This is a special week, as it contains the extra day in this Leap Year! I always think of a friend of mine whose birthday is on February 29th. So, I’m giving a special shout-out to him and anyone else reading this who’s a Leap Year Baby!
In light of this extra day, it’ll be interesting to see what the cards might suggest in this week’s reading. The deck assisting me for this week is the Tarot of the Lotus Circle, created by Marilyn Campbell, and published by Jasmine Jade Enterprises.
As always, with these weekly general readings, I take the deck in hand, shuffling the cards, and asking this question: “What do we need to know about the possibilities for the week ahead?”
This week’s video reveals the cards for our reading:
If you prefer to read the post, here it is:
After shuffling the deck and pulling the three cards for this reading, I turn the remainder of the deck over to look at the card at the bottom, which I consider the foundation for the week.
The card is the Princess of Coins.
The Princess of Coins can represent a student or a learning stage of development. The Princess doesn’t necessarily mean a student of school or university, though, but a student of life itself. Life is a school of higher learning—and we’re all enrolled.
If you’ve read my posts for any length of time, you know I’m big on asking the question, “What are you learning from your life experiences?” And that is true this week in this space. What have the people, situations, and circumstances in your life taught you?
In the image on the card, our Princess strikes a pose (Vogue!) on a fashion runway, for all those in the audience to see. Playing on the imagery, what are you modeling for the people in your world—your audience—to see? Are they accurately seeing the image you want to project—or are you making a fashion faux pas and now’s the time for a makeover?
Sometimes moving into a new direction is a call for a reinvention. Is this the time for you to stage yours?
Moving now to the three cards I pulled: the first for the beginning of the week; the second for the middle of the week; and the last to round out the rest of the week.
For the beginning of the week, we have The Hierophant.
The Hierophant is asking you, just like the Princess of Coins did, to consider how your daily life is really your spiritual teacher. We can, at times, get so caught up in the idea–the belief–that our greatest spiritual teachers are outside of us, in the form of other people (and sometimes that is the case), but your greatest spiritual teacher is Life itself.
Life is always giving you the opportunity to examine–and re-examine–your beliefs, and to learn which of those beliefs are actually your own, and which have been taught to you by others.
In the image on the card, we see a baby being baptized. The image evokes so many things: customs, rituals, ceremonies, and traditions come to mind. A baptism is also a form of initiation, and in that sense, The Hierophant can indicate socialization. Keeping with the idea of beliefs, this card can indicate sharing a belief system with an institution or a group of like-minded individuals.
The Hierophant can also suggest going with convention and maintaining the status quo—but perhaps from a place of conformity and seeking some form of approval. Do you really believe what those around you believe—or are you just following the crowd?
So, this week, first consider how you might be like The Hierophant. What do you believe? What have you learned from your own life experiences? Who is your “crowd?” Are you socializing with people who resonate with your beliefs, and gaining (or seeking) their approval—or are you meeting with their disapproval?
Whose words and teachings are you following? Whose beliefs and experiences resonate with you—and why?
Moving to the card for the middle of the week, we have the 3 of Wands.
When the 3 of Wands pulls in, its message is for you to explore your options and to broaden your horizons. This card suggests that what you’ve been waiting for is coming into your life (the man boarding the train he’s been on the dock waiting for). Whether it’s literal or figurative, now is the time to “get your bags packed” because you’re “going places.” Are you ready?
Wands is the suit of work, business, enterprise, and creative endeavors, so, in the middle of the week, there may be business that needs to be taken care of, in some shape, form, or fashion (my nod to our fashion runway model, the Princess of Coins).
If it’s of the literal sense, 3 of Wands can suggest either looking for work, or the birth of a new enterprise. If you’re a job seeker, than 3 of Wands is asking you to widen your search, keeping with the idea that this card means exploring options and broadening your horizons. It could mean the same if you’re getting your own thing going, in the sense that you might need to expand your reach, in terms of the people you’d like to do business with.
