labyrinth

the strong in the gentle...

2010-08-13T14:05:00.000-07:00

"Nothing is so strong as gentleness, and nothing is so gentle as true strength."-- Ralph Sockman.

Hercules the symbol of strength in Greek Mythology was worshiped as the God who freed the mortals from many a monster. He was born of the digression of the God Zeus with a mortal Alcmena. Zeus placed his son Hercules at the breast of his sleeping wife Goddess Hera making him partially mortal. But so strong was Hera’s hatred towards Hercules that she induced a hypnotic frenzy in Hercules making him kill all his offspring. To atone for his sins he visited the Oracle of Delphi who set him on the path of absolution through what became known as labors of Hercules, acts of heroism which freed the mortal world from many demonic pariahs.

The story of Hercules is not different from the tarots – the Fool is reminiscent of the birth and travails of Hercules. The fool also traverses the path of life learning lessons and atoning for his actions. He is also controlled by influences internal and those out of his control, that he has to wrestle to find internal balance. But that brings us back to the question what is real strength – is it unmatched physical prowess, or is the ability to control the people around you or yet again is it the fortitude with which you deal with the challenges life faces you? Is the purpose of the fool’s life to regain and reclaim his inner strength?

Life deals us many cards. We see glimpses of strength in many circumstances. When ceased by a vortex of cascading events that turn our life upside down and ceases all control from our hands, we are faced with choices. One path is always the easier one and the more beguiling, but the other seemingly less glamorous one requires true strength. Let me illustrate this to you with Rahul’s story.

Rahul graduated from one of the best schools in India with honors and landed himself a coveted admission into one of the top MBA schools of the country. The entire family rejoiced – he would be the first member of his family who would acquire a professional education and have a shot at rising up the proverbial corporate ladder. But as they say – life never stays the same. Destiny cut his flight to fame short. His father died leaving young siblings and a non working destitute mother. His uncles stepped forward to help him but his choices were cut short. With no money in the family without his father’s income the extended family pressed him to begin working. They were certain that if Kismet had it he would find his way to a professional education sooner than later.

Rahul decided to join the banking services and began training to become a probationary officer in the Indian banks. A far cry from his dream of corporate stardom! So has Rahul our Hercules in this story been defeated. So should he exhibit his strength by going into a frenzy, denouncing his uncles’ decision and hating his destitute family? Or yet again should he the newly appointed patriarch of his family become a tyrant and start displaying the megalomania that is so often seen in such protagonists? Would he then be deemed strong?

The tarots have their own speak in this situation. The Lover’s card talks about Hercules making choices sacred and profane and it is only the sacred choice that brings harmony to life in the long run. There has been many a Hercules like Rahul in real life – who have accepted their destiny and yet not given up the burning desire to be somebody in their own right. They may have had to give up their original choice of path to success but in the new chosen path they have gone on to excel and be deemed success stories.

What makes such Hercules different from the frenzied, controlling megalo maniac? The answer lies in the strength. The card strength depicts a struggle between a fierce lion and Hercules – a hand to hand mortal combat – in this struggle Hercules defeats the lion but wears the skin of the lion as a cloak that makes him invulnerable to external forces. A simple lesson – when faced with struggles in life – the highest battle is with forces within oneself, the strong forces of negative emotion like jealousy, anger, greed, frustration and the desire to assuage these through controlling others. Those that win this battle become the bearer of the lion’s skin and are protected from travails in the future. They learn to receive the hard messages of suffering and use them as guides to temper there own behavior with others.

Thus Hercules that wins is the Hercules that wins himself. He continues to hang on to his ambitions for excellence but gives up the attachment to only one chosen path to excellence. Thus Rahul will certainly have what he wants just perhaps not in the shape that he thinks he wants it.

This examination of strength with gentleness is dedicated to men, so let me pick up the story of another corporate being. Arun graduated from one of the leading MBA institutes in the country – had just the life that Rahul was so desperate to have. He joined an international consultancy and was soon in the inner circles of power in the firm. If corporate seniors were to be believed Arun will be the youngest partner in the whole of Asia Pacific. Certainly no mean feat, for someone from as humble a beginning as Arun.

As is always true – when you find appreciation and recognition – you begin to identify with that entity as your own. So also did Arun. The more his work was validated, the greater was the self fused with the organization. Along with the fusion came the corporate myth – a sense of power. He began to feel that as long as he was at work and in the environment he belonged in – he was powerful. He felt strong, and his life had a purpose. To negotiate difficult terms, balance complicated interpersonal relationships and influence the who’s who of the business world seemed to become the mantra of his life. Every time he was successful in achieving a business goal he felt a surge of strength as if life had infused him with a shot of adrenalin that would drive him to the next challenge with an even greater zest.

But the wheel of fortune continues to turn. What has been happening is up in the air at a moment and then plunges down to the bottom. The wheel of fortune teaches us that we are not completely in control. There is a destiny greater than us that will push us to make choices and land in situations we would not have imagined. Asked a spiritual guru the question – why? Can you explain the reason why my life is going that way? The answer will be clear – it’s your life throwing you an opportunity to learn, the lessons you need to learn to become a complete human being. So what then is this complete being and the annoying question that nags at the edge of my mind – why the hell do I have to be a complete being in the first place? Why do I have to learn these lessons – to achieve some esoteric, abstract and elusive goal like Nirvana or is there a direct take back for me before that? What if I choose not to be Buddha and want to continue my pursuits as the most average mortal, what then?

The tarots answer is very clear – before the goal of nirvana is an inherent goal in everything in life – balance. The heady flight to fame and success is more often than not accompanied by conflicts and intra organizational politics. Many a successful manager are cut short in their prime because the politics gets the better of them. I have been asked many time in my work with various corporate groups – so what then are you supposed to do? Dive into the organizational whirlpool and fight till the last breath gets knocked out of your sails or withdraw from the murky depths and live an isolated secluded life on your own island? Frankly there is no correct answer.

Several years ago I met an experienced HR professional, who related a very valuable tale to me. He said that a large part of senior management goes in Machiavellian manipulations like the magician who tries to outsmart one and all with his silver tongued magical maneuvers. There is a corporate myth that this swashbuckling, quicksilver character is the only corporate beast that survives organizations and makes it to the top – a direct contradiction of the strength in the gentle. He however believed that it is not the manipulations of the so called core management teams or “whatchamacallits” but the grapevine that the rest of the organization hears that makes or breaks a leader. It is the management stories and the professional reputation of the leader amongst the rest of the peoples that will decide whether he is a successful manager or not.

Therefore if Arun is to survive it is not just his immediate superiors and the inner sanctum sanctorum that must believe well of him but his subordinates and the younger people around him who must vouch for his sound decision making and honest ways. If his success is based on real mettle the grapevine will speak well of him and no matter what the conspiracy he will come out of it unscathed.

The tarots reflect this in their own way; the emperor and the hierophant are both partners in maintaining balance. While most of us are quick to embrace the emperor with his earthly power and control over the material world, as professionals we forget to balance this surge with the gentle self introspection of the hierophant. The tarots always advice that true power is one that knows its limits and does not rage over others in its attempts to conquer. On the contrary it includes the mildness of having understood who you are and in the act of accepting yourself extending the same love and compassion to others.

It is only through this balance will you be able to use the skills and abilities of others by accepting them as individuals in their own right. While we are quick to learn to be charismatic strong leaders we forget the basic management speak – “true leaders are those whose teams can survive and function as well without them”. We are so busy making ourselves indispensable that we forget that organizations grow through empowering others not hogging the power for yourself. It is a cycle, strong teams means positive and healthy grapevine and strong leaders. At the other end – a weak leader implies a weak team which will not weather the first onslaught.

It is now for Arun to introspect, before his dreams begin to sour – who he is. Is he going to chase strength alone or realize that true strength comes from being gentle and accepting of oneself and others, and that it takes courage to be that way?

The writing is on the wall – Arun is a person in his own right – his professional strengths will shape his destiny and he is bigger than any circumstance that faces him just as this is true for the other protagonist – Rahul.

Helplessness or a Choice...

2010-07-10T01:09:00.000-07:00

Marriages are made in heaven and you can’t choose where you are born. Old adages which point us towards the helplessness of our fates, and unravel the control we may wish to have over our destiny. So the big question then is, are we that helpless or are these choices we make? If you care to read Brian Weiss’s ‘Many Lives and Many Masters’ – he claims that the soul in its afterlife chooses to be born into specific lifetimes to learn the lessons that it needs most, to move towards ultimate assimilation into the universe – nirvana or salvation as life describes.

The tarots are not silent on this either – the tarot card the World is nothing but a sorting of the chaos and conclusion of cycles of learning. It is a state where you stay suspended in the glory of peace and abundance and enjoy the fruits of having completed a long arduous journey. The fool in its search for this ultimate merging with the universe has lost much and gained wisdom through that loss, he has learnt to use that wisdom to temper his choices and actions, he has died and reinvented himself into a new being and finally arrived at this destination. It is now his time to rest and enjoy the fruits of his labor and bask in the wondrous world of wishes fulfilled. Isn’t that the ultimate goal for all of us in all pursuits in our life?

So how then do we explain our failures to ourselves? The challenge lies in what we describe as a failure… For Rayisa, her failure lies in the grief she carries within herself. An inexplicable heart wrenching, ear splitting screaming grief that wells up most suddenly and unexpectedly. In a perfectly happy moment when she is surrounded by the warmth of love and belongingness, the grief storms into her heart and she begins to feel as if a giant mill stone is pressing down on her chest threatening to push the last breath out of her lungs. She begins to believe that she is all alone and ill fated and even her happiest moments are tainted by the all engulfing pain she has carried within her self.

Rayisa is not alone in this feeling. Many of us share this aloneness we carry within us, which differentiates us from the rest of the seemingly “happy” world. The reasons for this grief can be several; once again a loss of someone you dearly loved, the pain of separation/betrayal by a loved one, just coping with the tattered remnants of a failed relationship or the sheer grief of a robbed childhood, but the grip this shattering emotion has on us is pretty much the same for all the situations described above. The grip is so strong and so enticing that it colors how we perceive the world.

Such is the dilemma that faces Rayisa. In the last decade or so she has visited many a healer, pranic and otherwise, consumed kilos of sugar, tried binging and then alternately starving, crying copiously and then chasing a high life in the hope of numbing the grief she carries within herself. Needless to say she has succeeded – she is anesthetized, she enjoys life to the full, keeps herself busy and is very happy with whom she has turned out to be. But the grief within her has a few tricks up its; every time she is happy she feels something is missing from her life – as if she misses a certain part to herself. She begins to feel dull and just a little less alive. Then comes a cataclysmic event – something that upsets her life and creates upheavals in her otherwise peaceful existence – she is overwhelmed by the circumstances and overcome with distress, natural and otherwise. But to her surprise she feels whole again, she is alive and in a strange way at home. This is familiar ground for Rayisa – an emergency situation she has been trained to cope with… her senses are sharp and adrenalin is pumping. She is ready to cope with what life has to dole out to her even if it is harsh. Such are the games that our emotions can play with us.

Would it be fair of Rayisa to call her life a failure just because she carries grief within her heart? Does it mean that Rayisa will only be whole when miserable? And does it finally imply that she should hate herself for feeling the way she does?

Let’s see what the tarots have to say for her. They say simply, be like the fool – allow yourself the chance to make a fresh new beginning yet again, again and again, no matter how many chances it takes without judging yourself as a failure. No one has been able to make themselves feel better by deriding themselves – the only way is to engage in those things that make you approve of your own self for now – those simple things like reading a book, a drink with friends, or just a warm bath, that give you joy. Remind yourself that this devilish grief belongs to a cataclysmic event in your life – whatever that may be – and is a revisit to the past.

Does that mean that there is no problem to deal with currently? Of course there is – the death card points her to a challenge she needs to face and accept in her present life. She is terribly angry with her husband for not being able to stand up for her time and again in offending situations. She knows he has difficult issues to deal with – but does that mean she is not allowed to be angry? But the cards tell her not to worry – the world has appeared followed by the ace of coins. The world that signifies the settling of all chaos and the ace of coins pointing to a fresh new beginning! The cards are telling her – differentiate between anger with your current circumstances and the grief you can feel in your heart. The intensity of pain you can feel when faced with an upheaval is not commensurate with the reality of the circumstance. Such is the cross people like Rayisa have to bear.

