Thoughtful planning

 

Full speed ahead; wait what about make a plan, work plan? Yesterday morning, hopefully, was the last frost of the season. The area has had several cold nights after some lovely sunny days. It is the tug of war between Spring and Winter and Spring finally wins out. Spring won't have long to celebrate as Summers here in the Ohio valley are very humid and hot. With the retreating frost line I can get started on my flower pots. I received a packet of Zinnia seeds yesterday from a lovely,  thoughtful friend which gives me the added incentive to get in gear.  Going to get out there and get things started for my enjoyment. Spring and Summer, the most wonderful time of the Year!

Celestial Tarot

Good question

 

A few weeks ago during a captious phone call with a client I place three one dollar bills in a container on my desk. The ditty bucket holds bits of odds and ends, stamps, a few pens, a couple of business cards, and now three one dollar bills. They are there to remind me to think about what a few dollars more is worth.  Business is business.

The Goddess Tarot 

Eight Wednesdays

 

There is a theme this week with the cards, Pentacles Wands Pentacles Wands Pentacles. Polarity of stability and impetuousness.  If the Journey through the Tarot starts with The Fool it concludes with The King of Pentacles. Live and Learned. I joined a group at the Y last night for an eight week journey of review of health and diet. I will take this Three of Pentacles as acknowledgement that this get-together with others will be a good thing. 

The Rider Waite-Smith Tarot

Creativity

 

We choose. Create in the light or beget in the shadows? We choose. Good days and not so good days, they each have lessons for us. What will we learn? More important how do we choose to learn?  

This morning I had a lovely lay in for healing. This cold will not get the better of me. In fact laying in and thinking happy thoughts has made me feel much better.  I can create my wellness.

MAJESTIC EARTH Tarot

Seasons change

 What a lovely reminder on the Autumnal Equinox.  A return to a more simpler life.  Spending time  outdoors in exploration and crafting my discoveries. The Earth continues her tilt away from the Sun, at least here in the Northern Hemisphere, so gather what will be needed during the winter days indoors. 

The Gaian Tarot

Expansion, contraction

What we focus on expands.  We have all heard this.  Our focus is the compass for the path we take.  It is challenging to monitor our focus constantly to keep us in the clear.  Such much negativity, fear, hate, and anger swirling around us, that some is bound to cling.  The work must begin with ourselves where there is always room for improvement.   A prayer for other helps too.

Investment

How vested in a project or commitment are we?  When all is finished is not a good time to find out.  My Father always taught us (sometimes the hard way) that if you were going to do something do it right.  I find I still hear that admonition playing in my head.  Even when not doing something I enjoy I still have to do my best.  There are things I would like to just walk away from, but no; started it must be finished, and finished, it must be done right.   I wonder now if that is one of the reason I just don't get started on things. Why bother?  Lately I find I am sitting in the gallery more often than not.




The Fairy Tarot

Money money money

Pentacles times three.  Maybe not just money, but foundational support.  My foundations are sometimes a bit shaky, and a structural engineer can't help.  It's all on me. 
I told myself no more classes to teach me anything new or remind me of what I already know.  Today, another class.  An Energy Healer is holding a class in a near by city and I decided to pony up and join.  An investment in myself; I am hopeful.  Nothing ventured, nothing gained.





The Goddess Tarot - Kris Waldherr

Chanty

"My Bonnie lies over the ocean.
 My Bonnie lies over the sea.
 My Bonnie lies over the ocean.
 Oh Bring back my Bonnie to me"

A sea chanty to help me at my work. Oh bring back, oh bring back, oh bring back my bonnie to me.
Maybe humming it all day will bring some fun back in my work-a-days.

Practicality

What did I want to do?  It was a question I was asked by a young professional a year ago.  Trying to find out what career was best suited for him,  I answered "I wanted to make money." I have pondered that answer more often than not in this last year.  Guess what, I have made money, but don't have many coins to count. It comes and goes.  I think about the statement, "make money" and I believe the declaration came from a place of lack.  And so I think one of the foundations of my work-a-day life has been built on lack.
From Rachel Pollacks, Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom, "...practical work, done consciously and with commitment, may serve as the vehicle of self-development."
Since I have to come to terms with the fact that I will most likely work until I decide to leave the planet; I best think of work of something more than "make money."

Rider Waite-Smith Tarot

A Look See

What did you want to do when you grew up?

