my Tarot work, not only am I extending my Tarot interpretations, it’s helping with my own Jungian Tarot quest too.

    COURT CARD AMPLIFIERS
    Finally, I have used these cards as amplifiers for court cards. It can be all very well to know what a court card means, but sometimes you need a bit of extra depth. So if I drew the Queen of Swords, for example, and then pulled … Become Wise (3 Diamonds), it sits very easily with how we understand her. But if we draw Welcome (2 Clubs) how does this sit with this famously stand-offish character? Thus a whole new line of thought springs up – how does someone who is not naturally very hospitable offer a welcome? Is the Queen of Swords going to act out of character? What does a Swords family welcome look like?! What else is written on that card that could be a message from the Queen of Swords to your sitter – read everything out – there is something that your sitter needs to hear!

    MATCHY MATCHY!
    I have even tried pulling the equivalent Being Human card with the equivalent Tarot card to see what pops up – 3 Swords, for example, is so often associated with grief and loss in most decks, but 3 Spades in this deck is Create/Play – with its prompts to – draw, cook, dance, weave, paint etc etc. What beautiful ways to work with grief.

    Are The Cards any good as an oracle?

    All in all I think that this is a lovely deck for all sorts of reasons – it’s lovely to handle and shuffle, the artwork is so lovely (of course!), the creative prompts, the keywords for contemplation, the additional depth that you can produce for a court card while working with your Tarot decks … and of course, you can play card games with it too!

    My only criticism is the size of the deck – it’s playing card-sized and I would like it to be larger to better read the writing and enjoy the artwork. But that’s a minor quibble!

    Have you got a copy yet? It’s only £10 and you can get it from Amazon HERE That is an affiliate link that generates 50p for me if you purchase a set of The Cards: Being Human cards. Discover more about them at www.thecards.org

    Find Chrissie Nichols on instagram @inkpotandpen

    ** This is a purchased item, not a deck given to me for review **

    *** – from the back of the Treasure is here card.

  • Nature’s Wisdom Oracle | Mindy Lighthipe

    Nature’s Wisdom Oracle | Mindy Lighthipe

    I first became aware of Mindy Lighthipe via her beautifully detailed botanical art. It was only as I drooled over the art on her website that I realised she had created an Oracle deck too – Nature’s Wisdom Oracle. I had to have a look at it, so here it is!

    Published by Schiffer’s REDfeather imprint, this is a 48-card oracle that consists of the fauna and flora that have had a big impact on Mindy’s life. You will find everything from a Dog and a Honey Bee to a Passion Flower and a Pansy.

    The cards are on good card-stock and quite glossy, so shuffling is easy from that point of view – no sticking. However, they are about 8.5cm wide, so if you have small hands it might be a bit tricky to shuffle. That said, there are lots of different shuffling styles to take advantage of. Although the backs are not designed for reversals, the book suggests that reversals can be acknowledged (a card that is especially relevant to you).

    There are 17 cards that feature flowers, leaves or trees and the rest are devoted to bugs, beasts and birds that the artist has a connection with.

    Bat – Beneficial – Nature’s Wisdom Oracle

    Each card has a central image in a broad border. Above the image we have the card’s title and beneath the image we have the main keyword for the card. The borders are all (bar three or four cards) drawn from the main image – which gives a very pleasing tonality to all those cards. The Ladybird card is totally different although it’s still a lovely ladybird image – you’ll spot it in the flip through!) And, if you are a bit phobic about spiders, there IS one in the deck – Resiliance – and therefore this video.

    There is a box-sized companion book, all in black and white, that runs to just over 100 pages. Each card has a full page image along with some information to help you interpret the card along with a nugget of historical or nature-orientated fact. For example, “The name Daffodil is derived from the Dutch word affodyle which means ‘that which cometh early’.” There are lots of exotic creatures such as Iguana, Hummingbird, Praying Mantis etc – probably not all native to your country of residence, but wherever you reside, you will have seen the creatures before 🙂

    The Bat’s entry in the LWB for Nature’s Wisdom Oracle

    The book also suggests a daily meditation, working with one card as well as a 3-card past/present/future spread.

