Acknowledging Accountability With The Judgement Card

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Drawing The Short Straw 

This blog post was written as my contribution to the Tarot Blog Hop to celebrate the Summer Solstice which falls on 21 June 2015. Our Blog Hop wrangler Alison Cross has asked us to pick a card from the Major Arcana as our subject for this blog post.  I was a late entrant.  I picked the short straw and got the Judgement card.  Why couldn’t I get prettier and more positive cards like The Empress, The Fool, or The Star?  How did I end up with Judgement?

It was purely my choice. Really.  There were a few more un-exciting cards, like the Sun, that none of the blog hop participants had picked at that time.  I could have picked the Sun. But it was boring.  I could have pulled out of the hop too, but that would have made me look like a bloody wuss in front of my Tarotist friends.

Being Accountable For Our Choices

Yes choices.  And that’s what this blog post is going to be about.  At the height of the Summer Solstice, it is a perfect theme because we could all choose to get out of the house and embrace the warmth and abundance Summer brings, or we could choose to stay indoors because we are worried about tan lines.  And if we chose to stay indoors, at least be accountable for the fact that you’ve  just missed out on all that fun and the rest of the world thinks you’re a sad lonely wanker.

Judgement

I am not typically fond of the Judgement card.  The card within my Radiant Rider Waite Tarot deck updated by Virginijus Poshkus, depicts an image of naked bodies rising from the dead, armed raised towards the heavens as an angel blows his trumpet.  Every time I pick this card for a client, the key message would be to get him to re-evaluate what decisions he had made in the past, the impact of these decisions on his future, recalibrate his thoughts about his goals and then reassess his plans to achieve these goals.  The message is very loaded.  Sometimes, it feels as if the card forces the client through a process of going through multiple stages of hoops and hurdles before he can finally get to his prize. Believe me, it is easier if I had picked the Star card and told him, “Don’t worry honey, all’s going to be well.” But life doesn’t happen like this all the time, does it?

In truth, when I kick that lazy-ass Jo out of my space and put my wiser Sun Goddess Tarot Jo’s hat on, the Judgement Card for me is possibly one of the most important cards in the deck.  It is only through the Judgement card, when we are encouraged to readjust the sails on our ship, that we can then move on to the World card, where we sail forward on our journey to achieve our goals and serve our purpose as it was meant to be.

So let’s take another look at the image on the Judgement card.  The angel in the card is Angel Gabriel, the messenger of God who famously appeared to Mary to announce the impending birth of Jesus Christ.   He was the angel that also famously appeared to Zacharias to announce the impending birth of John the Baptist to Zacharias’ supposedly barren wife, Elizabeth.  The naked bodies rising from the dead seems to be responding to the call of Angel Gabriel’s trumpet.  The mountainous terrain, clouds and waves in the background suggests the challenges one has to surmount throughout his journey to his goals.

When you view the Judgement card as a good knock on the head before you wake up your senses enough to walk towards the true potential of what the World card promises, I reckon, it is THE card that truly says it all and in many ways, ties the deck together to underscore what the true purpose of Tarot is, which is to offer you choices.

I have always prefaced my readings with clients by explaining to them that metaphysical tools like Tarot should not be used as “predictive” or “fortune-telling” tools.  Instead, they are meant to provide you with options with which you can make the right choices to influence your own desired outcomes.  The Judgement card points to the fact that whatever is happening with you today, is a result of decisions that you have made in the past.  If you’ve woken up to the fact that whatever you are doing now is not getting you to your goals in the way you’ve hoped, then you have the choice to recalibrate your thoughts, reassess your actions and re-chart your plans.

We do have the ability to make choices and we need to be accountable for the choices we make.

The Lovers

When it comes to making choices, one card that jumps up to me is the Lovers card.  Before I get rapped on the wrist by our blog hop wrangler for going beyond the brief to invite a second card into my blog post when we were only meant to talk about the one card we had picked, which in my case, is the Judgement card, please allow me to explain.

