Tarot: Emotional Support for Hermit

Hermit Tarot
Four of Wands in the Present, challenged by the Hermit

If you are familiar with Tarot cards as a psychological tool for discovery, you probably already know the meaning of the Four of Wands and the Hermit tarot cards.

The Gatherings

I host semi-regular gatherings in my home to discuss spiritual matters.  Sometimes we focus on Law of Attraction.  Sometimes on meditations or rituals to say goodbye to difficult griefs while welcoming in new joys.  Sometimes we simply talk or watch a religious movie like AGORA (great movie and a cheap rental). More times than not, after the main focus of the evening is over, someone gets out one of my decks of tarot cards and we all circle around the layout for a group reading.

The Group Reading

 

The cool thing about group readings is that one person at a time gets the advantage of the group’s intuition and insights.  As for the card reader, the pressure isn’t as strong to give a perfect reading, and guests who normally would never read for someone else feel free to chime in with their own insights–often some jaw-dropping truths that others don’t see.

I don’t often get read as part of the group.  There’s usually not time and I’m the hostess, so it’s rare.  Maybe once a year.  But at the June gathering, my friend Patrick read for me–and hit on unspoken resentments that  have been eating at me for a few months.

The Four of Wands card is often a card of celebration, particularly weddings.  The Hermit tarot is usually either a teacher shining the light for others or a seeker searching through the dark.  Put them together and…Patrick nailed it.

Life Coaching Tips

My Reading

I hadn’t seen Patrick in several months so he wasn’t aware of things going on in my personal life. He immediately saw the Four of Wands as me, as the joyful home, celebration, happy place that I offer everyone else.  The safe place.  The sanctuary. The one who offers emotional support to others.

And the Hermit tarot?  Me.  Walking the path alone.  Holding up the lantern to search for emotional support.

Rather than words, I’ll direct you to the two cards in the photo above.  The feel of the two cards says it all.

If these cards represent my present and what challenges me, then yes, they are correct.  I struggle with resentment right now that I am there for everyone in my closest circles to give emotional support whether asked for or not.  I try not to pass judgement on others if they are feeling wounded over things I might not have done or as a result of choices they made or things that happened to them that I could have seen happening to me.

But I know that there are things in my life that my closest circles have not approved of and are quite happy to see those things leave my life.  Nothing they’ve seen up close.  Nothing that affects them.  Nothing that takes money out of their pockets or keeps me from being there for them when they need me.  They know my heart was broken several months ago.  They don’t know what’s happened since then.  They haven’t asked.  Nary a “are you doing okay?”  They’ve never asked if I wanted to talk about it or wrapped their arms around me to hold me to the Earth when I felt sure it would spin me off.  They were nowhere around when I spent three days at home, sobbing. Not even a text.   The reason for my heartbreak was good news to them, but they didn’t seem to understand that I didn’t find it good news and that I was hurting over it.

That’s the secondary injury, one that hurts almost as deeply as the first wound. That I lost something very precious to me and have been grieving alone for the loss of a dream, and that I’ve gotten little to no emotional support from the same people who disapproved of what brought me so much joy.  It speaks to the source of emotional support and both my guilt over not keeping circles of friends and family satisfied and at the same time getting damned tired of the snarky comments about my choices and their concern for my well-being.  What cuts so deeply is to see the loved ones who aren’t supportive of my dreams be so supportive of the dreams of other people who have given them little to no emotional support in the past.

I don’t get it.   But when, if ever, they are ready to talk about the grief I’ve been through, the time for talking is over.  I’m in a different place now.

But I do know very well where I get my emotional support from, and it’s a most unexpected person.  The most unexpected person.

So my present tense is all about blending that happy home, happy place, celebration mindset with that feeling of being a hermit, being alone, making my own way in the dark.  I’m choosing more than ever to be a hermit about particular things in my life now, those things that my closest circles have given me hell about for so long.  I can still be there to give emotional support to others–I can’t imagine not–but instead of expecting emotional support in return, I will keep that part of myself to myself, keep those dreams private and unshared.

Next time I have a dream that is this important to me and it’s time to share it, my closest circles with have to get over their judgment if they want me in their lives.

Because I need a Four of Wands kind of person I can depend on, too, and I already know who that is and who that isn’t. And that’s a lesson from the Hermit tarot card.


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