    So, what’s it like to use? The artwork is undeniably good – Mindy received a Silver Medal from the Royal Horticultural Society in 2009 for her Symbiosis series of paintings. I have big hands, so the size of the cards didn’t bother me at all – it was easy to shuffle and work with. I think that this would be a great deck for someone who works closely with nature and would be a great deck to take to an event if you are reading there – perfect for single card readings!

  • Archetype Cards by Caroline Myss

    Archetype Cards by Caroline Myss

    The Archetype Cards is a set of 78 cards, created by intuitive healer and the Archetype Empress herself, Caroline Myss.

    I’ve had these cards for years (OMG bought them in 2007!) and each time I have tried to work with them, it just all seemed too hard and too complex to not only figure out my active archetypes, but what to do with that information when I had worked it all out. And if I can’t use it? What’s the point.

    But in the past year I have watched so many of Caroline’s Youtube videos on spirituality and her new series on these very archetypes, so I thought I would dig in again.

    What do you need to know? There are loads of archetypes – many more than this deck can conceive, but there are 6 blank cards for you to add in your own, if you feel that some behaviour pattern in you isn’t represented by one of the existing cards.

    We all have four basic archetypes – the Victim, the Prostitute, the Saboteur and the Child. There are several variations on the Child archetype – Eternal, Wounded, Orphan, Nature, Magical, Divine and Dependent. There isn’t actually a card for the Dependent Child though, so that’s a bit of a shame – still, one can use a blank Archetype card to create one.

    Although I am working with the cards on a personal level, I thought that it would be fun to compare her King, Queen and Knight cards with our understanding of our tarot Kings, Queens and Knights. Myss doesn’t have a Page card in her deck and I didn’t want to appropriate one of the other cards to stand in for it; so it will have to remain a mystery for a little while longer.

    And if it works for you – it’s more information that you can add to bring an additional nuance to your Court Card interpretations.

    King Archetype card by Caroline Myss

    Light Attributes would equate to the tarot’s Kings rightsides up whereas Shadow Attributes could apply to reversed cards. I like the idea of each King showing ‘enlightened, benevolent leadership. Benefiting those in your charge.’ So for the King of Cups, that would be in the field of relationships, the King of Swords that would be in the field of thinking and logic, the King of Pentacles in the field of ownership and for the King of Wands it would be in the realm of passion.

    The Shadow side of ‘Excessive feelings of entitlement. Rulership without restraint.’ That’s nice information to tuck away for using with a King card.

    When we take a look at the Queen archetype, we have the description ‘Radiates the regal feminine.’ I’m not sure what that means – but it is an appearance, charisma attribute. She ‘uses her benevolent authority to protect others.’ So the King brings benefits to people, the Queen protects people. Her Shadow side is that she ‘Becomes arrogant when authority is challenged. Controlling and demanding.’

    The Knight in the Archetypes card is quite a different animal to that of the tarot, I think. Each of the four Knights holds something of this ‘loyalty, romance and chivalry’. The Knight of Pentacles is loyal, the Knight of Cups is romantic and the Knight of Wands or Swords would fit the Chivalric standard. As a reversed Knight, do the tarot’s Knights show ‘allegiance to a destructive ruler or principle? Does he have ‘romantic delusions’? Yes, the Pentacles Knight reversed could show misplaced loyalty rather than a lack of loyalty, the Knight of Cups could have romantic delusions and those Knights of Wands and Swords could have an allegiance/commitment to the wrong sort of action, the wrong sort of thinking. And when I say ‘wrong’ I mean that it is currently detrimental to the situation in hand, rather than ‘wrong’ altogether

    And as for the Pages … I think they might be derivatives of the various Child cards, but I’ll need to look into that more closely and probably give it a post of its own.

    Do you use the Archetype cards? I’d love to know how you use them! This is an affiliate link, if you want to buy them from Amazon.

