209. MONTHLY MEDICINE: January is Trust
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Happy 2023, Wild Souls! We are jumping into an epic Monthly Medicine episode of the pod today, all about January (and a bit about our year ahead).
Air date:
December 30, 2022
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About the Episode
Our theme for the month of January is Trust. We are being called to courageously open to a deeper co-collaboration with Source, rather than letting our mind call all the shots. This is huge preparatory work for 2023, offering us a good taste of what the coming year is going to invite us into. We also answer an anonymous listener's question about their relationship to Eight of Cups, and how to work with a trigger it brings up for them when they pull it.
We will be off next week, but will see you again with a new episode on 1/13! Happy New Year, Wild Souls!
Links:
Sign up for The Threshold, our channeled guide around 2023 and The Chariot card!
A preview of our 2023 offerings!
Download your Ultimate Soul Tarot Card Guide here!
Land Acknowledgement
Honoring and acknowledging that this podcast episode was recorded on the unceded land of The Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, currently called Portland, OR, with the deepest respect to the Kalapuya Tribe, Cowlitz Tribe, and Atfalati Tribe.
Please Note
CW Tags: childhood ab*se, adoption, capitalistic structures, childhood trauma, and trauma
The content in this episode contains references to mentions of childhood ab*se, adoption, capitalistic structures, childhood trauma, and trauma. We have done our best to identify difficult subject matter, but the labels may not be comprehensive for your personal needs. Please honor your knowing and proceed with necessary self-awareness and care.
Transcript
[Introduction]
[0:00:00]
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(Instrumental intro music)
Welcome to Tarot for the Wild Soul, a podcast that explores the Tarot through an inclusive, soul centered, trauma-informed perspective for growth, healing, and evolution. I'm your host, Lindsay Mack.
Hello, Wild Souls, and welcome back to the podcast. I'm your host, Lindsay Mack. And as always, it is such a joy to be gathered here with all of you. Thank you so much for being here with me. We have… I feel like this is a very big episode, even though it's not… Like, (Lindsay laughs) I don't know that it's on paper. It just feels like the… This is our January 2023 Monthly Medicine episode, which feels incredible and huge. It's not necessarily that the episode itself, again, on paper looks any different, feels any different. But there's something really crackling in the energy of this month's kind of invitation, the themes, what it's calling us to pay attention to. And so it does really feel like a huge honor and a privilege to be gathered with all of you, to sort of chat it out (Lindsay laughs) and talk a little bit about the cards that are coming up for us. And of course, I'm gonna answer a wonderful listener's question. And again, then we'll bow away and say goodbye for now.
Before I get to that, a couple, like, legitimately two-second things. One, if you have not purchased The Threshold, my download all about 2023, The Chariot year, what it represents, it's a huge and beautiful channeled download. If you haven't gotten that, now is like a beautiful time because it's 2023 in like two seconds (Lindsay laughs). And if you're hearing this past 2023, it's definitely not too late. I highly recommend touching in with that. You can purchase it or learn more at the link in the show notes.
I also wanted to share that I have a little sneak preview because there are a couple of massively exciting, big things coming round the bend in the early part of 2023 in terms of offerings and very new things that I've never done before. So I'm excited to share them with you. There's a little link in the show notes to a blog post that I have just a little bit about some of those things, and you can sign up for waiting lists to be the first to sign up for certain things, which allows you to benefit from discounts and bonus opportunities. So if you want to know about what's coming around the bend in 2023, for me and Tarot for the Wild Soul, you can check it out at the link in the show notes. And now I'm gonna leave you be with all that (Lindsay laughs).
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[0:03:00]
Okay. So as I often do, I'm going to cast a very wide circle, and then draw myself into the center when talking about the energy of this month. The first thing I feel very called to say, which, like, I don't know. It's just really… It keeps rolling in my mind, and so maybe there's some value to it. I find it just beautiful, and fascinating, and just kind of perfect that on January 6th we have a Full Moon in Cancer. And I feel like for me, there's always something really powerful, just personally, about paying attention to the first New or Full Moon of the calendar year. Because I often find that it says a lot about what the year is going to be kind of about. And Full Moon in Cancer pretty much sums up 2023. I mean, I get into this way more in The Threshold, but we're in a Chariot year. The Chariot is ruled by Cancer. There's a massive… I cannot explain to you with my words (Lindsay laughs) how much 2023 is about loosening, shedding skins, letting go. Those are just such fucking clichéd terms in this world. And this is actually a year when collectively, systemically, planetarily, personally, professionally, it is a time of that. We'll look back and mark, probably, this year as being a really strong peak in terms of that. I mean, we're always shedding skins in our lives, but when the collective energy is so strong in that direction, there's a beautiful opportunity to do that.