Either way, the internet may prove to be useful, as I see 3 of Wands to be an internet card.
In addition to that, there may be a message here that you’re on the “right track,” but there may be a need for some type of “training” along the way (which would fit with the underlying theme of “learning” presented by the previous cards). And who knows? With technology being what it is these days, the training could very well be online.
The clock in the upper left corner of the card could suggest that it’s just “a matter of time” in which you see the results of your efforts, as I’m seeing the expression “timing is everything” in my mind.
Regardless of the situation, 3 of Wands is a card that suggests the prospects for the future look very promising.
For the end of the week, we have the Queen of Wands.
Here, we have another card from the suit of Wands, so the theme of work, business, and enterprise is being repeated.
Wands, for me, can also be the suit of image and identity; it’s the suit of your public and personal images, which brings up again the message of image presented by the Princess of Coins.
Going with that, I sometimes see the Queen of Wands as an “image consultant.” She is associated with the sign of Aries, and Aries rules the head—and the face, which makes me think of the phrase “putting a name with the face.”
And, throwing in The Hierophant for good measure here, we’ve been conditioned, as a society, to believe that “image is everything.”
But, with the Princess of Coins also being a card of possible reinvention, another message is that we get to decide how we shape our identities going forward.
The Queen of Wands is asking you to consider the same. Being an approach card, again consider the image you’re projecting out into your world. Is it one that you want people to really be seeing?
Since our faces are the first things people notice—are you putting your best “face” forward?
In another vein, the imagery on the card has our Queen positioned in a classroom, in the role of a teacher. In life, it’s said that, at times, we take on the role of the student, and, at other times, we become the teacher. So, just as you learn things from your world, you’re also teaching your world about you.
In the literal sense, you may be embarking on the track toward being a teacher by profession, or that you’re preparing to be trained in something by a teacher.
If that’s not true for you, then we come right back to the underlying theme of the week, and for you to know that this week is one of learning some lessons through your daily experiences.
To round out this reading, I’ll take the numbers on all the cards, reducing them to a number between 0-22, seeing what Major Arcana card will be the Lesson card for the week.
Adding 5 + 3 + 13 (I value the Queens in Tarot as 13), we have a total of 21. The 21st Major Arcana card is The World.
The World is a card that can suggest a triumph, victory, or success; it signals reaching the successful completion of a phase or chapter in your life.
The World suggests reaching a higher level of awareness. With that in mind, The World can suggest coming full circle; you’ve arrived back at the point where you started, but you have so much more awareness about things than you did before.
In this sense, The World is about reaching a state of wholeness. An important goal has been achieved, and all the feelings and experiences that go along with it.
If The Hierophant is a card of learning and educational institutions, The World is graduation from those institutions. It’s taking what you’ve learned out into the world—and to a whole new level.
And since the ruling majority (2 out of 3 cards) is from the suit of Wands, and can be about our work “in the world,” The World can be a card about your career path. How could you go about making “the world at large” more aware about who you are and the work you do this week?
If you’re in business for yourself (The World card, in this sense, is the card of the spiritual practitioner), how can you go about “educating the public” about your products and services, and create more “brand awareness”?
If you’re on the job hunt, how can you educate the institutions (The Hierophant) you’re considering on the value (The Hierophant is Taurus, a sign associated with value) you’re going to bring to them if they take you on?
Going with the idea that 3 of Wands is an internet card, The World can then symbolize the world wide web, which gives everyone online the ability to become more global—which means reaching more people.
Or, The World could help you realize (a new awareness) that the world is a big place with a lot of people—and there are just the right and perfect people in it for you to serve. You don’t need the entire world—just a fraction of it.
In the big picture, there’s enough for everyone, after all.
And that completes this week’s reading, bringing things full circle.
Here’s hoping you have a Tarot-tastic week!
For your own personalized Tarot reading, please visit me at jameshimm.com for all the details.
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