Tag: The hanged man

Turn Around

Sometimes you need to circle around a problem to nab the solution from behind.

Hello and welcome to TaoCraft Tarot blog and podcast. I’m glad you are here.

Today’s card is the Hanged Man. This card is different-looking from the usual Hanged man. You can see the card being drawn in the blog and on the YouTube channel. This particular card was created by Emma Daues for the Alleyman’s Tarot Deck. I uses a cat curled up in a space bubble turning and drifting endlessly to get at the same message as the better known Pamela Smith card. That oblique approach pretty much is today’s message.

Regardless of the deck or artwork you use, the Hanged man most often has to do with stagnation, frustration, feeling stuck, going in circles making no progress.

Circles have been a bit of a theme the past couple of days. Remember how the Page of Wands was circling around to the back and nabbing the point from behind? Today has a little bit of that energy too. Endless space circles certainly captures the stuck, stagnation aspect of the card.

Sometimes the Hanged Man is connected to self-sacrifice or fearless sacrifice. I don’t get any sense of that lesser known interpretation from our space cat at all. Although, I imagine a good sci fi writer could use a self sacrificing bubble cat in space as a story prompt and come up with something.

The main energy today lies with one of the most common messages I get with this. I suspect it is a very repeated idea because it is, in my opinion, the most useful one. This part of the card talks about seeing things from a different point of view.

As you think about problems or decisions turn things around. Turn it upside down. Kick the tires. Take outlandish options out for a spin mentally.

My all time favorite analogy for this energy is an interview I watched on TV once with one of the Disney “imagine -eers.” I can’t remember the gentleman’s name or any exact quotes but the essence of it was they would use physical models of new rides and attractions during the creative development process. A key they would use the model was for specific creative problem solving. If a problem turned up they would look at the physical model from physically different angles. They would stand on chairs and look down on it, sit on the floor and look up at it. I imagine they would circle around it too. A physical shift in perspective could spark inspiration for a creative solution or bring focus to a diffuse, poorly understood problem.

If there is something you are pondering, the Hanged Man reminds you to look at it from all sorts of angles. Circle around, maybe you need to nab the solution from behind. Turn around, see what the problem looks like behind you instead of perpetually chasing it down.

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Thank you again. See you at the next sip!

Opportunity in Slow

TaoCraft Short Sip is Tarot for your day in the time it takes to sip from your coffee

Thank you for reading and listening to TaoCraft Tarot blog and podcast. Your likes, subs, shares, follows, questions and comments are always appreciated! I’m glad you are here.

Today’s card is the Hanged Man from the major arcana.

It’s the day after a holiday here in the U.S. and like usual that makes today feel like a Monday even though it isn’t. There is a certain “pause and pirouette” feel to the energies today. We are just now moving into full cultural summertime even if there are a couple of weeks to astrological summer. We are moving from dark moon into a waxing moon. The weather is moving from a bit spring chill into full sunny stinking putrid humid hot weather. It feels like a larger, energy zeitgeist sort of shift too.

The Hanged Man often talks about being stuck or stagnant. I don’t think that is quite the message. The other threads of meaning for the card aren’t a perfect fit either. Diane Morgan’s “fearless sacrifice” isn’t it today. The notion of changing perspective to move forward is close, but not entirely right either. It is more a message of “pause and reflect” with greater force and authority and urgency than you would see when this same message comes through the seven of pentacles.

Now may not be the time to jump in with both feet. Now is not the day to engage frenetic summer mode. It feels like this energy might be trying to point to summer as a whole, actually. Despite its somber origins, here in the U.S. Memorial Day is the de facto kickoff to summer and its usual push to get in as much recreation as humanly possible. Most years the first half of summer usually feels like that old surf song from the 60s Wipe Out. Today’s advice from the card feels more like a slow R&B groove like “That’s the Way Love Goes” by Janet Jackson, or maybe “Summertime and the Living is Easy” from Porgie and Bess or “Humanz” by Gorillaz. Lyrically, the Gorillaz song makes the most sense, especially the line about “Calling the world from isolation.” We’ve all been through a thing or two the past couple of years. You don’t go straight from being in a coma to running a four minute mile. Yeah, be outside, do stuff, mask up when you need to and wash your dang hands but be chill and ease back into life with kindness. Slow forward progress is still progress. Cool your jets, move forward with kindness to yourself and everyone else too. Slow down and THINK. We are being a chance to savor and contemplate life a little bit. Today is an opportunity in slow.