And what's so powerful about Full Moon energy? And again, this is about just touching in on the Full Moon in Cancer on the 6th of this month, just in a couple of days. About a week away. What's so powerful about Full Moon energy is that it presents us with a very natural, organic peak and apex of a particular cycle. And we're called to really harvest something and examine what we've grown, what we've sown. What do we want to keep? What do we want to compost? Like, this is a powerful time of reflection. And the fact that it's in Cancer means that we're doing that deep harvesting around… Essentially, if we think about the Fours of the Tarot, we're doing really deep harvesting and excavation work in those areas of our personal life where… Like the most tender parts of us, like the deep, inner fleshy part (Lindsay laughs) that we have crab shells covering, typically.
So what happens when we wisely and intelligently let go of some of those shells, some of those shells that are doing an excellent job of keeping us a little safer, a little further back, a little further away from ways in which we're actually being invited to show and shine our vulnerability far more than we currently are doing? That in a nutshell, sort of, is really 2023, but it sets the tone for a lot of January as well.
[0:06:55]
So January, the theme of it is about Trust. January's theme is Trust. And again, that is about January, but really is sort of about the whole year. And again, I'm casting the circle in a very wide way and I’m going to come back to the center, or come toward the center. But I think it's valuable to say, again, The Chariot is a very, very strong piece of medicine. It takes us… It's an initiation. It's a journey. That's what this year is. It's an initiation where we're gonna get called into the deepest, core, fleshy parts of ourselves and listen to them. Where we're going to be drawn a little bit further away—in some cases, a lot further away—from zones of our life where the brain, where the mind, where the ego is running the show.
And again, let's thank the brain, the ego, the mind. They do wonderful things. They're not the best, though, at running certain shows. Our brain telling us, “We’ll you’ve got to stay in this relationship because it’s what everybody expects of you. And it's working, so why look for…?” You know, whatever. When we… It's not like we're going through a temporary period of feeling a little bored, a little dissatisfied. It's like truly, we know we're complete. Like we know. We know. We know (Lindsay laughs). You know? How can we heed that? It doesn't mean we need to take immediate action. It just means that we're acknowledging like, “Oh, my brain really wants me to stay in this. My brain really wants me to hold onto this old way of doing something, but I can't do that anymore.”
That's the push-pull. That's the… That's the big tension of The Chariot is that the shell wants to keep everything looking the way it is, really nice. It doesn't want us to show up and be vulnerable. It doesn't want us to be seen. It doesn't want us to admit that this way that we've been in relationship, identifying ourselves, doing our work hasn't been working. Right? We don't want to be seen in that. And yet, being witnessed in that… And again, it's not about making a huge announcement for the whole world. It's about just acknowledging it in ourselves. Acknowledging in ourselves, “I'm complete with this and I don't know what that means.” It's the beginning part of The Chariot; our work with this card.
[0:09:41]
But the other piece about this and about the energy around this is that it's not just about what we're complete with. It's not just… It's the fact that because 2023 is a Chariot year, we're leaving Line One of The Majors, collectively. Which is way, way bigger than just The Chariot. Line One is all about identity. It's about structure. It's about who we are; what makes sense. It's about ordering a good life. It's about doing the things we have to do. It's about building foundation. Building healthy, crucial foundation. Foundation that we typically use as a really important Anchor for our lives to be able to say, “This is who I am. This is how I identify. This is what I do. This is how I am defined.” And when we choose… When The Fool flows up to The Chariot, because The Fool moves us from every card to the next. The Fool is the golden thread that stitches all the cards together. When The Fool taps The Charioteer on the shoulder and says, “Sweetheart, I don't know that this particular chariot, this particular vehicle is going to support you, is really going to be the vehicle that you need where you're going.”
And think about what Line Two… Line Two is the line of the underworld. It's the line of… It is the journey. It is the pilgrimage. It is the initiation. The point of Line Two, the journey has to do… As we transition, as we move through and journey through Strength all the way to Temperance, we shift out of the mind driving the car as much as it does, and move into way deeper co-collaboration with Source, which sounds really great on paper, and it is great. It's also really hard (Lindsay laughs). There's, like, a lot of work to it. Maybe hard wouldn't be the word someone else would choose. I think it's hard. You know, I do. I think it's intense work. Worth it, but intense.
