Anagrams

As part of my morning routine, I do a lot of puzzles to help ward off Alzheimer’s, to keep the synapses firing and to continue building more dendrites in my brain. Plus, it helps me wake up and face the day.

I like a variety of them; various word puzzles, Sudoku, Blockdoku (a Sudoku/Tetris mashup), Solitaire-which is technically a game, not a puzzle, but depending on the specific game I do have to strategize. 

I have always enjoyed playing with words, maybe it’s the writer and linguist in me. When I taught sixth grade, I tried to bring in word structure whenever I could by teaching my students that the meanings of various prefixes, roots, suffixes and endings could help them decode and comprehend unfamiliar words. I tried to share my enthusiasm with wordplay but by sixth grade some students are just a bit jaded. I can only hope I planted some little seeds in their fertile little minds.

One particular wordplay I enjoy is anagrams. That’s where the letters of one word can be rearranged to form a different word.

For example, act is an anagram for cat.

One of my favorite anagrams involves the word listen. Its letters can also form the word silent. Go ahead, check. I’ll wait.

Got it?

Good.

I love this point so much, I had a poster of it in my classroom for many years.

As I’ve blogged recently, I grew up in a home where I didn’t feel heard and therefore, valued. My opinions didn’t matter. Therefore, I didn’t matter.

This brings me to the question. What is the difference between hear and listen?

We often use them interchangeably, but they are not. Simply put, one is passive and the other is active.

We often say we listen to music when in truth we are hearing it. But, maybe this is an odd example.

A strange sound occurs and we ask “Did you hear that?” It just happened. Hearing is passive.

Then we pay more attention to try and identify it. We now have an intent. Listening is active. (If we were truly listening to music, we’d be trying to identify the instruments, the lyrics, and maybe some various musical themes. Was that an oboe or a bassoon? Or perhaps we are indeed listening because it’s something familiar we want playing in the background while doing something else, like driving, vacuuming or washing the dishes.)

Right now I can hear the hum of the humidifier in the background. I know the sound because, well, I bought the humidifier a year or so ago. I am not focused on it. It’s there, just running.

I’ve noticed we often hear people without understanding what they are saying. We think we are listening, but I’m not sure we truly are. Often, in a conversation, we catch something that triggers us and we feel the need to interrupt and possibly press our point. Politics and religion are such big triggers for us because we have placed our faith and trust in these institutions or individuals and we rely on them to take care of us, governmentally or spiritually. We feel we are right and others with different beliefs are wrong simply because of our own faith, trust and belief system and therefore we don’t want to believe we have misplaced our trust. Or, those institutions have let us down and we no longer have faith in them and question why anyone would. We need others to see our ways for our own validation. Our ego has spoken and loudly.

I do understand that if we are truly listening to someone they may say something of interest which sparks a question in our mind. So, we become curious and want to ask in order to continue the dialogue to try to understand where the individual is coming from or even learn something new. But, if the original speaker is already defensive and misinterprets the tone of voice then voices can get raised, emotions get aroused and an argument can ensue.

The other thing that can happen when voices get raised is the original speaker just shuts down. No one actually ends up saying anything. No one gets to express their point. Feelings get hurt.

I also see this on social media. People misread or partially read a text or comment, go on the offensive and then get defensive when their point isn’t taken seriously. Often, these conversations devolve into name-calling.

I often find myself struggling with this. I know my journey is my own, as is everyone else's, and mine has taken quite a different turn away from what society considers the "norm."  On this path, I’ve had experiences I can’t explain without using the words “intuitive”, “psychic”, “other worldly” or even “statistically or logically inexplicable” and I can get defensive when others question the validity of my experiences and therefore, don’t validate me. I realize I need to validate myself or seek those who can understand at least part of my journey. I’m also learning sometimes it's best just to keep my mouth shut.

All this reminds me of a line from the song The Sound of Silence, “People hearing without listening” which in turn suggests people are talking without speaking, which is also a line from the song.

We have become so disconnected from each other and ultimately ourselves I often wonder if we can even reconnect.

Perhaps if we were silent more often when we listened and then spoke with more compassion, we could reconnect with others.

And ultimately, with ourselves.

Note: The video below is a cover of the Simon and Garfunkel song, "The Sound of Silence" by the band, Disturbed. I find this cover to be a very powerful rendition of the song. I hope you enjoy. -JB

Four Pentacles for February

Four of Pentacles
Rider Waite Smith Tarot

It’s that time again.

A new month brings a check-in with my New Year Reading. For February, I drew the Four of Pentacles.

Pentacles represents the physical aspect of our life; material, prosperity, abundance, etc. It also represents what we do or need; i.e., resources, work, labor, career, etc. to achieve the level of prosperity or abundance we require, however we define it, 

It can also reflect our connection to Earth and the resources the Earth provides us and our trust and commitment to the planet.