    Buy Caroline Myss’ Archetype Cards on Amazon
  • The Fool’s New Journey Tarot

    The Fool’s New Journey Tarot

    Just published at the end of March, The Fool’s New Journey Tarot (TFNJT) is the latest offering from John Matthews to hit the esoteric shelves. It’s a 60-card deck billed as a tarot by its publishers, REDfeather, so that made me super-keen to see how the deck challenges what I expect from a tarot.

    First of all I wanted to make a special mention of the box! Gosh it is really quite lovely – dark blue with almost holographic clouds.

    Although it took me a bit longer than I cared to admit to realise that I had to sliiiiiide the sleeve off the box before it would open. Once I’d figured that out, I am pleased to report that the box is a flip-top style that fastens with a satisfying magnetic snap.

    I’m useless with tab-top boxes – my desire to Get At The Cards is supremely thwarted by fiddly little lips and slips of box that I inevitably end up tearing. A flip-top box gets a tick from me.

    Inside the box you will find a full-sized book and the cards themselves … and *resigned sigh lol!* the cards are in a tab-top box. Knew it was too good to be true! I promise that I have opened it extremely carefully and have not ripped the lugs off the side of the box yet.

    Let’s talk about the cards first.

    The artist, Charles Newington, has a successful career as an artist and print-maker and is perhaps best known for The Folkestone Horse which is carved into the chalk escarpment above the Channel Tunnel on the English coast. He is also the artist on John Matthews’ ‘The Goblin Market‘ Tarot (2021).

    Initially, I wasn’t sure how I was going to get along with this deck. I’m a big fan of tarot decks that have loads of symbolism. I love drawing out interpretations that may be tied to a gesture, a fold in a robe, the colour of a dog’s collar or even where a head sits in relation to distant cloud formations. The artwork of the FNJT deliberately strips that away and takes the idea of the card (well, the original 22 Majors) back to simple principals. That’s not to say that there is NO symbolism in the deck, but it’s definitely got the gas turned down low.

    Here’s a video walk through of all the cards.

    All 60 cards of the Fool’s New Journey Tarot

    The card stock is very good and I love the finish on the cards – there is no sticking together or clumping. I think you can see how slippy and divinely shufflable they are at the end of the video when my little pile of cards topples over.

    Given my love of symbolism, I was surprised to find how much I enjoyed the artwork – from the content to the colours. Several cards remind me of Matisse or Picasso in style – so don’t confuse simplicity of line with unsophisticated card art!

    The traditional 22 Majors ARE here, but interspersed throughout the 60-card deck. New archetypes such as The Future, The Believer, The Fisherman flesh out this new Fool’s Journey that is designed with 21st century seekers in mind.

    Let’s look at the book. It’s a box-sized companion book coming in at just under 250 pages and opens with an absolutely splendid foreword by fellow tarot artist and sometime-collaborator Andrea Aste. This is followed by an introduction by John who explains the genesis of the deck and lists the 60 cards of this new tarot dawn.

    The companion book is, as you would expect from an author of the calibre of John Matthews, very well-written – concise, clear and informative. There are two pages (including a small colour image) devoted to each card. The card descriptions include reversed interpretations and keywords – so you are really getting 120 possible single card scenarios from this deck as it IS designed to work with reversed images (btw the image on the card back absolutely lends itself to reading with reversals too).

    The second section of the book takes the form of The Fool’s Story, written intuitively by John. Firstly the Old Journey story takes our Fool through the Majors of the traditional tarot and then the New Journey, which leads The Fool through the new swathe of characters and situations offered by this deck.

    The final section outlines how to work with the deck and contains readings and spreads using varying quantities of cards for you to play around with and includes a few paragraphs on what to do with a card that feels unreadable – which I thought was an interesting idea!

    I’ve been working with the deck on facebook for the past few days, offering readings for friends and referring to the guide book for the interpretations. I think it works really well. The traditional Majors are still themselves, but some aspects are transferred to these new archetypes – and I find that it doesn’t diminish the originals at all.

