‘It’s complicated’
On Fridays I read the cards for love. ‘Let’s look at where it hurts the most,’ I say to the sitter, in response to lamenting about not knowing, not knowing what the other wants, not knowing his heart. As it is a fact that the heart’s desire is directly proportionally with where it hurts the most, we read the cards for this point.
‘Your man’s desire is to cut through the thicket of obstacles and get to his one true love.’ I then wax more than philosophical by pointing to the tradition according to which the sevens in a pack of cards indicate trouble. With the 7 Cups, heartache.
‘What hurts is that this person cannot choose,’ I then say. ‘There’s too many opinions about what a couple is,’ I say, and point to the cards of the Lovers and 8 Cups. ‘It’s the path of pain for this person, of the whole 6 Swords caliber,’ I deliver the final verdict, and then ask: ‘Why is this so?’ ‘It’s complicated,’ the sitter says, vacillating between saying more and saying nothing. I myself tilt towards the nothing, as there’s nothing more to say. As I’m not the sympathizing kind, I let the pain of this realization set in. It’s more efficient than offering empty words of reassurance.
And so we learn once more that, if in doubt, all we need to do is check with where it hurts the most. The true heart’s desire can be extracted from this point. Of course, when that is said, we still have the question of the extent to which choice is actually available. If the situation doesn’t help us with making the choice in accordance with the heart’s desire, then we’re there with the maintenance of pain, walking on it, as it were, with the whole 6 Swords intensity of it. The same principle applies to other situations too. If your hardest pain is in your purse, then your most ardent desire will be for money.
‘I just want to know if it will go away,’ the sitter says, while I snap out of my silent contemplation of how pain relates to desire. ‘It won’t go away,’ I say dreamily. ‘But what you gain today is knowledge. He still loves you,’ I say, ‘and that’s all there is to it.’
The idea that ‘that’s all there is to it’ comes from the realization that love and togetherness are not the same thing. Togetherness does not automatically follow love, just as love does not automatically acknowledge togetherness. This is a tough lesson for many to learn, but it has been my experience that the sooner one learns this, the simpler the ‘complicated’ gets.
I sent the sitter home precisely with these words: ‘It’s not complicated. It’s just what it is. The pain to get what you can’t reward yourself with, the whole of 7 Coins style.’
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Cards: Carolus Zoya Marseille Tarot, ca. 1780, the original deck in my private collection.
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The pain…
For more conversations on love of this type, check out my book, Tarot for Romeo and Juliet: Reflections on Relationships.
