Queen of Pentacles. Love and materialism.

   The Queen of Wands is a card that I don't have a great deal of connection with.  Hopefully talking about her might yield some understanding.
    This earthy lady is a mix of watery emotion and grounded pragmatism. Her card is a quiet idyll in the sense of a storybook cottage complete with cute bouncing bunny and bordered in roses. To me it looks like a page from an illustrated children's book.
   Our Queen sits on a throne cradling a pentacle as if it were her baby. Now looking at all the Pentacle court cards, you can't help but notice that each of the figures is deeply absorbed with their own pentacle to the exclusion of anything else going on. Here the flora around her is starting to grow a little wild...a precursor to the overgrown garden that exists on the King's card. This absorption with the material realm is a common thread and I wonder quite what this means for the court cards of the Pentacles suit.
   I understand this to mean that these characters find it difficult to tear their attention away from their own material pursuits. They spend their time working on their careers, thinking about their belongings or homes and looking after their earthly concerns. But one thing to notice is that they really love their pentacles. It is not a damning indictment on materialism (for that see the four of pentacles), but speaks of the actual beauty of materialism.
    The Queen has a deep pink robe on over a white blouse, which is indicative of her innocence and deep love for the world. She wears a green cloak which stretches from her head to her feet and shows her abiding love and compassion. This really is one sweet lady who really cares.
   Her throne is adorned with fruit (apples, oranges and pears) symbolising the fruitful nature of the energy inherent in the card, you can also see several cherubs along with the head of a goat (Capricorn). The rabbit is a symbol of fecundity and abundance and links to both her outward timidity and her sexual nature.
   There is little to connect her to fire or air and as a result this can lead to a somewhat limited awareness of situations outside her own material sphere. At worst this can manifest itself as stodginess and she may lack a spark or inner brightness. More vibrant expansive signs or characters may find her a little sedate for their tastes, but this suits her just fine. She really is happy within her world. The lack of fire does not mean a lack of passion or spirituality, it simply means she connects to it through her earthy nature and strongly emotional character.
    What this card brings up for me is the question of materialism. The western culture has a heavy bias towards materialism, but has severed its ties to the earth. It has not reached the stage of the Queen of Pentacles, but is still languishing at the Knight. When people talk of materialism, there is often scorn in their voices and this is because of what it has come to mean to our common awareness.There is a deep wisdom in the Earth, this has been forgotten and has been replaced with a culture of convenience. Materialism for most people means losing touch with their inner nature, of being absorbed in their shallow lives and never looking beyond the next distraction. Of living for the paycheck or for the weekend.
   The deep wisdom is embodied by that love of the Earth, of loving our lives here and now. It is okay to love our possessions and our homes, our careers and our bodies. It is that love that we have forgotten. there is no love for our possessions, everything is disposable and we have been told to not connect with our materiality...that it is somehow bad and unspiritual.
    What is unspiritual is not loving our lives and all that is in them. When we love our possessions we treat them with honour, we live in an almost zen like state. Materialism is one of the ways we can express love in our lives and of course it stands to reason that it should not be the only way. Enjoying a new teapot is not equivalent to idolatry unless we recognise no other item or being as worthy of our love...and anyone who just loves their teapot is quite clearly not all there.

7 of Pentacles. Planting the seeds of success.