Thanks so much for reading & listening. I especially appreciate it on days when the message is condensed and to the point like it is today. I hope you’ll keep coming back for these little sips of Tarot wisdom both big and small.

If you want a full cup of Tarot all your own, private readings by email are always available on the blog & podcast website. The link is in the episode description for podcast listeners. The blog, the podcast and the companion YouTube videos that show the real world card draw for these posts and episodes are not monetized and need your support. If you enjoy this Tarot content, please visit the TaoCraft Tarot ko-fi page in the episode description. Shop and membership proceeds contribute to creating this free to access Tarot content for everyone. I appreciate your help.

Any likes, subs, shares, follows, questions or comments you can spare are always appreciated too.

Thanks again for listening. See you at the next sip!

Whose Expectation Is It?

TaoCraft Short Sip: Tarot contemplation in the time it takes to sip from your coffee

Hello and welcome to TaoCraft Short Sip: Tarot contemplation in the time it takes to sip from your coffee. I’m glad you are here.

Today’s card is the Hanged Man from the major arcana portion of the Tarot Deck.

Major arcana cards are about the major life lessons, about the twists and turns life can take. Sometimes they are guidance for a big choice you have to make, but in this case, it can be more along the lines of a general wake up call. That’s the kind of energy around today.

There was an episode of TV show we used to watch where the mom of the family was YouTube famous for a few days because of a video of her yelling “knock it off!” at her kids. She was the “knock it off” lady.

That’s the vibe the Hanged Man has today. Major arcana cards can be just that blunt and to the point sometimes. They are most often the cards to give the frying pan over the head kind of messages. I always enjoy it when Tarot drops the diplomacy and tells it like it is.

To borrow from another bit of pop culture, this kind of vibe is a little like the scene in the 1990 movie Ghost where the ghost, speaking through a psychic, asks psychic Oda Mae to be tactful and gentle when she talks to the bereaved character Molly. So of course, she gently and famously says “Molly, you in danger, girl.”

This card isn’t telling you that you are in danger, but it is telling you to knock it off.

If you think that life is stuck and not making any progress, whose expectations are being frustrated? Neil DeGrasse Tyson said that “The universe is under no obligation to make sense to you.” Even more so, the universe is under no obligation to operate according to your timeline. The major arcana cards specialize in difficult life lessons. “It’s not about you” is one of those lessons.

So if you are feeling stuck or frustrated, the Hanged Man’s gentle, diplomatic advice is to KNOCK IT OFF! The universe is under no obligation to work according to your calendar.

Thank you for reading, listening and watching. The blogcast isn’t monetized and depends on your support. Email Tarot readings purchased on this website and Tarot Table memberships on ko-fi contribute to creating these (almost) daily Tarot readings for you. Any likes, subs, shares and follows that you can spare are always appreciated too.

See you at the next sip!

POV upside down

Welcome to TaoCraft Short Sip – Tarot guidance for your day in the time it takes to sip from your coffee.

Today’s card is the Hanged Man from the major arcana.

Usually this card is associated with stagnation or being stuck or “hung up” somehow. Today another meaning is stepping forward. It is all about perspective. It is all about point of view.

The things coming to mind today are the same ones I’ve talked about for years in the print blog. Like I’ve always said, one person’s stuck in the mud is another person’s spa treatment.

There is a lot of subjectivity in the passage of time. A few weeks might be a nice break when you’ve been busy or under stress. Mental respite is as important as physical get-aways. But what if waiting IS the stress? Then waiting a few weeks more might be intolerable. It’s unreasonable to expect to change your point of view all that quickly. Frustration doesn’t turn off and on like a faucet.

If you feel stuck, are you measuring progress by the right thing? If your love life is going nowhere, look to other parts of life to see if there is opportunity for movement, for happiness – and vice versa. If, for example, work has been moving too fast, look at other area of life for opportunities to slow down.

It seems simple and obvious, but sometimes when we are caught up in stress of one kind or another the simple and obvious gets out of focus. We lose the forest in the trees as the saying goes. Tarot not only teaches far flung grand ideals spooky spiritual stuff. It is just as likely to give calm, practical advice.

Sometimes even Tarot turns its point of view upside down.

Thank you for watching, reading and listening to today’s short sip Tarot. Follow the blog to get all of my Tarot content. Short sip daily meditation Tarot card readings are available on the blog, on the TaoCraftTarot YouTube Channel and on the Podcast by the same name. The podcast is available on Spotify, Anchor FM, Stitcher and more. Any likes, subs, shares, follows or reading orders you can spare are always, always appreciated.