The image on the Lovers card looked quite a lot like the Judgement card.  Both have an angel in the background, but the key difference is that while there are naked bodies rising from the dead in the Judgement card, the Lovers card depicts a naked man and woman. Unlike the feel of the Judgement card which seemed cold, the Lovers card depicts a sun shining boringly over the couple, offering warmth, positivity and comfort. The snake in the tree points to the story of Adam and Eve and infers that life has full of temptations. The flames behind the man is a symbol of passion.  The angel in the Lovers card is the angel Raphael, who is the angel of healing.  The Lovers card tells me that hard choices that aligns with my personal values would have to be made. In spite of the fact that some of these choices are so difficult and puts me between a rock and a hard place, I should be assured that I am guided by my angel who will be helping and healing me through that process.  Only if and only when, I muster the courage to make the right choice, can I truly move forward along my journey to get to my goals.

Moving Towards Achieving The True Potential Of The World

When I reflect on both the Lovers and Judgement card together, I am reminded that  throughout a lifetime of challenges, along with its fair share of good times, I did have the ability to make choices that shaped how I responded to these challenges.  Whatever outcomes I had experienced as a consequence, were all attributed to the choices I made.  Judgement, tells me that I am almost reaching there.  I am almost getting to my destination.  It is a card placed just before the final card of the major arcana, the World, and quite aptly too.

When we can finally acknowledge that we do have the power to make things happen and embrace new opportunities by letting go of the past which may not serve us anymore and changing the way we think or changing our plans along the way, the World would be ours to hold.

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About The Writer:

The writer of this blog post is a marketeer by trade, and an intuitive reader by accident who deploys the combined modalities of a Tarot, Numerology and Astrology overlaid with her Clairvoyant and Clairsentient skills to deliver her readings with authenticity. She was awarded a Certified Professional Tarot Reader qualification from the Tarot Certification Board of America (TCBA) and is also a certified numerologist.  She is currently running a consultancy based in Singapore called Sun Goddess Tarot,  which provides confidential intuitive readings combining the metaphysical disciplines of Tarot, Numerology and Astrology via face to face and emails as well as readings at corporate and private events and workshops.  As a member of the American Tarot Association (ATA) and the Tarot Association of the British Isles (TABI), Joanna governs her practice under the associations’ respective code of ethics.  She is currently mentoring fellow intuitives on the path of developing their intuitive potential and actively teachers Tarot and Numerology as well. 

Website: www.sungoddesstarot.com

Email:  Joanna@sungoddesstarot.com

Facebook:  www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot

Twitter: www.twitter.com/SunGoddessTarot

Instagram: @SunGoddessTarot

Celebrate Joy This Summer Solstice

Summer solstice blessings everyone!  Welcome to our Summer Solstice or Litha 2014 celebrations.    Please follow the links below to read the contributions of my fellow Tarot blogging friends on the topic of Litha:

Blog Before   |       Master List    |         Blog After

This blog post was written as my contribution to the Litha 2014 Tarot Blog Hop.  I was delighted that Olivia Destrades from First Earth Tarot who was our Litha Blog Hop wrangler,  picked such a fun and wonderful topic - JOY -  to kickstart our celebration of the longest day of the year.  And I would be telling you why quite shortly after I had explained what Litha was all about.

Summer Solstice / Litha

On June 21, my Pagan friends all over the world celebrate the Summer Solstice at a festival called Litha.  It is a day which marks the longest day of the year and it is about this time that farmers reap their first harvest.  At this time,  vegetables, plant and flowers are growing everywhere, fuelled by the life-giving energy of the sun.  With growth, there is abundance and so much joy.  So there is no better festival to celebrate joy than at Litha.