  The seven of Pentacles is a card that is relatively easy to read. The Pentacles growing on the branches of the plant are worldly fruits that are ripening ready for a time of harvest. The figure in the card has just finished a difficult bout of work and is waiting for that time to arrive.
   He wears a red tunic over blue garments, the red symbolising the active forces he has just used to plant and tend his crops and the blue is related to communication. This communication is that he is aware of what the plant needs in order to thrive, the plant itself representing a project, business or other worldly venture.
     This card can appear as a confirmation that money is on its way or some other reward for one's hard work. It shows that the seeds have been correctly planted, tended and watered and all that remains is for the fruits of your labour to be gathered at the right time.
    Since he is not in the active pursuit of harvesting it shows that this time is not quite upon him. He stands resting on a hoe or other gardening implement with a look of appreciation and satisfaction. The tool is a connector between the farmer and the earth below.
    Seven is a magical number and in this represents growth and ripening, which are processes the farmer himself can only affect indirectly. The time of his tending for good or ill is over and all that remains is the process.
   The card speaks somewhat of the laws of karma, of reaping what one has sown. The farmer will receive his due depending on how well he has tended his interests. Since the card is only a minor arcana it doesn't necessarily have the depth and strength of the Justice card where it relates to Karmic return. In this instance it more readily points to cause and effect as being the instruments of return.
   This card came to me more as a confirmation of the course I was on than as a great learning. I am about to begin work at a healing centre in town this month. This has been something I have been working towards for a great deal of time. In the past my healing work has been something I have fit in around other people and places during my travels rather than something that I have set my life around. It represents a new level in terms of my own growth as it is me stepping forward in a business of my own, one that I have to tend and water all myself. Yesterday I spent the day walking around the town posting flyers and spreading the word about what I am doing. I have sent off for business cards and spoken with people about my ideas for things that will happen.
    I have planted the seeds of my business and tend to and watered the ground. This has been something I have worked towards on some level for a great deal of time. It is not the time yet for me to reap my rewards, as I am not yet at that stage, but I can see that for the first time there is something growing here. Previously when I have started my own healing businesses they had withered on the vine and I now understand why. The conditions had never been right for a business for me, either the land was not fertile or I tended them poorly.
    My own lack of conviction had been partly to blame for this, conviction in what I am doing and its validity and relevance. These emotions are the water that a growing venture needs to see it through. I am sure I will find challenges along the road, but I am more ready to face those than I have been before. My lack of convictions are not the only factor to have affected my previous failures, I can see that looking back there were also many other situations at play. Metaphorically the ground was hard and the environment was too cold to grow the type of business I would like to run.
   I feel that I will turn out a better crop this time, certainly the conditions are more conducive to growth, but only time will tell.

The Hermit

   The Hermit is a card of solitude and it is something that I have been avoiding lately. Usually when this figure appears in a deck I take the time to step into my inner world and away from the cares of the material one. This time I have found it more difficult to do so. There have been too many interruptions and tasks that needed my attention.
   The hermit though is a patient old man and he can wait until you are ready to take his hand to ascend up the mountain with him. For he knows you aren't going anywhere until you do.