Can Rayisa hate herself for this seeming failure? She has a choice – she can choose to be helpless when faced with this circumstance and hate herself even more, or she can actually just accept herself for who she is. The question Rayisa has to ask herself – who is actually judging her for being who she is? The answer will provide a clue to how she will resolve this. Some people around her perhaps, or maybe the amorphous society at large? Some of these are people who don’t really matter and whose opinion bears no value in her life, yet there may be some who influence her life.

The truth lies in the fact that many such people carry the burden of grief themselves, scratch the surface and there will be an outpouring of lava, and because they are judging themselves harshly for carrying the lava within they will judge Rayisa similarly. Yet others who may seem perfectly at peace are just numb to their own condition, and Rayisa’s forthright acceptance of her own grief threatens to disturb their carefully balanced and fiercely guarded anesthetized state. Naturally she is to be judged and derided.

I think what the tarots point us towards is real mental health and true healing provided by the temperance card. The healing which accepts you for who you are, the strong with the weak, and allows you to be at peace with oneself, not the precarious balance of the two of swords which can be unbalanced by the mere hint/glimpse of reality. Those who are happy within never feel the need to judge others for their crosses and extend the same kindness to others that they do to themselves.

So, she knows that she does carry the burden of grief – but the world indicates that it will pass – there will be a resolution – but in the meantime she needs to be kind to herself. She has to learn to approve of the helpless, fragile and sensitive Rayisa as much as she does the Rayisa who loves to live life to its full. Only then will Rayisa have come a full circle and completed her journey from the fool to the world.

joi de vivre

2010-05-22T12:55:00.000-07:00

The tarots version of true joi de vivre is the Fool Card, or the jester who begins his life with the freshness and joy of youth. It is the only card which unencumbered by contrary experiences and realizations takes a leap of faith into the future driven by the joy of just being. Isn’t that the joy that is so precious to us that we chase it in anti ageing pots and creams, spas and rejuvenation therapies, cleansing mentally and soul-ly; all in the attempt to hang on to that freshness of youth. Simply described the ability to enjoy life to its fullest and with the gusto of youth!

“Sound of vernal showers
On the twinkling grass,
Rain-awakened flowers -
All that ever was
Joyous and clear and fresh – Thy music doth surpass.”

What is it about the Fool that we are unable to let go? And is it necessary for us to let it go?

Recently I met with some old friends at a getaway and it seemed that all of us walked away charged with the desire to meet again and bask in the carefree bonds again. I asked my self what did this event do for us. After much contemplation the answer became clear – it made us feel good about who we are, not just a throwback memory of the past but a real boost to self esteem as who we have turned out to be. We walked away reaffirming the choices we have made for ourselves and more than the affirmations and appreciation we may have received from others we allowed ourselves to be the recipient of approval from our own selves. The non judgmental quality of the fool – unencumbered by negativity and critical comment the fool is able to trust that life will turn out well for him even if he does not know what life holds for him. He is able to do this because he has not received dents to his self esteem which have the power to turn us into our own worst critics.

I have experienced the same joi the vivre in another memorable situation. Some years ago I worked in a small consultancy with an intimate little team of young people who worked tough long hours together. I was their supervisor and loved every moment of coaching and teaching them. Though my job was to teach them how to create content I ended up being a counselor, friend, mentor and an equal participant in the travails of their life. This bright bunch of young people taught me an important lesson about myself. While I have always been known to be an outspoken and confident person, but this was only skin deep. My inner voice was that of a square, logical and sensible woman who could not accept the gentler side to herself. They taught me that while I may cherish the outspoken self it was in fact harder for a person like me to allow a certain mildness and vagueness to creep into my interactions. This self same crazed chase for sharply defined experiences prevented me from truly letting myself go and accepting the softer person within me.

A lesson so simply taught by youth, who themselves were impatient to acquire the layers of experience so that it would shroud them with a certain gravitas, that would make it easier to influence others. Such is the paradox of life – you only look back at an experience and realize that you missed that moment for what it offered.

“We look before and after,
And pine for what is not:
Our sincerest laughter
With some pain is fraught;
Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.

Yet, if we could scorn
Hate and pride and fear,
If we were things born
Not to shed a tear,
I know not how thy joy we ever should come near.”

To my mind people come to get tarot readings to revive their hope for a better clime, not to visit the prophet of doom. The karmic cycle also points to rebuilding and rebirthing your own self until you achieve oneness with the universe. A rather esoteric & fluffy concept but in real terms quite simple! A friend going through a hard time once said – “ I think I am ill fated – these things always happen to me” Yet another said “Why is it that my relationships always fail and I end up feeling betrayed”. A small sample of the numerous ugly messages we send ourselves in post mortem. Our opinion of ourselves changes. We accumulate layers of critical judgmental thoughts around ourselves. SO is there any reprieve?

Sure, there always is. We carry within ourselves an inner child that helps us experience excitement and joy to its fullest. The inner child is an all knowledgeable, wise little creature who despite having learnt difficult lessons in life retains the ability to revive hope, hence he is our biggest resource in coping with tough times.

This is beautifully depicted in the tarots, by the card Sun. The weather beaten, broken fool through its journey of life arrives at a juncture where he walks the last milestone with a golden happy child. Through him he learns to experience the simple joys of playing in the sun and soaking up the warmth of the surroundings. Through the song and dance he learns to look at himself anew and appreciate himself for who he has become; finally he asks the child – “Who are you?” The child shines brighter and answers, “The new YOU.” Tough times reshape our perspectives and hence reactions to things, the SUN sends us a message – of course expect to be changed but also learn to love it. Only when we love the new us will the inner child be happy and allow us to regain the joi de vivre which may have otherwise dimmed.

So the Sun says to my friend – No you are not ill fated – you haven’t learnt to appreciate the strength within you and nor are you a failure in relationships. Another perspective – you know how to extricate yourself from a bad situation – your sense of self preservation prevents you from continuing in terrible self abusive interactions. An infinitely more loving way to adjudge yourself.

"With thy clear keen joyance
Languor cannot be:
Shadow of annoyance
Never came near thee:
Thou lovest, but ne'er knew love's sad satiety."

Magus the magician has always appeared in my readings for people as a warning. A master manipulator is what I love to call him. He is a charismatic personality with a gift of the gab and the ability to spin yarns around you. So charming are the fantasies that despite yourself you are ensnared for posterity, and enslaved to a person whose motives are more often than not self serving. But is that the only side to the Magus?

Merlin the Magician, born of a human woman and a wellspring called Incubus, possessed supernatural powers. While he was responsible for sorcery he also engineered the birth of King Arthur through magic & intrigue. He became a trusted friend and advisor to King Arthur until possessed by the Lady of the Lake. His story tells us to believe in magic and miracles. Also to believe that there are vast wells of unexplored potential within us we aren’t aware of. Therefore the power to achieve whatever your heart desires also lies within us. This theory has been popularized by many books like The Secret and Creative Visualization but it is the ability to dream that allows us the opportunity to achieve. An important truth told by the Magician.

I have met the Magus and those posing as the Magus. Remember a true Magician does not lie and conceal himself behind deceit – he has the courage to follow his fantasies without extending promises he cannot deliver. Contrary to our pre-conceptions a real Magician is not necessarily the fiery warrior charging on a steed; no he leaves that for the Knights and himself is stoic, and calm and tranquil like the wise man in the moon. Within his sobriety he holds the magic that created the world and the Universe is his to ask from.

True joi de vivre comes from letting go, allowing yourself to dream, fantastic dreams and believing that the ability to achieve them lies within you.

“Teach me half the gladness
That thy brain must know;
Such harmonious madness
From my lips would flow,
The world should listen then, as I am listening now.”

The verses are from the poem – Ode to a Skylark – Percy B. Shelley

lost souls...

2010-05-12T01:54:00.000-07:00

At one time I believed that all the lost souls were drawn to me like a moth to a flame. I could walk into a gathering and many a pair of searching eyes would zone in on me and there I would be engaged in a disarming conversation with some of them. I thought it was a special talent. It was the ability to provide unconditional acceptance and support that made me who I am. The lost souls would find a sanctuary like no other and never before, and draw from my strength to become bigger and better. Little did I know that rather than a talent it was a quality that was seriously detrimental to my well being? This very talent I needed to recover from to make me stronger within my own self. Yet again it was the age-old suspension of my being clamoring to be a whole. The lost souls resonated with that suspension and were enveloped in its chaos. This synchrony instead of making me feel stronger only served the purpose of splitting me further apart.

Let me introduce you to some such souls. The magician; I met the magician when I was 15. With his silver tongued demeanor he painted the vision of the upright solid gent who forced all others into a faded comparison. Just his strong shining presence paled the rest of the world into a faded yellow. With my very own chaotic suspension, his apparent solidity helped me imagine that I depended on him for support. But true to himself, there he was, the master manipulator – who specialized in helping you believe things that others saw as apparent lies. So strong was the presence that I spun a world of fantasy around myself and him – a fantastic, him-centric world that did not really exist but was designed to make him feel stronger than ever. He drew from my imagined and real world its life blood and slowly and steadily helped erase the boundaries of my security. Frankly I only had myself to blame for the miseries I brought upon myself.

She sought me in a group of the le miserables. She the eternal clinging twine completely absorbed the essence of my need. We were two kindred souls intertwined by our blues. Needless to say we were inseparable. Our inner selves, our experiences in childhood, our emotional chaos all congealed into one large gelatinous mass that threatened choke all the reality of our lives. So strong was the bond that even our miseries became one. I regretted my better circumstance and tried my utmost best to provide what I could to make up for what fortune had favored me with. But it needed to be a timed relationship because reality cannot survive this fusion. Even if one is conjoined, individuality and its demands exert there pressure on the relationship. Both wish to negotiate their own perspective and the lines of “either my way or the high way” are drawn.

He was the spoilt, golden prince and he loved to be loved. And so I like many others did just that… adored him; I loved him till my heart broke into two. I loved him so strongly that I couldn’t separate myself from his wishes. And then we became adults. The golden prince could not find the missing pieces to himself. He had many encounters with the Hierophant and its guidance/assistance to access the various parts to himself, but he was too afraid to look into the compartments within his soul lest one of them turn into the proverbial Pandora’s box. As for me – I could love him no more. My grown self could not help but realize that there was no chance of completion from a source which was so fragmented by itself. The Hierophant could not be the strong man or the emperor of my life. I had no option but to nurse my disappointments and make a curtain call.

The list of lost souls I have been fused with is endless but here is one more that deserves a special mention. She is the Queen of the Universe or so we all believe. Her regal ways and commanding airs have a clear impact on all of us. We all dance to the tune she plays. We dance and we dance till the soles of our feet bleed and the sweat pours of our backs. We bend over backwards, we bend over front forward, we laugh and we joke, we cry and we cajole, we hurt and we forgive, we beg and we plead and it goes on and on like the whirling windmill buffeted by the strong winds of her command. And we never tire. Till the Strong edifice, the Queen is strong no more. Our hearts break to see the object of our slavish reverence so crestfallen only to realize that we have still to continue the never ending dance of subservience.

Do we grudge her this in her hour of need? Frankly No. At least I don’t – My heart breaks every time I see the Tower fallen and the power wrested from the Queen and I wish that she would be the Queen of yore again. But what of the ministers that surround her. They in their otherwise impoverished state maybe ineffective but today have reared their ugly heads for who they are. They have surrounded us with negativity of manipulation, deceit and surreptitiousness. The otherwise subservient minions have today changed the culture of the kingdom to that of insidious means. I am naturally forced to think – which one did I prefer the absolute dance of slavery or this manipulative murky mulch that seems to engulf all in darkness. Frankly I do not have a clear preference.

On our journey through life we meet all kinds of people – some whole and some lost. But it is the LOST souls that leave an imprint in our memories. Ever wondered why? I have come to the conclusion because their apparent weakness resonates with something within us. We are drawn to engage with such people because we find the same lost vestiges within us. The tarots have always prescribed that the path to salvation is to embrace the strength with your failings. No one can hope to move on in life without confronting and accepting those demons.

So I have a choice here – I can choose to talk about them with hatred and hurt that they have caused me with their actions or embrace them as a part of my life that taught me lessons about myself. Of course, embracing does not mean exposing yourself to the same pattern of hurt again and again, rather learning not to repeat the same mistake and protecting your self from self inflicted flagellation and pain. My uncle recently told me – life is governed by a 90-10 rule. We have as little as 10% control over the things that happen to us but have 90% control over how we react to those circumstances. By managing our reaction we can therefore hold our fate in the palms of our hands.

