Episode 153. The Tower and the Vertical Lines of the Major Arcana Air Date: February 22, 2021 [Introduction] [0:00:00] (Instrumental intro music) [0:00:12] Hello Loves, and welcome back to Tarot for the Wild Soul Podcast. I am your host, Lindsay Mack and as always, just so thankful, so joyful to be gathered with you in this virtual space. Thank you so much for being here with me today. Thank you for your patience on the timing of this episode, what a Tower week indeed! ​(Lindsay laughs) Today we are talking about The Tower, which is our final card in our Vertical Line Journey, the second vertical line of the Major Arcana. So we're going to be talking about The Tower within the context of intuitive rewilding reclamation and expansion. And I certainly had a ​(Lindsay laughs)​ Tower week in my life. We had crazy snowstorms here in Portland, and we're out in the woods outside of Portland. And so, it was pretty hardcore here. We were not even able to leave the house for about three to four days. You know, Chase is healing from a non-COVID related illness. And it's a very spiralic thing, healing, as many of you know, there are great moments, hard moments, wonderful days, very, very tough days. And the ups and downs of that are really challenging and, and intermittent power outages. And multi-day Wi Fi outages. And it was, it was wild. And yet, we are so lucky © All materials property of Lindsay Mack and Tarot for the Wild Soul compared to so many, especially in Texas, where so many are suffering, especially those in marginalized communities, with the power outages with the unprecedented weather. In Oregon, there's still people after 10 days who don't have power. These are massive, massive Tower themes. And so in a way I'm sensing into and really observing the alignment in there being no episode on Friday ​(Lindsay laughs)​. Because I do think sometimes that is Tower- it's just being able to roll with what is, not to say we like what is. Not to say that it's like “Oh, just be with it, chill.” But meaning we just have to be adaptable, sometimes to the unforeseen. And so that that is really what was going on. And by the way, in the show notes of today's episode, there are a couple of resources of places to donate if you have the means, the ability to do so. Honestly, even a dollar helps to various places in Texas, where that money can really 100% of it can go to those who are in need. And in other places dealing with absolutely unbelievable weather and power outages and deep, deep cold that are not Texas and not Oregon. So I'm holding all of those places in my heart right now. [0:03:15] And it's a really hard time to be on the planet. And I'm just really honoring and acknowledging that fact, and bowing to everybody going through really hard and difficult times right now. This is our Tower episode, as I mentioned. Our final kind of installment in our little deep dive or a little exploration of that second vertical line of the majors. And The Tower... You know, we've talked about The Tower so many times on this podcast, but it is good to talk about a lot because it's a lot of things and it's also really challenging. And The Tower deserves a lot of space around it, a lot of space for conversation and consideration. And I feel like this probably goes without saying, but I think it’s important to name here that in Soul Tarot, there's a lot of emphasis on like, directly… That really, all cards are for us at the core of them. That they all bring medicine of some kind. They all bring gifts, they all bring treasures. And that doesn't mean you have to like what they bring​ (Lindsay laughs)​. There's a lot. © All materials property of Lindsay Mack and Tarot for the Wild Soul [0:04:38] I've really been reflecting on this with regard to what my husband is moving through here in our home right now. And all of the times- all of the many, many times I've moved through an initiation or an experience, a journey related to illness or chronic pain. I've been working with chronic illness and pain my whole life. Sometimes it's been so severe, I've been unable to perform even the smallest tasks and sometimes even doing those is a huge victory. And it's a very, very particular rhythm of living. And it is. Yeah, really, I think having that kind of spacious compassion for The Tower and our Tower experiences is really important. I know that The Tower brings immense medicine. I know that because I've lived through Tower more than probably most of the other cards in the Tarot. I've seen folks’ Tower experiences be very, very life changing in ultimately, important and meaningful ways. But it can really suck to get there, the journey can suck old car tires, in the biggest ways, just in a huge way ​(Lindsay laughs)​. [0:06:14] So I want to leave some space for that. I don't want to necessarily, like bypass the challenges that can come up when we go through our experiences. And life is really hard. It's often extremely unfair. And we don't always know the “why” around why we go through what we do. And there are times in life, when Towers show up at our door, and The Tower really can feel very, very different from experience to experience. Sometimes it is horrible, and painful and dreadful, dreadful, in terms of experience. Sometimes it doesn't feel like anything, it’s literally imperceptible, but we might be aware that there's something bubbling, something growing under the surface. It could be that The Tower is very, very external for us. It could be that it's completely internal and we see absolutely no evidence for it or around it at all. So that kind of weaves into the tapestry of this whole exploration of the vertical lines, which is really like… At the end of the day, the Tarot really belongs to you. It's such a powerful art form and tool because it is always evolving with us. And there is space and inclusion enough in the Tarot to hold the myriad of everyone's experience. Everyone's experience with a certain card is welcome, because we're all growing and changing in where we're at. So I want to sort of start there and just really say in a really imperfect and kind of not really clean way, meaning not drawn up in a nice bow, that it's an ever-evolving experience working with a card such as The Tower, it really is. © All materials property of Lindsay Mack and Tarot for the Wild Soul We can love The Tower, cherish it. I love The Tower. And when I see it in a reading, I really appreciate it and have absolutely no fear in my nervous system when I see it anymore, because I know that very often my mind, my story about what The Tower might be bringing is a lot worse than what it actually brings. [0:08:53] Not that cards bring anything but the energy around it. And because I want with every part of my being, personally, to be free to be awake to not be building Towers on top of broken or wounded foundations. So I really value that the egoic discomfort, the evolution in my Towers getting knocked down. And that's not for everybody ​(Lindsay laughs)​. Not everybody... I didn't used to like that. So I, yeah, I just want to say that. You know as always with what I say about The Tower, take what works, leave what doesn't. Honor that we might be in different places with our experiences, what we value, what feels okay for us, to know that you have perfect autonomy and freedom to disagree and think differently. In fact, I hope you would think for yourself around any of this. [0:10:01] So, yeah. With regard to creating some space around The Tower card, I mentioned that because we're going to be talking about Tarot ​(Lindsay laughs)​ -I always do that- The Tower, in this particular episode in a really, really microcosmic way, in a very specific way. So I want to bow to... I want to first take a moment to fully honor and bow to those and include myself in this. I've had many horrifically challenging Tower experiences in my life where Towers had to come down. It was- it took everything I had, barely survived it, and I am who I am, because of those experiences, because I was willing to move into a root system that needed my attention. I was willing to heal that foundation. The Tower is often, finally, a clearing of something that has not been an alignment for a long time. It's not like Towers happen overnight. It takes a long time. There's a reason that this card is, you know, 16 out of 22 cards in the Major Arcana, and it's because it takes a while for us to get there.