New Moon - 12th (Sagittarius)

Fall Ends - 22nd

Christmas -25th

Full Moon - 26th (Full Cold Moon)

Year Ends - 31st

 

A Note: This is the last time we’ll be using the Ancient Roman calendar as part of the monthly analysis. I am wondering what new things people might like to see in the New Year. Should I try out new decks, a new spread, or format? Let me know your thoughts in the comments! 

 

Next year I am also starting up a personal newsletter with a different approach to the month ahead. Follow @angel_intentions on Instagram for upcoming details!

 

In Ancient Rome, December was the tenth month of the year. Its name comes from the word decem, Latin for ten. Today, December is the twelfth month in our calendar. Numerologically, this means we have completed an old cycle and way of being and believing, in order to start again. We are incentivized by a greater cause, with perspective to how we can be of greater service towards the collective. The reading this month speaks to a greater narrative - to us as individuals within a greater ecosystem of suffering around the world. We sit in duality and discomfort. We are being asked to redefine happiness as being part of a greater meaning and service. We are being asked to consider not just those who share our fireplace, but also those who have none. The year ends on a very different note than the way it started, and this month encourages us to process it all.

Energy of the Month: Reversed Page of Cups ~Seven Seas by Echo & the Bunnymen~

 

The reading for this month shows that we will need to prepare for an underworld descent and apply spiritual medicine to many areas of our lives. Fall ends in the last week of December. Days get darker. We are being prepared for ego dissolution and navigating the unknown with but our faith to guide us. In this process our understanding for what is possible expands. We grow as adults but also retrieve the child self (the true self and the dreamer) we left behind to survive. We may feel at the passive mercy of what is occurring in our lives and the world. It is important not to kill or suppress our raw or natural instincts and responses in the attempt to seem agreeable to society. They can help us harness our energy and strength and regain our will. Without this, we cannot see ourselves clearly. This month, we will see if we can be courageous with ourselves by representing what we believe in.

 

As a page, we first must learn to find balance while getting in tune with and navigating these emotions. We must walk the line between self care in a vulnerable time and becoming aware of collective suffering. The path historically laid before us feels maligned. It can feel that we must rely on only ourselves as a compass, but this solitary path can lead us uncertain of the next step. All we can see is our reflection in a golden cup –the idealized version of ourselves. This does not give us an accurate understanding of where we are or how we need to get there. We need to watch where we step. We need practical actions and resources to fulfill it. Trying to fulfill our ideals in this state can leave us feeling discouraged, disoriented, overwhelmed, and ungrounded. We struggle to approach the path to our ideals with sacred intention. To find our way, it may be necessary to distance ourselves from those we don’t align with and our old identities. This allows us to find true belonging and strength in relationality, community and the collective. We will be able to better thrive, ground, and recognize ourselves in those around us.

Love: Ten of Wands ~Gush by bdrmm~

 

In Love, the ten of wands asks us to analyze what we are trying to veil from the other, in order to look more put together. We are worried we will preemptively let someone in before we are ready, before we have all our ducks in a row and have it all sorted out. We are underestimating the magnitude of what we have to accomplish, and this may even grow into an ordeal. For those of us who are not in a partnership, love itself may feel like a stressor or a burden. We don’t want to bring anyone into this or have them experience us like this. It is okay to relieve yourself of the additional task of pursuing romance, but we should still turn to our inner circle for help. In a Western, hyper individualistic society, we may feel we have to take everything on ourselves. But we are communal beings, and some of the things we are asked to take on, or feel we must take on, really take a village. In partnership, when we finally let on everything we have been taking on or had been thinking to accomplish, the other feels stupefied of having heard of it or been reminded of it for the first time. They wonder if this is what they’ve become –someone we didn’t feel like we could bring into our confidence. The key is to have this communication earlier on, and see where you can course correct. 

 

The beauty of this card is that we have put together a strongly constructed goal–something that brings purpose and meaning to life’s struggles and suffering. It has everything we need to steer it forward. It is like a raft, a vessel, or even a ship that will carry us forward and strengthen our resolve. A lot could be accomplished here if we can bring others on board. A long distance can be traveled, if we can go in the same direction. Each wand seems to be like an oar. We cannot steer all the oars at once on our own, but together the oars could be moved together in unison. Together we can use a strengthened will to move the ship forward through the sea and light the night.