So my inner dialogue can be – “No matter what circumstances are currently impacting my life, they are less important than how I react to them. Accordingly, I have a lot more control over what happens next than you realize. Instead of trying to demonstrate my survival skills or self-sufficiency to anyone else, I need to focus on strengthening my own foundations. It's not about what others think; it's about my integrity.”

I began writing this with a song that exemplifies LOST SOULS for me and so I end with it.

“How I wish, how I wish you were here.
We're just two lost souls
Swimming in a fish bowl,
Year after year,
Running over the same old ground.
What have we found?
The same old fears.
Wish you were here.”
Roger Waters - Pink Floyd

when deafness surrounds you...

2010-04-13T14:55:00.000-07:00

Our entire generation goes misty eyed about the song “The Sounds of Silence” by Simon and Garfunkel, which talks about human dependence on technology robbing real communication between people. So true, but something I am also supporting through this blog. But today I am thinking about a slightly more perturbing predicament – imagine a surreal situation where you are screaming in a room full of people surrounded by voices, chatter and the clinging and clanging of real life, but no-one can hear. You scream and you scream, your face turns purple, your breath runs out and the shrillness of your own screeches in your ears makes you fear the cacophony you must be creating, but all those around you continue about their chores as if you and your sounds do no exist. In short, you are surrounded by deafness. Doesn’t it sound like the scary reproduction of B grade horror film – I am afraid I will have to disappoint you, this is real.

Meet Rani, she will tell you about herself. She is a 15 year old very fierce young girl, very smart and way ahead of other students in her grade. She has an idyllic home, loving parents, a sister and doting grandparents. All outsiders who look at her talk about, how she has all that she possibly could want! And she does… Scratch the surface and you will find pain in the young girl’s eyes, why? Rani’s parents encourage their children to talk to them, and so Rani shares the adolescent realities of her world with them.

She tries to talk about the pressures she faces in life, the terrible struggle to stay popular in her school, the social pressures of conforming to the traditions of her family, the do’s and don’ts of good behavior, keeping up the style quotient, her troubles with boys, her emotional upheavals – you name it and she has tried. Each time she opens a little core of her being she finds herself facing judgments and analysis that does not make sense to her. Keeping up with the Joneses is so important in her family that they forget to accommodate for the blossoming eccentricities of their daughter. So much so, that only those opinions and sharing are validated that fit in with their world view, anything slightly different is dismissed as irrelevant crazy ravings of adolescent hormones. Despite having everything she could possibly desire, Rani finds herself getting alienated from her idyllic home.

She soon finds herself feeling run down, ill and racked with weird anxieties and phobias. Her parents are naturally concerned, but after the doctor assures them that Rani is physically fit, they dismiss her illnesses as psychosomatic symptoms of adolescence. For a family that believes in love and support, they can only extend their deafness to their special child.

Rani grows into a strong young woman who has internalized the deafness that surrounds her by being an aggressive person with a distinct difficulty in listening to others herself. She carries that anger within her and extends it to others through rejecting their pleas for a real connection. She works as a really successful career woman in a bank, but is not known for her compassion.

Rani meets Saroj at a club. Saroj is a typical suburban mom. Busy with parenting her little son, they meet at the swimming pool on a weekend and become great friends. They soon discover that Saroj is Rani’s colleague’s (at the bank) wife. Saroj looks forward to coffee weekends with Rani, she feels that Rani’s intensity compliments her milder view of the world. Soon they are really close friends and share confidences with each other.

Saroj’s soothing manner calms Rani and allows her an opportunity to listen to someone else for a change. She sees her friend’s wonderful happy little home and is a little wistful that she has never attempted such a life for herself. They both often laugh that for two people from worlds so far away from each other, they seem to get along so famously.

One day Saroj tells her that her beautiful family is not so wonderful after all. Her accomplished husband and she have experienced great difficulty forming a bond. An overly interfering mother-in-law has prevented the young couple from having a moment of peace. There marital life has been so strife torn that they have not been able to forge that trust that spouses should share before they have their offspring. Saroj’s mildness of manner and conventional upbringing stops her from leaving her home and child. She attempts to explain time and again to her husband, that they should distance themselves just a little from his family of origin and find space for their marital life. But his overwhelming filial love prevents him from seeing sense. Saroj is afraid that this will adversely affect her son and his psyche.

She has tried to communicate this difficulty to her mother in law and their family, but ends up getting adjudged as just “different’ and ‘troubled’. Instead of helping the young wife they end up encouraging their son’s behavior as normal and Saroj’s behavior as ranting of a mad woman. As long as Saroj, tows the line and never every questions the rationale of the family she shall be a good human being else, she is a sinner and a person to be shunned. Support be damned to hell, she ends up being the odd freak to mistrusted and doubted at all times. Despite being in a family she ends up being alone.

Rani hears Saroj’s story and realizes – what they have in common? What is that bond that draws them close? Why despite all the freakish differences they end up finding solace in each other’s company – they share the same distress – the distress of having been surrounded by deafness. Screaming and screaming yourself hollow, to have someone hear but no one does. Why – because people around them do not wish to hear anything that disturbs their own construct of reality, any stimuli which will make them question the logic of their actions threatens to disturb the carefully balanced house of cards they have created for themselves. They have sold their soul to their own ideas and can only hear sounds of silence.

“And the people bowed and prayed
To the neon god they made
And the sign flashed out its warning
In the words that it was forming
And the sign said, "The words of the prophets are written on the subway walls
And tenement halls"
And whispered in the sounds of silence”

Rani listens in wonder that despite being a sufferer of similar circumstance both their reactions to life have been so definitively different. She shares her story with Saroj – this is perhaps the first time she is telling someone. Saroj hears her and is shaken that her friend with a predilection for strong words and strong statements could be actually hiding a vulnerable child underneath. She convinces Rani – that they should pay a visit to a Tarot healer she has heard of for guidance. Rani who is pretty dismissive of such an idea initially, gives in to her friends wish and decides to accompany her albeit with severe doubt about the worth of such an endeavor. Here’s the guidance that they both receive from the tarots.

Saroj’s Reading

The first layer of her reading says simply – Saroj is coping with severe disappointment at the hands of her family, though a path will soon appear to help her forsake her disappointments and move away from unrest. The cards advice her, to be strong and adamant in the face of adversity and to stand steadfastly besides herself. Any hurried flurry of action can result in the misbalance of the carefully balanced swords. She is living holding her emotions tightly in control and any desperate and impulsive act will only succeed in disturbing her sense of balance.

The second layer focuses Saroj on a simple fact – judgment day is near. “The Angel hands the Fool a small trumpet. The Fool is hesitant, but he knows that this is a final decision. Either to go forward, or stay where he is. He blows, and the trumpet's song echoes across the sky, its vibrations seeming to crack open the Earth. From under the Fool's feet, memories rise. Images of his innocent youth, challenges, loves, failures, losses, success, disillusionment and wisdom. For the first time, he does not try to leave them, ignore or forget them, but accepts them”. Judgment tells her that a moving will only happen if she lets go of the hurts – destiny will deal with those that have harmed – and to feel mercy for herself and others (temperance).

She can find solace and wellness in her strengths – the conversations she has with her friends (page of wands), the appreciation she receives within her group of friends and in society (the 3 of cups), the hard work she is capable of – maybe even try a new opportunity for work and the creativity she has within herself (ace of wands). Embracing these strengths she will regenerate and renew herself. She will provide self nourishment to herself (the empress).

Once she does that justice shall have its day – those that have harmed shall pay dearly for the harm done unto her and her relationship with her husband shall be restored to what it should have been – she will find complete love (2 of cups).

Rani heard and it thought to herself – something any psychologist could have told her. And then it was her turn. She wanted to test the tarots – without telling the reader about herself – get a reading which would help her.

Rani’s reading
The reading begins with the advice – “take hurried action – do not deliberate too much act on an impulse and find a counselor/therapist or a healer to consult with. This is a journey you cannot make alone.” The cards advice Rani to find help through a trained professional who will help her move towards finding love – to find the blessing that we may allow love to flow into our lives. Above all Rani needs to learn to allow herself to be loved – her logical/rational mind overrides her vulnerability – she will definitely need to help to accept that about herself and then feel safe to let others see it.

The second step tells her to show mercy (temperance) to herself and others – to be less harsh in her judgments of other people and reality – to move beyond the betrayal (7 of cups) that her family’s deafness has meted out to her. Once she does that the star will restore her hope for love (refer my earlier post on betrayal for the complete meaning of the star). She has already lost her childhood – she now needs to change the inherited spectacles she uses to look at life and develop a new perspective that comes from wisdom and having survived trying circumstances (hanged man). Only when she gives up her attachment to the earlier way of judging others will she find peace. When faced with adversity in childhood we tend to absorb it as a part of our identity; which them becomes a construct to be questioned.

The last part of the cards deliver a more trying message for Rani – she needs to work hard at managing both her confident and the dark side to herself (chariot). It is a struggle that will not come easy. She will only be able to win the battle through determined effort and realization that it is in times of uncertainty (the moon) that her instincts kick in. She needs to watch herself in insecure situations and learn to accept that she may be vulnerable and that being deaf and aggressive to others view is only one way to dealing with it. The message of love she has learnt from the ace of cups and temperance, in the first part is another manner of dealing with uncertain times.

Given all that she has the full potential of developing into the independent, successful and peaceful individual like the queen of pentacles.

The drive back home...
Rani and Saroj are amazed – they have a lot to think about. The tarot readings have provided the guidance they needed. They ride home in silence. It is needless to say that they will certainly think about this at every alone moment they find.

They have both tried to tell others what they really wanted – a hearing – in more ways than one – but the one thing they forgot to provide – extend that hearing to their own selves.

"Fools", said I, "You do not know
Silence like a cancer grows
Hear my words that I might teach you
Take my arms that I might reach you
" But my words, like silent raindrops fell
And echoed
In the wells of silence…

how do I move on...

2010-04-07T05:55:00.000-07:00

The grief cycle is just so simplistic, once the giraffe’s foot hits the bottom of the quicksand pit, he becomes aware that an alternate view of the world is visible and new solutions to life become apparent. Unfortunately it’s not so simple. Every time grief turns up on our doorstep we say to ourselves, “if I can get over this, I can survive just about anything in life.” But moving on is complex and as soul searching as the process of accepting grief.

Let’s explore this a little more. Eva asked me – “Help me find pieces of myself. I have coped with my loss (her spouse of 15 years had walked out on her) and everyone around me feels – I am whole despite it. I wish I could say the same for myself. Help me discover what I believe – For a person as compulsively articulate as me, speaking out is not hard – what is harder is to stick with an opinion I had. My experiences have made me change what I believed in, question the basis of data processing in my brain and definitely eat my own words so many times that I have a great amount of difficulty, if not fear in making statements about what I shall or shall never do. I have learnt that there are no givens and nothing is cast in stone hence I often find myself questioning an opinion I may form in my head even before my lips have opened to emit the first opining sounds.”

What Eva was trying to tell us that, when we love and trust someone for a long period of time, they become a part of who we are? We begin to see ourselves as reflected by them; their reactions to us insidiously creep into our beliefs and identity. “I sought to alter the person I love, but ended up altering myself.” It was no surprise that the loss of such a relationship would make her question what she believed in. She needed to re-gather the fractured fragments of her mind and reiterate her thoughts for her own self in order to move on.

We embarked on the journey of the search for Eva and explored several aspects to her life- we looked at things she wanted and the demons she wanted to defeat - here’s what turned up:

4 of cups & 8 of swords: Eva had learned to cope with her loss by drawing into a numb state and blocking out real fears and feelings for the circumstance. What had begun as a process of self protection was now outdated. Just accepting her grief had not helped her forge a vital connection with life as yet. A shroud of faded numbness still clouded the sharp images of relationships and interactions.

Disengagement and an uninvolved manner of existence prevented her from accepting things about herself and others. Her fears (8 of swords) held her captive and prevented her from bringing about change in her life - we asked her to formulate an affirmation – “I believe that people can be changed – they just need a catalyst that begins that process of change. Sometimes the catalyst is themselves, a catastrophic event, a powerful influence, a personal emergency or even necessity. I also believe that in some way I change everyone I come in contact with – that is perhaps a talent I have.”

