The Tarot Room – Georgianna

Sunday, July 7, 2024
#11 – Strength

Learn to direct your inner wildness during this period of fiery intensity and your personal power is likely to grow.  Innocence and purity work together to balance your passion with wisdom.

Explore ways to act assertively but without aggression.  The gentle touch might go a lot further than a loud voice or an impetuous rage.

It’s a very creative time and you’re encouraged to allow yourself room to flourish.  Don’t be shy.  This is the moment to take action and move forward with plans you may have held off on until now.

If you happen to like fancy Italian handbags, fortune telling imagery, and cats, today’s post is for you.

A cat friend of mine (you may remember him from an earlier post, Cat Reading) was staying with me last week.

When his driver came by to pick him up, she brought with her the most marvellous fortune-telling cat handbag from Milan you’ve ever seen (though it’s likely to have originated in London … but either way).

Just look at these pictures …

Crystal balls and flowers, potions, and magic books, fortune-telling cats in turbans behind beaded doors …

And on the back of the bag it says “Never let fear decide your fate.”

Good advice, especially from a cat … I think.

In any case, this bag by Vendula London Is fantastic. Wish I had one.

Saturday, July 6, 2024
9 of Cups

What a wonderful day.  You feel open and loving and willing to let the world know – at least if they ask.  You might not feel like running out and embracing everyone you see, but there’s a sense of contentment and well-being that’s impossible to ignore.

This is an excellent time to enjoy and share.  Be generous with your feelings. There’s really nothing to fear in letting people know you care.

Give as you can and laugh out loud as much as possible, even when you’re alone. It may have been some time since you’ve felt this good.  Enjoy. You deserve it.

A great tip for getting to really know your Tarot cards, whatever deck you use, is to draw them. This is true whether you’re good at drawing or not (however that might be determined). The learning happens either way. It’s about looking at the cards really carefully, not about making fine art.

I’ve been reminded of this lesson lately while redrawing the Cards of the Day for The Tarot Room, as well as while drawing on my newest wooden Tarot box. As is the case whenever I draw images from my decks, I’ve noticed things I had forgotten, or maybe had never noticed in the first place.

It could be a colour that jumps out – like the gray sky in the RWS Ace of Wands, or the fish-scaled shoes worn by the King of Cups. It might be a symbol, like the butterflies on the Queen of Swords’ crown, or the water flowing behind the High Priestess, the Empress, and the Emperor. It could be anything.

There are so many things to notice … and if you’re a practiced reader, you’ve probably considered most, if not all of the symbols, and colours, and key words from your favourite decks. But at least for me, getting ‘beginners’ eyes’ again as I try to etch the card pictures onto a page, always reignites my enthusiasm for the deck I’m drawing, and teaches me something new.

And for beginners … drawing your cards is a fantastic exercise to use to get to know your deck. The whole trick is that it forces you to look. And at least for me, Tarot reading at its core is about reading the stories in the pictures on the cards. The more you carefully look at those pictures, the richer your stories can be.

Give it a try. And if drawing all 78 cards in a deck is too daunting, try just drawing the cards you pull in a reading. Or just one card from a card of the day … or whatever might work for you. But try it. It’s fun.

Friday, July 5, 2024
Queen of Wands

Be yourself and be it fully. This is a day for you to shine. You know yourself and you’ve been true to your soul. It’s always worth it and now you’re remembering why.

As you harness your energy to create your will, do so with compassion. Remember what you suffered to get to your present state. Have compassion for those that are still struggling. They can use your inspiration, but remember your strength. Be careful not to burn them.

The Moon moves into Cancer today, and stays there until Sunday.

Looking at this transit through the lens of the Tarot, you might describe it as the High Priestess dressed in the clothing of the Charioteer. She’s left the safety of her pillars and veil, and has hit the road.

The Moon in Cancer, or the High Priestess dressed as the Charioteer, can be a powerful time of comfortable change and emotional resilience.

Knowledge gathered in silence has coalesced and it’s time to share without fear of being hurt.

Emotional loyalty, intuitive direction and strength of character can give you the resolve to go forward. Even into the unknown.

Try not to coddle yourself. You can only win if you have the courage to play to the end.

