Three of Coins — Tarot of the Absurd

Thursday, October 31st, 2013

craftsmanship • artisanship • skill • talent maximization

 3 of coins tarot meaning

This card is often called the “teamwork” card. However, as an introvert, I prefer to call it the “talent maximization” card.

 

“Introvert” and “extrovert” are words that describe how one responds to stimulation, especially external stimulation. While extroverts crave large amounts of social stimulation, introverts generally feel most capable in quiet, low key environments. This is because the brains of introverts and extroverts are wired differently. The ratio of introverts to extroverts is possibly 50-50, with most people falling along a continuum somewhere close on either side of middle-ground: a bell-curve.

 

The key to maximizing individual talent is to put ourselves in situations where the mode of stimulation is right for us.  Unfortunately for introverts, the current trend in schoolrooms and workplaces is to maximize productivity for extrovert teamwork: classrooms have little pods of desks and kids are expected to act as committee members in all subjects; most offices are open-plan, without walls. It is difficult to maximize one’s talent when one’s social setting works against it.

 

It is important to realize that different people have different productivity requirements. It is also important to remember that their are many people on our “team” who remain unseen, behind the scenes. Whether we work best alone or with a group of people, when we work toward the fulfillment of our dreams and improve manners that may be hindering our success, we move closer toward achieving success in our goals. Whether the skills that make our craft come out best in an isolation chamber or at a rave, we are still interdependent within society. The Three of Coins tells us to maximize our own skill and to be appreciative of the teams of people who make our work viable.

Two of Coins — Tarot of the Absurd

Wednesday, March 20th, 2013

Balance2 coin tarot meaning

 

A ball upon a swinging thread

a ball upon a ball— a juggler—

manager of time eternal—

carries no whip.

 

Time is slave to no one and

disciplined by none—

for discipline is slaved to time.

 

Time takes its own self— tarries—

then bolts! like a bang! bang!

ball upon a ball—

 

The juggler bows himself in two.

One fluid focused motion

vaults him on a ball upon a thread

whereon he lifts his mask revealing

time itself— master of us all.

Nine of Coins — Tarot of the Absurd

Tuesday, March 19th, 2013

nine of pentacles

I am the fulfillment of my

desire— having sown

I reap command— command!

and I command myself—

secure as I swing— curled in—

one with the wind— sure

my fortune I have sown—

sure, assured, secure.

 

Six of Coins — Tarot of the Absurd

Friday, October 19th, 2012

six of pentacles meaning

Generosity, charity, sharing. Accepting handouts.

 

Relatively fresh out of college, where I survived by studying hard, running fast and having virtually no social life (unless you consider brief midnight visits with the vending machine social), I set out to Alaska to plant trees. I set out to Alaska to plant trees because planting trees sounded adventuresome and romantic, and other than my need for adventure and romance, I was entirely devoid of direction. Despite having graduated with high honors, a double major, and the scholar-athlete of the year award, I was ignorant of most things and relatively immature.

 

I learned the basics of migrant labor amidst the cruel chaos of breaking up with my boyfriend in a relatively public arena. I learned the taste of water straight from a mountain stream. I learned how to cook over a fire and why it was that the pot called the kettle black (the kettle was black! but so was the pot…). I learned the feeling of dressing in cold wet dirty socks first thing in the morning to work in the rain. I learned the power of skinny-dipping unbashfully. And, having for the first time in my life met generous people, I learned how to take advantage of other people’s generosity. Eventually I learned the rudiments of generosity myself. I can’t say I was quick.

 

Sunshine was the most generous person at camp. She is the sort who, finding herself with the daunting task of some epic journey, might take along a totally unprepared companion and share everything she owns rather than face the journey on her own. I was the sort of person who, finding myself slightly over-prepared, would take on the journey on my own rather than face the task of caring for someone else. Strangely, we found ourselves friends. I spouted lots of book-smart things and she demonstrated generosity.

 

One time, relatively early on in the summer, Sunshine went to the store to buy a chair and came back with two tiny folding chairs. I did not go to the store to buy a chair because I was perfectly comfortable sitting on the ground and thought I’d better save my money. Sunshine set both chairs up near the fire.

“Why did you buy two chairs?” asked Jon.

“One for me, and one for a friend,” said Sunshine.

“One for a friend,” snickered Jon.

One for a friend! I thought it was brilliant! Sunshine prepared for friends, and friends came. I prepared for solitude, and solitude came. Sunshine spent the rest of the summer showing me generosity. I spent the summer adoring her. Underprepared, we went into the wilderness together. The experience has made us friends forever.

Ten of Coins — Tarot of the Absurd

Tuesday, October 16th, 2012

feedback farm alaskaFamily. Security, wealth, and accomplishment. Sustainability: meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.

 

Wealth can loosely be defined as a stockpile of resources. Income, on the other hand, is resource flow. The resources that determine wealth are relative. They differ between societies and among different groups of a single society. It is therefore impossible to come up with a definition of wealth that we can all agree on.