The justice: Acceptance yields into eventual forgiveness. But the feelings of revenge take a long time to go. Though she had accepted hurt a lingering sense of revenge stayed – the justice card showed up telling her that life has its own way of delivering its retribution. Her statement will reveal a need for acceptance that those that hurt shall pay – but may not be at your hands or in the manner in which you want them to pay, but pay they shall. She said “I believe in divine retribution – I believe there IS a reason why something happens and a definite payment of your dues in this birth. If you sow seeds of betrayal and hurt you reap unrest, dissatisfaction and grief at the very least. I also believe that divine retribution is in a speedy execution mode as far as I am concerned but also metes justice to those that hurt me.”

Strength: One of the biggest effects that such a loss had left Eva with was guilt – what if I had done this, maybe he would have stayed? If I had been more assertive maybe he would have learned to respect me? etc., etc. A thousand messages had gone home making it impossible for her to let go of trying to control the event. The strength sends us this message - Not only does this mean that you need to control your impulses, strength teaches a lesson of recognizing and accepting our own demons i.e.,, one of them being guilt. It is not something that she could have done but perhaps the type of person she had chosen or the reasons for making the choice that could need scrutiny. It is time to self audit and recognize the choices that led to such a circumstance (how many times did she compromise with an action that harmed her) and what then can be changed within to prevent such an occurrence.

Eva believes “I believe that everyone comes into your life for a reason and you must learn your lessons from those visits. You better learn fast from the bad ones or else they will visit you again sometimes in other forms.”

The ten of swords and the empress: There can be no moving on without reawakening love for oneself. In losing the love of her spouse she has learned that she is unworthy of love. The biggest enemy at the time of grief is your own self – giving yourself messages like – this only happens to me? Now that this has happened I have been damaged for life? Quite to the contrary the 10 of swords and the empress teach us to regenerate and rejuvenate our selves. Then 10 of swords herald the end of a false way of seeing a circumstance. So much as you see a man struck down by the swords, the dawn breaks in the distance signaling a new beginning. The empress asks you to nurture yourself and claim the power you may have lost for yourself. The stronger and more nourished you are internally the weaker the enemy shall be.

Eva tells me “I believe that every break up does not necessarily lead to bitterness. It is all about how you feel about yourself at the end of it all. If you walk away with your head held high and yourself respect intact the memories are not necessarily painful. It is only when you realize the lesson that you have learnt from the experience and absorb the benefits thereof can you begin to forgive the persons who hurt you.”

The star: Eva cannot move on without hope. Even in the therapeutic relationships that heal trauma survivors – it is love that heals. Teaching a person to accept love is perhaps one of the hardest tasks possible for a therapist. The star card is your therapist for you - having lost all the star card points you towards hope and healing. Even if sudden magical transformation is not imminent – this card definitely points us towards believing in ourselves and in the healing power of love. It is only love that heals. A love for yourself first, and then for others! Eva heaves a sigh of relief, “I also believe that real love has a calming effect and allows you to blossom as a human being. All consuming passion does just that – consume you.”

The path of moving on is not complete without accepting your own weaknesses. Having assured herself that she will find love, Eva, needs to accept that she can only do so if she does not repeat the mistakes she made previously.

The devil and the magician: When you look to complete what you miss from others (devil) you will land in the hands of temptation and fall prey to the magical manipulations of the magician. Haven’t we found that we always find the same prototype attractive? What if that prototype has left us hurt and exposed. Isn’t it then necessary to question why do we need to get into relationships with people who evidently end up hurting us? Is there a piece of us that we miss? Perhaps, a fear of true intimacy which Eva has explained to herself in the STAR! When building strategies to fortify her weaknesses she needs to use the hope within herself as her source of strength.

She says to herself: “I also believe that I only seem to get a zing from emotionally charged situations. I am not sure IF I can ever find that ZING on a sustained basis with other people. What is beautiful is the fact that the minute I learn this lesson I also have an objective vision to the emotional traps that others can lay for me. I also learn to discern emotional manipulation disguised as deep sorrow. I learn to differentiate true mettle and strength of character from a cleverly concealed act. I come closer to the TRUTH I so believe in. The truth my world is so centered around…”

If we are vulnerable – it is our job to protect ourselves against hurt and abuse. A greater reason to be vigilant before we give all! It is perfectly all right to let the other person earn our love rather than hand it out easy. The stronger your belief in your TRUTH the greater the likelihood of finding a loving and nurturing relationship that offers you true intimacy.

do they see your love...

2010-03-30T23:50:00.000-07:00

I have been toying with the idea of what to write about for the past few days. Love is always easy, for a person like me who has toyed with it, grappled with it and suffered as well with it, there is always, a load to say. But I am going to change course this time and write about a lecture I have been delivering for several years now at various schools in Delhi. Career choices – or the lack of choices thereof!

In between, working with others and setting up my own training firm, I worked with a dear friend, on a project very close to our hearts. Helping young people find out what they would like to do. We called it Playshops – it was aimed at helping young people discover aspects of their own talents they had as yet not experienced. We based it on the concept of Multiple Intelligences, a brain child of Dr. Howard Gardner, someone I have always been impressed with. Several such workshops and programs have sprung in this country since but what stays in my mind is the experience of the kids.

As adults, teachers and parents we are very well versed and acutely aware of our experiences & feelings about our children’s choices. The most relaxed and the unstressed parent/guardian has only one summative assessment of this discussion – uncertainty, helplessness and feeling out of control. In one simple word severe ANXIETY. Loud and clear, overwhelmingly so… It is this anxiety about our own helplessness that makes us react in various ways to our children’s choices.

Some of us try to talk and advice our children, some others enroll them in additional coaching, sports, music, dance, art, drama, etc. etc. the list in endless; while yet others try to control TV watching time, on the phone time, face book time, yahoo messenger time, study times, even sleeping times. Frankly whichever route you follow, however cool you think you are, it finally is all about coping with anxiety, and that too our own. This does not mean that we should stop doing what we do as parents, even if I were to suggest, so what? We would not be able to help ourselves. Our concern for our offspring is a nature’s way of telling us that we are parents and it is or job to ensure that the offspring flies away from the nest. So what then can be done to help us? Well, let’s take the first step.

For a brief moment let’s forget about ourselves and think this from the other protagonist’s point of view. Let’s hear our children speak. I am basing this on my work with several adolescents in the past years and of course my own teenage years. I am going to tell you the story of Firoza.

Firoza is a passionate young girl, who loves her dreams and fantasies. She loves her friends, her parents, her sibling and of course her school. She also loves to hang out with her friends, go for movies, and appear cool. It is very important to her that people should appreciate her for who she is but in the heart of hearts she does not really have a grip on who that Firoza really is. In fact she is looking for her. So if you can provide her with an experience that will bring her closer to that truth she will be attracted to you.

She believes that her parents are afraid that she will fail in a multitude of ways – not secure enough marks to get an admission into a great college, maybe not be offered the right choice of subjects in school, will fall in love with the wrong guy and fritter away precious years in frivolous pursuits. She is acutely aware that people watch her and she performs for their benefit. She mirrors what she sees in their eyes. If she sees derision she plays out her worst self, if there is anxiety she will play the devil’s advocate and if there is cynosure she will be defiant. But, the minute she see love and appreciation, she will dissolve into the beautiful little baby you first held in your arms and demand the same love and attention that you are so desperate to give.

The truth is she is extremely sensitive to your dialogues. Firoza came to me for a reading; I met her some years ago at a program and have always felt close to her since. She asked me to find out what her mother and father felt about her. A strange request–I asked her what do you think? – She replied – “of course they love me – but I want to know what they think about me?” The cards were spread – the empress and the 4 of cups followed by the high priestess and the hierophant.

The story was simple her mother loved her with the unconditional, nurturing love of the empress and was an important figure in her life but as yet she felt bored and unsettled (4 of cups). She had a lot going for her in her life symbolized by the 3 cups in front of her and more was being magically offered by the hand but inner discontent prevented her from being able to see it effectively. The high priestess stood for potential as yet undiscovered and a need to develop powers of intuition and natural insight. This clearly indicated the need for her mother to transit from being the nurturing provider alone, to being an “unobtrusive guide” who would help her on the journey of self discovery. This is much like the counselor who helps you hear your internal dialogue without allowing her own personality and reactions to come in the way. The hierophant’s role was that for her father to be a rather more obvious guide or a teacher who would help her make choices without attempting to control the outcome.

I remember this reading as I introspected – how in much in contrast this is to our own methods for controlling the environment for coping with our ANXIETY.

Coming back to Firoza, the cards asked her to address her anxiety through the 8 of swords. They advise that fear of unknown is worse that the fear of a real fear. So we embarked on this exercise – Let’s name it. She made a list of all her fears, here’s what she came up with:

Fear of:

Death,
Stomach upset,
Inability to stay popular,
Not being able to hold attention,
Not being liked,
Being misunderstood,
Love and being in love,
Loss and partings,
Rejection,
Being dismissed,
Losing people,
Being clingy,
Being angry,
Being hurt,
Being aggressive,
Trying too hard,
Talking too much,
Having to explain myself,
Having to fight, and
Losing when up against someone else.

Are you surprised, no shocked that such a little person can feel so many things? There’s more in store. The tarots went on to advice her to explore what she wanted from her parents specially her mother.

Here’s what Firoza said: “My parents are a part of my life in a million shreds. Their opinions and their voice are a part of my being. There are just those little bits of myself fused with each of these million shreds of my parent’s wishes that just hang together in suspension. These shreds function in a synchrony to make me who I am. If there is a disagreement or a conflict with my parent the synchrony gets disturbed. In fact it is they who have taught me the rhythm to this synchrony. Is it that impossible then to believe that the very thought of being in a disharmony with them can separate the shreds of my being?”

And here we are as parents doubting the impact of our words on our children. Firoza is clearly telling us that above all she likes harmony. In fact she needs to be in harmony. So whatever you may do – career choices, choice of subjects, moral dilemmas – help her keep her balance and be the high priestess to her confused mind. Let her find those little bits of herself in the suspension so that she can soon become a whole.

The tarots always end on two counts – a child is like the fool card. An adolescent is like the Greek God Dyonysus, the god of free spirit, an over-turner of bounds of tradition and restriction. He is like the child discovering life for the first time. He is trusting, innocent and ignorant of the travails that await him and as yet ready to take a leap of faith into the future. Walk with him and you will surprise yourself by what you learn as he travels the path of knowledge, development and self awareness.

As Firoza summed this up beautifully – “I know I want to be a Firoza who stands for the Tarot Cards the Sun, the Star, the Moon and the World! I want to be a person capable of unbridled love – Firoza is a beautiful color – my color that is feminine, happy, charming, ever hopeful and supremely confident. Though I don’t want to be Firoza the stone – because stones are opaque and unmoving and I am translucent and fluid with God alone knows what all that is inside me.”

is forgiveness a passive act…?

2010-03-24T12:33:00.000-07:00

All religious scriptures instruct the sinner to beg for forgiveness and kneel at the feet of god in abject submission and all shall be forgiven. Your soul will be redeemed and you will be able to find a spot for yourself in heaven. One kind of forgiveness – I have done this, begged for deliverance from retribution time and again from the lord and been forgiven. I am sure all of us have found ourselves caught in whirlpool of emotions, when faced with our own wrong doings and battled with ourselves and god to accept our own failings. An inner turmoil most of us experience regularly… But today I want to speak about another kind of forgiveness - forgiving others. Do you think is hard to ask for forgiveness? - You don’t know the beginning of it my friend, it’s even harder to forgive someone who has willfully harmed you and shows no acknowledgment or repentance for the same. And is it necessary for you forgive them in the first place? A dilemma I have spent many years battling with.

The wrong doers can come in many forms; someone you love, a primary care giver, a spouse or a partner, a friend, a colleague; the list extends to encompass any every one of those relationships we negotiate with. The issue is not who the person is but how you are affected.

Let me begin with a story. Once upon a time there was a young girl who married a wonderful man to escape the tediousness and boredom of her other life. They lived in a nuclear family and hoped to make a wonderful haven for themselves. And they did… but for the fact that the young girl was troubled by demons within her. The slightest hint of insecurity would throw her into the throws of rage. She would be so consumed by it that it would take her days to come back to a state where she recognized herself again. Needless to say the wonderful man could not continue to be of support to her forever. He found the demons too hard to face. As hard as he tried, his own difficulties would not allow him to make sense of what was happening around them. He left – to save himself and his sanity… No one blamed him, after all the demons were too hard to bear. The young girl bore the brunt of the responsibility for the failure of the relationship.

