Pearl Street Tarot

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The word “emotion” derives from French ‘émouvoir,’ which means ‘excite.’ Emouvoir derives from Latin ‘emovere’: e ‘out’ + movere ‘move.’ Emotions are energies in motion. Denying or suppressing an emotion renders it stagnant, creating pain and illness in the body and blocking life force.

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Knight of Cups

Tensions are escalating and the west coast (our country’s left side) is on fire. The left side of a body corresponds to our more fluid, receptive energies. Our culture’s resistance to water (or, in tarot, the suit of cups) has created a social body that is brittle and lacking in tenderness. We use binary thinking to chip away at each other. We break so easily because most of us, in our lack of reverence for water, force ourselves and each other against our fundamental naturalness. Authentic desire creates a current through the heart, which serves as our emotional compass. When we ignore or push against this current, it’s like swimming up a river instead of allowing ourselves to be carried downstream. It depletes the body and erodes self-trust. When we surrender to our current, we face all the aspects of society (judgments, obligations, fear mentality, structural oppression) that seek—fruitlessly––to stifle that current. Following your heart in this dull unliberated society is probably the bravest thing you could do. Water knows no tension. It teaches us that we don’t have to be rigid to be strong. It is all-inclusive and all-encompassing, unconditionally filling every space offered to it. It can be just as destructive as fire and just as healing. It’s soooo needed right now

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7/12 card pull: The Hierophant + Scry Mirror

Lasting spiritual growth is impossible without shadow work. With a full moon lunar eclipse in Capricorn the day after July 4, this month forces us to collectively look our ugliest societal structures square in the face. A mass spiritual awakening coincides with a desire to uproot old systems of abuse, including both punitive religiosity and “love and light” spirituality. We ask ourselves: what would spirituality look like without bypassing, shaming, exclusion, punishment, or judgement? And can we look at our culture’s history of spiritual wounding––from whitewashed Christianity to conversion camps to witch-burning to the Inquisition––with unflinching awareness? On a personal level, this card pull asks you to expand your heart to love your shadow. Can you look at yourself, exactly as you are or have been, without turning away in fear, shame, and disgust? What healing alchemy results from maintaining your gaze? When will you realize you have nothing to fear? This is task can seem daunting when you’ve been taught your whole life only to love your goodness and your light. And that loving something “bad” inside will encourage it to grow. But “loving” something doesn’t mean stuffing it with candied affirmations and false statements, or bypassing our feelings of self-disgust or self-hatred. After all, pretending we feel completely positively about ourselves is yet another form of bypassing. True love necessitates seeing everything for exactly what it is. Embrace a heart-centered growth practice that priotizes wholeness over goodness. Make ugly faces in the mirror. The heart is all-encompassing, all-inclusive, and has the power to transmute the most stubborn shame.