A Sip of Tarot: On Schedule

Today’s card is The Hanged Man from the major arcana.

Neil DeGrasse Tyson famously said that “the universe is under no obligation to make sense to you.” By the same token, life is under no obligation to meet our time schedules. Sometimes things take a frustratingly long time to happen. Sometimes things go so slowly nothing seems to be happening at all. Other times life goes lightning fast and takes us by surprise.

Time is literally changeable at super high speeds. Even right here, with both feet firmly planted on the ground, our perception of time seems entirely fluid. Perception is part of the key energy around the card today.

I’ve often said that with the Hanged Man, one person’s stuck in the mud is another person’s day at a spa. As with so many things, a small shift in perspective can change your feeling and experience enormously. One pattern I’ve seen in readings over the years is that a narrow focus on the path ahead breeds frustration. If one aspect of life is taking too long to happen, or if you feel stuck and making no progress, maybe that is another area of life grabbing you by the elbow and trying to get you to pay attention to something else. If things are going slowly, maybe it is because life doesn’t want you to whizz right by the scenery on the side of the road. If you feel stuck, it might be an opportunity in disguise to rest, stop, really see and appreciate where you are right now before running ahead to something new.

Thank you all for reading and listening! I’ll see See you next time on the TaoCraft Tarot blog and the next Sip of Tarot episode of the Clairvoyant Confessional podcast.

Today’s Tarot: It’s a Brisket

Time is a thing, and it takes a lot of it to make a good brisket.

If you compare references and card decks, the Hanged Man is one of those cards that has widely disparate interpretations. Based on the energy around it today, I would guess it is because the card is one of those zeitgeist sensitive time sponges. Here’s what I mean by that:

Some cards are anchors. They are – almost – timeless, with deep roots in the fabric of everything. Their meanings and interpretations seem relatively steady over time and throughout multiple decks and references. Or so it seems in the world of Marseille / Waite-Smith based Tarot. I can’t speak for Lenormand style Tarot, but I suspect it is similar. Three of swords and the Moon are examples.

Other cards, like today’s, are more fluid. They adapt and lend themselves to intuitive needs of the moment like water taking the shape of its container. I’ve seen the card interpreted as meaning stagnation, self-sacrifice, transition, new perspectives, new perceptions, surrender, release, and initiation. Today’s energy would add deliberate waiting and a little well-placed patience. It has a slightly different tenor from the ‘wait and watch for the right time and opportunity’ message that might come from the two of wands or the more meditative quality of the four of cups or the resignation of the eight of cups.

The Hanged Man, for today anyway, is about cooling your jets while in full active engaged realization that it takes as long as it takes. Let the planted seeds grow. You can’t hurry love.

It’s like making a really good brisket.

I’m not the carnivore I used to be, but I’m not vegan by any means. True to my love of Taoist philosophy, I prefer the middle way. Thanks to that and my husband’s family reunion, I have had genuine Texas brisket. It had been smoked for something crazy like 24 hours. It was one of the most delicious things I’ve ever stuffed in my food hole. It wouldn’t have been that way without that one critical ingredient: time.

That old margarine commercial might have said that it’s not nice to fool Mother Nature, but the truth is that you CAN’T. Low and slow meat smoking is just that…slow. You can’t make it go faster and get the same result. You can’t shove a frozen turkey into a 1000 degree oven and get anything other than a burned blob with botulism sauce.

All food cravings aside, the message isn’t a goodie two shoes entreaty to be blissfully patient. Who in human history has ever been calmed by being told to calm down? This is more about a deliberate, knowing, intentional well-placed taking of time.

It takes as long as it takes. Let it. Your brisket will be better in the end.

Today’s Tarot: Hanging Around

Public Domain

In Carl Sagan’s fiction work Contact, Ellie Arroway is a scientist involved with SETI, the search for extraterrestrial intellence (which is a real thing.) In it, at one point, she considers not only the vast distances between Earth and other potential homes to intelligent, communicative life, but also the role that time inherently plays. Obviously, it take a heckuva long time, even at the speed of light, for one side of message to get from there to here and vice versa. What if there is also a vast difference in lifespan and local experience of time. A few days to us is a lifetime to a fruit fly, and many generations to a germ. As she was driving she noticed crack or bumps in the road at fairly regular intervals. What if, she wondered, the pulses in a signal came so slowly, so widely spaced that we didn’t even notice the signal, with each blip of the message just being dismissed as an anomaly.