Who would you ask her to forgive, the wonderful man, herself or the demons of her past? And would it be a passive act? The card that immediately comes to my head is Justice – the scales of justice are always balanced – you shall get what you deserve. A message given loud and clear by the departing of her husband! The avenging angel stands punished. But yet again a twist in the tale, who will wield the card of justice? Is society the wielder of the sword of justice or is there a higher sword than that? Is the justice meted out by our own inner conscience higher than that of the outer world? The tarots teach us just that.

The justice card is illustrated by a story, where there once was a competition between the goddess of intelligence Athene and the god of the oceans Posieden; both were asked to present a gift to mankind and the most useful gift of all would declare the winner. Posieden struck the ground and produced a horse, the first of its kind and everyone was sure that nothing better could be produced. Athene provided an olive tree – the oil of the fruit would provide mankind with nourishment and warmth, while the olive branch was a symbol of peace, when the steed was a symbol of war. Athene was declared the winner and Athens was named after her. A lesson mankind must never forget, learn to assess their own actions with rational judgments, for reason to override emotion to balance things in life.

The young woman’s fate is sealed. Her husband unwittingly has entered into a relationship fraught by troubles from the past – he does not deserve to deal with this and hence is correct in leaving her. However another look at this situation – his wife is suffering from problems from the past could be any trauma – a neglected childhood, emotionally unstable primary relationships, a betrayal by a loved one and maybe even abuse. She has obviously not learned to trust and hence the slightest of insecurities makes her fly into a self protective rage. Certainly not exemplary behavior but also not a deliberate one, is he now correct to leave? Are relationships only about a wonderful haven? And are wonderful havens never to be disturbed by tumultuous situations? If the society was to wield the sword of justice – they would end up doing a great wrong.

This is exactly what justice teaches the young girl – balance your life and assess what is wrong with you? Find out what alienates you from the current circumstances – what are those demons that control your being – spell them out and face them. Accept that your behavior is inappropriate but before you punish yourself for losing your husband also assess his failings. Has he been such a great spouse – is he completely in the right while you are in the wrong? Possibly not – there must be something about him that triggers insecurity – sit together and assess this for yourselves. Once the analysis is done and the cards are on the table wield the next card – justice tempered with mercy – the Temperance.

Temperance or forgiveness says – “first and foremost forgive your own self. Anger can never be dealt with by directing more anger at yourself, it can only be mitigated by compassion. So accept that just as you were not responsible for the actions of the demons in your past, you are not responsible for your husband’s action. As a child you could not have done anything to prevent what was happening to you and hence are not responsible for what happened. A fact – forgive yourself.” Only when the young girl stops taking responsibility will it be placed where it rightfully belongs.

The story further unfolds, she works hard at understanding why she reacts the way she does – replaces all the voices of alarm with self soothing and healing mechanisms, but alas the one thing that stays with her – her desire to seek revenge. Her life does not seem meaningful unless those that harmed her pay for what they did. She embarks on the journey to confront the perpetrators of harm and draw solace in the fact that they will be pained. What begins as a war of justice turns its tables on her. Each time she confronts the demons, they become more powerful. Why? By her acts of aggression she is playing out the drama of the past where the demons appear less demonic in comparison to the angry young girl. Also they become stronger in the knowledge that they can still affect her. So what then is the solution for the young girl to right the wrong within her…?

Even though she has found forgiveness and healing for herself, is it important to forgive the demons of her past? The temperance is a card of balance, balancing of the good with the bad. The young girl does not need to forgive them because she is on a spiritual journey to salvation but for a very tangible and necessary benefit. The cards say “As long as you carry anger for an event or a person with you – you continue to identify with that event and stay connected to it. Only when anger is diffused does the connection sever and you grow to be a bigger and better person. The first step to diffusing anger – develop your own self and hold your power within you – you will find the hold that the event had on you will fade. Also magically the perpetrators of abuse stay powerful as long as they know you are affected – the day they lose their power to impact your life they begin to appear in the correct perspective, as they really are, weak and corrupt.” Once she makes these realizations she will find it hard to allow them to stay powerful and even forgive them. She will have a whole life without.

As for the wonderful husband – well, he will have to work harder to be the wonderful support he promises to be whilst she works on calming the demons within her. They will both learn to forgive each other.

Does the act of forgiveness appear passive? Quite to the contrary – any process which requires such soul searching and active change of thought can never be a passive exercise. A lesson I have taught myself again and again. Life has taught me to see everything etched in sharp outlines and difficulty in seeing the grays. A long time ago I found it hard to accept a line of an evangelical poem – “lord give me the strength to accept the hardships so that I may be reasonably happy in this life and eternally happy in my life with you”. It seemed to negate my quest for revenge – for all the wrongs done unto me, only to learn that the path of forgiveness is a far more arduous and powerful one. It is actually in forgiveness that I have found peace because the demons no longer are powerful enough to control the way I live my life.

i have been betrayed...

2010-03-17T15:44:00.000-07:00

I have been betrayed… how many of us have the courage to make such a statement about ourselves. Say it out loud… Not easy. But I find that in the event of a betrayal that is just the thing to do, so much so that unless you accept this undeniable event you cannot move beyond it or cope with it. My last two posts have been truly cathartic for me and this one is primarily reminiscent in nature. Rumination about my own and others experiences….

Most psychological experiences of betrayal follow a grief cycle (Kubler Ross) and acceptance only comes at the end of the series of reactions. Shock or immobilization followed by denial that this cannot happen to me, anger, bargaining, depression, testing & acceptance. As always I will attempt to explain this through an experience I am uploading a video of a giraffe stuck in quicksand to explain this - do see to understand.

Inquiring about a cheating spouse/partner or lover constitutes a large majority of the reasons for requesting a tarot reading – the simplest and the most obvious of all betrayals. I say simplest because the betrayal stares you in the face and is possible to fathom. The psychological reactions may be complex but betrayal has the same ramifications as coping with the finality of death, allowing you the right to grieve. This becomes harder if the relationship is clandestine and you have to put on a brave front to hide the true extent of misery.

Just as an illustration – a woman once told me that she had discovered some emails from her partner to another woman and was having a hard time believing that this was possible. So what’s so new about it? Frankly nothing except that as a tarot reader I have learnt to respect that each person’s reaction/experience of the same circumstance is unique and it is your responsibility to help them figure out what to do to help them move beyond this heart breaking event.

If we look at the grief cycle it clearly outlines 5-6 stages of experience. Shock & denial, anger, depression, bargaining & testing and finally acceptance, I have found that in all my readings with various persons, the tarots have their own combination's to indicate the stages that a person may be at:

Situation 1
As in my example the cards revealed the tower, the 7 of swords, and the devil. Definitely stage 1: shock & denial. The woman had just discovered that her partner was unfaithful and the tower represented the shock she had experienced when the carpet was pulled from under her feet. She had hitherto believed herself to be secure in her trust for her partner and now the scales of power were completely turned upside down with the act of betrayal (7 of swords – fleeing from a dishonorable act).

The devil shows the image of a man and a woman chained to the devil; in other words controlled by inhibitions, fears and phobias. It indicates that the woman is so completely controlled by her fear, that instead of looking her circumstance in the eye she would rather be controlled by the Jungian shadow, or at part to ourselves we would rather not face. However the devil also carries the message – ‘out of apparent evil, good shall come’ a message of hope that if fears are faced, the woman will be able to free herself from the fears and grow into a more complete human being.

Situation 2
My own experience with betrayal has always been a very short if not nonexistent stage of shock & denial, and an overly elongated period of anger, my most favorite emotion. Some years back I found that a childhood friend had completely betrayed my confidence and turned out to be someone my blinded eyes had not seen. Despite the number of years I had to question, the proof of betrayal stared me in the face so sharply that I could not entertain the luxury of being in denial. I transited into anger rather fast and found myself eating out of control as a form of self abuse. Severe anxiety which is the flip side of anger resulted in allergic conditions and asthma; I found hard to control.

The cards then advised me through the chariot, the card of victory over conflict and struggle. The card shows a charioteer trying to keep the black and the white sphinxes under control. A simple message – it is out of conflict that creative change occurs. If there is a conflict of interests and a struggle, victory is certainly possible but a fight for self assertion would be necessary. Clear advice – I needed to assert my right to be angry and not give in to the conflicting manipulations of the friend.

Situation 3
A woman once asked me to find out whether she should stay with her husband or not. The cards indicated that her spouse was really not interested in her. Even though she was very young, right from the beginning of their married life he had shown disinterest and disengagement. She had tried in vain for several years to make the relationship work but was unable to find any involvement from him. She said that she had accepted that he was perhaps forced into marrying her, but did not know which action to take… The cards were very clear – the 5 of cups and 3 of swords – abject grief. She needed to grieve over her loss. Just ignoring the fact that she was experiencing an extreme sense of loss was not going to help her move beyond it. She was unable to take the decision due to the fact that at some level she had not grieved for her loss enough to allow herself to move on.

The cards were followed by death indicative that change was imminent – she could not possibly hang on to an already moribund relationship in the hope of what was not. The faster she accepted this, the less the pain she would experience. In fact accepting grief and the resulting change is a corner stone to moving beyond a betraying circumstance. The depression stage of grief is absolutely necessary for you to allow yourself to experience death of the earlier way of being and to embrace a renewal.

Situation 4
Bargaining and testing: Haven’t you found yourself talking constantly about a betraying circumstance – going over and over it again and again, in the hope of making sense of what happened, how it happened and what you have to learn from it. This is your mind's way of making sense of your betrayal and trying to adjust the reality to explain itself. As a young person whenever a friend had broken up with a boyfriend, someone had snitched behind my back or someone was trying to manipulate me – I found us – a group of friends discussing the circumstance turning it upside down in an attempt to analyze it. Extremely important – it is just your mind’s way of reaching out to others to validate your experiences and to figure out an alternate reality.

The card that often appears for a person who is in this stage is the hanged man, telling the story of the Greek god Odin who hung himself upside down from Yggdrasil (ash) tree to rejuvenate himself. As he waited for people to bring him water and food to quench his hunger & thirst he noticed an alternate reality of the world. In these repeated discussions with the world post betrayal, the tarots say that “you have already lost what there is to lose now there is nothing worse that can happen, your soul is now free to look at the world from an alternate perspective and find a reality that was hitherto unseen”. As Jung says the conscious mind need to dies for the unconscious mind to provide alternate solutions.

Situation 5
It’s been a long journey, from the devil, the chariot, death and the hanged man – several daunting milestones have been passed. You are finally in the presence of a blessing. Acceptance – the way forward exemplified by judgment in the tarots – a complete renewal. The judgment card uses the Indian concept of Karma – a balancing of the accounts of life. In this arduous journey in handling betrayal, you discover parts to yourself that did not earlier exist. It is time for self appraisal for accepting oneself and the circumstance and the resolutions that have been found for inner conflict. It is also the time to appreciate one’s strength and realize that while we condemn those who puff themselves with their own praise – we also condemn those that sell themselves short. SO gather these parts to you and set a future plan for yourself – a resurrection for a new beginning. It is a time for rejoicing and renewal.

Beautifully summed up by the tarots, however one small hitch. We tend to get stuck at one stage or the other mostly denial or long drawn anger. If you find yourself in these situations remember – the lessons of the devil and the chariot – unchain yourself from your inhibitions and phobia and take action to self assert in the face of a conflict. (refer my posts on coping with anger) Another obstacle, we can cycle from bargaining back to anger and denial – this means that not enough time was spent in rooting yourself out of denial – maybe there are some devious fears left unturned – a time for self examination again.

The grief cycle is just so clear and self explanatory but it is not the obvious betrayal which we have a license to grieve over that’s hard – on the contrary it is the subtle betrayals of life that are the harder one’s to map. For example – after the first few years of your marriage you discover your spouse’s feet of clay and experience a betrayal of promises earlier delivered. Another example – when faced with a conflict in the family you married into and your spouse does not stand up for you and no one hears your voice. In your family of origin a sibling is favored over you and you find yourself at the receiving end of unfair dealings – far more insidious forms of betrayal that are just so hard to map on the Kubler Ross cycle. But only because you find it hard to classify these as betrayal. Remember for you to cope with it - you have to say it out loud - i have been betrayed.

The solution is simple stand by yourself – an unshakable belief in your own reality is the one and only way to withstand betrayal and make the journey of grief to towards a rejoicing and renewal.

power games - take 1

2010-03-12T14:06:00.000-08:00

What if you are feeling targeted and the in the vortex of an onslaught from an extremely aggressive person? What if you have grown up to be a person who is dumbfounded in the face of this onslaught? What do you do at such times to wrest power back within your grip? Do the cards have anything to say about this?