Each suit tells a story beginning with the Ace and culminating with the Ten. Pentacles tells a rags-to-riches story with the Ace offering a material opportunity and the Ten being the legacy left to the succeeding generation. By the time we reach the Four, some success has been achieved and the figure is clinging to his earnings fearful of overspending in case of a return to darker times yet wanting to maintain the current lifestyle to which the figure has now become accustomed. If the figure isn’t aware of his clinging, this could also lead to a hoarding situation, particularly if the card is reversed.

As Four is an even number, it can suggest balance in the story of the card. This is reflected in the save or spend mentality facing the person in the card. Does the figure save a little and spend a lot, or save a lot and spend a little? How does the figure maintain balance of his resources?

Numerologically, Four is also a number of stability. A stool can stand on three legs, yet four legs are more stable. So, here we see a beginning of a stable material situation.

Four of Pentacles,
Bianco Nero Tarot
by Marco Proietto

Yet, how did this apply to me in February?

I always see this card as a lesson to better manage my finances, especially now that I am retired. I must learn to control my impulsive spending or seek other avenues of revenue. Or, both.

Yet, I feel there was another lesson for these Pentacles, not necessarily of a material kind, though I’m not ignoring that message.

Mercury went retrograde this month. It hit me very hard. Harder than past Mercury retrogrades.

Retrograde is an astronomical phenomenon where a planet appears to be moving backwards in its orbit as the Earth moves along its own path, then catches up with and passes the planet in question. All planets go retrograde at some point and for varying lengths of time depending on their journey around the sun as it interacts with Earth’s orbit. Because of Mercury’s shorter orbit, it goes retrograde three times a year for about three weeks at a time whereas Pluto goes retrograde about once a year for about a six month period.

So what does this mean astrologically and how does this relate to me? I’m getting there.

When any planet goes retrograde, it can offer us a time to slow down and reflect on the lessons we supposedly learned during its latest transit, meaning which sign it is in for this current retrograde.

In general, Mercury is the planet of communication and short travel. Think of the guy with the winged shoes and hat who was the messenger of the Olympian gods. So, if he were sick and he couldn’t make the trip to deliver his messages, what could possibly go wrong? 

Mhm, you got it. Miscommunication, misunderstandings and the fallout from them. Also, as technology serves as a vehicle for telecommunication, it, too, can go haywire. 

Mercury

Now, this time good ol’ Merc went retro in Pisces, the sign of the fish. Two fish. Swimming opposed to each other. One swimming up, one diving deep. One reaches for the higher expanses of the heavens while the other plumbs the depths of the ocean. Yet, these two are somehow tethered to each other and sometimes straining to reach their intended goal. Pisces people can have an inner conflict of emotion (water, the ocean) and mind (air, the heavens/Spirit). Mercury also slipped a bit back into Aquarius, the water bearer, who pours his knowledge out of his urn onto the people below, hopefully illuminating them to his ways. As Pisces is a water sign (emotions) and Aquarius is an air sign (logic), we can also see the heart vs mind struggle amped up a bit in this retrograde. Pisces is also a mutable sign meaning Pisceans can adapt more easily to different situations. I sometimes see them like fish flopping around the dock trying to find their way back to safety.

So, how did this affect me and the Four of Pentacles?

Hang on.

For me, this became a difficult month, not only a bit financially, with the realization of really needing to control my impulse buying and to seriously look into other avenues of revenue. But, it was emotionally challenging, as well. 

But with Merc and the Fishies, I think those Pentacles took on a bit of a deviation from their traditional meaning. My tarot friends might look at me like I should have my tarot license revoked, if there were such a thing as a tarot license. 

What I noticed happening with me was some old wounds resurfacing in this retrograde. Okay, that’s typical for a retro situation anyway.

But, these wounds centered around being heard (there’s the communication aspect), being validated, feeling my self-worth, my own value. Ta Da! There’s the Pentacle connection.

My value. My own self-worth. So, maybe it’s not that much of deviance from their traditional meaning. I get to keep my license.

I’m trying to balance or find stability (there’s the 4) between expressing myself, wanting to be listened to and understood while accepting that the more I evolve spiritually and follow this path that I feel is my destiny, fewer and fewer people will be able to understand what I’m experiencing. They may accept me and support me, but who will understand me? Then, the other side of the Pentacle is, do they need to understand me or do I need them to in order to feel validated and less alone in this world? Or why do I even need to explain myself at all?

So, those are the Four Pentacles: self-expression, self-worth, self-acceptance, self-esteem.

Now, let’s march on to the card for the current month, the Seven of Pentacles. Oh, this should be fun. I can tell already I have my work cut out for me. Since seven is greater than four and both cards are Pentacles, the cards are suggesting period of possible growth in the physical/material aspect of my life.

Let's see. 

Seven of Pentacles,
Bianco Nero Tarot
by Marco Proietto

For more info on planets in retrograde, click here