Filling Our Cups with The Moon

Finally, a fun reading!

I’m not saying this to disparage our past few weeks’ worth of tarot. It’s been delightful - lots of important journeys, insights, etc. But this week is a special one as our cards are asking us to put down our questions, join forces with friends, and get weird.

I’m highlighting this specifically because the reading for August itself features a heavy load of intense cards, the most important being the “card of the month,” the Five of Pentacles. In it, two figured clothed in rags hobble through a snowstorm in the dark. Fun stuff.

In our monthly reading, this five formed a pair with the Five of Cups, suggesting that we may be hiding some grief behind our experience of lack. Perhaps we’re more comfortable talking about and experiencing a real or perceived lack of material resources than facing those same feelings and experiences in our emotional lives.

This week, however, has an answer to this five’s theme of suffering, poverty, and isolation, one that kicks us out of the difficult and tiring world of the Five of Pentacles and into something new, promising, and completely different: The Ace of Pentacles. We’re on a path towards a breakthrough in our relationship to money, work, material support, and physical health. It may occur in one of these categories or more, but pay special attention to how the Five of Pentacles has been appearing in your life so far. What has been a tried-and-true part of your own struggle narrative? And how has that been feeling stale? Stay tuned for a breakthrough - that Ace moment - at the end of the week.

So what do we do until then? Have fun and get weird is the answer.

The Three of Cups starts things off with a festive air. What has been delighting you lately? Most importantly, who has been sharing in this delight? Be sure to spend time with the people who light you up, fill your with love, and share a similar philosophy around love, art, creativity, and/or spirituality. This is a prime time for connections of all shapes and sizes. While it’ll be delightful to lavish your close friends and loved ones with attention, be on the lookout for new connections as well. The Three of Cups is not a stingy card (very much in contrast to the Five of Pentacles - this may be part of the medicine this week is offering) and you may be surprised by the synchronicities and new partnerships - romantic, creative, or otherwise - that can form when you’re out there, celebrating, and being generous with your energy.

We haven’t seen The Moon in quite some time, and I am incredibly glad to see it here. A strange card, to be sure, its presence here is offering a graceful transition between joy and connection (the Three of Cups) and new opportunity (the Ace of Pentacles). Both of these suits appear in our monthly reading in the tough and painful fives, so to have them here in lovely, exuberant forms is 1) beautiful and 2) likely threatening to our internal status quo. What happens when old narratives of suffering get challenged by new paths of joy? Some pushback can happen, so be alert for tender feelings of fear, trepidation, or mistrust. The Moon, however, can help us move through all that.

What I love about this card is that it tells us to step outside of our normal way of experiencing the world. When the moon is out what do we do? We dream. This week embrace the dreamy in everyday life, especially in the middle of the week. Treat yourself to inspiring art, spiritual exploration, and fantasy. Look for signs in daily life, treating your mundane tasks as if they’re as symbolically important as an impactful dream.

Do all this and then let it go. The Three of Cups is telling us to reach out and let our friends, old and new, support us. The love and care we receive from them paired with the love and care we give will help soothe and transform the grief active for us this month. At the same time, The Moon is urging us to make room for newness around financial possibility and what it means to support ourselves by loosening our tight grasp on what we “should” do. Play, dreaming, visioning, and especially stepping outside of our usual routines - all of these practices will help prime us to accept the opportunity coming our way at the end of the week.

I have a feeling that our Ace of Pentacles moment isn’t going to be a flashy one. (Though let me know if yours is!) Rather, it’s more likely we’ll be sensing the seed for a new way of being. Aces are bright but they’re also small. Be gentle with the realizations you experience at the end of the week, let your allies support and validate you, and, most importantly, commit to tending whatever gifts, shifts, or new beginnings are emerging in your life.

The Moon can sometimes elicit a great deal of angst and concern. What if I get too weird? Shouldn’t I do something with all this daydreaming/art/insight?

The answer, especially this week, is a resounding no.

The trips we take to this lunar landscape are an important part of our creative and spiritual composting. In other words, explore and create, but then let it go. It’ll decompose and go on to fuel the growth of another project, phase, or transition. For now our task is to play, release control, and then release whatever we find in The Moon card this week.