Makes me wonder if the universe isn’t really teeming with intelligent, communicative, technological life but each at such widely disparate time scales, that nobody can connect with anybody so that everybody thinks they are the only ones…but that something for another time.

The same phenomenon can happen when it comes to our interaction with Tarot, or any form of esoteric guidance, even pure intuition. Sometimes the whole idea gradually unspools over days, weeks or months until finally the last piece falls into place. If we miss a piece, the message goes on until finally the “ah-ha” happens.

A single card daily meditation practice is an excellent way to get a feel for this among many other things. Not only do you get a specific read of the energy for that specific day, you can see patterns emerge over the course of days, weeks, even years. My personal example of that is the strong presence of pentacle cards during the first part of the pandemic and the evolving intuitive images of the U.S. map with all the little tornadoes and the hurricane on the horizon that both reflected the overwhelming cultural zeitgeist energies that were so strong during 2019 & 2020.

What say you empaths? Has the cultural and environmental energies stopped ringing your bell quite so hard? I think that is the impetus behind the speckled stone image. Boundaries are firmer, individual concerns are at the fore and the existential political crisis (at least locally here in the US has dropped into the background somewhat.)

Today’s card connects to yesterday’s Four of Swords card which connected to previous readings. There is a continued thread of change & rest themed energies.

The Hanged man connotes stagnation, but this energy hasn’t been hanging around long enough to take on that interpretation. Hanged Man can also mean surrender, changing your way of looking at things – it can take on exactly the wait, don’t push, change what you are doing, rejuvenate, and contemplate energies we’ve been seeing. My hunch is that this kind of energy is going to be around for a while since we’ve seen it in a multi-day pattern like this. Astrology might ascribe this to some planet in retrograde or something. I don’t know anything much about astrology, so I attribute this to a yin phase, a time of quiet, of taking in, minor adjustments. It is a time of plugging in to recharge in whatever metaphoric sense you want to give the phrase.

If there is a message specific to today, I sense “patience.” Not everything unfolds at the pace we want or expect. There are reasons patience is considerd one of the great treasures of Taoism. Just like messages from aliens, life unfolds at its own natural pace, not according to our wishes.

“The universe is under no obligation to make sense to you”

Neil DeGrasse Tyson via brainyquote.com

Sit down!

Another way to understand reversed (upside down) cards in a Tarot reading.

I don’t know who enjoyed the cartoons more, my daughter or me.

Kids in the early 2000s had way better shows to watch than we did. But then, I’m old and decrepit and had to wait for Saturday to watch them. Still, Spongebob and Jimmy Neutron rocked.

One of the funnier bits in Jimmy Neutron was when Jimmy and Cindy used double negatives to get the teacher to give them permission to leave the classroom. When Carl tried to use some sort of complicated quadruple negative, all he got from Mrs. Fowl was a loud “Sit Down, Carl!”

Sometimes reversed Tarot cards are like Carl’s double negative attempt and they need to sit down.

Energy flows like a river. Tarot can point out where the current flows most freely…and where there are rocks in the way. Sometimes there are whirlpools and eddies and quiet pools. Reversed cards can make things go in circles if you get too tied up in them. There is a general notion that if a card turns over upside down (relative to the person doing the reading) its meaning is also reversed, presumably flipping the card from positive to negative connotations. Sometimes a reversed card is generally felt to be a negative omen, regardless of the specific card or meaning.

If the card points to the dark side of life in the first place?

If the reversed bad card is turned into a good card, why not just throw down a good card in the first place? Isn’t there more to it than that? Doesn’t that rob the reversal of any meaning? So what if it does?

Reversed cards can be difficult for beginner readers, exactly because of these swirls of energy (and questions) and the double negative style of communication. This is why I tend to tell reversed cards to sit down.

Double negative communication and any difficulty with reversed cards begins from a place of absolutes. The root mistake is to think a card has a fixed positive or negative connotation in the first place.