Money: Reversed Tower ~Cities in Dust by the Siouxsie and the Banshees~

 

This month, more than any other, we are feeling the pressure of time. Time to produce or achieve certain goals. Time to figure ourselves out and gain clarity. Time makes us feel as though we are crumbling under pressure. We have invested a considerable amount of time into a certain dwelling, or career, or financial way of expressing ourselves. We’ve come to identify ourselves with our investments, and for any of that to be forced to change would cause a considerable amount of grief for all our efforts, and discomfort at having to redefine it. These things offered a container and a structure with which to safely define ourselves. We would feel as though we are free falling and directionless without it. Where were we really going? What would our inner Page of Cups have to say about it? One way to answer this is –what would we reach towards if we were to find ourselves without these structures or containers? 

 

Like those on the quest to Oz, we may have trekked all this way hoping for an answer, a way home, a resolution, and higher knowledge. Reality starts to crumble when we realize that the wizard is not all powerful and cannot fix it all. The two fallen figures in this card clutch to what at first seems like an unreliable ground that won’t hold them. At a closer glance, it seems like the one sturdy, safe, and grounding part of the foundation. This is likened to the yellow brick road, the ideals that gave us hope and resolve and led us on this journey in the first place. This is what strengthens us and helps us find our way back. It seems like money is the area in life where we have most tried to seem contained, but lightning, a rose, or a dragon topples the tower and the sky sheds tears of regeneration. Perhaps the tower was the one that needed slaying. We may have been mistaken about who or what needed to go. Everything falls out and becomes destabilized. We find the parts of us that could not be contained. What do we want to recollect? 

Work: Reversed Eight of Cups ~Earth to Jay by Jay Arner~

 

The reverse eight of cups in work, preceded by the reverse Tower in money suggests that our sense of work identity is a key destabilizing factor this month. Perhaps we have had a moment of insight that cannot be retracted. Some dream that we talked ourselves out of and now we are in a place of wondering what is worth pursuing. The inner voice telling us not to change anything at all, to keep our egos safe.  The cups of dreams, intuition, creativity have spilled, along with the networks that supported them. It seems like they are always spilling and not being replenished, that they are staining everything. We are left with a sense of what they were supposed to be, and what was supposed to fill them. We spent our efforts flailing and trying to catch them, only to get spilled on and splashed at. Maybe we even feel others are pitying or laughing at us, like a waiter who spilled a tray of wine. Our arms however are now free, to devote ourselves to the clean up instead of the serving of others. To spill something is to draw attention to something. We have the option to stay in a repetitive cycle, transfixed on what was lost, or to really use our focus to recollect ourselves, to clean up after ourselves, and to refill our cups in new and sustainable ways. 

Health: Reversed Knight of Cups ~Medicine by Momma~

 

The reversed Knight of Cups appears in our Health sector to as a call to reconsider the motives of our health and healing goals. Are we pursuing health because we want to appear a certain way, to appease someone, or are we recognizing an issue and addressing it? The underworld journey inherent in the reversal of this card will also lead us to the medicine–a sense of renewal, purpose, and newfound commitment. We are reminded to approach our health in a sacred manner, because our bodies are in themselves sacred homes and temples. To treat our ailments, we need to address what our true Holy Grail is. What feels truly loving and restorative? Is our path helping to heal the collective narrative of what health “ought” to look like? Will it give us the strength to fight the collective battle? Will the medicine bring color, energy, and enthusiasm back to our lives? This month it is suggested that we will struggle with a poor grip on our horse, that which feels instinctually right for us. This part of us even seems gagged and tamed, with a golden yoke. It wouldn’t even know what to do with itself if it were released and set to run free. We seem ungrounded, but in this card, as in the Tower, we still have the yellow brick road to help us regather ourselves and pursue what matters. 

Spirit: Reversed Ten of Cups ~Everybody Wants to Rule the World by Tears for Fears~

 

In Spirit, collective joy, understanding and reciprocity feel like a pipe dream given what is taking place in the material realm. Seeing what has been unfolding is making us feel dejected, as though we are all losing a grip of true meaning and purpose, in service of humanity. We want to drown these sorrows and experience a dulled sensation of them. How much can we truly commune, feel mirth and warm sensations in these times? Our attention is drawn to one large cup, which is tipped over to its side, as opposed to the other cups which have spilled out. In it is a flower. A reminder of the beauty, the preciousness, and the brevity of human life. In it is the reminder of sweet joy and a taste of the divine. We should make the most of freedom and pleasure, knowing that none of this is forever, and even those who want to rule the world will change hands. We can find bliss in the now by holding hands as the walls of the Tower come tumbling down. We can find solace and strength in each other. We are asked to fight through a indecision and lack of vision, to renew and find it again and again. In never giving up, in keeping hope alive, in honoring ourselves and those around us, the dream presented in the ten of cups can never truly be defeated.