Over the Hump by Kate Mura of Group Tarot
A space for tarot reflection for the day, week, or moment it comes across your screen. Each of these is reworked intentionally for The Edge, from the egregore of Group Tarot’s Card of the Week, to center education, diversity, and intuition.
Partial content copyright 2023 Group Tarot. Used with permission.
Did you get to see the eclipse???
It was too cloudy for me to notice anything but the diffused golden light in the sky, however my skin remembered.
I woke up because of my skin.
It felt the same way it did leading up to the 2017 eclipse. I traveled with friends into eastern Oregon to enjoy the full umbra.
My skin feels different during an eclipse. Almost like being cold but not quite. Like a shiver was ramping up but never released & stays just a few hairs away from edging…
It’s alive, and light, and effervescent. I stayed on my bed meditating, reflecting, crying.
My father never got to experience a full solar eclipse in his lifetime, emphasis on full. He enjoyed the partial in 2017.
The energy was rife for reflection and contemplating personal alignment.
I went into this idea of a Year review thinking that I would both see themes and potentially even notice if there were any little keys or symbols that popped up habitually before the loss of a loved one since this year was a massive harvest of dear dear souls, even before the surge of violence in Israel and Palestine.
Please do make sure you know your history before forming any opinions and remember to look to Arab and Palestinian news sources as well.
Here is a simple guide to start you off
Honestly, looking at all of this together, what I am really feeling is a massive amount of overwhelm. So instead, I am going to break things down.
And it got long!!!
Fair warning.
TLDR: Even though this last year we had some massive upheavals, we also had some glorious successes and celebrations that our community and best friends were with us for and through. Despite friction, our consistency and community allowed us to refine ourselves and thrive, pulling us back to Earth when we got ungrounded.
By the numbers:
We had 24 different decks from 22 different creators!
Those decks were:
Note: even if multiple cards were pulled in a week, here I am counting per week, not per card.
- Spirit Keepers Tarot 1
- Sovereign Oracle 3
- Pride Tarot 4
- Divine Muses Oracle 2
- Gentle Creatures Wisdom 5
- Cirque du Tarot by Leeza Robertson 2
- Universal Waite Smith 2
- Portland Pagan crowd sourced Tarot 2
- 78 Tarot Carnival by 78 artists 1
- Tarot Neocolonial de las Americas 1
- Tarot of the Sidhe 4
- Wise Fool Tarot 1
- Modern Witch Tarot 2
- William Blake Tarot 1
- The Journey to Enlightenment Tarot 2
- Inner Child 2 Lua Tarot 2
- Shadowscapes Tarot 1
- Last Unicorn Tarot 1
- Rebel Deck 1
- Trick-or-Treat Tarot 1
- Beloved Dead Oracle 1
- The Disrupture Deck 1
- Sacred Sisterhood Tarot 1
In counting these up, I may have missed some… but I’m not going to search through more.
Rather, I’m going to look at the neat pile I created from this Grand Tableau, to borrow a Lenormand term, and play with them to see what story emerges on this cool afternoon.
But first, a mug of warm cider! And the last slice of chocolate chip cherry banana bread.
I’ll wait for you to grab a snack. This is a long CotW. 🙂
It’s amazing how the simple act of gathering every card together, makes this whole idea SO MUCH MORE MANAGEABLE.
Plus, I have the whole day available. And I needed it!
There’s a metaphor/allegory here…
Now, to play and re-arrange!
In terms of popularity/number of cards pulled, we have some ties:
- 5 Sovereign Oracle Cards & Gentle Creature cards
- 4 Tarot of the Sidhe, Pride Tarot, & Universal Waite Smith
- 3 Lua Tarot & Wise Fool
All the small oracle cards Theresa Pridemore created kinda give us a sentence for this past year: Despite friction, our consistency and community allowed us to refine ourselves and thrive, pulling us back to Earth when we got ungrounded.
What sentence do you put together? I’d love to compile them and share with everyone here.
Now, to the rest of the cards! Looking at like with like.
Our Court Cards.
Two different Queen/Royals of Swords/Epes, two different Guardian/King of Pentacles/Crystals, and the King/Royal of Cups.