Discovering Mediumship

I had been on a spiritual growth path myself so this topic was significant to me. I felt the joy in the hearts of the people I had touched just because my intuitive readings had opened them to options they had not initially  thought about.  Now, this happened to myself once, and that was why I saw the significance when Olivia picked JOY as the theme for this blog hop. Last year, when I discovered  that I had the ability to converse with loved ones who had passed on,  I went into panic mode, not knowing what to do.  As I knew Olivia was developing her mediumship skills, I felt quite safe to talk to her about it without being judged as a flake.  I remembered when my late father-in-law came through to me, I contacted Olivia and asked, "What do I do? I don't know what he wants from me. Why must he present himself to me? I am not ready for this."   Olivia answered quite reassuringly, " Use your Tarot cards Jo."  Doh. Why have I not thought about that.  So I did, and it opened my eyes from then on, to a world of experiences I never knew could be possible."  Olivia gave me the fishing line to help spread joy.

The Process Begins With Letting Go

A few months ago when I attended a friend's wedding, I bumped into another friend whom I had not seen for years.  We crossed the room to give each other a hug and that was when I noticed within my third eye vision, a man in yellow-tinted glasses coming through. His image stuck in my mind's eye throughout the entire wedding celebration.  I told David about it but he whispered, "Please do not discuss this at a wedding. It is not appropriate."   So I had decided to keep quiet about that image.  I also felt a lot of depression, I felt lost and lonely.  I knew, as a psychic empath that I was picking up on my friend's emotions.  At the end of the dinner, she confessed that she very nearly did not want to attend the wedding celebrations because her husband had passed on a year ago and she had not taken his death well at all, preferring to stay home instead.  However, she was persuaded to put on her best dress and turn up for the event out of respect for the wedding couple whom she was close to. When she found out that I ran a Tarot and Numerology reading consultancy, she invited me over to her home for tea so that I could read for her.

When I went to her home a week later, I put my cards away and told her that I was not going to do a straight forward reading, and explained that I had been developing my mediumship skills and felt that there was a purpose for us to bump into each other the week before.  I then continued, "I have never met your husband but I wanted to verify if he wore yellow-tinted glasses." She nodded.  Encouraged by that I tried to string a story or message from some images I got in my mind's eye and I also followed the direction of the emotions I was getting then.  I said, "I think your husband is trying to come through and he wants me to give you a message.  He said that you will need to move on, focus on your business and take care of the kids. You had been leaving your business to pretty much run on its own but you need to look after it. Your kids need you and they are grieving as much as you are but they will grief even more seeing you in this state. You are still holding on to things that should not be held on to."   She nodded at everything I said and through her tears, brought me up to the stairs to her bedroom. I was shocked to see her husband's clothes still hung in the wardrobe, his personal belongings including 2 golf bags still in that room beside her bed, and his photos was hung everywhere. It was as if he had not left, and she was waiting for him to come home.  So I told my friend that she needed to remove them as soon as she could because when she clung onto him and his memories so tightly that it had affected  her present life and possibly her future, her husband will not be able to rest in peace and cross over.

I Celebrated Joy With My Friend

One month after that visit, my friend called me to say that meeting me at the wedding reception was a godsend because after my visit, she had decided to turn her life around and bravely acknowledge that while she let go of that pain and allowed the grief to ride it's course, she was now ready to move on. Her husband was gone but his memory would always be in her heart.  As I write this, she had just bought another office unit next to her current one, with the intention to expand her business.  She had also involved her son and daughters in it and was committed to seeing the family grow that business together.  JOY.

I have been widening my experiences with my intuitive skills in the last few months.  As I gradually embraced my claircognitive skills, I had been blending them with my Tarot, Numerology and Astrology readings that I currently do for my clients.  My greatest gratification is the joy that these clients have experienced when I opened their hearts and minds to options and the advice that they had needed , and the promise that they would never be alone in their journey.

If  this Tarot community, or Olivia or my intuitive coaches were not there  to hold my hand for a bit, I would not have that safe space to develop my skills.  I believed that you could never seek joy on your own.  You will always need the help and support of people whom you can trust to hold your hand through that journey as you seek joy.    So I leave you with my Celebrate Joy Tarot spread and this request, in the inspiring words of my friend Arwen from Tarot By Arwen,  "Seek joy, y'all!"

 Celebrate Joy Tarot Spread

1) What in your current circumstance is blocking your ability to celebrate joy in your life?

2) What additional help, tools or resource do you need to bring back joy in your life?

