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Every 2nd week, Tuesdays from 6-8pm PDT
Link: https://zoom.us/j/8622569132

Intro to the Major Arcana

0. The Fool

Questions:

  1. [Activating Path] How can the Fool help you to take a leap right now in your life? How are you leaping into Tarot?
  2. [Esoteric Meaning] The Fool represents Primal Air, Fiery Air, Ether, and the life-breath that first animates the universe. “Cosmological consciousness awakens into conscious self-reflection” How did your soul initiate its journey?
  3. [Elements] Contemplate how the Fool moves from 1 to 2 in each suit. Activate and Initiate each element within yourself. Fire: I Am the Fiery Breath of Cosmos Coming Alive as its Own True Nature. Water: I AM Love in Creation Coming Alive in Beginner’s Heart. Wind: I AM Original Being Breathing into the Miracle of Beginner’s Mind. Earth: I AM the One Becoming—Now. I Am my True Nature. Journal.
  4.  [Self-Empowerment] The first mode of empowerment is Attached Detachment. The motto of the Fool is, “prepare, prepare, prepare, detach.” Open yourself to the Fool archetype and then let go into it. From Pamela, ‘As I entered the next ritual, the ritual of the Fool, I asked, “To what single point do the energies of Fire, Water, Wind, and Earth swirl? What single idea emerges from the whorlings of the Four Worlds?’ I sat in meditation for a long time. Suddenly, it came. It was a single concept revealed in a singular moment. It was one single Hebrew word: Heenenee. That is it: Heenenee: I Am Here. That is all: Here I Am.  And suddenly I was flooded with the rushing impulse of being alive. I Am Here. Here I Am. I am Alive. Absolutely Alive. Right here; right now Heenenoo. We are here. Here we are. Let us celebrate. Let us celebrate this incredible life we have entered into. Let us sow our seeds, cultivate our Earth, cultivate our arts – and let us seek high initiation. We have arrived. We Are Here.” Journal.

I. The Magus

Questions:

  1. [Archetype] How do you channel the creativity of the kosmos? What wants to be manifested through you now?
  2. [Esoteric] Beth is the house. How do you create your house / temple / palace? What role does the container play in your path of growth?
  3. [Elements] The Magus is called to wield the tools of the elements. Find representations for the four elements and place them on your altar. These elements correspond to the Magus’ admonition: To Will (fire), To Understand (water), To Dare (wind), and To Be Silent (earth). How do you embody these four qualities as the Magus?
  4. [Initiation] Meditate before your altar. Open sacred space and call upon the archetype of the Magus. Enter into your self-initiation as the Magus through Focused Action: center in your power, reach up and connect with source above, reach down and connect with the garden below. Pick up your altar item for each element in turn and proclaim:Fire: I AM the Temple of Living Fire Gathering and Focusing the Sparks of the Cosmos into the Power of Being and Becoming.
    Water: I AM the Temple of Living Love Whose Essence Generates Cosmological Burgeoning.
    Wind: I AM the Temple of Intelligent Design Gathering and Focusing Cosmological Idea.
    Earth: I AM the Temple of the Cosmos Concentrating That Which Is into BeingNow, imagine the world you would like to call into being! 

II. The High Priestess

Questions:

  1. [Archetype] What are the qualities and duties of a priestess? How do you embody the High Priestess in your life? Where can the High Priestess take you deeper right now?
  2. [Esoteric] Gimel, the camel, traverses the barren desert. Write about a Dark Night of the Soul that you experienced. How did you learn to weather it?
  3. [Elements] Consider the four 1’s together: Force, Open Channel, Dawn, & Form. Consider the four 6’s together: Glory, Faith, Clarity, & Beauty. Describe the initiation that is being wrought by the High Priestess as we move from 1 to 6. Consider the Mystery Card in relation to Death, Birth, and Karmic Transitions. How is Daath an essential part of the transformation from the 1’s to the 6’s?
  4. [Initiation] Create a time to meditate at your altar. Call in the High Priestess in whatever form you connect with (Isis, Hecate, Diana, Mary, etc…) Ask the High Priestess to guide you into the dark mysteries of your soul – into the Inner Sanctum – into Daath. Take your time and meditate on your darkness within. Receive whatever shadow material arises. Notice that integrating the shadow naturally leads us back into a more beautiful light, the light of Tiphareth. Journal.

Bonus: Who is the Dark Feminine? How do you relate to the Dark Feminine in yourself and your relationships? Where in our culture does she show up and how?