Sure as always they give ready advice to you. Separate yourself from the person. In situations like these we tend to become one with the perpetrator, his words become reality, his judgments take on a dimension larger than your own meek voice and his opinions about you become much larger in proportion than the vision of your own self. Such is the power of onslaught. Draw inwards like the hermit – and think through who you are – are you a creative person, are you fair, sensitive, loving, intelligent and effervescent? How do you describe yourself? Does your own description match the messages that the perpetrator is giving you, or is it just the force of impact that drives you away from standing by yourself? Ask yourself these questions… In just the act of asking you will find that you are able to connect with who you are and distance the negative messages reaching out to you.

Next figure out - why are you being attacked? Is it something you did or is it the inner experience of the other person to an event that he could not resolve for himself? The answer lies in the five’s – the 5 of wands and the 5 of swords. Extreme jealousy & competition is prevalent in the environment making the perpetrator furiously angry with the circumstance. More than the anger being directed at you – it is his powerlessness that drives him to attack. Ha… a situation which had its beginning in making you powerless is actually insidiously about the attacker’s own helplessness and dis-empowerment.

The cards conclude their advice to you with the strength and death. Both cards teach forbearance – and patience. It is not the weak that walk the path of restraint and acceptance. This path less traveled is for the higher souls. Not a song sung in a eulogy for you, just because you were at the receiving end but the truth. It is easier to retaliate and get the better or worse of the other person. Worse still it is simpler to give in to the onslaught and abandon yourself completely. It is far harder to control your own demons and accept that this is a painful circumstance but one to be dealt with complete submission because the more you push against the factors that demand this change from you the more likely you are to be in pain. Silence is a powerful weapon it can fell a fierce adversary far better than words can. Accept it and bear it.

In such situations you will find that the perpetrator is backed by others whose insidious maneuvers are far more lethal than the ‘in your face’ ones. Same emotions (jealousy & conflict of the 5’s) can be portrayed by a quieter less aggressive person who can easily victimize you without appearing in the wrong. The fact – an aggressive person accepts responsibility for being the wrong doer the quiet manipulator doesn’t. SO the recipient of aggression in the second case walks away with an equal amount of damage as in the first case, without knowing what or who to blame. The blame will in most of these situation turn on your own self.

Cards yet again preach the same process as the first.

Separate yourself
Ask yourself why are you being attacked?
Forbearance & acceptance

With one minor difference… DO not stay silent because such a person needs to be told that you are on to them and you will not allow their machinations to get the better of you… Surely but quietly, using the strength card, let the Machiavellian manipulator know that you know what he is saying but do not agree with it. Do not be the fall guy for other people’s poor motivations.

The tarot teaches lessons which allow us to grow as people. This growth is ALWAYS about learning that the same weapon cannot work in all forms of combat – As the earthly emperor you have to learn that real power is about knowing who you are and standing firmly for yourself and those that you love. Power can never be taken away from you by the aggressive perpetrator or the manipulator if you can hear the voice of your soul.

All things in life come in a balance. The good and the bad, the beautiful and the ugly, the loving & the hated so on and so forth. So do the powerful and the powerless – it’s all about seeing it the right way –If you are powerful within your own self no earthly maneuverings can wrest that from you. You will even have the affirmations that your wronged soul looks for once you have stopped craving for them.

I guess today I was at the receiving end, hence such insight into how it works… or is it just another way of unraveling an emotional knot for myself.

uncertainty does not rest easy...

2010-03-08T07:00:00.000-08:00

I can write about love, separation, anger and cataclysm but writing about uncertainty is so elusive. Thoughts that form in my head and waft away before they crystallize! Is it that you lose touch with this feeling as you grow older or is it just something that I don’t want to unearth from the depths of my mind. Perhaps it was my life’s circumstances that prevented me from handling uncertainty well but the word itself threatens to disturb the tentative vestiges of peace within me.

Uncertainty presents itself in various circumstances in life. It begins with a first glimpse as an infant, when unsure of the next meal you cry, to the first crush, then waiting for innumerable successes & failures and finally uncertainty in shouldering the responsibility of one’s decisions. Each time we are faced with this emotion – we think “this is the worst it can get” but there are always surprises in store for us as we grow.

Out of all the various types of uncertainties of life finding a relationship stands out as the most significant of all. Many young persons have posed this question for me “am I going to meet someone this year?” The problem is there is no perfect answer. What if the tarots say yes? The next question will be – “will this person be ‘the one’?” If the tarots yet again answer yes, “will I marry him/her?” – Sure say the tarots – so then “will we be happy together?”... So on and so forth. Therefore even though we feel that we will be satisfied with the answer to whichever ‘will’ we are asking for, the truth is far from it. Knowing full well that we are in a vicious cycle, it still does not deter us from asking the question.

The tarots are there to help in coping with uncertainty, whenever it presents itself. A young person asked me, “Do you think there is anybody, who does not have someone for them?” The tarots don’t believe that some of us are born to be lonely. The cards are based on the karmic cycle of life from the Fool at birth to salvation with the World. The journey is incomplete without learning to negotiate relationships and find completeness within oneself, a lesson only learnt when you have loved and lost, only to love again. As a reader I have never met any person who does not have the hope for finding someone – perhaps only those who stop looking either because they tire of the search or they don’t need to anymore, choose not to be with someone. Then also it is a choice you make – therefore the anxiety about the uncertainty that I will not find someone suitable/compatible is baseless.

Let me illustrate this with several examples. Two men once came to me – they were friends and felt that a serious relationship was elusive and seemingly impossible for them. One of them was a very confident, handsome young man who was surprised that at age 34 he was still single. He told me that his friends accused him of being extremely snooty and vain about his dashing looks – “no one was good enough for him”. The cards surmised – the 6 of cups, the world, 5 of coins, the 4 of wands and the 9 of swords, followed by advice in the form of 2 of wands, the hierophant, strength, and temperance.

This is an aside, to my tarot reader friends. All cards should be read in a sequence and build a story related to the cards moving forward rather than looking backwards. Look for a holistic picture that a spread tells you rather than a piece-meal approach.

The story goes: he was far too stuck in the past and unable to embrace the future without letting go of conditioning from the past (6 of cups). The world signifies in this case a life overseas – which had resulted in him feeling uprooted and lost (5 of coins) and depressed (9 of swords) when he had shifted homes there (4 of wands). All in all, a rather traumatic shift to a foreign locale in the past! Further probing revealed that this in fact was true he had moved there when his parents separated and felt he had lost a part to himself then.

The advice was clear – the 2 of wands implying before you hurry into a pursuit wait – wait and look at what life is offering you, take stock of what you have and what you want, do not hurry into any action. The next card the hierophant teaches us a simple lesson – a need for finding missing parts to your own self. Once again all the cards are unanimous in their statement – you cannot have a meaningful relationship with anyone until you feel whole by your own self. This was followed by strength which simply put means control the demons of self loathing and excesses within you; give your self the quiet time to let the hierophant figure out who you are and what you want. The final card temperance says the same thing that healing would happen and options for relationships would reveal themselves to him.

The cards here teach us an important lesson, often what appear is not. A snobbish looking person maybe as troubled as a humble one and outward robustness often does not tell the inner tale a person experiences.

The second young man, a simple, suggestible and earnest looking soul had a different tale to tell. He had met many people and had a close relationship with a woman he really liked but was unable to commit to. Hence, he continued to look for love elsewhere. The cards reassured him in their own way. The first part told him that since he had already decided that he could not commit, he should treat it as a relationship concluded and stop distracting himself from moving on. The 5 of cups, the queen of swords, the ace of swords, 5 of wands and the 2 of cups; cards explained that the young man had experienced some grief (5 of cups) associated with the queen of swords, and he should slice this entanglement out of his life by the deciding ace of swords and hanging on to this relationship posed a distraction (5 of wands) which pulls him away from finding real intimacy elsewhere.

The cards next indicated that he would meet a queen of wands soon, someone he has known awhile (6 of cups) and that perhaps he will be able to form a relationship with a person who helps him feel secure (the temperance) and makes him feel stronger for himself (the emperor). That someone who will be the strength in his life, quite unlike the queen of swords with her slightly more fickle and self centered pursuits…

The cards helped both the persons cope with their uncertainty differently – in the first case, to understand that the feeling of uncertainty had become one with his self, due to earlier experiences while in the second case the uncertainty was induced by a relationship which had run its course but not as yet been expunged from life.

In most cases the cards indicate that uncertainty induces fear and hence the only way to cope with the fear is to name it, once you have identified the exact root cause of the fear, you will be able to find the necessary solutions and the fear of uncertainty will lose its hold on you.

It is so easy to dwell on the feeling when discussing others but yet my own inability to cope with panic every time I am faced with it is quite explicable. Through a gazillion experiences; waiting for a boyfriend to call, waiting to hear about an examination result, an unresolved fight with a spouse, an unexecuted decision, waiting to catch a flight… and many more, I have accepted that severe anxiety in coping with uncertainty is 2nd nature for a person like me. I don’t think that this is the time to analyze why I am that way or what has caused such a reaction, but to understand what the cards say to me. They have always told me to teach myself acceptance.

What if you are an anxiety prone individual who finds it harder than others to deal with uncertainty? Will beating yourself about it make it easier? Will it make the palpitations, the sweating and the purging lesser? Not at all! SO might as well accept that this is me, I really cannot punish myself for this, instead I will anticipate that I WILL have this reaction when faced with any uncertainty and hence will plan to deal with it.

For me, I have found my answer in a simple strategy – I work as hard as I can on anything that I am undertaking and then let it hang suspended in my brain for a while without punishing myself about anxiety that I experience too much. I know that after a period of rest my brain or the universe, whatever you wish to call it, will pop a solution that is the best for me and I will be able to make sense of the chaos. I am sure you have heard of it – it is called serendipity.

i am not impotent...

2010-03-04T01:30:00.000-08:00

It is extremely important to me that I should not feel impotent at any stage in my life. It is not the question of physical impotence, but the feeling of helplessness and powerlessness that engulfs us at various moments in our lives. I have grown up with this strong sense of justice instilled within me and out of all the teachings of the Mahatma, that I have dismissed one stays strongly etched in my psyche – “it is an equal sin to tolerate injustice as it is to commit injustice unto others”. In fact, I think I live life trying to balance the scales of justice, in all my interactions and in this I am my harshest critic.

Recently I was assailed by anxiety in the middle of the night… I was engulfed by a feeling of suffocation and frustration – insomnia claimed me for itself. The evening had been a terrible one and I had walked away from a family visit feeling attacked and targeted for no fault of mine. All of us have felt that often others have taken advantage of our silence, and our reluctance to openly conflict and refute an aggressive person, and continued their onslaught on our dignity. This can happen in many situations, in a family gathering where power is unbalanced, at an office meeting when one or the other colleague is unduly aggressive or even amongst peers and siblings when we find ourselves heckled by a particularly manipulative person who twists our words to ridicule us.

In all these situations, all that we walk away with is a feeling of being unheard, our sense of being wronged, unacknowledged and dismissed and to add insult to injury our own helplessness at not being able to stand up for oneself. Is it any surprise then that I could not sleep?

The beauty of such situations is summed up in two simple words “impotent anger”…

The cards are very eloquent about impotent anger. As always they dwell in the root cause of all phenomena. The cards tell their own story – a plethora of cards turn up in a beautiful sequence of events; the emperor, the 5 of cups, the ten of wands, the magician, the 3 of swords, 8 of cups, knight of pentacles, and the ten of swords. A daunting tale at best; in this case I will try to explain it from my own experience that evening.

The emperor tells us the that my need to feel important in the family turns to grief with the 5 of cups so much so that I can only focus on what is spilled, not on what remains. The spread goes on to indicate that I carry the burden of being manipulated. The ten of wands implicates a load that I carry within me – which I do not know how to unburden myself off and the magician in one of its meanings implying a self centered master manipulator, who is unscrupulous in servicing his needs for power and by his clever words can inflict injury. Naturally I walk away from the interaction feeling grief and betrayal (3 of swords) and the 8 of cups – leaving a situation I have invested emotionally in behind in disappointment and disillusionment. To compound insult to injury I am frustrated by my inaction (knight of pentacles) and the 10 of swords tell its own tale of the end of a false way of looking at a situation & a relationship and hence residual grief.

To cut a complicated story short – it is a family which I have invested in immensely and despite all my efforts there is a master manipulator amongst us who gets the better of me each time. The accompanying feelings of grief, betrayal & disappointment are no surprise. To compound this matter I carry within me an earlier conditioning that needs me to feel powerful in family situations and when I am unable to stand up for myself I feel frustrated and suffocated. I have been so blinded by my own need for power that I am unable to see the situation for what it really is.

