Tarot Card for the Day ~ December 21

Queen of Spears

Dindrane

Focus for the Day:  What is your unique personal sacred quest?  How can you recommit to it, know it more fully, and take a concrete step toward it today? How can you open to that in you which is compassionate, kind, healing, artistic, gentle, honorable – and let those qualities become the pillars of your strength?

Well. We haven’t seen this card since December 11 of 2008.  And it’s such a valuable card. 

Certainly a suitable card for Yule –the Winter Solstice — a day which so many spiritual paths consider sacred, characterized by the deepening of spirituality and a thinning of the veils between worlds, realms and dimensions.

Some readers find the Queen of Spears to be a dark, kind, friendly and honorable woman, or any person whose energy reflects those qualities.  Others see her as a person of deep spiritual strength, one who encourages the higher aspirations of others.  I like that.  Still others find her to be the archetypal shepherdess, or a woman known for mysticism and visionary experiences. 

I perceive the Queen of Spears to be the card of the feminine sacred quest.  Although most people don’t know it or remember it – even the ones who have read Arthurian legends since childhood – there was one single woman who was among those who quested for the Holy Grail. 

She was Dindrane, Percivale’s sister.  A princess and an anchoress − in Christianity, a woman who chooses to withdraw from the world to live a solitary life of prayer − she was a most helpful director, motivator and advisor to the only three knights who did in fact ultimately achieve the Grail.  

In our culture, as in most cultures over the past 5,000 years, it is generally the guys who go off questing, pursuing the sacred, etc., etc., etc.  Or at least it’s the fellas whose stories get told.  Time for that to change, and also time for us, umm… penile Americans to aspire to, embrace and foster the divine feminine.

So, on this Yule, and therefore throughout the entire season of winter:

Ladies: each of you, what is your unique personal sacred quest?  How can you recommit to it, know it more fully, and take a concrete step toward it today?

Gentlemen: how can you open to that in you which is congruent with the energy of the Divine Feminine — compassionate, kind, healing, artistic, gentle, honourable – and let those qualities become the pillars of your strength?

Bright blessings and the touch of the sacred!

Quote for the Day: We are all affecting the world every moment, whether we mean to or not. Our actions and states of mind matter, because we are so deeply interconnected with one another.   ~ Ram Dass
 

Today’s Weather:  Traces of faeriefire across all quarters.  Carry a butterfly net and some macaroons.  Avoid toadstool remnants near you path.  Tread gently. 

 On This Date: 69 – The end of the Year of the four emperors: Following Galba, Otho and Vitellius, Vespasian becomes the fourth Emperor of Rome within a year.  [Coincidentally, the Roman Senate ends its practice of choosing as emperor whosoever can pee farthest in freezing weather.]

And: In England, during the 18th century, there was a revival of interest in Druids. Today, amongst Neo-druids, Alban Arthan (Welsh tr. light of winter but derived from Welsh poem, Light of Arthur) is celebrated on the winter solstice with a ritualistic festival, and gift giving to the needy. 

Blessed Yule!

A Solstice Litany:

 For the return of the sun ~~ blessing and praise!

 For all gift-givers ~~ blessing and praise!

 For the Children of Wonder ~~ blessing and praise!

 For children everywhere ~~ blessing and praise!

 For sunsets and starlight ~~ blessing and praise!

 For fabulous feast days ~~ blessing and praise!

 For those who cook them ~~ blessing and praise!

 For the tree in the corner ~~ blessing and praise!

 For the candles in the window ~~ blessing and praise!

 For the icicles on the trees ~~ blessing and praise!

 For light on the snowfields ~~ blessing and praise!

 For charity and peace ~~ blessing and praise!

 For the robin and wren ~~ blessing and praise!

 For animals everywhere ~~ blessing and praise!

                                                                   ~ John Matthews,

                                                                    from The Winter Solstice,

                                                the Sacred Traditions of Christmas 

 

Tarot Card for the Day ~ December 20

Ace of Cups

The Holy Grail

  

Focus for the Day: What is your Holy Grail?  What is the highest, most perfect ideal you can strive for?  What is the purest, most positive thing you can aspire to do?  Who or what is the best, most brilliant, most caring version of yourself you can seek to become? Starting today, this minute, how can you honor THAT knowing, THAT aspect, THAT vision of yourself and your life?

We last saw this card less than two weeks ago.  And it’s a wonderful, beautifully spiritual card, so it’s perfect that it has come back around in this season, and particularly today, winter solstice eve.

Many spiritual traditions consider today the time when the veils between the realm of ordinary reality and the realms of spirit are at their absolute thinnest. Some Celtic  spiritual paths believe that winter solstice eve is the time when the spirits of all those who have died since the last winter solstice will be taken from this realm into the lands of eternal rest. So PLEASE take advantage of the energies and openings today in a sacred, loving and healing way.

[The 2009 Winter Solstice will occur at 12:47 p.m. on Monday, December 21, 2009. That will be the local time on the eastern coast of the continental United States.]

Aces in any Tarot deck are cards of a new beginning.  So, that being the case, how can you (how would you like to or how do you need to) begin your life anew, today, right now?  What changes can you begin, even in small ways?  What potentials can you believe in, hope for, reach for and remember?  (And you can expect The Universe will keep asking that question until you all remember to ask it alla tyme by yourself!)

In any Tarot deck, the Ace of Cups is interpreted as a card of abundance, joy and even divine inspiration. [Ahem!] Some readers speak of this as a card of tremendously uplifting energy. [Ahem!  Ahem!]

My own intuitive interpretation is based on the beautiful illustration of the Ace of Cups/Holy Grail in the Legend deck created by Anna Marie Ferguson.  

  

There have been many visions of what the Grail may really be. 

~ Some have seen it as the vessel from which Jesus drank at the Last Supper. 

~ Some perceive it as one of the Great Magical Cauldrons of Celtic spirituality. 

~ Others have thought it a huge jewel broken from the crown of Lucifer when he was cast out of heaven.  [Me, I’ve always thought Lucifer got a bad rap.  What if he really WAS a light-bringer, and religious bigotry and opposition simply worked to dog him down?] 

~ It has even been written that the Grail is a great crystal at the juncture between the Shamanic upper, lower and middle worlds, and that our ordinary reality world balances upon its tip. 

I see this card as being about regeneration − which makes sense, as so many of the objects mentioned here are mystical, magical, regenerative tools. 

The Ace of Cups asks that we be open to rebirth, perhaps a spiritual rebirth, and that we begin to seek it today. 

Most importantly for me, our culture has come to see the Grail as a symbol of purity and perfection.  So when I work with clients and this card comes up, I say,

What is your Holy Grail?  What is the highest, most perfect ideal you can strive for? What is the purest, most positive thing you can aspire to do?  Who or what is the best, most brilliant, most caring version of yourself you can seek to become? 

Now, starting today, this minute, how can you honor THAT knowing, THAT aspect, THAT vision of yourself and your life?

Well? 

It may take a little work, sure, but you’re certainly worth it!

Bright blessings, and a beautiful Solstice Eve!

Quote for the Day:  The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult and left untried. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Today’s Waethyr:   Soaring grindylows  debating diurnal gandayaks about the possibility of the existence of humans. Hone your hoopoes. All of them. 

On This Date: 1192 – Richard the Lion-Heart is captured and imprisoned by Leopold V of Austria on his way home to England after signing a treaty with Saladin ending the Third crusade.