III. The Empress

Questions:

  1. [Archetype] The Empress represents the feminine abundance of Nature. Consider where you stand across: Self, Relationship, Community, Nature, and Spirit. Where could you be nourished right now? Where are you in abundance? How can the Empress help YOU become a Doorway of Fertility?
  2. [Esoteric] As the “Daughter of the Mighty Ones,” the Empress provides balance between Chokmah, Divine Masculine and Binah, Divine Feminine. Place the Empress card between Water Mother and Fire Father (below). Within yourself, how are masculine and feminine either balanced or wounded? In your relationships, how are masculine and feminine either balanced or wounded? What does the Empress demonstrate is possible when these polarities come into harmony?
  3. [Elements] Lay out the 2’s and 3’s of each suit together with the Empress.
    Fire: In Spirit, I am attracting ___ right now, and I am giving birth to ___.
    Water: Emotionally, I am attracting ___ right now, and I am giving birth to ___.
    Wind: Intellectually, I am attracting ___ right now, and I am giving birth to ___.
    Earth: Materially, I am attracting ___ right now, and I am giving birth to ___.
  4. [Initiation] Create a space for meditation. Choose a deity to represent the Empress (ie: Hathor, Aphrodite, Venus, Lakshmi, Sita, Tara, Kurukulla, Mother Mary etc…) Enter your meditation. Visualize the Emerald Green of the Empress and let her luminous energy fill your body. Call in the deity that you chose and picture her above your head. Ask her to bestow a blessing: the blessing of Life, the blessing of Love upon you. Picture a soft white light flowing down from the empress toward you, carrying the blessing. Breathe the blessing all around your body – be swaddled in it. Breathe this blessing into every cell of your body – be saturated with it. Breathe in and receive, receive, receive. Welcome in the initiation of The Empress. Journal about your experience.

IV. The Emperor

Questions:

  1. [Archetype] The Emperor calls us to assume the throne and take charge of our lives – to rule. When we rule through service and by listening to love and to Nature, then the kingdom thrives. What aspects of your life are being run by the helpless victim, the tantrum-prone child, or the rebellious teenager? Where can the Emperor help you claim your sovereignty?
  2. [Esoteric] The attribution of Heh, the Window, calls us to become window-like ourselves. There are two aspects of the window:  the power of Visionary Sight, and the Constituting or setting in order quality. In what ways are you a transparent medium to conduct light? Where have you created the structures of your life? How can you do this more consciously?
  3. [Elements] Consider the 2’s and 6’s in Fire and Wind. What is your relationship with conflict, violence, and force? When (if ever) do you wield it in your life? How can it be in service to landing in the 6th sphere of Tiphareth? Consider the 2’s and 6’s of Water and Earth. How (if ever) are you spreading your seed into creation? What is your relationship to being a father of your offspring?
  4. [Initiation] The Emperor is a powerful ally for “evolving fields, systems, and structures.” Make a space to meditate and call in the Emperor. Take stock of your mental landscape. Where are you flowing, and where are you caught up? Take a step back – open into the Eagle’s Eye view of your conscious experience. Ask the Emperor to help you evolve you consciousness. Make new connections, find harmony in your internal landscape, and open into greater beauty. Ask the Emperor to initiate you into a more expansive reality.

V. The Hierophant

Questions:

  1. [Archetype] The Hierophant embodies the Teacher, the Wounded Healer, and the Sacrificial Priest. He calls us out of our self-pity and into growth, healing and wisdom. Pick a wound that is present for you now. What lesson is this wound here to teach you? Who would you be if you fully embraced this wound as an integrated and integral part of yourself – as your sacred medicine?
  2. [Esoteric] Vau is the hook or the nail that secures flesh and spirit together. It is the instrument that causes the wound and the function of that which brings light. Consider the Hierophant together with the Devil. For you, what does evil mean and what is its role in a cosmos made of infinite love?
  3. [Elements] The Hierophant takes us from Attraction (2) to Stability (4). He is teaching us how to grow.
    Fire: How can I harness my spiritual longing to become a beacon of light?
    Water: What agreements do I have towards relationship that are ready to be revised?
    Wind: Where can I apply the three modes of empowerment, attached detachment, focused action, and memory to move into mastery of a craft?
    Earth: Where am I hiding from my power?
  4. [Initiation] Enter a meditative space and call in the spirit of the Hierophant (or Chiron, Pope Gregory I, or any form you connect with). Pick one area of your life where you could use some guidance and ask, earnestly, for support. Listen and keep on listening. Become receptive. Ask to see where you are blocking yourself, or blind, or fixated. Welcome in some light from an unexpected direction. Close your meditation by generating gratitude for this simple lesson.