So that's where the theme of this month, Trust, comes in. Because that work starts now. It starts today. It's been happening. And there’ve been… I'm sure you have been experiencing this in your own way. Where we all kind of are right now is recognizing—maybe it's a very small, specific area. Maybe it's very general—that there's some parts of our life that we’re complete with. You know? We don't want to take them any further. We can't really go any further with them. But we don't really know what or how to go about changing it. Maybe we do have an idea, but the path forward doesn't feel so clear.
[0:13:07]
This month is kind of the bridge from that place to a place where there will be greater clarity. Because the work… Really, the key piece of January and the medicine it's offering, what it's inviting us to really offer our attention to is to a place of trust. Trust that we will absolutely be called up into action when it's the right time. The place within us that is wiser than the mind in some ways, that does know when it's time to pause, when it's time to go. That, for some of us, will be the toughest part of the year. 2023 is also a time of profoundly deep unknowns. There's a lot of unknown this year. It's a very big part of the year. So embracing that and welcoming it, dare I say. Just being like, “Yeah, I don't…” What does being in the unknown do? It roots you and fixes you to this moment. And that's really what we're being called to come back to, you know, in any given time. So how can we let that bring us closer to the center? Right?
In the midst of this time of radical release, of huge birthing, of huge shedding of skins, moving from one place that's held us to another place, not having all the answers… Think about when a baby is born, no matter how it's born. It doesn't know what's going on. We don't know. Like, when we're rebirthed, we're not given that information. There may be some wisdom within us that says, “Oh my gosh, I'm being pushed into this area, or I'm being…” you know. There may be some wisdom that allows us to sort of organically move in a certain direction. But just because we're not, or we don't, or we need a little help, it's not wrong. So we don't know. A baby doesn't know that it's moving from this comfortable, warm womb to a really wild world (Lindsay laughs). Like, you know, even if the birth happens to be particularly harmonious, whatever the hell that means. I think birth is always pretty wild. But there's still enormous intensity around that. Enormous intensity. What the fuck is going on? Rooting to an Anchor is one of the most important things we can do for ourselves now. Obviously, a baby can't control that. But we can offer that to ourselves as a re-parenting. The Chariot is a big re-parenting too.
So even though Trust is really the word for January, the two other themes that popped up are Truth and Integrity, which I want to kind of dig into that. Holding to your integrity as far as commitments go. That doesn't mean you keep your commitments, no matter what. It means you practice integrity to yourself. You realign your integrity with a spiral flow rather than a linear flow. You ask, rather than defining integrity in—you know, I'm sure that some folks would…we might have a very healthy disagreement about this—in a more capitalist construct. “I'm exhausted, I'm broken, I'm beat down, and I promised all of this stuff to someone.” Rather than being really clear when it is absolutely our body saying, “No, I cannot continue with this.” Just can we add in 5% more softness? You can go to 100, if you want.
[0:17:05]
Reframing integrity as a willingness to be in integrity—as much as we have the capacity, the ability to—to our bodies first. What feels the softest to our body? What do we have, again, the capacity and the spaciousness to shift or to alter in service of that? If something can be even slightly more gentle, more drawn out, more fun, dare I say, can we go with that option? And I know some folks are listening to this being like, “Get the fuck out of here.” But those moments come in in really soft ways. Sometimes they're really subtle. And if we're not paying attention, we may miss them.
I know just for myself, like… And I'm coming into this with, of course, a lot of privilege. But even for myself, there are times when I'm absolutely convinced, like, I have to push, and grind, and get this. Like, I don't. I don't, actually. There are times where my spirit will sort of swoop in and go, “You actually don't have to do this today,” and they're right. I'm feeling like I have to do it today so I don't have to do it tomorrow. But tomorrow is actually maybe way more supportive and easeful, and it goes a lot faster than it would if I forced it today. Again, there are times where I make the decision to kind of lean in and push, and that's fine. I think that's alright. We're not going for a completely push-free life. It's life, after all.
But I make this connection because I think we define, you know, most of us integrity as like, “Well, I keep my word, no matter what.” This is really an invitation to keep a gentle presence with the body and with yourself, and tune in a little bit more and ask, like, “Is this integrity in integrity for me? Is this in alignment for me?” There have been times when I am called to be of service, to record something, to show up for a class or a workshop, when I was doing those, like not feeling well or in contraction. And it was a yes, and doing it actually kind of helped my body move to the other side of that contraction or that pain. Or it helped to provide honestly (Lindsay laughs) like a more helpful present moment Anchor to be teaching and serving inside of feeling a little uncomfortable. There are just as many times where canceling, or shifting, or rescheduling is the way.
