{temperance}

today i drew the card of temperance. it's day 4 of my 37 day challenge, and the second time i have drawn this card in relation to my mother. coincidence?

our relationship is difficult. it has been for as long as i can remember.
the story of us is long and complex. convoluted and confusing. suffice to say, we have built our connection on a fragile and unsustainable foundation of guilt, unspoken words, hidden feelings and, what makes it most painful, love too.

these last few years have been particularly challenging.
for both of us.
i am an adult. a grown woman, enjoying the best years of her life and marriage with an amazing man. she is a widow. lost and angry, having suffered three strokes in nearly as many years. yet we try and live together, under the same roof, sharing the same space. it's been hard.

most recently my mother appears to have been spiralling into a deep depression. this is heartbreaking and frustrating on so many levels. she refuses to leave her room, doesn't entertain conversation, and merely exists within the four walls of her bedroom, curtains drawn, with occasionally the sound of the TV or radio for company.

caught in the middle between watching my mother literally waste her life away, and the routine of our young marriage becoming more like that of a nursing home, there are days i just want to curl up and hope for it all to go away.

so temperance, huh?

just when i felt all hope was lost, this card is telling me there is the possibility of a happy union between opposites. that such a place exists, where dark and light can complement and serve each other. where the masculine and feminine can combine and create great things.

it is a card about feelings. not the rough and raw emotions we sometimes allow ourselves to function off; but intellectual and balanced thoughts which help us distinguish what we are really feeling.
it calls for what it says on the tin ~ temperance.

this made me stop and consider: what do i want? and more importantly, do my current actions and behaviour encourage it? am i paving the path towards my ultimate goal, or merely muddying the waters? for the first time in weeks, i stopped spinning, stopped reacting, and paused for thought.

temperance is about integrating the clear faculty of thought and judgement with the more passionately driven emotion. somewhere therein lies feeling.

and the reality is, unwittingly, i have been working from a place of angry and frustrated emotion. and within this i have not been able to see the wood for the trees.

it may not solve all our immediate problems. it may not come even close to mending my mothers broken heart, but it is a small step in the right direction...

this is what fuels my desire to learn more about the tarot. how the journey of the fool can light up a path of recognition, provide you with a deeper understanding, and enable you to continue on the adventure...