3) How can the joy you have attained remain sustainable?

Please follow the links below to read the other contributions to the Litha 2014 Tarot Blog Hop:

Blog Before         |        Master List               |                  Blog After

And if you have been enjoying some of these blog posts written by the Tarot Blog Hop community, do LIKE our Facebook page here.

If you like this blogpost, do follow my blog at http://sungoddesstarot.blogspot.com and LIKE my Facebook page at www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot

About The Writer:

The writer of this blog post is a marketeer by trade and an intuitive reader by accident. She was awarded a Certified Professional Tarot Reader qualification from the Tarot Certification Board of America (TCBA) and is also a certified numerologist.  She is currently running a consultancy based in Singapore called Sun Goddess Tarot,  which provides confidential intuitive readings combining the metaphysical disciplines of Tarot, Numerology and Astrology overlaid with her Clairvoyant and Clairsentient skills via face to face and emails as well as readings at corporate and private events and workshops.  A member of the American Tarot Association (ATA) and the Tarot Association of the British Isles (TABI), she is also a reader for the Free Tarot Network and mentors Tarot protégés on behalf of the American Tarot Association.

Website: www.sungoddesstarot.com
Email:  Joanna@sungoddesstarot.com
Facebook:  www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot

Twitter: www.twitter.com/SunGoddessTarot 

Photo credit: Photo taken in Lombok, Indonesia by David Ash, www.singaporemaven.com

Beltane Tarot Blog Hop - A Union Of Opposites

Happy May Day or Happy Beltane everyone!  This blog post is written as my contribution to the Beltane 2014 Tarot Blog Hop.  The Blog Hop wrangler Maureen Aisling Duffy-Boose had asked that we focused our Beltane blog post on a theme inspired by the Lovers card in Tarot -  "A Union Of Opposites".  To read the blog posts of my fellow Tarot bloggers participating in this Beltane Tarot Blog Hop, please follow the links below:

The Blog Before    |        The Master List      |     The Blog After

What Is Beltane?
  
Beltane is a fire festival widely celebrated to mark the midpoint of the vernal equinox and the Summer Solstice. Traditionally, to welcome warmer weather, people during this time would indulge in cheery Springtime activities like planting seeds, dancing around Maypoles, starting bonfires.  They celebrated with plenty of fresh flowers and there was generally more fun, love and laughter in the air.   

The Lovers Card In Tarot

Beltane is one festival that celebrated love, fertility and union.  The Lovers Card aptly signifies this at a time when my Pagan friends traditionally honored the union of the god and goddess during Beltane.  As the theme of this blog hop was "A Union Of Opposites", I had to look for proof points to support this theme.  Of course I need not have strayed too far because during this time,  the Roman  Catholics celebrated the feast of St Bertha of Kent on 1 May.  She was credited for introducing Christianity to Anglo-Saxon England.  It was interesting to note that she married the pagan King, Ethelberht of Kent.  That sounded to me like a wonderful celebration of love and somewhat a union of opposites too. 

Inspired by St Bertha's story, I had decided to look for examples when I had created a "union of opposites" in my Tarot practice.  It struck me that I had been growing this "union of opposites" quite recently when I discovered my clairvoyant and clairsentient skills after attending a spiritual retreat organised by Danielle Dove and Karina Ladet.

A Spiritual Transformation

During the retreat, I went through a spiritual transformation that had evolved into a journey I am still currently awed by.  I was forced to step out of my comfort zone and temporarily remove my usual tools of the trade, Tarot, Numerology and Astrology.  I learnt then to trust my intuition completely without the use of these tools. I struggled with it and realised that I had to go through this learning process to come to terms with my ego, shed it completely, and then acceped the gifts of clairvoyance and clairsentience in a bid to better serve my purpose.  I spent weeks practising channeling without my Tarot cards and gradually came to terms with these gifts.  

Combining Tarot With Clairvoyance

In the weeks that followed, I began creating that union of opposites by using my Tarot cards with my clairvoyance.  This was the  reading that I had done, detailing my first experience of doing a channeling before creating a Tarot spread.  I am still in awe of it and so grateful that I got the chance to do this for a client.  