 

Popular culture looks at property holdings, investments and bank accounts as a measure of wealth. Wealth is generally defined as a personal accumulation of resources that both allows us to live with less stress and gives us a better shot at regenerating healthy progeny. Wealth is limited to certain individuals, at the expense of others.

 

By this measure, environmental assets are not counted as a part of wealth. Thus, the economic contribution of the public commons is not seen to exist until it ceases to exist, at which point those who exploited it to obtain personal wealth complain of an income drop and those who used it for subsistence are destitute. Such is the tragedy of the commons. 

 

A more holistic measure of wealth would be one’s dedication to sustainable natural resource management and the greater good of future generations: planetary wealth. This is the only definition that allows everyone living on the planet to be wealthy without poverty, if only we could just all get along. (In Utopia, everyone is wealthy.)

 

Any definition of wealth that allows rampant depletion of natural resources for individual empowerment fails in the long run, as it allows one’s offspring to live in an environment of depleted wealth, thereby offering them a smaller chance at success. Family is integral to the definition of the Ten of Coins. For those following this course of action who have no offspring, I have not one decent argument against unmitigated selfishness. I can only offer up a curse— may you have a lousy after-life.

 

 

“I once met a billionaire at a cocktail party (one of the grocery Lords Sainsbury) and was dying to ask if he thought he was rich, but I was young and too shy. I’ve never met anyone else who thought he or she was rich, presumably because they spend most of their time at cocktail parties with people who are richer. (Example: Lord Egremont’s brother, who used to steal toilet paper when he stayed at Petworth, one of the great houses of England, but Lord Egremont’s family would go through his luggage and steal it back.) So [wealth] is not a particularly useful term in political discourse, except to define those people who can afford, through lobbying and lawyers, to pay less than their fair share of taxes.”

— James Papp of New York, reader of the New York Times

 

 

What is the difference between wealth and income?

  

What is the wealth of the top 1%?

  

Who are the 99%?

  

Where do I fall on the income curve?

Five of Coins — Tarot of the Absurd

Saturday, October 13th, 2012

 

five of pentacles

Isolation. Insecurity. Worry. Financial loss. Poverty.

 

Perhaps I was a bit cynical when I drew this card and, to be honest, I’m not sure how much I like it. Maybe I was mean…

 

Some people have the attitude that if you’re poor or you can’t get a job, it’s your own fault. You don’t work hard enough. You’re not smart enough. You made dumb investments. You never invested. You squandered your money. You need a better education. You work for a non-profit. You don’t use the latest technology. You make your own luck and you, looser, you don’t know how. You’re poor and it’s not my fault so I’m going to pretend you don’t exist even if you live next door.

 

Who is someone else to tell you what’s wrong with your life? Your actions are indeed your responsibility, but whose fault is injustice and malchance? You’re overeducated. Companies are only hiring people who already have jobs. You have no connections. You’re brilliant, but socially inept. Your boss fired you because you were pregnant. Your work was bulldozed. The government funds large corporate entities, enabling them to sell their goods at a price that would otherwise be a loss while you, small businessperson, are left trying to sell your goods for what they’re worth and nobody buys. Your talents have become obsolete. You are too old. You are disabled. There are not enough jobs. There are too many people.

 

I tried to illustrate a way out for this troubled couple: if they would just stop looking in their empty purses, pick up their shovels and work, they’d be fine. Unfortunately, this is not always the case. Sometimes we dig and dig and dig and after all that work, all we have is a hole. Sometimes, the only way to keep this hole from becoming a deep pit of despair is faith. I have illustrated foolishness, but I have failed to illustrate faith.

Piatnik-Wien Three-Card Read

Sunday, August 12th, 2012

I am trying to learn to read tarot cards with unillustrated pips (minors) by merely reflecting on the geometry and colors and whatnot scribbles in the card. My favorite is the Tarot Piatnik Wien, which has beautifully colored un-illustrated pips.

 

I ask the deck to help me free my mind and learn to read unillustrated pips my own way. I draw at random one card for study. Valet de Baton. I am looking for numbers only, no people, so I draw another card. Valet de Denier. My third card gives me Troi de Epees, so I stop here and lay them out in a row.

 

Three of Swords

 

The Valet de Baton wears his fancy buttoned uniform in a field of flowers. The colors are warm. He kind-of reminds me of a British redcoat. He seems as if he is pondering something, tho not something unpleasant. According to the dictionary (one of my favorite references,) a valet is a man’s male servant who performs personal services. I think of batons as sticks. Sticks are natural things that come in all shapes and sizes. They are no longer living. This man is the Valet of Sticks, so he performs personal services for the natural world and those who love it. He likes to be outside doing stuff, but because he is immature, he does not have a great sense of direction in life in terms of what he wants. He knows what he should do, and he knows what is in his line of work, so, in general, he does what he is told. But because he loves the natural world so much, he also loves to explore. This leads him wandering down unexplored paths at inopportune times.

 

The Valet de Denier wears his fancy flower-embroidered uniform near a diamonded fence. He is a young man who performs services for money. Any blue collar worker (and he is blue indeed) can relate to this. He holds a big coin in his hand as if to say, “Hey! I just got my paycheck!” I think he is eager to learn what kinds of things he can do to make money. Until he matures, he might not care so much about the ethical side of the work he becomes engaged in. He knows that money is powerful but he isn’t sure why.