    Three cards drawn for a daily ‘pick a card’ draw on Facebook. The Clown, Death and The Wasteland

    But the thing is – and I’m sure it’s the question that you are asking yourself – IS IT REALLY A TAROT DECK?

    Well, if that’s your query, you would really need to be very clear on what constitutes a tarot deck. For some it might be the quantity of cards – 78. But just take a look at a Minchiate deck – nearly 100 in those whopping decks and Minchiates are very much regarded as tarot decks.

    Your idea of what makes a tarot deck could revolve around the structure of the deck. A traditional tarot has a Major Arcana (usually 22 cards, but not always) and a Minor Arcana that consists of four suits, each running from Ace to Ten and then a quantity of court cards per suit – mostly four.

    The Fool’s New Journey Tarot does not have this structure.

    Of course you DO have decks that are Majors Only and usually consist of 22 card but there is no reason why a Majors Only HAS to have 22 cards. A Majors Only deck based on a Minchiate Tarot would have over 40, so why not 60, like this one?

    How would I describe the FNJ then? I would say that it is a Majors Only deck – a vastly expanded Majors Only deck. Or perhaps a Tarot Oracle? However you wish to describe it, the FNJ Tarot feels like a brand new green shoot on the gnarled old tarot branch of the divination tree.

    At the end of all this, what do I think about the deck as a working entity? I think that it’s an excellent divination tool that would form a natural bridge for those who like working with oracles, but who maybe feel that tarot itself is a bit fuddy-duddy.

    I also think that it’s the perfect gift (treat yourself or a friend!) for someone who has maybe lost their divining mojo because with these new archetypes and a refreshing freedom from tradition, this set of cards is guaranteed to re-ignite and revitalise their practise.

    Buy The Fool’s New Journey Tarot on Amazon
  • The Marina Abramovic Method

    The Marina Abramovic Method

    Even though I was in St Andrew’s for my son’s graduation, a visit to Toppings bookshop is compulsory for me. There amongst the art biographies and text books I spotted a lone box – a set of cards by the Serbian conceptual artist Marina Abramovic.

    Famous for her performance art, these cards were developed by Marina as a method for other artists (take a bow Lady Gaga) to tap into the same zones as she does for her own work. I, of course, am not a conceptual artist, but I do work with cards and I was intrigued by what may lie within the little box – so, dear reader, I bought them.

    There are 30 cards in the set, each featuring Abramovic in a mix of black and white and colour photographs. On the backside of each card is an instruction to take action from the artist and a recommended time length for the action. The action can be anything from opening and closing a door for a straight hour, to writing your name on a piece of paper for an hour, to a 10-minute stretch and so on. All the activities are designed to help you reach your highest creative potential and tap into a different level of consciousness. The box also includes an illustrated LWB which fleshes out each card’s action for the performer.

    Would the card images work as an oracle? I wondered.

    I first shuffled the cards thoroughly (they are not numbered or titled) and asked a very specific question. The card drawn was this:

    I was utterly gobsmacked. The image was so rich, I didn’t know where to start! The woman lying by the ashes of a dead fire, the birch trees that grow first after wildfire has passed through, the idea that I was looking at a cross section of the earth with the woman lying like a seed – waiting to germinate. I also got a strong 10 of Swords vibe too, do you feel it too?

    My pen flew across the paper as I wrote down as many insights as I could catch – not all of them made sense, but I feel Marina gives us permission to make ART which does not always make logical sense.

    After 15 minutes of flow writing, I turned the card to read what her artist’s prompt was – to explore the space between sleeping and waking. The idea of hovering between sleep and wakefulness, between stillness and growth, to mine this space for one’s art is really interesting and so I decided to experiment for myself.

    That night when I was trying to nod off, I noticed that the ‘cinema’ behind my eyelids was extremely vivid as I drifted in and out of light sleep – I could clearly see the ‘dream’ text that was in front of me, but it constantly changed, like The Matrix. In the morning, there was only sudden wakefulness as I was pulled from a dream by my OH sneezing loudly. ‘I must remember the dream,’ I thought determinedly, but much as Coleridge experienced with Kubla Kahn, one cup of breakfast tea later and the whole damn dream had drained down the plughole of my mind. I could remember not a single thing. Yet I could still remember the vivid awake-to-sleepy dreamlets from the night before.