A Union Of Opposites

One evening,  a fellow psychic friend contacted me and expressed a lot of fear and anxiety.  Like me in the last month or so, she was going through a purging process.  She had to purge her ego too.  Although she was living half the world away, I was able to channel for her and felt a pain in my upper back on  the right. It felt like I was carrying a burden. It was a reflection of her fear as a burden, weighing down on her back.  It was a fear of not knowing where her skills would take her.  Her doubts driven by her rational mind was taking over her intuition.  That blocked her ability to channel clearly and caused her even more fear.   I felt a cord at my Solar Plexus chakra too. It was a reflection of a negative cord she was bearing that was causing her  a lot of anxiety.  This negative cord had to be cut.  It was put there by her ego.  At the same time I felt my crown and third eye chakra buzzing and I knew it was a reflection of how actively her upper chakras were opened.  So I proceeded to do some cord-cutting to help relieve her of her fears and anxieties.  I also told her that my spirit guides were guiding me to let her know that she needed to go to a hill near a home to meditate and make peace with herself.

She felt better at that point as I carefully explained what I was doing for her with my channeling. I was communicating to her midway via Facebook message when I accidentally rolled my mouse over a Facebook post by Tarot By Arwen.  The Guardian of Air card from the Gaian Tarot deck by Joanna P. Colbert popped up.   This was an excerpt from her post, "The Guardian of Air is the Queen of Swords.  Swords/Air is the mental suit.  I set my intention to be a guardian of my own mental processes.  I speak with love and kindness."  I thought that was so beautiful. Feeling inspired then, I emailed the image of the card to my friend and I visualised myself holding her hand through her journey of spiritual self discovery.  I explained the synchronicity of the appearance of the card with our discussion about her situation by saying, "This is the Guardian of Air from the Gaian Tarot deck.  She is likened to the Queen of Swords.  She asks that you not be too over-critical of yourself.  Do not always judge your capabilities and compare them vis-a-vis the others who are going through similar spiritual journeys.  We all walk our respective journeys at our own pace. So do not be too hard on yourself." This truly resonated with her as she had been managing a lot of anxiety and doubt about her own capabilities.

So you see, both sets of skills though quite different, can co-exist side by side.  Just as I had combined Tarot, Numerology and Astrology in my readings, I have now started to add another dimension to the readings by adding my clairvoyant and clairsentient skills as well.  I now channel for my clients before I meet them face to face.  The Tarot cards would then become my tools to affirm the messages and visions that I got from my channelling.  With renewed confidence, I revamped the way I did my client readings by creating a perfect union between my clairvoyance and Tarot moving forward.  The more I did this, the more I surprised myself with the clarity and accuracy my client and I got from the readings.  Here is another reading that exemplified this. 

I commend Maureen for coming up with a theme that had helped me process that guilt I felt when I dropped my cards for awhile to practice my channeling.  With this union of opposites, nothing had changed.  No, actually, the readings were better.  I felt I served my purpose better with my gifts.   Since then, I have been happily blending my clairvoyant and clairsentient skills with Tarot, and I will continue to do it with immense gratitude for the opportunities entrusted to me by the Universe.  

Again, do visit the blogposts of my fellow Tarot Blog Hop participants.  The links can be found here:

The Blog Before    |        The Master List      |     The Blog After

And if you have been enjoying some of these blog posts written by the Tarot Blog Hop community, do LIKE our Facebook page here.


About The Writer:

The writer of this blog post is a marketeer by trade, and a tarot card reader by accident. She was awarded a Certified Professional Tarot Reader qualification from the Tarot Certification Board of America (TCBA) and is also a certified numerologist.  She is currently running a Tarot consultancy based in Singapore called Sun Goddess Tarot,  which provides confidential intuitive readings combining the metaphysical disciplines of Tarot, Numerology and Astrology via face to face and emails as well as readings at corporate and private events and workshops.  A member of the American Tarot Association (ATA) and the Tarot Association of the British Isles (TABI), she is also a reader for the Free Tarot Network and mentors Tarot protégés on behalf of the American Tarot Association.

