I am deciding to do a Journey Oracle card reading to help me understand the situation, and my experience surrounding this invitation. Unlike many of the Journey Oracle readings that I share in this blog, I am going to do a one card reading for this topic to demonstrate how I sometimes use one oracle card instead of four when I work with the Journey Oracle.
I love this card. It is #22 in the Journey Oracle deck: the card representing Mystery. How perfect for my one card reading. I see a creature hanging upside down, perhaps a bird or bat, or maybe a spider. Brilliantly coloured rays move out to the rim from around the creature; the red ones are especially intense and out of focus. This situation does have me feeling "upside down" with intense feeling tones. This card is about finding truth, wisdom and has this message: a glimmering.
THE SITUATION
This situation began
by being not the place.
The prevailing energy
of this situation is warm from the south.
The core energy
pattern of this situation is brilliant.
The Mother of this
situation is helpful.
The Father of this
situation is radiating warmth.
ALIGNMENT TO THE
SITUATION
Your relationship to
the prevailing energy is as a hunter.
Your perception of
the situation is unbound.
The impact of your perception is strong colors for protection.
The impact of your perception is strong colors for protection.
The connection
between the core energy pattern and the situation
is felt as dance.
The momentum of this
situation is fed by being a safe place.
These are the Oracle pronouncements about my situation. I am especially drawn to the first and last: being not the place, and being a safe place. Even though the overall impression of the situation is quite warm, I think these capture my feelings of uncertainty and caution.
To do a one card oracle reading I now turn the card over and look at the other side. This image represents my experience in this situation. How fuzzy and unclear is that! Do I say yes or no? Am I curious or resistant? Why does it matter?
THE
EXPERIENCE NAMED
A GLIMMERING
THE SITUATION EXPERIENCED
my friend
this is how they are
there is not enough food
one of you has to go
there is not enough food
manifestation
my friend
there is not enough food
survival of the species
my friend
one of you has to go
EXTERIOR SUPPORT
An exterior or
support system for the situation is feathered
edges.
These are the Oracle's statements about my experience. The poem about the situation experienced gives me a sense of foreboding but nothing very specific to reflect upon. However, the Exterior Support of feathered edges feels like it says it is important for me not to think of the situation in terms of opposites: yes/no, go/don't go but rather with a softer focus.
When using just one oracle card, I now turn the card back to the first side and re-look at the image, this time pondering the third aspect of a Journey Oracle reading: the change that is calling me. In the process of dancing the card back and forth I changed the orientation, and so this is my view. What a peculiar hybrid creature--a bird and a spider (with a tail?) The expression is also quite compelling--detached yet aware, focused, quiet. Now the many coloured rays seem to be coming from the creature itself as if these are changing views or energies.
CHANGE
The power needed to shift this situation will
be a sound of a drum chant.
Change will come by being in a hard place.
Your relationship to
the change in this situation is haunting.
The moment of letting
go into the change will smell of
lavender.
The concern to be
avoided within this change will taste of
water.
DIVINE WILL
The wisdom of being a quiet place will empower the
transformation.
Completed
transformation will be felt as a quality of sunrise.
DREAM ON THIS
QUESTION
Are you
happy here?
HOW IS THIS
AN ANSWER
Energy
These are the Oracle's statements about change in this situation. I am especially caught by two statements: of how change will come by being in a hard place, and of the wisdom of being a quiet place. How profound is the notion of being a quiet place instead of being IN a quiet place. I can choose what teaching I receive, and how, and when.
Again I turn the card to its other side and look into the image for insight about the resolution to my situation. I am startled to see a relationship between two bird forms, where when I first looked at this side of the card I only saw fuzzy pink, grey, and red.
The first bird is large and posturing with its wing and body stance. Seems quite dramatic.
The second, smaller bird, perhaps something like a penguin, has a smile. But you have to look closely for it, above the faint red line that traces the edge of the downward pointing beak.
The Journey Oracle story that is part of this card's wisdom is about seeing what is loved. When the teaching is true and the teacher is honest, it is possible to see what is loved--everywhere.
THE RESOLUTION
A Journey Oracle fairy tale
SEEING WHAT IS
LOVED
A pair of robins built a nest outside a
woman’s kitchen window. Back and forth the sleek, strong parents flew, and yet
she did not much attend to the new life’s manifestation that might be curling
inside that twiggy bowl. Then one day she saw a wee curving form and a flash of
translucent orange greet an adult bird’s arrival. The gaping mouths wavering on
rubbery stalks counted three, and from that moment the woman’s attention often
rested on the little family.
The hatchlings grew
until their jostling with each other for the offered morsels threatened to send
one over the edge. The woman began to wonder what she would do if a chick fell
out, or if the nest itself came down. She plotted how to keep the birds safe,
but always stopped short of action because it seemed this is how they are, even
when the chicks were so big that they would teeter on the edge of the nest,
buzzing their wings like whirligigs, reaching out always to say there is not
enough food.
One morning the woman
saw a chick sitting on a branch near the nest, receiving a morsel from its
skinny overworked parent. It was weaving a bit on its untrained feet and
rebalancing frequently with wild flutterings. “How can this be?” The woman
thought in alarm. “Surely it’s not time yet for the survival of the species
story.” But she resisted trying to help and just kept watching. And then, as if
someone said “one of you has to go”—all the birds were gone. No chicks were
left in the nest, the one on the branch could not be seen, and the parents no
longer came.
The woman went
outside, and saw a robin a distance away in the garden. Then another flew past
in the yard. A third dropped to the ground at the edge of the forest. “Is that
you, my friend,” she wondered, “or maybe your child?” Suddenly the woman was
seeing what she loved everywhere.