The cards go on to advice me that this is an inheritance/ baggage of the past (6 of cups) and hence I am unable to move beyond my prior experiences. It also indicates that I have the Sun, which is success, fulfillment and child like joy in my relationship with my husband the King of cups and it is time for the need to revoke the empress within me – to quote my earlier writings on the empress “almost always signifies a need to nurture your own self (not others), to rejuvenate your spirits, tap into your creative side and extend love and understanding that you would as a mother to your anxious child to yourself”.

I think the message is pretty clear – whenever we have felt unheard follow the tarots in clear simple steps:

Do not punish yourself for feeling impotent – focus on validating your own anger – “I do have the right to be angry and I did not react in that situation because it would have been detrimental for my dignity, not because I am a loser and a weakling”. Also we forget that silence is the most powerful of all weapons. Often manipulation when faced with silence rather than retaliation can render itself impotent. So we may not have walked away from the situation as dis-empowered as we think.
Think of the positive relationships in that situation that have been nurturing for you and validate your anger with them. Share your feelings of distress with them and ask for another perspective.
Ask yourself a difficult situation – is all the impotence I feel only related to the current experience or do I carry some emotional baggage that makes me feel dis-empowered and helpless in such situations. Accept the emotional burden and lay it to rest separating it from the present.
Once you have gone through this process – you will be able to take the necessary action to feel the emperor within you – powerful in your negotiations for your won self. It does not matter that you were unable to retaliate just then as long as you are able to set the wrong right for yourself, its perfectly alright – even if it is only later.

The message is clear – “Nor shall derision prove powerful against those who listen to humanity or those who follow in the footsteps of divinity, for they shall live forever. Forever.” – Kahlil Gibran

love, love and love

2010-02-23T14:22:00.000-08:00

Last night a young person asked me – how do you know what to look for? Is there any card in the tarots that indicates or defines that this is the love I have been looking for? Well, the answer lies in the fact that different people experience love differently. In my experience people have described their feeling of love in their own way and the tarots have a danced to the symphony they created. SO instead of holding forth on the subject and giving my opinion I think I will let the tarots and the speakers speak for themselves. These are all excerpts from books and my own jottings on my experiences.

Here’s how a woman describes her experience: “Lets put the boot on your foot - if you knew that I might die in the next 6 months and you loved me. Would you marry me and have my baby - despite being destitute and not certain which way your life would go - just to hang on to that perfect moment of love? Do you know what it feels like to have a baby that is a part of someone who completes all that you want from life? In another life that is something I would want with you. SO I am issuing it as a prayer for my soul to remember!”

In her reading we found the devil and the hanged man with the 4 of cups. The Devil, for a slightly obsessive and passionate kind of love that preys on her own emotions driving her to experience intensity that may otherwise not be possible to feel; and the hanged man to allow herself to understand a new reality. They see when we have nothing left to lose our soul is freed from the shackles of ‘what if, but & why’ and life is visible in a perspective otherwise concealed. They say the experience of birth is much the same – the woman for the first time realizes that life depends on her and that she is nothing but a pawn in the hands of nature, with very little control on what’s to be. In this loss she discovers her true potential and a new ability to take on the travails of life. So in her own words her subconscious clearly indicates to her the message that the tarots parody. She needs a new perspective on the obsessive love she feels. Why does she want to be so conjoined with her love, is this really good for her? The 4 cups brings home the indication – a forced disengagement and a little distance will allow her to introspect – the reasons for such a need.

In another story a man and a woman were in a relationship which brought out the worst in them. Cantankerous, difficult, nasty and plain passionate... The relationship continued for several years until realizing the futility of it all, the woman decided to end it and get married. Ironically there relationship is exposed. A reasonably mundane occurrence but what fascinated me were a couple of statements - He says to the woman: “At least I was faithful for 12 years to my wife before I met you but you are claiming to be in love with the man you are about to marry while you are still with me.” Then again he says, after she is married: “I didn't tell you that I broke up with my wife because you are married now.” What fascinated me was the difference in which he viewed honesty to himself? All the years that she wanted more, he had nothing to offer and then just when she gets married and voila! His life changes and he explains his own decisions with this odd concept of respect for a marriage - so different from the way a woman feels.

In his cards we saw justice and the hanged man. Justice is the one card completely governed by logic and the balancing of the just and fair against what is undeserved. So when justice appears it mean you will get your just desserts – so as you sow so shall you reap. In his case – he balanced the good and the evil in himself and his girlfriend and explained that he had only strayed from his marriage after having accepted that he had done his best and could not make the relationship work, whilst the girl was being unfair to her fiancée by being involved with another man while pledging marriage. Similarly he weighs himself as the wrong doer and allows himself to be punished by not disclosing to his erstwhile girlfriend his singular status and bears his separation in isolation. However the hanged man points him to a new perspective having lost all that he held dear and indicates that he needs to cast away his earlier veneer and feel love and compassion for himself. In other words mitigate the harsh sword of justice. Interesting isn't it? It amazed me. Of course they broke out of their relationships and were happy ever after.

Some interesting thoughts? What say?

The star in the tarot signifies a pure hopeful love, the fool on its journey after having lost all, finds himself drinking from a maiden’s urn, water filled with starlight signifying the birth of hope and the return of love to your life. It also reminds the soul that there is no one soulmate – the message of love is hopeful – even if you lose you will find love again in a newer form. In your reading if accompanied with any of the cards from the minor arcana like the nine of cups (signifying wishes fulfilled) or the knight of cups (tentative steps towards romance) it means allow your heart to sing with joy and embrace the feeling of love. Consider yourself truly blessed if you find the two of cups – you are in a relationship of equals – where your other half completes your being. Your partner will support you, cherish your inner self and allow you to grow.

As a friend once spoke about her love “The one thing that truly lifted my spirits today - you know that you have found perfect love when your heart sings every time you hear their voice, when you feel everything is all right with the world, when you are with them and when you know you are complete in that moment you have with them. Then there truly is nothing more you want from life (if you die then it does not matter). The rest is a relationship negotiating it - maintaining it and investing in it.” Sounds very idealistic and perhaps transient but a moment in love worth hanging on to?

I want to end this reprieve with the world – the ultimate card for love. The world… This card perhaps the most powerful of all has several meanings but it also signifies the end of the journey for love. When the world appears in your search for love – you have found nirvana and completed successfully the goal you set out for. You are in the presence of perfection, wholeness, satisfaction and happiness. But you surprise yourself by finding that you have finally reached where you began – learning to trust and let go. In other words a love we all strive for but seldom achieve. Unconditional love - a mythical concept, only felt by a mother for her new-born child and love for god in a search for the spiritual self.

However, in the adult form experienced transiently with a perfect someone. In a discussion over dinner someone explained how they felt “I wanted to tell you that even when I have fought with you bitterly and am feeling hurt to my deepest core - I know I can feel that pure joy only with you. Remember I told you that I like the poem Ode to a skylark - I think that joy is what I am talking about that sets your spirits free. So you are free to behave as you wish that feeling is mine to hold and cherish and even you can't take it away from me. I think this is the strength of my vulnerability - knowing unerringly that even I have no control over this. It gives me the strength to speak the truth.”

Maybe that is why all the so called spiritual gurus were found in pairs!

the sacred and the profane

2010-02-18T23:35:00.000-08:00

These words ring in my years every time I look at the Lovers’ card. Life is about choices isn’t it – that is the very reason why this particular card, which marks the souls journey into adulthood, teaches us to make choices and live with the consequences of those choice. Men and women alike are faced with this choice at some juncture in their lives.

The Lovers card is shown with Adam and Eve looking up at an angel – Raphael signifying, mercury and air, the basic element of Gemini. It means something mercurial and transforming is in the air – and what is constant is going to be altered. That is exactly the effect love has on us – the proverbial ‘rose tinted spectacles’ being one. Those governed by logic and science, report love as a chemical reaction, one that alters the blood chemistry and results in a feeling of euphoria. The reality lies somewhere in between and definitely dulls human ability to make rational decisions, such is the power of the Lovers card.

Does that mean that all decisions taken in love are profane? Is there a right or a wrong kind of love? Is it just society that decides this?

Over the years I have found that a large number of people who come to me are looking for a soulmate. Whether it is the young or the old the search for a soulmate is a never ending, awe inspiring one. Someone who completes your sentences, reads your thoughts even before you have crystallized them and accepts you as you are with no questions asked, epitomizes the dream lover or the soulmate. The desire for such a heavenly being overrides all other needs and requirements. Young and the old have asked the same question “Tell me is there a special someone in my life who I will meet?” My belief yes there is… not a special someone but several such special someone’s.

So then was nature’s way of making the primitive man polygamous the most natural one? This is where the Lover’s card in the tarot steps in. In one of my readings with a friend the person reported she had finally met the man of her dreams, a little too late because she was already married and had a family she did not want to leave. However, she was unwilling to let go off this new relationship that life had offered her. The new interaction provided her with a sense of completion she had not experienced before. She felt that she could handle and balance the two parts to herself. The cards that came in her spread were the Lovers and the two of swords, a stalemate. Did that mean that she would be able to maintain the balance she so desired?

There can always be many interpretations. The one that seemed to make sense was, the 2 of swords signifies a balance as long as you hold still, you remain blindfolded oblivious to the outer world because any sudden reactions can upset the balance and cause the swords to tip over. Could she hold on to the moment and maintain status quo? A big question, because love by its nature is volatile. If the new love is all satisfying and complete, her reality will appear faded in comparison to the suffused color of the new relationship pushing her to make a choice leaving status quo. Something in the circumstances would definitely alter to accommodate the new reality – unbalancing the swords.

So then would you advice her to give up the new relationship and adjudge it profane? You will find the answer in the Lover’s card. The spiritual meaning of the Lover’s card means that a man and a woman are two complimentary sources of energy, the yin and the yang. The soul on its earthly journey to the universe needs to understand this balance to communicate with its spiritual self. Only then will it be able to move on in the cycle of life and embrace higher lessons. In simple words to have a meaningful and fulfilling relationship you first need to have a relationship with yourself, i.e., accept yourself with your strengths and your failings.

We often look for what is missing within us in a relationship outside, in the hope that the other person will help us get in touch with that lost part and allay our fears while we are feeling lost. The Lovers teaches us just that lesson. To have a successful relationship first be whole – work at claiming all your missing parts for yourself. Once that is done the choice will be clear… the relationship that allows you to spread your wings, realize your full potential and lets you make your journey in your own chosen way is the one to depend one and is sacred to you. On the other hand, the one which is wrought with insecurity, fear and anxiety is the profane.

The tarots did not give my friend a yes or no answer but did give her enough to reflect on. What did SHE want? What in her current life made her happy – what was necessary for her to feel confident about herself? Was this new relationship just her search for herself? Was her marital relationship stifling and did not allow her to be herself? Which choices could she live with? Questions only she could answer – but answers that were imperative to find, as only then could she find the real balance in her life which is not a stalemate.

I have known of many choices. Some leave earlier relationships to find new ones, others stay despite a sense of unhappiness, some choose to stay single and have several relationships. yet others have dalliances on the side to distract from the unhappiness of the present… the tarot’s do not deem any choice to be profane. Only what is not good for your soul is profane and what you can find contentment and peace with is sacred. Souls singular goal is to seek freedom from obsessions and discontentment.

So does this question face only the poor married souls who have to make this choice? Is life just cut out for the singles? NO. The same question presents itself to them as well, albeit in a different form - “What kind of a person am I looking for?” Why am I not able to find the perfect person for me? Once again – the Lover’s provides the answer. First find what you miss in yourself and then embark on that journey to find love. A little bit of love for your own self can go a long way in finding love outside.

The Lover’s card also leaves you with something to reflect on – Is it imperative to be loved? Is it possible to be without love? Is it possible to be complete in your own self without this demonic search for a soulmate?

the many colors of anger

2010-02-16T14:32:00.000-08:00

I have found anger a very useful emotion - even a shield. It carefully conceals the true depth of my experiences from me. No matter what the instigation my mind embraces my most favoured reaction – rage! Not distress, sadness, grief, fear or even anxiety. It has a lot to do with the manner in which I have learnt to process life. It is often said to many a trauma survivor – “I don’t know how you could have survived this?” – In other words had I been in your shoes I would have wilted like the delicate flower I am and fallen apart at the slightest provocation. The truth is that it is anger that separates the survivor from the victim and a fighter from the loser.

