• What message do the green spirits have for me?  5 of Pentacles
• How can I best manifest this in my life right now?  Knight of Cups Rx
• What will help me strengthen my connection to the green spirits?  The Chariot Rx

The 5 of Pentacles suggest that the green spirits are letting me know this time of solitude and privation is necessary in order for me to lose my connection to things and start to spend more time focusing on who I am and who I want to be.  The connection of mugwort with this card may be showing that this is part of a healing process for me.  I think for many years I felt impoverished even when that was not the reality.  The lack of financial resources in my childhood has left its influence.  Mugwort suggests that I needed to go through this bitter time as a way to realign my system and be open to a new reality.  It’s time to sage my life so that the old negative influences can be swept away and make room for a stronger connection to the reality of what is around me right now.  The affirmation associated with this card is “I see the richness in my spirit and acknowledge my inner values.”  This seems very appropriate to where I am in my life right now.

The Knight of Cups Rx reinforces a similar message I’ve been receiving for the past few months – the answers I seek lie within my own heart.  As I’ve mentioned several times over the past few years, Cups have always been uncharted Territory for me.  Much of that is due to a childhood in which showing emotions or vulnerability often led to mockery or bullying.  So in order to avoid this situation, I donned very sick armor and acted as though the petty insults and slings of others didn’t bother me.  Unfortunately, I started to believe it myself.  Which led to many years of claiming “I don’t care” or “that doesn’t bother me”.  In reality it often bothered me a lot.  I started to believe that I couldn’t be hurt emotionally but the result of that was that I often cut myself off from emotional connections with people.  The only person I felt completely safe with from an emotional perspective was my husband.  Now he’s gone and if I don’t want to live an isolated, and very lonely, existence, I need to learn how to be more emotionally vulnerable with others so that I can form healthy relationships.  The affirmation associated with this card is “I create opportunities to share my thoughts and feelings with others.”  That is a key area of potential growth for me.   I think this reversed Knight of Cups shows that it’s safe to put down my armor for a while.  To start to look for ways that I can create a sense of trust and emotional vulnerability, that will allow me to be open to new relationships.  I also need to remember that just because I have removed the armor that doesn’t mean I’m discarding it completely. If the need arises I can always put it back on to protect myself depending upon the circumstances. According to the companion book one of the spiritual properties associated with sarsaparilla is “purification of the emotions and the associated ability to express clearly are most intimate thoughts and feelings with others.”. Perhaps a nice cup of sarsaparilla tea will help me in this endeavor.

The Chariot Rx shows that I still need to work on how to harness the energies of my will and steering the course of my life going forward. The herb associated with this is Cyperus. According to the companion book, its spiritual properties include teaching the way of the middle path and the capacity to regulate energy. In Chinese medicine it is seen as an important herb for regulating chi or bodily energy. I think what can help strengthen my tenuous connection to the green spirits is to listen to what they’re telling me. I think strengthening my connection to the green spirits has already helped me realize that it can be sensible to retreat. I’ve learned here is a delicate balance in life and trying to go against it can sometimes boomerang in negative ways. The way that I am going to learn how to steer the course of my own life will involve finding the middle path, and applying these lessons in practical ways. The key is realizing what my place is in this ecosystem and being careful not to disrupt things simply because it might benefit me. One of the key phrases associated with this card in the companion book is “needing to contact the watery part in oneself”. So obviously this also reinforces the message of the Knight of Cups. I need to create more balance within myself by embracing and acknowledging my emotional side. Working with the green spirits, and in this case I think that means reacquainting myself with herbal medicines, is a good place to start.