This was my morning reading today, and it reminded me of a message that I have received: to find strength in my mission of someone who speaks and seeks to heal out of his personal experience with suffering and pain. The Nine of Swords in this deck is very curious. What strikes me the most about it is that there are four owls. Number four here is strange, but it alludes to a certain stability (even if precarious, because of the diamond shape). The three owls that form the base of the formation only have two eyes. The one on top, however, has developed a third eye. Given this card’s usual meanings in terms of fear, anxiety, and restlessness; we can take the image to mean that there is clarity and enlightenment to be reached through the stacking of our suffering. We reach a breaking point where the Light can be seen, like when the Buddha awakened upon gazing at Venus after meditating for so long over the nature of suffering. The Hierophant shows that, as we transform our pain into awakening, we are given the Keys. The Keys to mysteries. The keys to illumation of ourselves and of those that we reach with our light. I like to think the leaves behind the deer are tobacco–a sacred plant. It harkens to the sacredness of it all: that through the pain that sems to be an inherent feature of incarnation in the Cosmos, the holy emerges. Healing breaks through. I vow to honor it. I vow to honor the Keys.

PS: as I was taking this picture my black tourmaline pendant piece fell and broke, as you can see. I have been wearing it for the past few days, dealing with some stress and negative emotions. I take this to have a meaning.