Living Authentically – Can 5 Tarot Cards Reveal The Truth?
Hi Musers, I hope you’re all having a great week. It’s Wednesday so it’s downhill to the weekend from here 😃 I have been thinking a lot lately about how to make changes in my life. I feel unfulfilled and sad a lot of the time, even though I have a lot of blessings. After a lot of reading I keep coming back to the idea of living authentically.
I shied away from the idea initially as it seemed too new age and woo-woo for me. However, I found that I kept coming back to it. No matter how I tried to dodge and run away I kept returning to the same place. So, what IS living authentically? According to the website Mind Tools, “a common definition is that being authentic is living your life according to your own values and goals, rather than those of other people. Put simply, authenticity means you’re true to your own personality, values, and spirit, regardless of the pressure that you’re under to act otherwise.”
I’m sure you can all relate. Few of us feel comfortable displaying our true selves in the world. We’ll always show a bit of ourselves but may hide parts to fit in. The interesting thing is, we may show different parts of ourselves to different groups of people meaning our workmates may know one version of us, our partner another and our friends another again. Of course, I’m not saying these are completely different personalities, just gentle tweaks.
Why Living Authentically Is Hard
It’s not always easy to be authentic. Here are a few of the reasons I’ve come up with for this:
- Do any of us do enough soul searching to know what our goals and values are? I’m not sure I do to be honest. I’ve spent so much of my life trying to be who I think I should be or what people want me to be that I’ve never stopped to wonder what I want to be
- You might lose friends. For example, if your friends love going out on a Friday and Saturday night and getting so drunk you basically sleep all weekend and you decide you’d like to stop they may feel you’ve changed or are judging them. Similarly, if your family are very religious and go to church every week and you start to question your faith, that could be difficult for them
- It might require difficult conversations. Maybe you prefer to not make a fuss and go along with others at work, home or with friends. Living authentically could mean having uncomfortable conversations when you need to defend your beliefs, values or boundaries
Enter The Spread
The first reason is a big stumbling block for me. I genuinely don’t know what living authentically looks like for me. I think it will take a lot of work to figure out and I hope continuing going to therapy will help. In the meantime though, I found this authenticity spread on Pinterest and decided to give it a go.
The Cards
Four of Cups. This card is often about being bored and disengaged but look at that rabbit’s face! It is a stubborn expression and he is visualising what he wants and ignoring the cups in front of him. Instead of ignoring blessings I am reading this as being prepared to say no to things that do not fit my values and are not a part of who I want to be. I need to stop going with the flow, or saying yes because it’s easier. I need to decide what I want and what I believe and settle for nothing less.
Happy. This is an extra card in the deck. I am going to therapy to live a happier life by cutting loose the trauma from my past. It’s like a great millstone around my neck, dragging me backwards. I haven’t been able to heal on my own so while therapy will be rough I hope I will be a happier, healthier person by the end. I think the card is also telling me to do things that being me joy, where time just flies. I need to make my life more about fun right now.
Nine of Pentacles. I am a good person and have created a lot of abundance in my life. I have a nice home, a husband I love with all my heart, my sister who is my best friend, a good job, etc. However I don’t feel happy. I can’t connect with this life and say it gives me everything I need. I need to look beyond things towards who I am, what I truly want and what I believe.
Four of Pentacles. I have been overly obsessed with money lately. I know it’s not a good way to be but I always feel out of control, that no matter how carefully I plan there are still more bills to pay or things we need. That means I do more of my freelance work and burn myself out. I don’t focus on my health, spirituality, relationships or simply put ME. What I need for myself. I need to remember that money is only one part of life and while I am certainly not rich, my life is relatively comfortable.
Judgement. This card is stalking me! I chose three tarot decks for my daily draw yesterday and shuffled each one thoroughly. Would you believe I got Judgement twice and the third card was Justice?? I need to evolve. I need to leave the old me behind and step into who I am meant to be. I think this will be a long and difficult journey and there will be a lit of pain but it’s a journey I have to make for me.
How Will You Live Authentically?
I hope you enjoyed this post and that it might have struck a chord with you. I’d be thrilled if you use this as you prompt to look into how you can start living authentically too. If there’s anything you want to share I’d love to hear it, just pop it in the comments. See you next time xx
