Health and Fitness Tarot

Today I’m starting a nutrition challenge through my gym, so I thought I would do a tarot spread to examine and clarify what I need to focus on during the four weeks of the challenge.

I looked around for some health and fitness spreads but didn’t find much that was close to what I was looking for, until I found A Tarot Spread for Achieving Weight Loss by This Aquarian Life. Even though I’m not specifically focused on weight loss (I’m looking to clean up my nutrition habits, increase my energy, and be more consistent in the gym), the spread is just right for the challenge.

The spread is shaped like an upward pointing arrow, and laid from shaft to tip.

Card 1 – Current Situation and Basis/Foundation

Ten of Pentacles. This card represents wealth and long-term success. Financial stability. Since this isn’t a financial challenge, I’m reading this as a reference to my past relationship with nutrition. I tracked macros for a long time, and I lost fifty pounds. Unfortunately, I’ve gained sixty pounds since then! But I know I should be confident in this challenge because I’ve done this before. I know I have past success as a foundation.

Card 2 – Mental Blocks to Overcome

Nine of Pentacles. This card represents abundance and luxury. It’s enjoying the bounty of your work. I think that this card speaks to the last one because even though I know I should be confident… I’m scared to start this challenge and fail. A voice in the back of my head asks if I have the strength in me to build a body that I’ll feel at home in. I need to tell that voice to fuck right off.

Card 3 – Emotional Blocks to Overcome

Eight of Pentacles. So strange for a run of Pentacles to come out of a well-shuffled deck like this. It’s a message, for sure! This card represents putting in the work, and slowly mastering the tasks at hand. I know that it’s a long process… but I want to skip to the end now! I feel like because I’ve been through this process before, it should be quick and easy. But it won’t be. It’s going to take just as long to do it this time as it did before, and just as long as it did to undo it. Everything takes time. Embrace the journey. Learn to love the struggle.

Card 4 – Physical Blocks to Overcome

Three of Wands. This card represents progress and expansion. After some success, you look to expand. It’s a bit ironic since I’m looking to shrink a bit… but I think there’s a deeper message about becoming consistent. I think this one is about fitness and getting active. I used to go to the gym six times a week, sometimes even twice a day. I may not need to do that right off the bat here since I’ve been struggling to go once or twice a week for the past year… but I very much want to get into the gym more and improve my athletic performance. Even if it hurts a lot in the beginning!

Card 5 – Current Attitude

Justice. This card represents truth and law. I think this refers to the fact that I’m entering this challenge with the idea that I should do everything exactly right. Target macros to the number. No deviation. No flexibility. The letter of the law.

Card 6 – Recommended Attitude to Adopt

Queen of Swords. This card represents independent judgement and clear communication. It’s very similar to Justice, but with an element of flexibility and “thinking for yourself” that tempers the message. Be honest, communicate, think for yourself, but don’t be afraid to take input and help from others.

Card 7 – Allies

Queen of Pentacles. My friends the Pentacles are back! The queen represents a nurturing provider. Honestly, in this context she’s like the Goddess of Meal Prep. I will absolutely be praying at her feet for the next twenty-eight days!

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An Introduction to Shamanic Journeying

This weekend, I had the privilege of attending a workshop on shamanic journeying at Soul Space. I’ve tried a few guided meditations and meditated on the runes before, but this is the first time I’ve had any training on journeying.

I was expecting it to have the same feel as a rune meditation, so I was very surprised that the experience was different for me. While the runes have recently started to reveal visuals to me, the first few times I could only feel sensations and knowledge. When the sound of the drum began, I immediately started to see lights and colours… and they formed into distinct images that I felt I could truly see in my mind. I wonder if the theta waves kick in that strongly just from the sound, or if it’s because of the live experience in the circle? I’m on the hunt for some good recordings so that I can find out if there’s a difference when I journey at home.

We travelled to both the lower and upper realms, and while I found that it was easier to access the lower, I feel more attracted to the upper. It felt like they were really excited to see me up there, so I think my next journey will be upwards. I don’t want to neglect the lower and middle realms, though, so I plan to make sure that I split my time to keep myself grounded.

One of the most interesting things that came out of my journey was a feeling that I had been neglecting the health of my solar plexus chakra. I’ve never given it much thought, because I considered it less important than others, like the third eye, heart, or root chakras. I have to admit I don’t even know what it’s for! So, I’d like to do some study on its meaning and how I can keep it healthy. It’s time to find some resources so that I can get researching!

Maybelle Mae, Mabel Krantz

Today, my grandmother drew her last breath, with my mother holding her hand. There are few people I’ve had a more complicated relationship with than my grandmother.

I remember when I was young, she would babysit me, and we would curl up in her big yellow chair and watch Sesame Street. That chair was one of my favorite places to be, warm and fuzzy and full of love. We would sing along and laugh.

Sometimes we didn’t laugh. When I misbehaved, she would threaten and sometimes make good on her promise to spank me, with a wooden spoon or a paint stick.

She taught me about psychics and mysticism, even though it was more her mother than herself who embraced the tradition of the witch.

She also taught me, at the tender age of six, that I should swirl food on my mouth and spit it out, instead of eating it. “You get all the taste, but you won’t get so fat.”

I was in awe of her habit of spending a few minutes a day standing on her head. Inversion, she told me, was key: it sent fresh blood to your brain and kept you young. I studied yoga because I believed there was truth in her words.

She never left the house without a full face of makeup on, and she taught me how I could use a scarf to put on my dress after I’d beat my face, so that I wouldn’t get a mark on the fabric. It was a great disappointment to her that I didn’t wear lipstick every day.

Maybe it was the lipstick thing… or maybe it’s because I’m bisexual AF (surprise, Grandma!)… but she sighed and shook her head at me on the regular, telling me I looked like “a sad little lesbian.” She thought I should find a man to take care of me.

She glared and glowered at my grandfather, and from the time I was born, I don’t remember them sharing a room. When I was young, I thought she hated him, and I didn’t understand it. I loved him so much.

I don’t think she hated him. I think most of the time she hated herself. She punished herself all of the time: starving herself, retreating to bed for days, taking Ativan like candy. She swung between extremes. She was depressed, or she was grandiose, but she was always dramatic.

Eventually, as an adult, I recognised that she was mentally ill. I forgave the pain she gave me, but I still carry the scars. I look back at pictures of her as a young woman… when she was glowing, vibrant, strong. Every single day, I wonder if there is something broken inside me the same way. If there is something in my cells that will fester over time and make me grow bitter and twisted with the weight of years.

She was a force of nature, and I loved her. But I also hated her. For her cruelty, for her ignorance, for the way she blamed everyone else for her problems.

The woman I knew died years ago, before dementia left her a shell of her former self. But today still hurts, a void inside me that I didn’t expect.