Website: www.sungoddesstarot.com
Email:  Joanna@sungoddesstarot.com
Facebook:  www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot
Twitter: www.twitter.com/SunGoddessTarot

Picture was taken off a Facebook post by Tarot By Arwen.  It depicts the image of the Guardian of Air from the Gaian Tarot deck by Joanna P. Colbert

Searching For Faeries This Summer

Celebrating The Summer Solstice With Faeries

When fellow Tarot blogger, Sharon Cummings volunteered to wrangle the 3^rd Tarot Blog Hop of the Year to coincide with the Summer Solstice or Litha, she helped me grapple with the topic of faeries. During Litha the earth tilts closest to the Sun, flowers are in full bloom, skies are blue, birds are singing, days are warm. She also said,” The Summer Solstice is for the faeries to come out and play, to give and receive gifts and to create mischief.”  This painted a picture of the stories told by Enid Blyton when I was younger. These stories were magical.  Many of these stories had faeries hopping from flower to flower written into the storylines.  Some of my friends, who connected with the fae folk, swore that they actually did.

While I understood that Litha was a celebration of the Summer Solstice, harking longer and warmer days, I still had difficulty grappling with the concept of faeries prancing about the garden on a hot summer’s day. 

Some of my fellow Tarot bloggers might enlighten you better on the topic, so I strongly encourage you to visit the blog posts of fellow Tarot bloggers lined up before or after me:  TABI’s (Tarot Association of the British Isles) post on the topic is at http://tabitarot.blogspot.com/2013/06/summer-solstice-blog-hop.html  and  Alison Cross’  is at http://tarot-thrones.blogspot.com/2013/06/litha-blog-hop-spread-embracing-your.html  

What Faeries?

I was brought up in a strict Asian household where I was made to understand that Santa Claus was a concept conjured by adults to enforce good behavior in kids throughout the year. I also believed that faeries were creatures conjured by Mum to prevent me from plucking her flowers in her garden that she had painstakingly nurtured over the months. 

 I had done some research about Litha and learnt that Litha was celebrated as a faery festival that honoured the arrival of longer days and the blazing sun.  It celebrated abundance, nature, revelry, fertility, healing, beauty and creativity.

My Midsummer Search For Faeries

So as my friends around the world revelled in the warmth of the Litha sunshine today, I went in search of faeries.  I felt like a deprived child combing the internet to ascertain what they looked like.  I re-read Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream to get inspired; I lighted candles the night before to illuminate my home so that the faeries could find a safe haven for rest.  I even left some honey chamomile tea and a bit of my famous Asian spiced pineapple compote on half a scone, out on my dining table the night before Litha, in the hope that faeries might enjoy a midsummer night’s snack (I did wonder if the faeries would appreciate my Asian culinary skills but figured that at least they were spared from my curry).  I was obsessed about looking for the magic these faeries purportedly brought.

By this time, David and Joel were ready to call the men in white coats to take me away, fearing that I had absolutely lost my mind.  Well, the faeries did not eat my compote and scone.  David did.  The candles were blown out by Joel, amidst his grumbles that I could accidentally burn the house down.  I still did not see any faeries.

What The Fool Card In Tarot Taught Me

Disappointed, I began to shuffle my Tarot cards and just randomly picked a card to the question "Where can I find my faery?".  The card that showed up was The Fool from my Radiant Rider Waite Tarot deck.

Upon further meditation, I heard what the Fool had to say to me.  Like the Fool, I should be giving free reign to this journey of exploring my creativity.  My eyes were transfixed on the rising sun within the image of the Fool’s card, encouraging me to look further and beyond my basic comprehension of the significance of Litha.  

The Fool took on a youthful perspective of the world and explored his surroundings in childlike wonder. He held a white flower, a symbol of purity and innocence, and he held it out as if to ask me to take a whiff of that flower. I knew he was encouraging me to step back and smell the roses some time.  