    Interesting. To me at least lol!

    I asked a dear friend to give me a question and the card drawn was this, The Crying Clown.

    Without giving her any clue as to the card name or the artistic instruction, I asked my friend to just tell me what popped into her head. Again a rich and diverse set of thoughts flowed out of her – everything from the significance of the time on the clock in the card, the energy of The Fool, the meaning of the smeared make-up and so much more. I gave her the title of the card and the artistic direction: ‘create an instruction for yourself’. And out flowed even more insights! So, this is exactly what my friend will do – create an instruction for herself, based on her own insights on the card imagery.

    It does indeed function as an oracle and beautifully too!

    For best results, do not censor yourself (I’m damn sure Marina doesn’t!) and record EVERY. THING. that comes up for you – no matter how off-the-wall you feel that it might be. Try to take the action indicated in the artist’s prompt and explore how that makes you feel – ridiculous? empowered? Cold? Breathless? Then take yourself off somewhere that you cannot be disturbed and work your way through your insights, bringing those artistic prompt feelings to bear where appropriate.

    The Method cards have a strap line with ‘reboot your life’ and I can see how the exercises can free up your creativity. However, as a card reader, the images themselves (regardless of the exercises) can reboot your powers of insight and interpretation REALLY well!

    Using these cards feels like being included in an installation project alongside Marina. The LWB deals only with the artistic prompts, so you have the absolute freedom to interpret her photographic art in any way that works for you and your question for the cards.

    Since posting about buying this intriguing set of cards on facebook, several friends have also now ordered them. I am so curious to see how they work with the cards too. I hope that she would be pleased that a raft of new people will be enjoying her work and employing it in a fresh way to create another layer to her art.

    Deck information:

    Dimensions: 3.6 x 16.2 x 12.2cm
    ISBN: 9781913947316
    Publisher: King
    Quantity of cards: 30
    Card stock: standard
    Finish: satiny sheen – nice to handle

    You can buy it HERE in the Royal Academy of Arts shop – but it is available at many other stores too. If you like this, you may also like the Oblique Strategies cards by Brian Eno.

  • Sovereignty | Wisdom of the Cailleach

    Sovereignty | Wisdom of the Cailleach

    The second Old Woman that I’m sharing from the Wisdom of the Cailleach cards is Sovereignty. You can read the first interactions with the cards HERE.

    Sovereignty sits enveloped in her green cloak, her staff of freedom grasped firmly in her strong hands. A pale green tendril flows ribbon-like along the staff.

    In the accompanying booklet author and artist Jane Brideson has given us an incantation for Sovereignty that talks of freedom, independence and bravery. There can be no deck created in Ireland that does not place Sovereignty at its heart because the arrival and effect of colonisers on her soil is as old as Ireland herself.

    As a Scot, the story of Ireland is not my story to tell though. I need to find my own relationship with Sovereignty.

    What exactly IS Sovereignty – it’s not a word that we hear spoken every day. We most associate it with a King or Queen – it’s a way of referring to them – as our Sovereign. It means that they are the supreme ruler.

    It was also a British coin, made of gold. Nice. Or is it?

    Here, in this card, the Old Woman speaks of Sovereignty of the land. But I’m not even clear about what that means, really. There is the ecological and environmental awareness aspect of treating the land with importance but there is also a more spiritual feeling behind the phrase too.

    This morning I sit with her for a while – difficult because my partner is buzzing around like an angry wasp (RAC cover is due – don’t ask) and his presence is not conducive to meditating quietly! My head is all over the place at the moment, I am finding it difficult to be present and it’s very frustrating; that’s a vicious circle try to find your way out of!

    There are lots of jumbled ideas and thoughts crowd into my head which I write down and try to make into something coherent to share with you. I end up with this:

    “Borders mean nothing to me.
    Politics and Government mean nothing to me.
    Economic need and profit mean nothing to me.
    Respect me, the land beneath your feet.
    Protect me, the land of your children.
    Love me, the land of your home.”