I love how we have played with and explored gender roles this year! Traditionally masculine energy is in traditionally feminine suites and vice versa. We know that transitions are welcome as we come home into our bodies, for both cis and trans folx. Shani Bagwell Harris has a great discussion of this on her FB page Oct. 8, 2023.
We know that women are smart, keen, discerning, decisive, able to prune down to the essentials. We know that men have a wide array of feelings, can nurture, be empathetic, go with the flow, be pregnant with creative and sometimes human, lives.
We know these qualities are in all bodies, all sex/gender combinations, and maybe we have dreamed about what it would be like to have true acceptance of all sexes & genders, of loving all of ourselves and our bodies.
And we stay curious about ourselves and each other – I had the Page of Swords in the wrong pile! We have our gender queer/non-conforming representation too! Yay!
We had A LOT of Major Arcana.
The Wheel of Fortune came up three different times from three different decks!
We created a solid foundation and had the ability to ride the highs and navigate the lows.
Hopefully, Card of the Week is one of the tools helping you through the lows. A weekly touchstone to consistent community, as our line of little oracle cards stated.
It’s interesting to note that we have 3, 4, 5, (skip 6) 7, 8, before jumping with even numbers 10, 12 and ending with The Sun, 19.
We skipped The Lovers and Strength, for here, Tarot of the Sidhe follows the Thoth Keys where Justice is 8 and Strength is 11 (flip-flopped in RWS tradition.)
Were we missing some love this year? Feeling weak or fragile? I know I definitely had big ole times where I felt like this! You?
And yet, all of this helped hone our personal messages, our perspective of the world, the ability to tell a different story, compose music & art, find our flexibility, knowing that a new day will always rise. Blessed be the Sun!
Looking at the Minor Arcana, we have the entire journey 1-10 and the only instance of a card chosen twice from the same deck, the 10 of Pentacles from Cirque du Tarot – a card we got three times.
That theme of threes!
We may have had a solid foundation of ups and downs, but in that three, we also had a solid foundation of community, friends, family, mutual aid, and people cheering us on from the wings.
Our grief, tears, and loss came up twice in the Five of Cups.
We also had, besides those 10 of Pentacles, close friends to celebrate with (3 of Cups) to align with spiritually (Warrior 3) and make magick together. Sometimes we were like an archer waiting to release the bow at the right time (Warrior 7 & 7 of Pentacles) knowing that everything has it’s right time and place, but not necessarily wanting to wait.
Looking at this 8 of Pentacles now, I am reminded of making the spheres for Rebels & Priestesses; did you have a creative project that kept you up to all hours? Or was on a deadline? Or had a lot of repetition? Going into the next year, we might want to recommit to healthy boundaries and practice habits.
Looking at the Gentle Creatures Wisdom cards all together, did you have someone to tell your secrets to when you felt uprooted? Were you able to conjure nurturers – including yourself! – and still find ways to play? Play – literal play, performing in plays, teaching theatre – definitely helped me when I felt uprooted, and helped nurture my soul.
Looking at our other Oracle cards together, a pair from Divine Muses and a pair from Beloved Dead, were we chicken, fearful looking into the Unknown? Did we trust and look to the Solar Feminine – back to our theme of shifting up gender norms. Yeah! – or Ancestors? Animals? the Divine? the Elements? for messages? Did you listen? What can you do to be braver next year?
Phew! That’s a lot!
And then our lone Rebel Card, $$$ Make it Rain or Make it Rain $$$,depending on which side you look at as the top and bottom.
I find this card kind of hilarious because a) I was places with good amounts of literal rain b) my tears definitely felt like rain at times c) I found ways to be generous with my resources d) I received an Arts3C grant from Regional Arts & Culture Council for Rebels and Priestesses, as well as two foundation grants for my theatre company e) I am always working on my relationship with money.
Value and money and the ability to meet needs, can happen in a myriad of ways. It is part of why sustainable is part of my personal code of ethics, my vision and work for the future.
This is all part of our foundation for the year to come.
Whether it has already begun, is about to begin, or is still months away, I hope you see your journey here, that this helps, and I would love to hear from you.
All the b.e.s.t,
*b.e.s.t. = beautiful. equitable. sustainable. timely.
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