Needless to say there is a very special place in the tarots for anger. Not one card but several cards reflect various shades of anger that a person may experience. I think as a tarot card reader one of my favourite observations is the many colours anger appears in. Some years back a rather fierce young woman came to me for a reading. With her strong opinions and flashing eyes she epitomised the “witchy woman’s” flying sparks and flashes of lightning. I was mesmerised. As we were reading the cards I realized – here was a woman who had seen tough times in her life and had learnt to survive despite it. Much as she owed her many colors and the vermilion temper to her experiences the cards were very clear in their message to her.

The devil appeared along with death, a powerful combination. It was time to let go off the obsessions of the past – allow yourself to be free from the controlling compulsiveness of the devil and accept that change was imminent. Death also pointed to the fact that the change would not be easy and would come with its pain, a difficult task for a person whose personality has somehow got interwoven with the anger she holds within. It is absolutely true that the very same anger that leant you the edge can become outdated and make it difficult for you to accept your softer & gentler self.

Most of us spend years trying to battle the anger within us, whether its is betrayal, jealousy, humiliation or even greed in multitude situations we use distractions to manage it. Whether it is shopping, alcohol, conversation, food or sex, distractions can only provide a brief respite only to return the anger in full force. The cards however always indicate a healing and nurturing process for the self. As a reader you have to help others make that journey for themselves.

The tarots reflect this is several ways. Many other cards – the 5 of swords with its direct message of a brief but fierce conflict, the 7 of cups with its fantastical illusions, the 5 of wands signifying jealousy and competition, the 7 of swords in one of its shades signifying betrayal and the 8 of cups asking a person to leave disappointment and disillusionment behind all provide us with many reflections of anger. These cards appear in various symmetries and combinations in readings indicating various circumstances but with an underlying experience of anger for the receiver. But as a reader I believe it is my responsibility to not only spell out the eventuality but also look for the messages that the cards send the seeker to help them find peace and tranquillity.

A friend once asked me, have you ever met anyone who is so completely angry that they have no hope of feeling calm. The answer is no. While in a reading you may see several colors of anger, you will also see several shades of hope. Look in the spread for the underlying causes of the anger – is it a current experience that causes it, is it greed and avarice that results in inner unrest, is it misdirected anger about issues unaddressed or is it an ingrained experience that favors this emotion? It is in the cause that you will find the cards, which will provide help. Look for temperance for healing and mercy, the star for positive spirit and hope, the high priestess for guidance and counselling, the empress for regeneration and self healing and even the 4 of cups or 4 of swords for immediate disengagement and enforced rest.

All you need to do is tell the story that anger can only be dealt with through acceptance that you have a reason to be angry, the realisation that it is the most powerful of all emotions and help find ways of channelizing it usefully.

our earthly mother, the empress

2010-02-10T13:51:00.000-08:00

Our generation grew up singing songs like “mother of mine, you gave to me…” , a song sung in eulogy of the mothers in our lives, ensuring that the power distance between us and them remained so. Today many of us as mothers are striving to be ‘friends’ with our children a euphemism to ensure that they keep talking to us. A very scathing opinion given by one of my lady friends who came for a reading. To cut a long story short she came to examine the difficult relationship she and her daughter shared. The daughter as all teenagers do felt her privacy threatened by her overbearing mother and the mother was battling with her insecurities regarding safety, moral character and future prospects of her progeny.

The empress in their reading came as a sign of need for self nurturing – contrary to popular beliefs the empress in my readings almost always signifies a need to nurture your own self (not others), to rejuvenate your spirits, tap into your creative side and extend love and understanding that you would as a mother to your anxious child to yourself. This powerful card is timeless and sends us a clear message – ‘the mother daughter relationship can only be successful if both parties feel nurtured, understood and accepted’. In other words if you want to heal a relationship which has gone rocky, first and foremost, accept your own weakness and forgive yourself. Only in extending compassion to your own self can you be kind to others.

The empress, the bearer of a harvest and creative abundance, teaches us to embrace all that is productive within us.

In my early years as a tarot reader a young person asked me about when they would get married and whether they would at all. Every which way the cards said one and the same thing… marriage seemed a definite yes – the earthly mother has appeared signifying the reign of fertility along with a relationship in the person’s near future. A few months later she came back to me and stated that contrary to what we had discussed she was really far from marriage in fact she had broken off with an already married man and ended up handling an unwanted pregnancy. I was aghast _ I obviously had overlooked the card for its meaning – Fertility. In fact the Tarots tell a very simple story – so what can seemingly appear as marriage just because I read the empress as marriage, since the enquirer asked about marriage, can actually mean motherhood and fertility.

An important lesson – allow yourself to listen to the messages from the cards without getting influenced by what the seeker wants. You will be able to hear the cards loud and clear if you focus on the person rather than what he/she speaks, asks and wishes. Think about the person and submit to the complete belief that what you will hear will be true.

The empress has always been extremely fascinating for me – maybe because my own rocky relationship with my mother had a huge impact on the way I think and negotiate relationships. In fact the rockier the relationship the harder it is to separate your mother’s voice in your head from your own. I have found that when you do grow up you become a harsher critic of your own actions than your mother ever was. Therefore, despite all the work I have done to change the way I think, I have finally found solace in the fact that you cannot change the fact that you love your mother, their opinion does matter but at the same time you can choose to forgive yourself if your actions do not always match up to her expectations.

the why and the wow of the tarots

2010-02-07T10:49:00.000-08:00

I was talking to my nieces today about starting this blog and the first question they asked, as all young people do, was 'Why?' followed by the next most favorite 'Wow'. If you really think about it that almost completely sums up my need for this. The eternal and unending 'whys' that face the 40+ gang like mine and the wide eyed delightful 'wows' that surround every new experience of the younger people.

I believe most brilliant things in life are simple - therefore I believe that everyone can read the tarots and there really is no complex science to it. So my goal is also simple - to help people learn what I know about tarots and an insidious objective of helping people find what they are looking for.

I began reading tarots at 24 and today at 42 I am still a learner as I think I always will be. In all these years I have believed that in sharing with others you will get some answers to the Whys and experience some of the Wows. When one is younger everything is beautiful and wondrous - every experience opens your mind to the gazillion possibilities that exist in any situation. I think as a Tarot reader you have to continue to remain in touch with that wonder and experience it every single time you see something new in the cards. The newness may come from remembering a new meaning to any card or it may come from the reaction of the person you are reading for. I think the simplest way to lose it is to become so blasé that you assume you know what the other person is experiencing. A little like if the love of my life leaves me I may be furiously angry and contemplate violence whereas someone else in the same circumstance may actually feel heartbroken, saddened and hopeless, a completely different reaction to the same situation.

I have found that most people go to astrologers, palmists and tarot readers to find an answer to various types of whys. Even those like me who choose to become tarot readers are seeking an answer to our whys, but perhaps want a little more control over getting those answers. The truth is there is no absolute answer - each card has at least 2-3 shades or meanings and the permutations and combinations of the flanking cards can create unending possibilities.

Any card has several dimensions - a feeling quotient, a sense of time, an unfolding of an event and a direction/path/guidance attached to it.

Let's take the five of pentacles - a visual image of the poor freezing outside the church - a distinct sense of getting lost but at the same time a sense of the wanderer. I typically associate it with a feeling of lacking a sense of belonging to any place/person but as an event unfolding it also means that despite the fact that your home is staring you in the face you are not able to make a connect with it. This card has appeared in my reading when someone is in a rocky relationship, when they have just started a new project/job and they have not as yet found their groove, just before an impending important exam or when you have just got married and are yet adjusting to your new home. I believe that if it comes in your own spread the cards are telling you to look for answers within you as it is highly likely that the answers to the "why" you are looking for are probably staring you in the face and cannot be seen because of the overriding anxiety you experience at that moment. So to gain objectivity, ask your closest friend to state the obvious and you will have your answer pat. Once again the five of pentacles is a fleeting card and will last only as long as you allow it to.

I think I am writing this today because I had the opportunity to be touched by the enthusiasm and joy of youth and it left me wondering that why life is such a paradox. The wonder (wow) that you need to be a tarot reader is best within your grasp when you are young but strangely enough you are only able to let yourself hear the answers to whys when experience teaches you to stop judging yourself. So if you aspire to be a tarot reader the 2nd lesson is learn to forgive yourself...

the tower - an overrated crash

2010-02-03T12:27:00.000-08:00

I have seen the tower in myriad situations and across multiple readings. Each time it appears with the images of the crumbling edifice, the lightning strike and the tumbling kings and queens, it holds a sense of foreboding tension for me. I see it appear and the dialogue that runs in my head "Oh my God - how do I mitigate the effect on the receiver of this news?" But the truth is actually quite different.

It is the flanking cards in a reading that signify its importance, so the impact can range from brief surprise to a far reaching impact. But it is not the tower but the others cards that should evoke fear. The tower on its own without the other cards can be quite a damp squib... What is also little understood is that the tower has a very fleeting impact. Perhaps a sudden news that takes you unawares and impacts you briefly for an hour or two before your mind adjusts to it; or in complete contrast an unexpected success that leaves you stunned before the excitement hits home.

Either ways its is just the imagery on the tower card that makes us dread its appearance. What we also don't remember is that it is accompanied by a burst of energy, which empowers us to achieve the otherwise unachievable. It gives us the impetus for taking risks and drives energy and passion into any task we undertake. When accompanying an event you are planning for, it can mean a significant energy force waiting to be released, which if you were to harness appropriately, would help you reap unimaginable success.

The tower appeared once in a friends reading before 26/11 as a catastrophe in the world out there while he was traveling. Something that did not affect him personally but ended up having a far reaching impact on his career. So I would advise a word of caution - don't start breaking out in sweat when you see the tower - instead see it as an opportunity to bring about change in yourself and the receiver.

Why am I thinking of the tower today - I guess hospitals have a way of evoking a sense of foreboding which reminds me of how I feel about the tower despite having experienced it in so many different ways. It is also my way of telling myself that what is anxiety creating is not necessarily all that very powerful or cataclysmic. One just needs to look at it from a different angle of the prism to see that it can actually be quite benign...

you know your own future

2010-01-28T14:09:00.000-08:00

I have been reading tarots now for 15 years with improving confidence. People say I am good - I guess that means I can foretell the future accurately. Still every time one of my friends reports such "bang-on" accuracy I only feel incredulous and of course wonderous. Incredulous because it is not me, in fact it has little to do with me - I truly just am the telephone that helps them hear - and frankly they believe they need the telephone when actually they are only hearing themselves. I think I will always be wondrous of the way all this works - that yet again I heard the truth and chose to believe in it.

Tarots are such a passion today but over the years I have learnt that all it takes is belief - the unshakable and absolute belief that what I am seeing/experiencing is true. Once an aunt asked me when will I be able to tell the future - and I remember telling her that you can already, you just don't let yourself - you are afraid to let go. If you allow the disquiet of doubt, uncertainty and anxiety to silence itself you will have your answers loud and clear...

So here's to all the tarot reading aspirants - before you learn the meanings of cards and the spreads, focus on learning to believe - believe your own self.

The confused Indian

2008-12-09T23:42:00.001-08:00

I begin with labyrinth a word I have found fascinating since I first heard it in grade VIII from my English teacher explaining John Milton's paradise lost. I still find it interesting because it describes me so wonderfully. The manner in which my brain works, my eternal search for internal wellness, my processes of creativity, the discovery of the various loves of my life... you name it.

I dont think there is anything harder than facing your own demons - and as I pursue my passion of understanding my own self - I am faced time and again with with the mirror that reflects my self sometimes beautiful and sometimes terrifyingly ugly. As a trainer on behavioral change it is my own journey that provides insights into how humans are resistant to change. I believe it is the human reluctance to see that mirror that prevents people from letting go of ageold decaying issues that have long been outdated.

I think the biggest challenge that Indians are faced with today at a very personal, communal, societal and national level is to figure the answer to "who am I"? This confusion is not very different from the labyrinth inside me. It is there in the society, in the manner we negotiate our relationships with each other and the west, in the confusion of the professionalism of the corporate world and also in the manner in which we cope with "terror" and "terror attacks".

In the wake of this catastrophe where everyone is looking for a cause to associate themselves with in order to ensure that the "anger" does not die out, I begin this journey of discovering the labyrinth that being me and being Indian creates in my mind. I firmly believe that this is the first challenge that faces us all.