[0:19:54]
And reframing integrity is a really important part of this month. And it's a really important part of trust because it brings up a hell of a lot of doubt and insecurity to say, “Well, I said I was going to do all these things, and now I'm not. And what does that mean about me?” And really, it doesn't mean anything, other than the fact that you're honoring yourself. So that's a big part, again, of trust. Trusting ourselves, trusting what we might call Spirit, you know. But trusting ourselves, opening to new opportunities, a new way, more vulnerability takes a tremendous amount of courage. And there's a lot of excitement to this year in this time, and a lot of kind of light dawning and us seeing something new that we weren’t able to fully perceive. When we trust ourselves, it, again, usually brings up quite a bit. And that goes back to that Full Moon and The Chariot work that kind of radiates on the whole month, the whole year sort of as a guiding theme. Letting that lunar light shine on all of the really deep stuff, all of the really tender stuff that's ready to bubble up and be worked with, you know?
Deep, deep trust is required of this time. And we're not always going to trust, but we're being called to play around with it and sense into our relationship with it, you know? Because again, I’ve said this before, leaving Line One of the Tarot, which we are doing this year, is absolutely an initiation and a movement to pivot into greater collaboration and surrender with Spirit. So it's a willingness to actually let Spirit and Source and our soul facilitate things, rather than us overriding that and making shit happen outside of that idea. So it's… (Lindsay sighs) Again, there are times when something is Spirit-guided, and it requires a tremendous amount of work and output. And we can look to nature as an example for this, right? Like, nature doesn't try, when bulbs are planted before the spring, the bulbs aren't saying like, “Well, I gotta get, like, a move on.” (Lindsay laughs) Like, they're resting until the soil warms enough for them to actually sprout and move their way forward. If they're not… I mean, bulbs have a life force of their own, but if they have a mind and a sentience to them, meaning they can perceive things and make those choices in the ways that we do, which is a little different, obviously, it would be akin to that.
Line Two basically says you don't have to do…you don't have to make anything happen. In fact, what we might define as making something happen, when it's an alignment with the soul, with Source, it just has a different ping and ring to it. It just… It flows differently. It comes together differently. Surrendering and letting something find us, and find you, and find, you know, us on the timing that's right is kind of what 2023 is all about. And it's not easy to do. And to sense into, like, “Is this the time to pause, and to wait, and to be in receiving? Is this the time to go?” I believe it may be confusing at times, but I also sense that we will really kind of know where we're going, and what action to take when we're called to do. So it doesn't mean we won't be called to do stuff in January or in 2023. It’s a hugely productive year. It means that we're actually waiting until we get that pull, get that Yes. When we actually have the information and we know, so we don't burn ourselves out on shit that doesn't really matter. You know?
[0:24:52]
So our card for January 2023 is Eight of Wands, which feels so right. And it's been sort of a present ally for us for the past few months. Any Eight in the Tarot is a card of transformation. We go into it one way, we come out of it different. Totally, totally what we're gearing up for. That's next year. 2024 is an Eight year. It's a Strength year. So Eight of Wands represents something that's already on its way. It's something that's already in motion. And our job—very similar to what I was just talking about—is to rest the body, prepare the body, nourish the body. Get all of our ducks in a row so that when those Wands come to our door, we can greet them as nourished, and as topped up, and as loved up as we could possibly hope to be.
And it's the ultimate, right, trust. It's the ultimate invitation to trust. Because we don't do that. Like, we don't know how to do that. Like I'm… You know, I’m just now in my work, in my practice starting to get a lot better at that. A lot better at being like, “Oh yeah, this thing's on its way. Cool. Can I… I have a little spaciousness here. Can I take that spaciousness rather than needing to fill it with this and that?” It's hard to do. You know, it's hard to frame that up when we just don't have the practice in this culture of, like, “Fill all the time you have.” You know? Or “idle hands are the devil's hands.” Like, it's a real bucking of that idea, you know, Eight of Wands.
So our job is to really hold to our trust and our integrity in the face of that calling; to welcome something and let something land at our doorstep. So it's really…it's a month of preparation. It's definitely a month of transformation. It's a month of change. And it's also about cultivating a much greater and more benevolent feeling, more homey feeling, or intimate feeling with Source. So there isn't a sense of like, “Spirit is doing something to me,” or “I'm… You know, I don't have freewill,” or “I can't take empowered action here or there,” because none of that's true. Source is inside of us. It represents a very wise, deeper compass than what's in our brains, what's in our forethought, right?
