I was recently told that I hold emotional control by taking a teaching role among my friends, and that this would be something good to let go of, where appropriate. I can feel the emotional control clamping down at the mere mention of advice to let go, as if my ego thinks I am about to spiral out of control at the suggestion. I have been a teacher my entire adult life: in some form this always seems to include emotional as well as intellectual control, and so advice about how to let go would be helpful.
For guidance about how to shift my need to control the emotional climate around me, I went to the Journey Oracle divination deck and drew this card. Amazingly, it is the card called “teacher.” As I gaze into the image I see a female figure looking left. She seems to wear a bright smile and has a confident posture; certainly she seems in emotional control. And yet the space between her arms and her lower torso makes a strange, wide-eyed animal face—this juxtaposition of control and wild certainly does not feel very safe to me. The woman does not seem to acknowledge the animal, even though she is made of this energy. Is this a core issue for needing to be in emotional control? The colors of this card are unappealing to me. A murky yellow brown is shot through with dots of brown and black. The feeling I have is that this color needs to be “cleared up.” Is this a visual parallel for how to let go of emotional control?
The statement for this card is “Don’t need to know everything.” When I let go of my emotional resistance at being told not to know, I see how perfect this advice is for the loosening of control. It is just what I need to realize in order to let go.
The writings of James P Carse and Ken McCleod have been helpful for insights and activities that create ways to let go of emotional control, as have the writings of Pema Chodron. You can discover more about this divination deck, and how to create your own readings , at www.journeyoracle.com.