A few weeks ago I was asked this question from a younger person; who at the age of thirty is having an identity crisis with the career he has chosen and trained for.  My answer was "to make money."  I wanted to make money, that is all I could think of when I was a teenager.  Money so scarce in my childhood home.  We were poor by many standards, so money was the beacon.  Not my siren call, just money, and I have been chasing the dollar every since.  Not having money can make me unhappy but I have also discovered, having money won't make me happy either.   I like having extra funds available to me, but I am still the same gal who finds my life lacking.  From where I stand, like this pentacle fairy I am looking to what is next.


The Good Tarot - Colette Baron-Reid

Innovation

You never know how good you got it.

That sentence may or may not be true.  Some know how good Life is and appreciate the good days and the not so good days as well.  This card reminds me of my Mother telling my sisters and brothers how when she was a little girl she could remember helping her Mother and Grandmother make ketchup, letting us know how fortunate we had it with the bottled version.  I recently did the Whole30 with my Sister and Niece and one of things I made was Ketchup; couldn't use the store bought as sugar was one of the things we had to eliminate for the month.
If I get the opportunity to join a group today, I will take it. SPRING begins sometime today, during the  snow showers predicted this afternoon




Gaian Tarot - Joann Powell Colbert

Competence

"If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail." - Benjamin Franklin

I turned the last page of my calendar for 2017 this morning.  As the year comes to a close what things or tasks can I do to prepare for the bright and shiny New Year that is at hand?
Mostly I have been "by the seat of my pants" type of gal, still there is much wisdom in Mr Franklin's quote.  I do find myself more often than not these days running a list of things in my head that need done. As I look closely at this card, I see the architect looking over the plans and comparing them to work that has been done.  I have a checklist and planning guide in my email cache; guess this year might be a good year to print it out and plan my 2018. 




Rider Waite-Smith Tarot

Self-perception

Do we do what we are, or are we what we do?

Do we become what we do? Would we be strangers to ourselves if we did nothing? 

"We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be." - Kurt Vonnegut








The Sacred Circle Tarot

Practice makes perfect

The author gives us ravens instead of an apprentice or trade master since ravens are clever and industrious.  

I have to leave shortly to go to a class for continuing education to keep myself up on the whatever is the newest in real estate or a primer on current applications.  Today it is the forms we use.  They have this class every year and I go because it is pertinent and I can get a bit casual about filling in the 'blanks.'  The thing is they offer it yearly because of all the new agents that come into the profession and they really need to understand these legal binding contracts and they are exactly the ones that don't come. 
It takes more than showmanship and a business card in any profession; to bad most don't get that.  Clever and industrious yes, and also a good skill set. 


The LINESTRIDER'S Journey - Siolo Thompson

Gathering

Yesterday the squirrel in the four of pentacles was gathering nuts and today in the three of pentacles we have a community of gals that have gathered their flowers and herbs.

After my staring contest yesterday I realized the squirrel was hinting at gathering what I might need to sustain me through the coming winter months.  These gals also have gathered gifts from Mother Earth to work with. The darkest days of the year are ahead before the Wheel turns after the Winter Solstice and so I think I am being advised to gather what will sustain me.  The days are getting shorter and I have always been susceptible to seasonal depression with the waning daylight; so forewarned is forearmed.  I will stock up on Vitamin B 12, my Verilux light out for daylight simulation at my desk, brighter bulbs in some of my lamps, a stack of good books, and continue my time with the wonderful blogging community that has become near and dear to my heart.
And most of all continue my attitude of gratitude.  The Earth needs a good long winters rest to be able to give me a delightful return of Spring so I will refrain from complain.

Book covers

Something is amiss in this portrayal of the Three of Pentacles.  The Marco Polo Tarot has an Asian based theme, and these three don't appear to be of Asian decent. Are they master craftsmen, paid labor, or prison labor?

I best be aware today because all may not be what it seems.  Makes me think about the adage - don't judge a book by it's cover.  We really should not make assumptions of people.  The clothes that are worn, the work that they do and the places where we find or meet them.  But we do.  Most all go by first impressions, though to do so limits us of real discovery. 
So today if something just doesn't feel 'right'  I will give it some extra attention.  Practical observation with no presentiment hopefully will give me insight into a possible difficult situation.



Thank goodness for craftsmen and women, who build and develop so many useful tools that make my life easier.