    We can impose our temporary will upon the land through various Governments and political decisions – but she exists as the land on both sides of a border. She runs under the sea, she is all the land, not just a town, county, country or continent.

    We look at her for what we can get out of her – from crops to coal, mines to motorways. It’s quite an exploitative relationship.

    She stretches back in time to hold our ancestors, stretches forwards in time to our children’s children. But what we do to her will ultimately impact US, not her.

    And yet, despite how we treat the land – carving our lives into her skin, gouging out resources from her flesh – she longs for us to create a relationship with her.

    Respect
    Protect
    Love

    Where is the nearest sacred space in your landscape? If you are not near one, you could create one of your own. I am very blessed with sacred spaces nearby – wells, stones, old trees, caves and so on.

    Recognise that the earth is holy.

    It is the supreme power – this, for me, is Sovereignty of the land.

    Time to create a simple ritual – using natural materials. It could be a prayer or a song, but please don’t leave anything non-biodegradable in the landscape.

    Every day, find a way to demonstrate my respect, protection and love of the land.

    What does Sovereignty say to you?

    My review of Wisdom of The Cailleach Cards

  • Wisdom of the Cailleach Oracle | Jane Brideson | Review

    Wisdom of the Cailleach Oracle | Jane Brideson | Review

    I have been longing to meet the characters of the Wisdom of the Cailleach Oracle since artist Jane Brideson began to share her paintings for it a couple of years ago.

    On Friday, they arrived: The Wisdom of the Cailleach was finally here with me!

    I savoured the package: I carefully opened the black envelope with Jane’s details on it and slipped out the booklet and a black bag. I was so excited I could barely get the deck out of the bag and barely get the shrink-wrapping off it in a grown-up way (yeah, I used my teeth!)

    Wisdom of the Cailleach packaging details

    Reader, this is just the loveliest deck – take a look at my flick through.

    There are 22 Oracle cards and 7 Old Women cards. The theme of the deck is, of course, the wisdom of the Cailleach. Now who, or what, is the Cailleach, you might be asking yourself.

    You can see my first reading with the cards HERE.

    The word itself translates from the Irish Gaelic as ‘crone or hag’ but she is also known as ‘the veiled one’ and represents an important divinity figure in Irish, Scottish and Manx mythology. She is named within the landscapes of those countries; she is Winter itself; she is both creator and destructive force.

    The Long Road – I’m going to follow her!

    In this deck you will not find thin-waisted, lissome beauties, but old women absolutely at one with themselves and the world around them. For me, it’s exciting and wonderful to behold!

    The Oracle cards have insights from Jane on how to work with them – card interpretations along with the cards depicted in full colour. Jane has written a poem for each face of the seven Old Women and encourages us to work with them and create our own, unique relationships with them.

    I was ready for this deck. I look at the white-haired and elderly faces of the Old Women and I love them. I am entering their ranks and I am pleased to take my rest amongst them.

    The Wisdom of the Cailleach feels like coming home.

    Find Jane on Facebook and her Wisdom of the Cailleach page.
    She also has a website.

  • Frithing | Scottish Divination |Caitlín Matthews

    Frithing | Scottish Divination |Caitlín Matthews

    Last weekend I was lucky enough to be included in the line up of the World Divination Association‘s Virtual Conference. Amongst the stellar speakers was Caitlín Matthews who spoke to us about ‘frithing’ which is a traditional Scottish West Highland way of divining, using temporary features in the landscape – the flight or position birds, cattle, people etc. Caitlin provided us with a beautiful contemporary example of her own that included hammer strikes from neighbouring building work!

    Photo of Caitlin filtched from the WDA Conference Page <3

    Being Scottish AND living in the West Highlands, I thought I’d give it a go.

    On Monday evening I went out into the still-sunny garden and sat in my shed (aka the ladycave!) for a while, getting centred, trying to remember what to do, constructing the question for my ‘frith’ ….