VI. The Lovers

Questions:

  1. [Archetype] The Lovers operate across many levels: the love we find through human relationship, the integration of opposites within ourselves, and the quest to recognize the Beloved everywhere we look. Love heals, love awakens, love is all there is. Where are you holding back from love across a) relationships, b) self, and c) kosmos? Is the act of resisting or holding back itself an expression of love?
  2. [Esoteric] Zain is the sword that cuts and divides. The Lovers represent the disposing intelligence. Grief and pain are baked into the very nature of the Lovers. Duality begets fear; birth begets death. Where can you open to accept the grief and/or pain in current relationship? What happens for you when you welcome these feelings?
  3. [Powers] Despite the hardship and challenge that relationships bring, the Lovers connect the cosmological powers of Creation and Synergy. How has relationship been a conduit in your life for both creation and synergy?
  4. [Elements Initiation] Create an altar to represent the four elements and enter into a ceremony to initiate into the Lovers. Create your own love song to each of the elements or feel free to use mine.
    In Fire: this fire is the heat of my longing and my drive to unite with the Beloved. Thank you Fire!
    In Water: this water is the water of life that my fetus grew to term in. When my water broke, I opened into the fullness of human life with all the emotions it entails. Thank you Water!
    In Wind: the sword of my intellect is both weapon and tool, responsibility and blessing. I honor knowing myself through duality. Thank you Wind!
    In Earth: I take my body as my lover. I take this earth as my lover. I welcome the kosmos to know itself through me in this vehicle of form. Thank you Earth!

VII. The Chariot

Questions:

  1. [Archetype] The Chariot takes us from Creation to Destruction. What is being created in your life? What is being destroyed? How is the cycle of creation and destruction in service to your path of growth? What can you do to work together with this cycle?
  2. [Esoteric] Cheth is the fence and the field. The fences are the boundaries and structures of our personality. The field is our conscious awareness. Reflect on your path thus far through the major arcana (as the Chariot is the culmination of the prior paths). How has your field lifted? Where have your fences repositioned?
  3. [Elements] The four elements together with the cube of space comprise the Chariot or the throne, upon which the Charioteer rides. From another vantage, we are the chariot which carries the light of Source. Experiment with experiencing yourself as a combination of the elements moving in space. Take a breath into fire, into water, into wind, and earth. Breathe into your front, back, top, bottom, left, right and center. Breathe with consciousness and recognize the I AM the rides through your vehicle. Journal about your exploration – who are you really? and how do you understand yourself?
  4. [Initiation] Create a ceremony space for yourself and meditate with the image of the Chariot. Connect with the Earth. Call in your guides and protectors. When you are ready, you may say these words aloud,On this day, witnessed by my guides and all the realized beings of the ten directions and three times, I make an offering of myself.
    I offer all that I hold – back to Life, back to the Source, back to the immeasurable expanse of my true nature.
    I offer my thoughts and opinions, that I may become pure consciousness knowing myself.
    I offer my memories and emotions, that they may directly connect me to the reality of the present.
    I offer my body and energy field, that I may know myself beyond separation from earth and kosmos.
    I offer my voice and the light that shines through me, that my being may benefit all beings everywhere.
    I offer all that I AM to be lifted beyond fear, to be realized in union and communion with the infinite LOVE that is.
    Breathing out, I offer my breath to Life. Breathing in, I receive my breath from Life.
    I open to receive the initiation of the Chariot.

VIII. Strength

Questions:

  1. [Archetype] What is the source of your strength? How can you open yourself to allow this source to guide and sustain you?
  2. [Esoteric] Teth is the serpent. We have discussed many symbols related to the serpent: the tempter, the redeemer, kundalini awakening, the ouroboros of infinity, constant renewal through shedding skins, and healing via the Staff of Mercury. What does the symbol of the serpent mean to you and how do you relate the serpent to the key of Strength?

3. [Elements] Consider the nature of our human existence as illustrated by the 4’s and 5’s:

Fire: I cycle between spiritual containment and struggle
Water: I cycle between emotional satisfaction and hurting
Wind: I cycle between intellectual mastery and fear of the unknown
Earth: I build up walls for safety only to become imprisoned in them
Why is the pathway connecting these polarities named Strength? Where and how do we find strength within these cycles of growth and decay?

4. [Initiation] Please set aside a dedicated time to receive the initiation in the video below.

IX. The Hermit

Questions:

  1. [Archetype] When I am alone, what arises for me? Take this inquiry as deep as you are able to go.
  2. [Esoteric] The Intelligence of Spiritual Will: Do you have free will? What is free will? How does free will connect with the personal soul and with your perspective on spirit/God/emptiness, ie: the Ultimate?
  3. [Elements] Choose one (or more) of these prompts to take into meditation. Journal about your experience.
    Fire: The foundation of my practice opens me to the glory of being.
    Water: I surrender control of my emotions to be held by faith.
    Wind: I know clear vision beyond the illusion of separation.
    Earth: Resting in my being, all becomes beautiful.
  4. [Initiation] I AM the light that I AM, light in extension. Write a poem or a prayer, beginning each line with “I am…”
  5. BONUS: Practice this I AM Meditation together with me