He was happy being led by the Universe to his destiny, with just a wee pack strapped across his back and his little mutt Toto beside him.  The Fool and Toto looked so happy traipsing along the path that I could almost hear him whistling while Toto barked in sheer joy. They seemed to be soaking in the abundance that surrounded them and just walking their journey in gratitude for every little thing that they have experienced along the way.  He was urging me to live my life with joy and gratitude every single day.

I realized then that I missed the point about Litha.  Litha was a magical festival. It honored the magic of summer and the life-giving energy that the Sun provided.  While my friends were celebrating Litha in all that fun, warmth and revelry, I was busy looking for faeries under the cushions.  Litha was about creative self expression afforded by a beautiful, flower-filled and lush environment with warmer and longer days.  This provided inspiration for my creative self expression. I was inspired to share a bit of creativity with my friends and family, in whatever form that creativity took.

Summer was also a time of fun, and I needed that after being hit by a period of stress-related health issues.  I needed to get out more to enjoy some sunshine with the family.  I wanted to start doing what I used to enjoy doing when I had more time, like cooking and baking.


A Bit Of Summer Creativity

So, like the Fool taking a leap into the unknown, I had decided to experiment with a bit of poetry.  Please don’t laugh at it. I have many talents but writing poetry definitely was not one of them.  So this was my first attempt at writing poetry.

Like a Queen, she glows with radiance

Adorned in robes of emerald, gold and ruby,

Her scepter casts light in all its brilliance

Ruling the summer in all her glory

Shrubs and flowers, a-blooming

Covering fields in rainbow hues

Birds embrace the winds while singing

As the clouds part to reveal the skies so blue

Flowers sway gently in the breeze

As faeries dance hand in hand

Watching the unfurling of the leaves

While the Sun warms our land

I have also decided to share some of my “faery” food – my Asian spiced pineapple compote, which would make a wonderful tea-time snack when served on toast, biscuits or scone. As I wrote this, I planned to pack some compote into a picnic basket tomorrow morning so that the family and I could enjoy some sandwiches by the beach.  It was indeed time for some sunshine.  The recipe is appended below:

Asian Spiced Pineapple Compote

Ingredients:
·         2 pineapples - peeled and shredded manually ( do not use a blender)
·         1 1/2cups water  - scented with juice of 2 oranges and a tablespoon of orange zest)
·         1 cup brown sugar
·         2 sticks cinnamon, 4 cloves and 2 star anise

Directions:
1.After shredding the pineapple, put the pineapple, water and spices in a pot and cook over low to medium heat until the pineapple mixture is soft.  This takes about half an hour with intermittent stirring.
2.Stir the sugar into the pineapple mixture and continue cooking till the mixture thickens over slightly higher heat for another half an hour. Once the mixture has thickened, remove spices and leave mixture to cool in pot. 
3.When sufficiently cooled, spoon the compote into sterilized jars with tight fitting lid and store in the refrigerator. 

 May this compote add a touch of sweetness to this bountiful summer.  And while enjoying my compote, do explore other Tarot bloggers' perspectives on Litha. The link to the other participating bloggers is at http://sharoncumming.blogspot.com/2013/06/tarot-blog-hop-litha-2013-master-list.html 

About The Writer:

The writer of this blog post is a marketeer by trade, and a tarot card reader by accident. She currently runs a Tarot consultancy called Sun Goddess Tarot, based in Singapore.  She has obtained a Certified Professional Tarot Reader qualification from the Tarot Certification Board of America (TCBA) and is also a certified numerologist. A member of the American Tarot Association (ATA) and the Tarot Association of the British Isles (TABI), she is also endorsed as a reader for the Free Tarot Network and is a mentor for the ATA.   She can be contacted at www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot or www.sungoddesstarot.com

The Fool from the Radiant Rider Waite deck was my Fae taking me up that path of Summer creativity and fun.

My Asian Spiced Pineapple Compote made a perfect tea-time snack in the Summer
that even the faeries would approve.

Not to be outdone, the hubby joined in the culinary fun by baking these
 raisin scones to complement my pineapple compote.