Like, what the mind tends to think, like, “This is the right time to do this,” might not be the right time that something wants to be born. The soul has enormous wisdom to it. And aligning ourselves with Source, or Spirit, or Divine, or whatever you want to call that, it's just linking to that. So it's not about some greater Being controlling our lives, or us saying, like, “Oh, I'll wait until you tell me to go.” It's actually inside of us. So tuning in with ourselves. That's why in the beginning of this episode, I talked about, like, coming home to those really tender parts in us and listening to them. Because they will really communicate about what they want, and what they're looking for. So building and nurturing a home within ourselves is a big part of this year; knowing we are home. You know, as maybe cheesy as that sounds, it's really a big part of it.
[0:28:47]
So, Eight of Wands. Something already in motion. Something we've set in motion a long time ago, a long time ago, coming forward, coming closer, and what that might trigger off for us, that kind of expansion. Because whenever there's sort of a vacuum, whenever we're called to kind of rest or prepare, or not go until the light turns green, so to speak, it can bring up a lot of stuff around unworthiness. It can bring up a lot of stuff around, “We're gonna miss it.” So that… Expect that feeling, that wounding of “If I don't go, I'm going to fuck everything up. If I don't move on something, if I don't get something going, I'm going to just be… I'm going to be fucked,” you know? “It's not right. I'm…” you know, those old stories can come up that we’re—and I think this word is really problematic in a million ways—but that we're lazy, or that we are somehow… Like, we don't know how to get things going. And I want to say to all of you, I totally honor and validate your feelings. And I do think that when it's really a green light, I mean, there's still a choice in it. We can not go. But when it's really a green light, you're going to go. Like, you're going to know to go, and you can trust yourself enough to know that you can do that.
So just know that by the very virtue of Eight of Wands coming forward because, again, Eight of Wands in and of itself is kind of an initiation. It basically says like, “Something is on its way. Can you open to receive it? Can you really make the space? Can you do whatever you have to do to prep yourself, to prepare your space for this thing to come in? And, you know, can you be really clear about your capacity, about your schedule, about your nourishment?” It’s almost preparing to, you know, give birth in a way, symbolically. Like, do we have stuff in the freezer? Are we as prepared as possible, you know, to the degree that we can be or have the capacity to be, so we're not scrambling once it's in motion and that proverbial baby is coming, you know? (Lindsay laughs) So that, in and of itself, is an act of trusting ourselves and Spirit. And it does bring up a lot of important stuff.
So here's the key. The key to silencing and shushing those really hard and painful feelings of unworthiness, about things not moving fast enough, about the fear and the worry that we're going to miss it, is not to jump that green light, is not to go while that light is still red. That's not going to silence that. It's not going to make you ultimately feel better. That's not gonna make any of us feel better. What we're actually being called to do is to soothe those feelings right at the root and say, “Okay, this is a big wound here, and that's really important for me to know.” Because how often do we see or bump up against our wounds and think, “Oh, if I do the opposite or if I really do…” You know, if this part of me is saying, “You're not moving fast enough,” and so we try to fill our schedule with every little thing, then when the actual thing that wants to come through that's really exciting in Eight of Wands, we have no room for it, or we have no resources for it, or capacity for it. And then it kind of floats away if we don't leave that space. So rather than kind of try to pacify through a different kind of action, can we just be with those feelings, right?
[0:32:45]
The card that came up around this sort of wound work as a kind of Anchor for what might be bubbling up for us to pay attention to around Eight of Wands themes was Seven of Swords reversed. So that's part of what I'm speaking to: letting those two Swords that you can't carry go, and that includes the brain noise. If it helps for anyone to hear this, there's literally never been a course, an offering, something I've put into the world, including certain podcast episodes, that my mind isn't screaming at me about, like, “It's not good enough. You need to start over. People are gonna hate it,” whatever. And also, people can not like it. That's okay. It's no reason not to do something. But it's not… I've learned—and I have to really bow to Michelle for this because their work has been so helpful in this space—it's not the truth. It's not the truth. A lot of the time, that sort of screaming and ranting from the brain is because I'm onto something pretty powerful, and it's trying to protect me, you know, in its own funny way.
So the mind is the one that says, “You need to have those two Swords. You need to have those two Swords. You gotta pick them up. You gotta pick them up. You gotta get them, you gotta get them, you gotta get them.” We don't gotta get them. And in fact, saying, “You know, those two Swords are on the ground for a reason. I already have five in my fucking hand right now. Five in my arms, five on my lap, five, like, wherever they are. Those are the things I need to tend to.” That kind of devotional discernment, that kind of clarity, we're being asked for it to be razor fucking sharp right now. Razor sharp in terms of like, “This is not in alignment for me right now.”