   He represents a time of silent retreat and introspection. He is Father Time, Saturn...the wise old man. The world lies at his feet as he stands upon the peak of the world. At first glance it may seem as though his head is bowed maybe in sadness or contemplation, maybe even to see where he is placing his feet. But since he already stands at the mountain top, it may just be that he is looking down on all that is transpiring below, separate but ultimately aware of all that is going on in the only the way that a silent watcher can be.
     His wooden staff is a bright yellow and it may simply be that the light of his lantern falls upon it turning it this colour. But that in itself holds meaning. Yellow is the colour of the mind and the intellect and it is this that keeps him upright and connected to the ground beneath him, both his support and his authority.
     Jung labelled the old man as one of the main archetypes, an archetype being an impression without our collective consciousnesses that having such depth that he has a form and wisdom all his own. That he may appear in ones dreams or visions as a link to the ancient wisdom of our elders and ancestors.
   His lantern contains a six pointed star, a symbol of the meeting point of all the elements and heaven and earth finding balance. With this wisdom he guides the way in the darkness, holding it aloft to bring light to the world below.
   When this card appears in a reading I take as a sign that I need to take a moment and step inside to find this inner mountaintop and speak with the presence of my highest self, the ultimate witness. The last time this card appeared I took a pilgrimage to Mount Shasta in Northern California. I had read about the peak many years earlier and had always felt drawn there. I was lacking direction in my life and I felt like all my dreams had turned to ash and my path was obscured. I didn't realise at the time how much solitude would play a part in that particular journey and if I had known I may not have so easily gone down that road. I was living in England after a soul crushing defeat in terms of my plans to start working in the US. I had been foiled by a single line of small print at the bottom of my visa ticket, which didn't allow me to change my visa. This meant I had to let go of a job offer and return home to live with my parents, shortly after turning 30 and take up a job mopping floors and serving burgers in a military base.
    The card had come up and I had decided that I needed a retreat to take time to think. I ended up at the mountain in early spring when the snows were just clearing and staying in a quaint bed and breakfast in which I was one of the only guests. The place was a little cramped and filled with dusty antiques and brik-a-brak (not my style at all!)The other guest was a lady in her sixties. She had lived a life remarkably free of difficulty or suffering, but instead it had been filled with excitement and adventure and she was treating herself to a trip around the world. We talked some, but for the most part I walked the roads around the mountain alone, enjoying the sun and the views.
    Solitude has been a constant companion for me, one I have not always welcomed, but one I have found to be comfortable enough. After I had learned my second level of Reiki I have felt the presence of beings around me, so it has not been solitude in the sense that most people understand and I feel that this alone has allowed me to endure long periods of time without other contact.
    My memories of being a young child are filled with moments of solitude, watching the rain or the snow from windows, or spending time reading or watching the clouds pass. My parents were often busy with their business and we would have sitters watch us, but for the most part we would find ourselves left to our own devices. Thus, silence is no threatening monster to me and I am quite comfortable with it, within myself and my environment.
     The hermit and his cloak remind me of some of the many times I spent while in England. Often I would walk the streets late at night, seeing the beauty in the sodium lamps that ran along the parkways where I lived. Most people looked at the sky, but I could find beauty in the street lamps and on more than one occasion found tears in my eyes at the beauty of it all. The cloak I would imagine wrapped around me keeping me hidden from the often drunken boorish individuals who also liked to walk around late at night.
   So I do feel a quiet kinship with the hermit. He is here to remind me that the inner solitude is less than a step away and sometimes a retreat is just what you need. That he is here to take your hand in those moments of solitude and quiet to guide you to the mountain top, not always to give you answers, but sometimes just to show you the view.