    But I couldn’t concentrate for the racket coming from outside.

    In the tree behind the shed, a bird was shrilling out its alarm call, long and unmistakable. There must be a cat in the garden. I’m not a fan of cats around my song birds and I’d just buried two little bluetit nestlings who had perished that morning. There would be no more chicks joining them beneath the rose bush today.

    I stepped out into the garden and looked into the tree. It was the blackbird’s alarm call and usually I can see the familiar long flicky tail and the yellow beak flashing amongst the leaves, but nothing. Not a bird, not a cat.

    And still the alarm sounded.

    I went back inside and tried to concentrate even harder, but the call was like an alarm clock that I couldn’t turn off.

    Irked and irritated, I went back indoors, resolving to do it again once things were quieter.

    But, of course, I didn’t.

    It was Tuesday morning by the time realisation hit me like a lightning strike. My question had been ‘What should I focus on ….?’ and I didn’t get any further than that – nothing about my family, career (ha!) or anything else at all.

    But the universe HAD delivered me an answer – the blackbird’s alarm call. The. Black. Bird. Alarm. Call.

    Blackbird card from Druid Animal Oracle
    Art: Will Worthington
    Words: Philip & Stephanie Carr-Gomm

    It was #blackouttuesday and I’d received my answer and it was an alarm call.

    Racism isn’t limited to the injustices that we see in the USA. Racism is alive and well in Scotland too. Click on the image of Scotland’s Justice Minister, Humza Yousaf, to see the BBC Scotland article.

    Unbelievably, despite being University educated (Glasgow, the best, of course!) and knowing about the city’s role in the tobacco trade, I had never EVER made the logical jump from tobacco to slavery. I know, I’m bloody ashamed of myself to admit it too.

    I’m getting myself educated. I have my book on order: Recovering Scotland’s Slavery Past. And I have procured a copy of ‘It Wisnae Us’ by Stephen Mullen which is EXACTLY what I want to read.

    So, frithing …. yes. Do it. You might not get the answer you expect, when you expect it, but it looks like you can get the answer the Universe wants you to listen to.

    Click to visit Caitlin’s Courses at Hallowquest

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  • The Moon Oracle | Caroline Smith | John Astrop

    The Moon Oracle | Caroline Smith | John Astrop

    There are a few lunar oracles about, but this reprint of the Moon Oracle by Caroline Smith and the late John Astrop is well worth exploring.

    Originally published in 2000, it has been given a bit of a repolish and rebox and is now available to buy in a lovely silvery grey presentation box, from Eddison Books.

    The 72-card deck comes with a box-sized companion book of 129 pages. There is good and clear information to let you start working with the cards almost as soon as you have them out of the box!

    Even better, there are lunar tables at the back of the book that now go up to 2032, so you’ll be able to use this deck for quite some time!

    I would point out though that it was created for Northern Hemisphere work, so if you are Darn Under (g’day Aussie, Enzed and Tazi cousins btw) you’ll have some mental jiggling about to do.

    This is an Oracle and, as such, not structured the same way as a Tarot, but it does have three distinct Arcana:

    32 Lunar phase cards
    28 Lunar Mansion cards
    12 Lunar Goddess cards

    The 32 Phase cards correspond most closely to a Minor Arcana – there are four ‘suits’ based on the Elements – Earth, Air, Fire and Water – and each suit has eight lunar phase cards that run from the Dark Moon through to the Full Moon and back again. Each of those eight phases corresponds to a type of plant energy – seed, bud, leaves, flower, fruit etc. Each card is then allocated a keyword based on the quality of that energy (seed energy – the Balsamic, waning Fire Moon) and how it might interact with the Suit. So, the Seed card for the Fire suit is given the keyword of Compromise – which sort of fits with a waning Fire energy, I think.

    The accompanying book explains how to interpret the card, depending on which of the three astrological signs you need. In the example above, I’d be looking for the Leo information.

