Today’s meditation was skipped.

•    •    •    ◈    •    🌾    •    ◈    •    •    •

Daily Mental Health Prompt: Seek a positive message to carry with you throughout the day and offer perspective.

Today’s draw is the Eight of Coins, which is traditionally a representation of hard work, expertise through practice, honing a skill, quality craftsmanship, handicrafts, and manifestations through skill and hard work. The card is often the embodiment of the “practice makes perfect” adage.

The Eight of Coins has then been combined with the Dreamscape card from the Create Brave Cards, which says, “When I imagine my future, I turn it into a reality.”

Today’s cards feel like a carryover from yesterday’s card of the day, which spoke of the need for more than wishful thinking in order to build the future one wants as opposed to the entitlement of expecting it to be given to us.

Today we see a card that represents working hard to hone one’s skills and abilities in a specific area combined with an affirmation that talks about turning what one imagines they want into reality.

This speaks not just of the work involved in building the reality that we want to experience, but also the fact that this process takes time. It takes time to develop one’s skills, including both successes and failures along the way. Sometimes the things that we do don’t work out, and from these things that don’t work out we learn how to do them successfully the next time.

In this way, failure is never actually failure unless you give up. Instead, failure becomes a learning experience on how to improve.

The message in today’s Eight of Coins and affirmation card is a reminder that instant gratification might seem nice, but it doesn’t really give us anything of value.It’s those desires that we worked towards and earn through trial and error, curiosity and exploration, that give us the sweetest things in life that we find most fulfilling.

DECKS USED:  THE GOOD KARMA TAROT AND CREATE BRAVE CARDS

September Prompts by @forgotten.dumpling & @ml.mecham
Prompt for September 8th : I carry the ash in both hands

As the man, I was falls away defeated by new ideas and new perspectives (Ace of Spades atop Five of Clubs), I find myself less focused on balance created by stagnancy (Two of Diamonds) and let go of the need for plans to be starched rigid with strategy (King of Diamonds).

These expectations are burned to ash by trial and error (Five of Spades) while I find a better way (Nine of Diamonds).

And yet as I move on, I carry the ashes with me, coating the palms of both hands, for they serve as a reminder of what came before and was lost along the way as I move on to better things (Jack of Hearts).

Other elements included in this reading:
Bird Figurine for Encouraging Hope, Positivity, and Renewal
Foraged Parmeliaceae Lichen for a “Breath of Fresh Air”
Foraged Acorn for Protection during New Beginnings
Selenite for Purification and drawing in Positive Energy

DECK USED: THORNWOOD PLAYING CARDS

@jourie.co‘s An Imaginative Life Journal Prompts
Prompt for September 10th : Who are you when no one needs anything from you?

Reading Summary: Someone whose entire world (The World) becomes driven by their addictions (The Devil), who is never satisfied with how much they have accomplished and is always looking for more to do (Two of Swords atop Nine of Coins).

Take Away: This is interesting, as it’s a question I’ve never really considered or looked at before. In fact, it was this question and how intrigued I was by it that convinced me to do this particular challenge for September.

These cards make a good point. Before I had others depending on me, I was working myself into the ground while heavily flirting with my addictions.

Although I often find myself perceiving my responsibilities to others as a struggle or a chore, the truth of the matter is that if these responsibilities weren’t there, I would be finding other ways to not just keep myself busy but keep myself overwhelmed with too much and distracted by addictions whose urges are currently dimmed by my focus on other things.

Other elements included in this reading:
Norway Maple Key for Fostering Strength and Resilience
Foraged Parmeliaceae Lichen for a “Breath of Fresh Air”
Flower Agate Moon for Opening the Mind to New Possibilities
Tigers Eye for Protection and Fostering Confidence
Selenite for Purification and drawing in Positive Energy

DECK USED: THE GOOD KARMA TAROT

Even though I hate the stuff, I took a benadryl when I had an allergy flare-up earlier instead of trying to “tough it out” until it was over.