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Thursday, July 4, 2024
#0 – The Fool

This is a great day to take the leap and do something different.  It might seem crazy and you have no idea how it’s going to turn out, or maybe even how you got on this path in the first place, but here you are.  It’s time to make your move and do so without fear.

The Fool card isn’t telling you to be an idiot, but rather to stop double thinking yourself all the time and worrying that every single thing is in order before you can make a move.

Life isn’t really that logical.  There’s no way to prepare for all eventualities, no matter how smart you are.  Do what you can and let the universe take care of the bigger story.

Today’s pull from Georgie’s Magic Card Collection is The Medieval Scapini Tarot by Luigi Scapini. Though it was published by US Games in 1985, it’s meant to embody the spirit of the 15th Century renaissance period, the time when Tarot first came upon the scene …

5 Points About This Deck

Artwork: Scapini’s work is gorgeous – rich, detailed, evocative of the old Italian decks. My deck has a faux gilt for the backgrounds of the Major Arcana and Court Cards, as well as on the card backs. Though this is nice, I can just imagine how beautiful it would be if the gilt wasn’t faux (I don’t mean real gold, but shiny paper gold). Even so though, the artwork on these cards is really beautiful.

Card Size: The Medieval Scapini Tarot is tall and slim, 13cm x 7cm (about 5X3” or so) – a little tall for smaller hands, but not too unwieldy, and quite elegant looking. But despite the fact that I sometimes have difficulty shuffling big cards, for this deck, I kind of wish the cards were a little bigger. The artwork has so many marvellous details, I’d love to see them all more clearly … but maybe that’s just an issue with my eyesight.

Major Arcana: The images on the Major cards follow the Visconti Tarot style for the most part, but with a few exceptions. For instance, The Star and the Moon cards definitely lean more towards the Rider-Waite-Smith concepts than otherwise.

Minor Arcana: Unlike the Visconti decks, The Medieval Scapini Tarot has fully illustrated Minor cards, or at least images that tell more of a straight ahead story than the Visconti-style decks do. And they’re as beautifully drawn as the Majors, just with less gilt. While the artwork is still very Visconti-like in the Minors, the images reflect the occult ideas of Papus, Oswald Wirth, and Arthur Waite.

Readability: Though the images on the cards allow for fairly clear interpretation, and one could read them without having knowledge of a particular Tarot system, the LWB (little white book that comes with the deck) gives you a complete description of each card, with suggested definitions. It’s a small book with tiny font, but it holds a lot of info, and I found it quite helpful.

All in all, I’d say The Medieval Scapini Tarot is a wonderful deck with a nice mix of medieval and modern imagery. I should use it more often. I do wish though, that the cards were bigger. They’re really beautiful.

Wednesday, July 3, 2024
4 of Disks

Money might be tough to come by, while time is even more precious. Wherever you look, though, it seems like someone else is asking for more. The tendency here is to gather yourself and your resources and go off alone to think.

Go ahead and do that if you’d like, but try not to get yourself too closed off. You probably have more than you think you do. Maybe even enough to share.

If you’re being asked to spend on something that will help establish an even firmer foundation than you presently have, give it some serious thought. It might be more than you had anticipated, but the pay offs are probably well worth it.

Extravagant or foolish spending is not recommended, but remember the old adage – it takes money to make money. If you don’t put it out there, be it actual money, your physical effort or something else you consider really important, nothing’s coming back.

This is true about your emotions as well, don’t hold them too close to the chest. Be generous with your heart. Remember, you get what you give.

Mercury moved into Leo yesterday and will stay there until July 25th.

Looking at this transit through the eyes of the Tarot, it would be like the Magician is wearing Strength’s clothing. He’s still floating his lemniscates, but now he’s wearing a dress.

Mercury in Leo, or the Magician in Strength’s clothing is a time of energetic and maybe even exhilarating communication.

During this cycle, it’s easy to express your ideas with enthusiasm, and you’re encouraged to do so. Don’t be shy, but try not to walk all over anyone else’s sunshine.

Watch out for ego talk, either from yourself or others. Everyone likes a good storyteller, but boasters are less welcome.

Let yourself be inspired and your desires be clear and focused. When innocent passion is directed by an intelligent will, the possibilities are infinite.

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