metaphysics

The Witness and Mountain Goat: Oracle and Animal Guidance for the Week

Posted by Barbara Techel

This morning I felt called to pull our weekly cards from two different decks than I usually use. I’ve also recorded this reading. So if you’d rather listen, than read the message, you have that option.

 

So what is it we need to be aware of this week for our highest good?

From The Mystical Shaman Oracle:  The Witness

Right away I feel called to share that one of the key things I learned in Oracle School is witnessing and observing my own patterns and behaviors. This isn’t always an easy thing to do because with this can sometimes bring shame, pain, and/or guilt.

The Witness card asks us this week to pay attention to those moments these difficult feelings come up. And it’s important to remember that when they do to be gentle and compassionate with yourself. Within these moments that can feel painful and difficult is an opportunity to get to the root cause and begin to make changes to course correct and feel better about ourselves.

To the right of the woman, there is an eye and what appears to be light shining from it. I see this as reminding us to take time in stillness or meditation when uncomfortable feelings come up and tune into our own intuition. I see the eye on the card as representative of the third eye chakra which is about intuition, imagination, thought, and self-awareness.

Additional insight from the guidebook provides this invitation: The witness that has been by your side all along is now ready to become your ally. You thought you were the doer, but today you discover that things happen when you get out of your own way. Witness creation unfolding before you. Change reality by finding stillness and letting your true intent reveal itself.

All answers lie within, even when those answers are sometimes hard to acknowledge. But once we can become aware of them we can practice self-care and forgiveness towards ourselves, which then can help us to not only be more compassionate to ourselves but to also witness others in a more gentle way and also extend that compassion.

What animal ally is guiding us as we learn to be witness to ourselves?

From Messages from Your Spirit Animal Guides Oracle: Mountain Goat

So, yes, it can feel like an uphill and difficult climb when we witness and look at challenging feelings. But mountain goat reminds us that in order to restore balance to our whole being and especially within ourselves, being witness to the why of these feelings, becoming aware, and then working toward change will eventually lead us to feel freer and fully alive and experience more joy.

A line from the song Lonely Goatherd by Richard Rodgers popped into my head – High on a hill was a lonely goatherd. I see this as a reminder of the importance of being alone with ourselves and practicing stillness in order to find more balance in our every day lives.

Additional insight from the guidebook provides this invitation: It’s unrealistic to expect your life to stay completely in balance at all times, as it’s continuous interplay between the various polarities. Even the seasonal adjustments of light and dark slowly and gradually shift in a ceaseless dance. Notice how you feel when something is out of balance, and then take necessary steps to adjust in ways that provide greater equilibrium.

I’d like to add to this a quote I learned from my mom which is “this too shall pass.” When we are in a state of feeling dark, fearful, guilt or shame, it’s a signal to pause and just be with ourselves while also trusting that as it always does, it will eventually pass. Even when we may not have complete clarity of a challenging time in the moment, clarity often comes when we trust we will move through it, and insight will be revealed to guide and help us at some point. So staying in awareness is our friend (along with mountain goat!) to have beside us as we journey forward.

I hope this reading was helpful. Enjoy your week!

XO,

Barbara

Book a private reading with me here.

Cards used for this week’s general reading: The Mystical Shaman Oracle by Alberto Villoldo, Colette Baron-Reid and Marcela Lobos and Messages from Your Animal Spirit Guides Oracle by Dr. Steven Farmer.

Chaos as Opportunity: Oracle and Animal Guidance for the Week

Posted by Barbara Techel

Our cards this week are both in protection (reverse) Chaos and Conflict and Sandpiper Spirit.

Note: I’m sharing a photo of the cards upright so you can study them for yourselves for added personal insight and how the message may pertain to you.

Whenever this card shows up in a reading I try to take a moment to check in with myself. It’s easy to look at this card and think, Oh no, I don’t want chaos or conflict! Who does, right? But the card pulled in reverse is asking us where do we feel conflicted right now and how can we approach this as an opportunity to deepen in understanding? Not only for the benefit of ourselves but for all involved.

Think about those times where something just wasn’t working out as you hoped. But yet, when you look back you can more often than not see that what you thought you wanted that didn’t come to fruition was actually for your best interest.  In the middle of chaos it’s important to take a moment, pause, and really listen for what you are feeling and to stay in the present moment.

To think ahead of what could be or what might or might not happen only causes more internal chaos and conflict.

