I’m undertaking a 1000-day reinvention project, blogging here daily to track my progress. In Saturday Reflections, I take time out to reflect.
Last night I did a brief Tarot reading, about the upcoming holiday week, and what comes next. I asked about my book manuscript, which has been lying fallow ever since the developmental read-through I completed in November. My ski crash as well took me out of my writing routine, as I needed extra resting time to recover.
The card I drew for how to approach a return to the book manuscript in January was The Hanged Man, a bit paradoxical and even a little annoying to me. A man hangs upside down by one leg on a verdant tree. He is calm, and has his other leg crossed behind him. A halo surrounds his face. His arms are behind his back.
I was hoping for a card of plodding, deliberate action (Knight of Pentacles) or maybe one of fast movement (The Chariot, Eight of Wands), not one that shows someone in a kind of suspended animation.
The Hanged Man brings a message of peaceful acceptance and understanding. He surrenders to the reality of life, doing so with flexibility and calm.
Of The Hanged Man, Avia Venefica writes, “There is no expectation with this card. All expectations, along with all actions have been suspended. The Hanged Man is in a state of purposeful, complete surrender, yielding his mind and body to the Universal flow.
That makes me think that January is going to be more of what I’ve faced in December: bowing to the reality of my relationally interdependent life and its demands rather than turning back to my solo creative projects with 100% focus.
Or, perhaps, something else might happen? Something unexpected from the universal flow?
In Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom, Rachel Pollack writes that the Hanged Man also indicates a willingness to act from authenticity rather than social pressure:
In readings the Hanged Man bears the message of independence. Like the Fool, which signified what you sensed was best, even if other people thought it foolish, the Hanged Man indicates being who you are, even if others think you have everything backwards. It symbolizes the feeling of being deeply connected to life and can mean a peace that comes after some difficult trial.
I never thought of the Hanged Man as being a symbol of independence or going your own way, but indeed he is hanging upside down while other people walk or sit right-side up.
This Christmas season I’ve given up on external and internalized demands for what to do. I’m limiting events I host and attend. I’m not integrating my partner with my children. I’m hand-crafting gifts rather than producing mass-produced goods that might be more perfect and refined. I’m following the independent path of the Hanged Man.
In January, what would being who I am look like? What will surrendering to universal flow look like?