You know, it's… Really, time management is also a part of it, which I am so…I struggle with the same way as I think a lot of people do. It's kind of like mind management. It's just saying like, “Okay, this thought is here. Can I record anyway and just notice what comes up maybe?” I find a lot of the time when my mind is really kind of ranting and raving, it can be helpful to remember that other people engaging with my work also might have minds that are very loud and very busy. And maybe I can speak directly to some of those feelings, you know? (Lindsay sighs) So all that being said, I think that Seven of Swords reversed is really just giving us a really helpful heads-up to what to look for. So when those wounds come up, we can tend them, rather than believe through taking some sort of alternate action to quiet them, that'll actually give us what we're looking for, which it will not, unfortunately.
[0:36:03]
And then how can we work with these energies? Three cards came up. So I'm just going to briefly touch on them as sort of one unit: Justice, Queen of Cups reversed, and The Moon. So just real light fare (Lindsay laughs) came up around how we can work with Eight of Wands, and the Seven of Swords reversed-ness that's sort of coming up as a response to the expansiveness of Eight of Wands.
So step one, kind of task one is really just recognizing that a lot of January is going to be a lot of embracing of the unknown, and a lot of being called to look past the surface, down into the deeper stuff. So can we embrace that? Can we just embrace the hell out of the discomfort, out of the unknown, and understand we're not going to know? We're not going to know what's coming in those Eight of Wands. We're not going to know what’s sort of… Just to be with the moment. Just be with it. We will not have the answers that we're craving about several different things, and that's not… (Lindsay sighs) It can make a person feel like, you know, they're absolutely tumbling end over end. It's a terrible feeling to not know. And when we can bow to this moment, when we can be with what is, when we can call upon the resources that nurture us in those moments, it can be very…it can be the raft, be the boat that helps get us through those waters. So The Moon coming up really lets us know that inside of this, how to work with this energy is really just to float with it. It’s really just to be like, “Meh, no idea what's going on. I baked a loaf of bread, I went out to dinner, I went to bed early, went to bed late,” whatever. Like, I'm just… It’s okay. Like, we don't have to know.
[0:38:13]
Queen of Cups reversed, crucial for us to be taking time, true time for ourselves. Time that doesn't just pacify. Time that is not just like whittling away, but time that really fills up the cup, as it were. When Queen of Cups reversed comes up, it's kind of like a bit of a more amplified, more urgent knock at the door of our hearts being like, you're being called out to the edge of the sea of your being by yourself. Like, this is a call from inside the house. You’ve got to come out here or the knocks are only gonna get more intense, you know? So gently identifying the aspects of ourselves that are calling us back home, and doing what we can to make space for those things.
And then Justice. Justice, in a way that is so hard for the human mind to hold, and I understand because I… You know, Justice is hard. It's really like, it is what it is. It just… It, I-T, capital I, capital T. It is what it is. We may not know. We may know. It may be exciting. It may be infuriating. It's neutral. It's not neutral to us and to the mind because we're human, and that's so valid. But Justice actually does present a neutral eye, and it really does say, “Can we just honor and bow to what is, and just be with it?” It's a moment-to-moment practice. It's really a very strong initiatory time. And if we can be with the wonderful and with the challenging in every moment, and lean into how far, how spacious that deep inner trust can be, can go within us, again, it will be very powerful. It will open us to a great many things. And that is, in a nutshell, the download for January of 2023.
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So now I'm going to shift into our listener question. This is from Anonymous, and they ask,
Hi, Lindsay. Thanks for offering your unique magic to the collective.
Thank you.
I have a question about the Eight of Cups. I've always had a strong reaction to this card because of my personal story of being adopted. A lot comes up for me around walking away from things, or things walking away from me. So even just the imagery of this card feels activating for me. And yet, it has also been a dear ally over the past two years as I have embarked on so much soul journeying and big life changes. I wouldn't trade the experiences I've had, but I'll admit that parts of me want the change to stop me so I can settle into what I'm building now.
Whenever I pull the Eight of Cups, I have an immediate fear of the rug being pulled out from under me, from losing what I love, and from having to walk away from things I want to keep in my life. Even though this hasn't been my actual on-the-ground experience of this card, it still comes up for me every time. How can I work with the Eight of Cups to reduce my fear of this energy, and to appreciate what actually is? What can we do when we fear an energy that time and time again proves to be helpful for us, but we find ourselves so scared of anyways?
[0:41:39]
Thank you for honoring me with such a deep question, Anonymous. And I just want to take this moment to bow to you and to bow to all adoptees. I know that being an adoptee is completely unique for every person, and all feelings about it are valid. But I do know how immensely challenging it can be inside of that identity, inside of that experience. And I'm just bowing to you with the deepest, fullest, most empathic heart that I possibly could. And again, it is a privilege to bear witness to you inside of this incredibly tender, beautiful, important, multilayered work you're doing with yourself, with the Tarot.