Zebra also is a reminder that most things are not black and white. So many factors may be at play and each needs to be taken into consideration.

Sandpiper Spirit as the second card pulled and the message of “Be playful” is another valuable reminder of when something feels out of control the importance of getting out of our mental state and engaging in some time to just be. I love that the Sandpiper on this card is splashing in the water and lotus flowers float around him.

The lotus is rooted in deep mud and grows through to become this beautiful flower. Just like we too, when in the thick of what feels like slogging through the muck is leading us to bloom in a new and expanded way.

Sandpipers are scavengers and must work hard to find their food. This is another good message for us that in order to feel whole we must work for what is important, while also incorporating time to do what brings us joy also.

Hope you enjoyed this general reading for your week!

XO,

Barbara

Book a private reading with me here.

Cards used for this week’s general reading: Wisdom of the Oracle and Spirit Animal Oracle by Colette Baron-Reid

Tasha Tudor – A Special Oracle of Mine

Posted by Barbara Techel
My “think and tinkle” station in my bathroom

As I began to write this post I thought about calling it “Think and Tinkle” and then thought with a grin, perhaps I could title it “Ponder and…” But as the day has unfolded, alas, the title I chose is much more in alignment with the message I want to share. And don’t mind me, I can have a silly sense of humor.

While I can be downright serious and a deep thinker, perhaps it’s something you don’t know about me, in that I do believe I have a pretty good sense of humor. I feel like I developed it being married to my quick-witted hubby, John, or perhaps I had it in me all along. Who knows? But I guess I kind of digress…

ANYways…seriously. It’s such a beautiful way to start off my day by randomly pulling a card from Mark’s inspirational deck, which sits on a small stand in my bathroom. The deck is The Book of Awakening, which by the way, is the same name of a book he wrote. If you’ve not read it, you might want to check it out if it calls to you. Now I’m wondering what Mark Nepo would think of my private pondering time on the commode with his card deck?  🙂

Today’s pull was, “Be Who You Are” and says, “You do not have to do anything to be loved, and being who you are does not let others down. This needs to be repeated, and often. Simply be who you are, and love what is before you.” 

There was a time when I would have read this and thought, but how do I do that? Missing the whole point that there is nothing to do, but to just be. And it was because I worried so much about judgement from other’s. But now I am so much better at living my life in the way that feels right for me.

But being this spiritual being in a human body with a mind and an ego that tries to sometimes convince me otherwise, the need for reminders through pondering moments such as today and Mark’s gorgeous and thought-provoking cards keeps me walking a journey of embracing all of who I am.

And was I ever tickled about a synchronicity that unveiled itself as the day went on that I saw in relation to this cards message!

Tasha Tudor in my favorite season of Fall

I received an email from Bob, an editor in Brattleboro, VT doing a story for their local newspaper, the Brattleboro Reformer, about author Tasha Tudor’s Advent calendar. As you likely know if you’ve been here with me awhile, I’m a devoted fan of Tasha’s, though she’s been gone since 2008. If you don’t know about her, just Google her name.

In doing some research, Bob came across a blog post I wrote in December 2012 about my dream vacation John and I took to Vermont around that same time. While I wrote many blog posts about our time in Vermont in the Fall, one post I’d shared two month’s later was about the advent calendar with Tasha’s simple, but endearing illustrations. I had purchased it from the museum in Brattleboro that honors Tasha’s memory and I had been truly enjoying opening a new little door of the calendar each day in anticipation of Christmas approaching.

Bob asked if I could chat a few minutes about what it is I love about Tasha and her advent calendar. I don’t know if he was prepared for the enthusiastic, bubbly gal he was going to have on the other end of the phone! But indeed, I was willing to talk to him as I could talk about my love for Tasha ALL. DAY. LONG.

After a delightful conversation sharing my love of all things Tasha with an emphasis on what appealed to me about the Advent calendar and how I loved Tasha’s philosophy of life in living by the beat of her own drum, I hung up the phone and the “Be Who You Are” card popped into my mind again.

Every day there are oracles for us if we pay attention – oracles that act as mirrors or reflections to help us along our path whether we are feeling challenged or as confirmation we are heading in the right direction. And while I continue to make strides forward with writing my third memoir, I’m Fine the Way I Am, I’ve had a few moments wondering how it will all turn out.

But as I was reminded with the card pull and Tasha as my oracle, to keep following the truth of my own heart as that is the only way to truly be.

XO,

Barb