September 7, 2008

• Reality Check — State of the United States

  While reading comments on the entry I posted yesterday on my other Xanga site, SuSu, in which several people asked me not to stop commenting on politics, I felt inspired to take my commentary to another level, and do a reading on the current state of my country.

  I focused, sought clarity, shuffled the Book of  T deck, and dealt ten cards in a Tree of Life spread.

  The first thing that popped into my mind is, “It has no heart.”  I see five minor arcana, two court cards, and three major arcana.  The only one of them in the suit of Pears (Cups or hearts:  emotion, intuition, feelings) was a reversed (negated) King, symbolizing a void or absence, at upper left, the position representing spiritual obstacles or challenges.  It can be interpreted as a devious, deceptive, destructive, “heartless” man, or as a general absence of the intuitive feminine influence.  Since those few women who have gained political prominence in this country tend to express the kind of linear logic understood by men, this makes sense to me either way.

  At lower left, the position for material, physical or economic challenges and losses, is another Major Trump, The Royal Maze, formerly Wheel of Fortune.  Opposite the Maze, at lower right in the position of physical or material strengths, is the five of Stones (Coins, Pentacles, diamonds, money or material things).  Between the Maze and the Stone five, in the position of our collective material status, is the six of Blades.  Fives in general denote struggles, “opposition on top of opposition,” and sixes generally represent an end to opposition and movement through challenge, toward renewal.

  The “material plane” in a personal reading with this spread can refer to health, wealth, work,  the physical body and its environment, or all of the above.  In this collective reading, it can refer to the economy, the war, and./or catastrophic climate change.  Taken together, I see in that bottom, material, row, that our situation has reached a critical level of loss and destruction, and now people are forced to seek ways to resolve the conflicts and meet the challenges.  The Maze or Wheel is the real wild card of the deck.  It denotes no particular outcome, but introduces the element of chance.  All that is certain is that once we make the move, enter the Maze, spin the Wheel, we learn something, grow, and come out wiser somehow.

  In the center, where the heart should be, is the deuce of Blades (Swords, spades, intellect, words, communication). Deuces in general denote polarity and division.  The deuce of Blades means ambivalence, ambiguity, confusion, and conflict of ideas.  Flanking the deuce of Blades in the center row, the plane of feelings, emotions, and relationships, are two more cards in the suit of Stones (earth, matter).  Eight in the left column symbolizes environmental, material, and economic overreaching, creating challenges that cause us fear, sadness and discontent.  In opposition to it is the King, suggesting that as a nation we derive pleasure and emotional comfort from our possessions, from stability, and also from sensual indulgence including, obviously, food, one of the most basic of material things.

  There is another deuce in the spread, in the suit of Serpents (Wands, clubs, power, fire, creativity, spirit).  It is positioned at upper right, opposite the heartless King.  Between them, reversed in the top position which denotes our spiritual status, is the last of the three Major cards here:  Citadel or Tower.   We, in the aggregate, as a nation, are not growing in a spiritual sense.  We don’t agree on what “spiritual growth” means, or on what growing spiritually would bring.  Some of us pull toward traditional paths, while others reach toward new ways.  That which does not grow, regresses, stagnates and ultimately dies.
  
  The outlook on the material plane is more promising than that on the spiritual, but nothing in this glimpse of the present moment says much about what might come next.  The tenth and final card, at the bottom, by itself, removed from the three planes of body, mind and spirit, might provide some insight.  In the base position, representing the theme of the time, an overview of the reading, is Nameless One, Major Trump #0, The Fool in older decks.  We don’t know where we are going, but it looks better than where we have been.  We don’t know how much we know or what we don’t know, and to a large extent we are not paying attention.

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  • 3:15 pm
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