So again, I'm sort of going to start from the edges and work my way in, if that's alright. I want to start with the last part of your question, which is so brilliantly communicated, which is, “What can we do when we fear an energy that time and time again proves to be helpful for us, but we find ourselves still scared anyway?” That is kind of the thesis statement, I would say, of my work with the Tarot as it pertains to a practice of rewilding our relationship to it. So I have an offering about this, Rewilding the Tarot, but I'm not pitching my offering (Lindsay laughs). Just naming that if you want more, it's out there. Rewilding is an ecological term that was coined by Michael Soulè along with another biologist. And Jesse Wolf Hardin had a relationship and had a hand in forming sort of a modern-day definition of that word.
And rewilding is essentially doing whatever we can do, as humans, to remove blocks and impediments that have been placed onto the land. So loosening up the places that are actively blocked, where there's actually sort of a detriment happening to a particular area of nature, and then getting the hell out of there and leaving it alone (Lindsay laughs), you know? And rewilding is a process that we've seen has totally restored and worked on multiple levels with animal habitats in certain areas, with different plants, or herbs, or flowers, or species coming back once humans back away and leave it alone. So we do whatever we can to help a process, and then we leave nature to itself.
[0:44:39]
I believe that when we map that process on to our relationship with particular Tarot cards or the Tarot, the same thing happens. When we identify places that you have so beautifully identified here in your question, “I have a huge fear, a huge wave of trauma, a huge wave of worry come over me every time I see Eight of Cups, even though I know in my lived experience and my actual field study the card doesn't bring that up.” That process of rewilding applies here, because we know that the thing that needs tending… The Tarot often provides kind of a blank slate, a conduit, as it were, for things that are really deep and tender, and deeply buried within ourselves to come up.
So I'm not a therapist, of course, and I'm not speaking in the capacity of anyone who's, you know, giving help in that way. Just speaking within my own lane. But it seems to me that you're having a very normal, natural… Based on what you experienced and the trauma you've been through, having a very valid and understandable response to this card that is about moving away from something that we've outgrown, that says that perhaps… This is totally my own, but your little one is saying, “Don't leave me. I don't want anybody to leave me. I don't want to be left. What if something happens and I'm shocked away from the comfort, from the security, and from the base that I'm so craving and seeking?” So this is something I don't know that I've ever actually spoken about as specifically as I'm about to. But I actually think that the Tarot is one of the most interesting places to re-parent our little ones to the capacity that we feel like we can do.
My little one has extremely strong responses to certain cards. I appreciate and really value The Tower. My little one is very frightened of it, especially because of this past year. They don't want shocks. They don't want devastation. They don't want, you know… They associate that now with certain things. And that's a part of my continual rewilding, re-parenting, like, love practice with myself to say, “There is medicine in this card and, little one, your feelings about whatever this card is bringing up is so valid.” So every time The Tower comes up, it's actually…and it's a weird and wild detour. You know, it's not quite the linear experience of pulling a card and going, “Oh, you know, okay, The Tower,” or “the Eight of Cups. Interesting.”
[0:48:07]
It's actually more about an invitation to heal the part of me that has been so scarred by shocks and by, like, up-leveled foundations way before. I mean, from the time I was very young. My little one doesn't really like The Moon because we were left alone so much through pain, through difficulties. There was such a measurable… I was alone my entire childhood. Like, no one was my parent. My primary parent was literally sleeping my entire childhood. And when they were awake, they were usually violent and angry. So I didn't have anybody, you know, and it was crushing. So my kid doesn't like The Moon. And it's kind of part of my job (Lindsay sighs) to say, okay, as a field researcher, I do understand the value and the medicine of what The Moon brings. And as a person, I have certain things mapped onto this card and the way that it feels. And I get to, you know, sweep my kid up and tend to them because they don't like it.
You know, so (Lindsay sighs) I don't think that our inner little ones—or even our scared adult selves, because they're just as worthy of tending as our own inner kiddos—I don't know that we're necessarily supposed to avoid what you're speaking to here, Anonymous. I think that it's part of what many of us, very unconsciously, are actually drawn to by picking up and working with a Tarot practice. Because it lights up parts of us that are not immediately present. You know, it lets us know, like, “Oh, right. There's still a part of me that is so scared of the rug getting ripped out from under me.” For a completely different set of circumstances, Anonymous, I also have that fear. That's one of my little kid’s greatest fears. And it's hard to talk to them about it and to soothe them because sometimes the rug does get ripped out from under us in life. And that's really hard to hold that paradox.
