One from the vaults….
Earlier this week (August 2019), one of my friends was offered a promotion. The job, however, was becoming a manager over a team known for being difficult. So tricky she will be the fourth manager in eighteen months. The team had to be split between three offices, due to extreme interpersonal issues.
Should she take it? Would she be able to make a success? What could she do? I went for cards not seen on my blogs for some time: le tarot persan de Madame Indira.
Containing just 55-cards, these cards blur the much-loved boundaries of what is allowed to call itself a tarot.
I fell in love with these cards around 1998. It is like a peacock with its iridescent colours. I remember shuffling it for the first time, and la Chouette and la main de Fatma falling out. I knew it was something special.
Le tirage des messages
Traditional cartomancy draws heavily on binaries: sinister and dexter, above and below, near and far, past and future, you and them, help and hindrance, red and black, and so on. One of the most useful is what to do and what not to do. Le tirage des messages will provide such advice, which is one of its strength. The other is that it contains information on the querent and their situation.
The nineteen trumps and la Chouette (the Owl) are shuffled, cut, and five cards are drawn and disposed of as follows:
- The first card reveals the state of mind of the querent facing her question
- The second card describes the present situation
- The third card is the behaviour she should adopt
- The fourth card is where she should forbear
- The fifth card is the answer
Reading
For this draw, although one uses just the nineteen majors and la Chouette, the minors can be employed for clarification or any follow-up questions. For this reason, I still assign a significator. La reine trèfle was the most appropriate, considering both her job and her hair-colouring.
The cards as they fell:
- La maison (the house)
- La rupture (rupture)
- La panthère noire (the black panther)
- Le mariage (the wedding)
- Les hirondelles (the swallows)
The House advises on the state of mind of la reine de trèfle. We can tell immediately that la reine priorities a sense of belonging, but also security. La reine does not wish to be propelled too far from the environment she feels at home in, or amongst those, she does not incline to let in.
Looking at the second card, we find the Rupture card which discloses the present situation. On the one hand, it references that by accepting the role, la reine is breaking from her entourage. But one suspects it describes the various divides and interpersonal issues within the new department.
Cards three and four, the Panther and the Wedding cards, describe the attitude to adopt and what to avoid. We must consider these together.
A powerful and intelligent animal, the melanistic feline also fosters a sense of something concealed (the leopard’s spots). If la reine wishes to make a success of her new opportunity, it is essential to define boundaries and keep a neutral composure in the face of hostility and difficulties.
The worse thing la reine can do is be drawn into complicated dynamics and cliques. If she does so, she will lose important ground and the necessary distinction in her role. It will be tempting to try and soothe and befriend, but it is not the path needed in this situation.
Our answer comes in the form of the Swallows. We all know swallows are migratory, but also excellent flyers and communicative. It shows that la reine will be able to navigate her way and negotiate the sphere she finds herself in. Following the advice above, she can successfully communicate in a manner that earns respect but importantly pays a dividend in the long run.
As the Swallows have a migratory quality, I shuffled the pip cards and covered it. Here we have the Cinq de Cœur.
Such a combination portends the emergence of calmer waters, but also a sense of personal satisfaction in a job well-done.
It is only through refining the situation, and understanding how fortuitous energies and circumstances are, that we can offer any guidance. Even then, all we are doing is reading the emblematic pattern as an optical dialect.
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References:
Tarot Persan de Madame Indira © Grimaud, 1981.
Les tirage des messages taken from L’ABC du Tarot Person de Madame Indira by Colette Silvestre.
Featured Image: Montasim Jawar, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Journal of a Cartomante 