My method for dealing with reversed card is to view it as neutral regardless of orientation on the table. Take today’s card, the Hanged Man as an example. Let’s give it the ‘stagnation’ meaning today. For someone who has been harried and hurried and pushed, a time of being “stuck” might be a gift of enforced rest just when it is most needed. For someone who is rested and ready to move, “stuck” is a source of enormous frustration. To the first person, if the hanged man is read as meaning lots of new starts and forward momentum, which indeed could be negative and stressful for someone already too much on the move. For the second person, reversed hanged man and the connotation of forward movement is good news, not one bit negative in any way. The card and its message is neutral, not matter how it falls on the table or which side of its nature steps forward. The good or bad, positive or negative is assigned in context by the sitter (Sitter or seeker means the person getting the reading. When you read for yourself, reader and sitter are the same person.)

By beginning from a position of neutrality about the base card meaning, allowing the client to make any ‘positive’ or ‘negative’ judgement about how the card’s message applies to them. It makes it easier to read a reversal: take whatever meaning steps forward to you. If it is reversed, that simply means that the idea, life lesson or energy movement is blocked or challenged in some way, like a whirlpool outside of the river’s primary flow.

Or, it may mean nothing other than random chance in a deck that has been used and shuffled.

Let your intuition be your guide. If no intuition steps forward, then default to method. In this case, make the base card neutral in good vs bad, consider all the possible meanings for the card, and take the reversal to mean slowed or challenged energy surrounding whatever the card is addressing.

Class dismissed. You can stop sitting down now, Carl.

YouChoose Interactive Tarot 20 March 20

 

I hope this slight change in format showcases what I’ve always known about my readings: Distance is my specialty. I’m really good with the written word. Typing a reading filters through my language centers differently. The information is the same, and it spits out the the same core message as in a live, in-person, on the spot reading, but I communicate that message just a tiny bit differently through email and the handwritten InkMagick readings. There is more emotional power. There is more style and panache. There is more poetry.  For example, imagine the message from spirit is “flowers.” In the real-time reading you will 100% for sure get “flowers”. In the written reading you will 100% for sure get “flowers. The core message is absolutely identical. With the written message, there is an chance the message might be a tad more polished, sophisticated or poetic…you might get “flowers like a yard full of spring violets” or “flowers, like a bouquet of pink roses”. I’m really good at doing in-person readings…you’ll always get your flowers, so to speak, but I’m super-extra-good at written readings. In all fairness, that might just be my perception because written readings are just so darn satisfying to do. Especially the pen and ink on paper one. I use a glass dip pen (I swear it reminds everyone of a magic wand) and specialty ink. Pen and ink holds a certain magick even beyond the power of the written word in a digital reading. It goes without saying all of the readings you get here are done by little old me and all the years I’ve been doing this, never a computer program, always unique, always for you, no matter which format you choose.

That being said – on to today’s cards.

Left: Four of Cups. Feel the feels. Emotions are running high. Emotions change often and things are understandably stressful. If you are one of the lucky ones who meet the times with calm or humor, keep it up…the world needs you. Look at the young man under the tree. He looks more introspective, not terribly happy. The Mermaid is silently, patiently present. Whatever your response to these times may be, sit with the present moment. Be present, not judging.  Times will flow like the stream, circumstance will change. This moment requires a patient, perhaps silent touch. Be. Be with the moment, be with each other in the feeling of the times, if not in physical presence.

Center: Ace of Pentacles (Ace of Coins) Coins have to do with the element of earth and the suit in general relates to the physical realm. This card picks up where the Queen of Wands left off. This is beyond leading by calm management and expample. It is time do do the practical things, do what you need to do to manage and preserve. Be smart and logical. Manage your resources and preserve them, never mind the notion of leadership. Ace cards are more primal and of the essence of the suit. Manage things well and keep it up.

Right: The Hanged Man. Boy does this capture the current energy, with everyone with a brain and a heart sheltering at home to protect everyone. We are in this together, we are isolated and at home for other people. In the past I’ve written that the Hanged Man teaches us that one person’s stuck in the mud is another person’s day at a spa. My mind is especially drawn to the bird with the bauble in its beak. This is a gift. It is a spa day. This enforced cut-back in outside activity and distraction is our chance to do something deeply wonderful. We are busy feeling stuck when we are also being handed a treasure. Now is the time for introspection. Set goals. What is it you want out of life? What can you do to move toward that when this is all over? People pay money for the chance to eat simply and meditate all day, take walks, do yoga  and go on a spiritual retreat. Don’t let this treasure fall past you. If you are reading this, you have internet access enough to find yoga instruction, new recipes to try, free ebooks galore. The “hang” won’t last forever. Take it in. The energy that is touching the human race right now is profound and powerful. It might frighten you. It might frustrate you. Or, if you take a hand in the process, it change you for the better.