 

The Troi de Epees is black with a yellow border, as are all the epees in this deck. I call them blades. The backgrounds of the blades remind me of chalkboards, and the squiggly designs remind me physics equations or something I can’t comprehend.

 

What this says to me about my ability to read pips intuitively is this:

 

Like the Valet de Baton, I often run off into the woods without a proscribed trail. I do like to follow trails, one after another, but I do not know where I am going and I don’t necessarily care. I simply enjoy the woods.

 

Like the Valet de Denier, I hope to find a tiny bit of worldly success off what I do. But the success I will have at relating to plain pips in a worldly manner without outside influence will be mighty small. However, I know an awful lot and I can learn put it to use.

 

Finally, if I expect to be able to find insight using the pips alone without outside reference whatsoever, I will find nothing but blackness, indecipherable scribbles, and frustration illustrated on the Troi de Epees. This is but a small failure: a normal, every-day failure that occurs when one is not interested enough in the task at hand.

Five of Coins — Sakki-Sakki Tarot

Monday, April 16th, 2012

Monicka Clio SakkiArtist: Monicka Clio Sakki

Author: Monicka Clio Sakki & Carol Anne Buckley

 

Like all fives, the Five of Coins indicates a situation of conflict. The difficulty here is with money, wealth, or possessions. Times are hard. Life sometimes seems meaningless. What is the purpose of such material things as we surround ourselves with? If we open our minds and accept life without the comforts we are used to, what new things do we find? All things material are impermanent.

 

With patience and courage, the feeling of impoverishment can be overcome. The tools to do the dirty work are with us all the time. It is easy to look in the accustomed places for comfort and a sense of belonging; it is difficult to see a whole new world of riches that lies just beneath our feet.

 

•   •   •

 

I once lived in Hawaii. I worked with an arborist in an immense botanical garden, where I climbed trees big enough to hold tree-mansions. In my spare time, I swam in the ocean, out in the open ocean, swam from beach to beach out in the ocean, all alone. I brought nothing with me. I wore goggles and a swimsuit. I swam for hours on end. I swam with turtles, dolphins, humpback whales, and a myriad of fishes, out there, all alone. I came to land like a mermaid, uneasy on my legs. I was in love with the ocean. I was madly in love with the ocean. It was almost enough to sustain me— but I was missing community. I had no family. I belonged in the ocean, all alone, but I did not belong on land.

 

When my boss became tyrannical and abusive, I had no where to turn for help. His actions took away the beauty I had found in life. I became sick. I had no energy. Hanks of hair fell out of my head; much of my remaining hair turned white. Eventually, I realized the most important thing is family. Because I had not made a new family of people to surround myself with, I decided to return to the northeast US, where I grew up. I have family here. I know the seasons. This is my wealth. This is my community. These are the riches that have been beneath my feet all my life. When something is lost and something new appears, quite often, it has been there all along.

Strength — Three of Swords — Seven of Coins — Russian Tarot of St. Petersburgh

Monday, April 2nd, 2012

Artist: Yuri Shakov

 

Last night, in an attempt at sleep, I read the entirety of Wang’s An Introduction to the Golden Dawn Tarot. Unfortunately, I found it riveting. I want to try moving towards multiple card readings. I would like to try to remember the stories behind how one card relates to the other. I draw three cards— past, present, future.

 

The past is Strength. Not that Strength is past, but that physical Strength was the most obvious manifestation of my very-independent Self. That Self has past in the direction of the Three of Swords. The body and one’s apparent independence are ultimately impossible to hold onto. It is best to become less attached to them before necessary. This decreases heartache and increases freedom. The Three of Swords leads onward to the Seven of Coins. Having a child is always the Seven of Coins. I imagine the investment is perpetual, tho one hopes to put less effort into it over time. And I imagine harvest thus:

 

—hunting for ripe blackberries at the beginning of the season—

among the brambles
not quite out of reach
one sun-kissed drupe
placed upon the tongue
evokes a wash of purple
dripping from the sky
melting over thorns
a be-here-now
of sunlight

in the mouth

Seven of Coins — Cary-Yale Visconti Deck

Friday, March 30th, 2012

Today I draw a card for a woman I know in a faraway land. Because I like renaming people, and because I am supposed to be learning French (ha!) and she is in France, I rename her l’Accordéoniste, which looks fancy to me because it has an apostrophe after the “l” and an accent aigu over the “e.”

 

“Show me a card for l’Accordéoniste and give her a castle and true love,” I demand.

 

Seven of Coins shows its face upright and says to me:

 

I give her nothing. Her labor’s fruit is all her own.

If she is wise— and wise she is— she will work hard

and know that growth of fruit takes many years.

The tree that fruits is strongly formed and neatly pruned,

its soil fed, its rats and insects chased away,

and it is blessed with ideal weather by the gods.

Seven coins are golden fruits of each of seven loves,

and the boughs of the tree are her castle;

and the music she plays entices the gods

to properly favor the weather.