So I think in answer to your question, your tender, beautiful, valid, worthy, gorgeous, shining question that you've asked me is, we hold the both/and of it. We acknowledge that having a soul-led Tarot practice is just not separate from those deep inner parts. So what I believe is actually happening is you're having, again, a very valid, triggered response to this card because of, again, the unbelievably…the true and valid wounds that you've had in this area of being abandoned, or being walked away from, or walking away, or again, the suddenness, or the shock, or not wanting things to change. And this card doesn't, as you say—you've already observed this—doesn't actually… Like, it doesn't happen. Those things don't happen in that particular card. We're not… That's not what this card is bringing, which, again, you know.
[0:52:34]
So what I would say is, can you let this card, Eight of Cups, in whatever way feel safe to you to do this? Can you actually let it be about the re-parenting and about the acknowledging first, rather than trying to sort of…? I don't think you're actually bypassing that but, like, weave it into the whole experience with this card. If it helps you, I have to do that with quite a few of these cards. Like, little Linds comes first, and then I'll tune in with the card. That's why some of my ways that I teach these cards are a little different, even very subtly so, because I have to go so deep with them. In other words, there's work with myself, there's check-ins with Spirit. Like, “Spirit, we're afraid that this might happen. What is it actually bringing?” Realizing that it can show up so differently from situation to situation. It’s keeping the curiosity way open. It's like a relationship with another person. We don't say, “I know everything there is to know about that person, and the end,” you know? We're constantly learning new things and not, ideally, making assumptions.
I think that the fact that this card feels activating for you is so valid. And I think… And I welcome you responding to me over email to let me know how this landed. I hope that I was as sensitive and as respectful as I attempted to be in answering this, what’s such a big question. I did get a yes to answer it. So if there's any kind of clarification or any kind of…anything else you'd like me to know about how my answer landed with you, I'm totally here for it. I would say, tend to that immediate fear of the rug getting ripped out from under you. Maybe even saying to your kiddo in your own words like, “Oh, sweetheart, I… Yes, that fear is so valid, and that's not what's happening today. I've got you. I'm not going anywhere. I'm right here. And even if we do take a tumble, even if the rug shifts from under us, I'm not going anywhere. I'm here. I'm never going to leave you.”
I mention that as a helpful invitation because that actually is what my kid needs to hear from me all the time, is that I'm not going to leave them. Because I do sometimes, you know? I'll go off here or there and forget that they need more tending than I give them credit for, that part of myself. So I'm… They definitely do not let me off the hook. And they do remind me, “Hey, you know, this part of you really needs some tending.”
[0:55:54]
Perhaps using the card as a call, as an ally, and as an Anchor into re-parenting that particular wound. It won't be the only tool. And, you know, healing is spiralic and not linear, so there's no like, “Hey, do this and you won't have that trigger anymore.” I promise you, though, that there'll be seasons to the trigger you'll start noticing. Like, “Oh, it's much, much softer today and, you know, there's more openness here.” And there might be times where it's big. There might be times where you need to take it out of the deck, and that's really valid.
So, again, let me know how this lands with you. I'm always open to feedback and responses from folks like letter writers. But I just really want to say that I'm rooting for you, and I think you're an incredible self-parent. And I'm sending love to you and this part of yourself, and to all of us who are doing the best we can to be self-parents for a million different reasons. And again, I just want to fully acknowledge and name that although I used myself and called in my own experience to kind of express my own journey, it's not comparing my own journey to that of an adopted person. That's really unique and very specific, and I'm just bowing to that with as much respect as it deserves. So, again, let me know how this lands. But thank you, again, for honoring me with this question. I think you're doing a beautiful job. And hopefully, my answer spoke to what you were asking for with specificity and helpfulness.
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[Conclusion]
[0:57:53]
Thank you so much, again, for being here with me, Wild Souls. It's always such a joy to get to record these and connect with y'all. I have, again, a couple of real exciting things coming to this audience particularly, but anybody who engages with my work. And I'm just excited for us to be here together for this round and this season of the pod. Wishing all of you a really lovely, gentle, easeful transition into 2023, a really, really gentle, easeful Full Moon, a really easeful shift from a Lovers year into a Chariot year. Thanks so much for being here with me again. As always, we're going to be off next week. So there's not a podcast episode next week, but we'll be back the week after. I believe that's… Ooh, I believe that's Friday the 13th, so that will be our next episode. Okay, loves, take care. And, yeah, until we meet again, please take exquisite care of yourselves.