Every month I’m going to pull a card for us as a guide for self love work that we might want to focus on through out the month. This month’s card comes from the gorgeous tarot deck Tarot the Hidden Realm by Barbara Moore with art by Julia Jeffrey. It’s gorgeous by the way.
When we look at self-love the image that comes to mind might be a lot of rainbows, glitter, and unicorns, but those of us that have done the work know that learning to love yourself can be a painful process. It involves facing a lot of demons and overcoming them.
Sometimes it even feels like things get worse before they get better.
When you aren’t paying attention to how you’re treating yourself you can live in a sort of oblivion about your life. Self-love usually starts when you hit a low point and realize all of the ways your lack of love is negatively affecting your life.
Coming to that realization that things are wrong in your life because you haven’t cared enough, or known how to give yourself something better can really do a number on your self-esteem.
At best – you realize that you have a lot of work to do to begin to see yourself in a loving way. At worse – you realize that your relationships are hindering you from loving yourself, that you’ve done damage to your body by not loving it the way you should, and that your lack of love for yourself has manifested itself in a lot of acting out and toxic behavior and nothing in your life is how you want it.
Try not completely freaking out when those feelings hit you.
The Ten of Swords pictures the goddess Morrigan going into battle with her sword held high and a look of pure fury on her face. She is the bringer of war and death. She says “I am ending this today.”
This card reminds us to tap into our warrior spirit and to not be afraid to fight for ourselves and for the lives that we want. This card represents a situation coming to a head that is yearning for completion, it is an end to suffering but it’s one that you have to fight for. You’ve got to be your own advocate. You’ve got to take care of business and emerge on the other side victorious.
Because you are a survivor and a warrior.
Destruction may seem like it’s a bad thing but at the end what you get is relief and the room to start something new.
This is a wonderful descriiption of self love. It really hit home for me. It IS a LOT of work, and its painful at times, but in the end its so worth it. It can be hard to stick with it at times, and sometimes I stumble, but I have to remind myself that its just part of the dance :)
I have hit a low point the last few months. Reading this has helped. Thank you.
Oh, I love this.
I don't think this is talked about enough in the self-love community. That it IS a battle – every single day!