    There are 28 Lunar Mansion cards. There is a key word provided for each card, based on the astrology of the card – here it is MASK. The card is governed by Mercury and Uranus (info on bottom left of card) and covers 25.43 degrees of Capricorn to 08.34 degrees of Aquarius (bottom left).

    The book entry for the Moon Mansion cards begins with a description of the card – so that you know what you are looking at. Then some myth or lore around the card and then concludes with a couple of paragraphs about the meaning of the card. This one, for example, indicates ‘eccentric, unusual or even deceitful thinking’ and that when it comes up in a reading ‘somebody is lying’ and more besides, but that’s the gist of the thing!

    24th Lunar Mansion

    The Lunar Goddess cards are probably most like the Tarot’s Court Cards and are very beautiful! There are three categories of Goddess – White, Black and Red Goddesses.

    The Black Goddesses are associated with Death and Rebirth (the astrological signs of Scorpio, Sagittarius. Capricorn and Aquarius).
    The Red Goddesses are associated with Preservation (the astrological signs of Cancer, Libra, Virgo, Leo)
    The White Goddesses are associated with Creation (the astrological signs of Pisces, Aries, Taurus, Gemini)

  • Ancestral Oracle of the Celts

    Ancestral Oracle of the Celts

    Caitlin Matthews is a popular and prolific author of a slew of books and divination decks (if you are a Lenormand fan and don’t have a copy of her Lenormand Oracle Handbook, you are missing out!) and the Ancestral Oracle of the Celts is one of her most popular creations.

    Originally printed in 1990, it has been re-released by Watkins and unleashed upon the divination world!

    Let’s start with the box – it’s a lovely sturdy box decorated by the image from the Way Shower card. The deck and accompanying book are accessed via a drawer to the side of the box.

    The box with the drawer open and the guide book showing.

    This is a 40-card oracle, with two distinct types of card – Ancestral Cards and Clan Cards.

    There are eight Ancestor cards, provided in pairs. These pairs are all Lord and Lady … and very helpfully, the realms that they preside over also all begin with the letter L – Love, Light, Lore and Love.

    These cards are landscape in orientation and each features an aspect of the Gundestrup Cauldron:

    Gundestrup Cauldron

    These cards represent our common ancient ancestors and are described as Gods and Goddesses from Celtic lore, such as Bran and Brigantia. These cards pose questions for us to consider when we draw them in the Oracle Readings.

    The other 32 cards are the Clan cards. There are four clans, each of eight cards. Each clan (Wisdom, Sovereignty, Truth and Honour) and has a symbol – Stag, Hawk, Salmon and Boar.

    Since each card is a ‘person’ card, each of the clans is depicted with a different coloured border – Red, Purple, Gold and Green.

    The Ancestor cards, flanked by the Clan cards.

    All 40 cards are related to the Sun Circle and the illustration shows how the Ancestor and Clan cards lie together on the Wheel, which is the Wheel of The Year.

    Sun Circle – p11 in Guide Book

    The artwork by Wil Kinghan is lovely and the clan cards cover every aspect of ancient society – Kings and Queens, Weavers, Shepherds, Commanders etc.

    There is a mix of Masculine and Feminine presences within the cards, but the ENERGY of each card is beyond the outward appearance of each character.

    Although the book is small, it has 88 pages of information. The majority of it pertains to each card, but there are also sections on how to consult the cards and re-membering the Ancestors for deep work.

    My only criticism of the book is that some of the print in it is TINY!

    Book entry for Lord of Love, the font of the copy next to the image is very small!

    So, what do I think of the Oracle – the cardstock is very pleasant. The cards have a definite shine – nice and easy to handle and to shuffle.

    I’ve used the Burning Question spread, two cards, which required a random Clan card and a random Ancestor card. The questions posed by the Ancestor card are interpreted through the wisdom of the advice offered by the Clan card.

    This is a lovely Oracle and the perfect addition to your suite of decks if you enjoy Celtic themed work.

    You can explore more of Caitlin and John Matthews vast body of work on their Hallowquest site. You can also purchase this deck from Amazon via this affiliate link.