Tue, 07 Oct 2008 14:50:02 +0000
River reflections, view from my window, www.carolineallen.com

I’m working on my second novel Air. It’s flowing, but the stress and worry over money keeps pulling me up and out. The writing is so rich, so flowy…I’m being led down profound and unexpected paths, for example, looking at sensitive men in society and how hard this world is for them. Some of the ideas in Air may actually have something to do with the reason behind all of this economic crisis stuff we’re all facing.

So, I can’t write because of the anxiety due to the world’s economic crisis. Like everyone, I’m feeling the pinch. Artists are some of the first to really feel financial downturns.

So, I’m sitting here using my tarot deck to calm myself. Finally, I think: Well, why not use the tarot to do a blog on what people need to know about this financial crisis.

I throw one reading. It says: Do your art! Great, I think, but what about paying my bills? And how does that help everyone else out there? So, I gather the cards and throw another reading. It says: Do your art!

OK, fine! Fine! Fine. I will. I am and I will.

I keep the reading beside me as I write Air and I keep coming back to it, keep perusing the cards. They have more to say.

Don’t panic, they say. Go out and take a walk in the woods. Relax. Let go.

I wanted some deep information about the world of economics and what the future holds FINANCIALLY, I sneer at the cards. They reply calmly back: Relax. It’s OK.

There is plenty for everyone in nature. There is plenty for everyone in the core of your creative soul, the cards say.

That’s all fine and dandy, I think, in the SPIRIT world, but I’m in what some call Ordinary Reality, and I can’t use a leaf to pay my heating bill.

Then the cards give me this:

There is so much healing happening in the world, a spontaneous combustion of healing is happening in the world. The financial markets are just a scare tactic to stop this healing in its tracks.

What?!”@$&? Healing? Please…the world’s a cesspool!

The cards respond: Yes, it’s a cesspool and so many people are healing that the very cesspooledness is being highlighted. Can’t you see? People are scared of the healing. What better way to stop them than to make it seem impossible to pay their bills if there’s no money and even more impossible to heal…can’t you see…it’s a trick. People are triggered by all the healing. Don’t ride that trigger. As artists, it’s our job to hold the bar high, to hold the light, to see and express the truth, even as the world gets more and more frightened. Even if the world doesn’t want to hear it.

What? Healing? The cynic in me cries: What coocoo for cocoa puff idea is this?

The cards say: If you want to take action (AFTER you take that walk in the woods), you could look at any area of your life where you are lacking integrity around money and bring light to that area. Are you still harming the environment in a way you could shift? Are you still unforgiving to someone in your past around money? How healthy is your relationship to money?

If you’re one of those out there who’s feeling the financial crisis really hard and right in your face, the cards say, it’s time to assess, rethink, and heal. Healing around money happens within before it can take affect in the world.

So, we can bitch about NYC bankers, about bailouts and greed, or we can heal the wounded inner money maker in ourselves.

I ask the cards how to do this healing and throw a few more cards down on my desk. They say: Many people have made a bargain — I give up my voice in exchange for a piece of the financial pie. Now there’s no financial pie, what the f”£@ck did I sacrifice my voice for? Nothing! So, heal this notion in yourself that you must give up your voice to survive.

I want to stop with the tarot and go back to Air, but I have to stop and ask: But don’t we live in a world where it’s impossible to be in your voice fully and make money? I’m an artist. I try to speak my voice and I feel very on the edge with money as many many many of my artists friends do. So, please clarify.

OK: The world DOES think that if you do what you love, ie Art, you’re going to pay for it because the truth is that there’s a world paradigm that says If I give up my true voice, I’ll make lots of money…and people who give up their voices are not going to be throwing money at people who don’t. The ones who’ve lost their voice have too much internal resentment.

So what’s a gal to do?

The cards say: everyone needs to heal around money. Everyone can do their own healing around money. Full-time workers who hate their jobs, artists who struggle with really being in the magic of their soul because they feel so un-moneyed, rich people, poor people, women who think their husbands should make all the money, husbands who think they’re in control of the money. A newly laid off business person who thinks it is shameful to be broke, people with money who look down on the poor, the poor who look up to people witht money as if they’re better….and on and on and on.

So, the cards ask: Where do you need to begin to heal?

I’m a writing coach and I used to be an international tarot reader. I’ve taken up the cards again and am doing readings for individuals. Check out my website at www.shiftingperceptions.com and contact me at carolineallen@aol.com if you’d like a reading.