The BloG
Major concepts. minor musings.
Monthly Reflection: Continuum & Keeper
If you’re familiar with the tarot, these might not be the tarot cards you’re used to, but the Ephemere Tarot deck by Arthur Wang is just as powerful. Though the minor arcana follows the traditional structure, Ephemere’s major arcana, follows The Hero’s Journey, instead of our familiar Fool. In this month’s reflection, we have two majors. Whether traditional or otherwise, this is always a sign that big things are occurring for us. As someone writing this on the precipice of a major house move, I can certainly say that energy is reflected in my own life!
May Reflection - Continuum
As the last card of Ephemere’s major arcana, Continuum of course indicates the closing of a chapter, but moreover, the cyclical nature of everything in existence. With every ending, comes a new beginning, as they say…
Monthly Reflection: Three of Swords & Knight of Cups
The months of April and May appear to mark an important turning point for us my friends! The areas we have been stuck are being brought to light, and while it might be painful, it is an opportunity to release and to forge ahead on a new and better path.
So, let’s break this down…
April Reflection: Three of Swords
This was a significant, albeit difficult, month.
The Three of Swords is our card of heartache, a card many of us fear to see, and the way the Wayhome Tarot depicts this has an interesting additional layer for us to consider.
We can see the blood red liquid as a signifier of the pain we hold within ourselves. It sits there, circling round and round within us, an endless loop…
What It Means To Be The Fool
As some of you may have seen on my Instagram stories (check it out here), last week, I went to the Tarot: Origins & Afterlives exhibition at The Warburg Institute. It’s a small, free exhibit in London that delves into the history of the tarot, and I found it incredibly interesting. One of the things I love about tarot is that it’s an endless treasure trove - there is always more we can learn, more to research, more to study. Anyone with an interest in tarot who is able to get to the exhibit before it closes at the end of the month, I would certainly recommend it.
One thing at the exhibition that particularly caught my eye was a tableau of Etteilla’s original 78 cards.
Monthly Reflection: Seven of Wands & The Hierophant
March Reflection: Seven of Wands
If you’ve been following along with this year’s monthly reflections, you’ll know that, at the start of the month, we pulled the Seven of Cups for the outlook of the month ahead. At the end of the month, we see another seven in our reflection!
We began the month with the potential for distractions, but the Seven of Wands indicates we’ve handled those distractions rather well. These distractions came to knock us off our path, and we said, “No, thank you!”
Suits & Seasons: Spring
As someone who spends so much of my life working with, talking about, learning about and thinking about the tarot, it doesn’t take much for me to wonder, “How does this real life thing relate to the cards?” I’m sure I drive my partner nuts with my regular tarot references!
And so, as seasons change, I have found myself revisiting something that originally sprung to mind (pun unintended… but now I kinda like it) around the last spring equinox. There are four seasons and, coincidentally, four tarot suits. Which season corresponds with each suit?
The more I’ve thought about this question, the more obvious the correspondences have seemed, and as we approach the Spring Equinox, I have found myself revisiting the idea that Spring and the Pentacles are inextricably linked.
Monthly Reflection: Nine of Stars & Seven of Moons
As we enter the month of March and we see the first signs of Spring (or Autumn for my Southern Hemisphere friends), the Nine of Stars indicates that many of us are bringing big goals or dreams along with us, taking root through the course of February.
2025: The Year of The Hermit
Last week, you may have seen my reflection on 2024 as The Year of Strength, the 8th card in the tarot. If 2024’s tarot card was Strength, this means that 2025’s tarot card is The Hermit.
The Hermit is the card of introspection, self-reflection, personal journeys and spending time alone. In essence, it is focused on our internal world, rather than the external. Personally, I have always loved this card, but it is actually one of the most divisive cards of the tarot deck. A lot of people fear this card, or at the very least, dislike seeing him in a reading, and what I have come to find is that, generally, our opinion of The Hermit seems to reflect how comfortable we are being alone with our thoughts. For some of us, spending time alone feels like peace and tranquility, to others, spending time alone feels like our own personal brand of hell.
Regardless of whether we are comfortable in The Hermit’s presence or not, I must stress that his presence is usually incredibly positive. Introspection leads to growth, it leads to enlightenment, it leads to self-love. Improving our relationship with ourselves is invaluable. At the end of the day, the only person we can count on being with us from the moment we’re born until the day we die is ourselves, so having a good relationship to self can only be a good thing.
So, what does this mean for 2025, and what can we learn this year?
Monthly Reflection: The World & The Fool
I’ve been doing monthly reflections sporadically on Instagram, and while they have been interesting, I’ve always felt like there was more to say than can be included in a caption! So, this year, I’ll be bringing it to the longer format here, to allow for a more expansive exploration of the cards, and I hope you enjoy coming on this journey with me!
And what a combination of cards to start with! Though tarot is always profound and insightful, it isn’t always quite so on the nose, but here we are, with our last card of the major arcana followed by the first card of the major arcana.
Quite simply, every ending comes with a new beginning. This is the cyclical nature of life.
2024: The Year of Strength - A Reflection
Strength is a multi-faceted card, and I don’t think we can fully understand it without first looking at the imagery, because it really is the root of all of the various elements to the card. One of the things I love most about it is the fact that the term ‘Strength’ is so overtly masculine, and yet, the card itself expresses a feminine energy. We often associate the word with force, endurance and physical strength, which has very masculine associations, but the beauty of this card is that it encourages us to question that narrative. The woman in the card is clearly no match for the physical might of a lion, and yet, she is able to open the lion’s mouth.
She has not attempted to capture and dominate the lion, forcing it to open its mouth. Rather, she has befriended the lion, and he is allowing her to open his mouth. To dominate the lion is to operate from a place of fear and create a powerful enemy. To befriend the lion is to operate from a place of compassion, despite the vulnerable position it puts her in, and create a powerful friend. So, which approach is really ‘stronger’, after all?