Celtic roots and atheism

  Just a few weeks ago I took part in a Shamanic workshop based on Celtic and Pagan beliefs. I have wanted to talk about this since I was involved but I have needed a few weeks to let things settle.
   My previous understanding of Celtic and Pagan beliefs was based on what scraps are currently available in the media such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer...not the best reference I know... and my interactions with the tradition while I had lived in Scotland and Wales for a few years.
   Being brought up in the North East of England I was not really exposed to any of these beliefs. The predominant belief system in the majority of England is that of atheism (discounting areas near Glastonbury and more progressive areas dotted sparsely around the country). There was a common consensus that being an atheist is somehow more intelligent and is the only choice for a forward thinking individual, even if many of the people who hold and espouse these ideas have only gotten there by the virtue of them being the predominant way of thinking. I found that honest belief was extremely rare and I am hard pressed to think of individuals who didn't believe either in oblivion, atheism or were holding the belief that we cannot know anything beyond our basic senses (agnostics). This was despite a fervent and dogmatic belief in scientific doctrine...which was usually held with an incomplete understanding of scientific thought, the basis for these beliefs being here-say and peer pressure from opinionated know-it-alls.
    I have never really understood the reason for the depth and strength of this spiritual void that exists in England and previously the only possible answer had been the strength and prevalence of the Church and a strong and resilient resistance to the doctrines they bring. That there is great resistance to the blinkered and often dogmatic opinions of the church comes as no surprise and England has had a chequered past with the Church abusing its power. I was brought up in an irreligious environment as were all my peers (to my understanding) which is often very different to the upbringing many Americans have had. Even though I went to a church school and attended Sunday school (admittedly I just liked drawing pictures of lions eating Christians) I found that even the so-called "religious" folks had a world weary outlook and were simply trying to stem the tide of rampant atheism destroying their foundations.
    When I tried to discuss the more spiritual leanings I was finding in myself through meditation and the eastern thought I had been exposed to in my readings, I found that most people had a kind of knee jerk reaction. They seemed pinned between atheism and Christianity and could not step out from behind this dualism, that if someone rejected one, it simply meant accepting the other. It reminded me of a guy I met when I first came out to the US. He had been raised as a Christian in one of the more fundamental sects, one that didn't allow drinking, wearing shorts or other obviously heathen practices. He had rejected all of that and had fled his home and all he knew in order to find his own way, but like a butterfly whose wings are most vulnerable when its escapes its chrysalis like imprisonment he was in danger. Because his indoctrination was so strong he felt that there was only two choices and so had adopted Satanism through his rebelliousness. I recall sitting and talking with him and seeing the world as only consisting of two sides..even in spite of the great evidence that there were more than two simple routes. The practices of Satanism he was espousing seemed morally and socially dubious to me and I knew that this kind-hearted individual would not last long in that world. Unfortunately this meant that after finding Satanism was not to his liking he, felt that Christianity offered his only sanctuary. Sadly, he went back to his past re-adopting all its beliefs.
     In the US it seems that being an atheist or an agnostic is a kind of quirky belief that is just as fringe as any other myriad of beliefs out there. For me it is a relief to be out from that suffocating dualism and the scornful mocking and insufferable superiority that always accompanies it. None-the-less I have always been curious as to its true roots as the church alone doesn't seem powerful enough to evoke the strength of response you find in most individuals.
    Being British in a Celtic workshop in the US presupposes an affinity to Celtic lore and way of life... after all I have Celtic roots somewhere back in history and I was raised close to the land it talks of. Seeing things in this way gave me a fresh perspective. While I was living in Scotland and Wales, there are much closer ties to pre-Christian ways of thinking. Pagan festivals are a common occurrence even if you don't attend them there is an awareness of them occurring. While in Edinburgh there were several celebrations that involved leaping over fires and people painting themselves in very vivid colours and costume during the various pagan holidays. I started to wonder what had happened to our roots in the North of England. We are sadly so far cut off from any connection to our true Celtic roots that Morris dancing is our only link.
    Part of the workshop involved bringing a drum or a rattle to help with journey work and I had to make one myself as my funds have been extremely low. I have a book on Celtic knot-work, which I had always felt an affinity for and looking through the book for designs to add to the rattle I found several patterns that are attributed to North Yorkshire. Long before the Saxons, the Vikings and the Romans came and pillaged and destroyed our homes in the North we must have had our own beliefs and connections to the land.
    While in Scotland and Wales one of the sad elements I had to encounter was the hatred the Scottish and the Welsh have towards the English. I always felt a little removed because of my Italian ties, but I could definitely sense a hostility and several times in Wales I had had to avoid gangs of thugs who would have been quite happy to put an end to me or my friends. One birthday event even ended in a trip to the hospital for a friend of mine as we went to celebrate and encountered a select group of Welshmen who didn't like his face.
      I have understood that the English have had great deal to answer for in the treatment of our outlying brothers, but I had never really considered that the true English have suffered a much worse fate. We have become alienated from our roots and lost our Celtic heritage. No wonder there is such great resistance for any group that has attempted to land, conquer and tell us how to think. Even to the point where we became the bully we so greatly feared to many other cultures and countries. Our spirituality was lost to us all those long centuries ago, taken forcibly as we were made to believe in the Gods and beliefs of another. We have become so caught up in resisting, that our own connection to the land and our old ways has fallen to ash.
     Seeing the Celtic festival here in Flagstaff has always made me consider what has been lost in England. That Americans are able to celebrate their Celtic roots more readily than those who live on the land that once held that magic. We have become so bitter and alienated without a heritage to call our own we hide it behind false pride and a mocking deprecation of our own culture and that of others.
    By connecting with my Celtic heritage I have found a strength that has always been lacking, one that has been buried so deep as to be lost. It allows me to understand the loss the Native Americans feel, or any other culture who's way of life has been threatened and torn away from them. All I can do is offer my heartfelt apologies for the races, cultures or peoples that my ancestors have damaged and hope that maybe they can show us the way back to our own roots in the Earth.