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Welcome to another of my guide Melinda’s Friday messages about how to live life. If you’d like to know more about her and what she has to say you can find more in the first post in this series.

Melinda’s message – What nourishes you?

The eight of cups is a card with nothing inside it. The cups are empty. Drained of whatever refreshment they once provided. That is the snag, the trap, or the hook of this card – there is nothing inside. Often people go back again and again to the wells of their life looking for what has fulfilled them in the past and then when they are empty they are lost.

Has your life, your family, or your work become empty? It always amazed me how people of strength and vigour – hardworking practical people – would arrive at my table and be shocked and immobilized by the emptiness in their lives. Can you imagine the weeping of farmers sitting across from me when the earth does not repay their labours? Sometimes the river runs dry and the rains don’t come. Sometimes the harvest is lean. Sometimes the field will no longer grow food. Worse still for the mothers whose progeny failed to hold life tight enough? What can anyone say to help them find renewal when their life has run dry and they are faced with only the emptiness inside. What did I say when faced with these people?

When the cups are empty where do we look?

In my life I moved from place to place. I stayed somewhere until the well started to dry up and then moved on. I was a nomad. I did not expect to find a place where I would stay and live my life. As I travelled I would forage. Fruit here, berries there, roots and other things all found its way into my pot as I travelled – along with fish, rabbits, and birds. The country side always provided. Perhaps my next time through a town would be more fruitful and perhaps it would not.

It is time for a journey when this card shows up. What you are looking for will not be found at home. There is no use checking the larder or root cellar – they have been emptied. Staring into the empty vessel is of no use. Instead it is time to broaden our gaze. This is a card that cannot be solved by small steps or straying cautiously into the spaces between home and away.

Whether you find yourself in this place due to loss, tragedy, or your own doings matters little in the end. When you are in the between spaces in your life it becomes time to forage. What is growing that you are not looking at? Where is there nourishment that you would not choose to eat, but that can sustain you? All around these eight empty cups grows vines and flowers. Life persists in the face of their emptiness. Despite their emptiness.

When someone sat before me full of emptiness I always showed them where life was still fighting. With my words I fed them some of what I had to eat and sent them on a journey. I unhooked them from their life and showed them what was vibrant and alive around them – around the empty cups. Some failed to look up, some did not go far enough to find renewal, and some found fertile ground on their journey. After reading for people in these situations I would often sit by a stream in the heat of the afternoon and watch the life flowing around me. The birds, insects, and plant life all alive and filling the air with sound. Life hides in the foliage of this card. Life waits in the foliage of your life when your cups are empty. Stop looking into the empty well – before you fall in – and walk down the road and into the woods where life is worth living.

Thank you for your time.
Melinda

I have been asked not to answer questions for Melinda but if you leave a comment she will get back to you.

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The Hermit’s Lamp is the blog of Andrew McGregor – Toronto Tarot reader, artist and teacher. The Hermit’s Lamp is also a storefront in Toronto selling metaphysical and spiritual supplies. Please visit The Hermit’s Lamp website for more information on readings and classes both online and in Toronto. You can also listen to the Hermit’s Lamp Podcast here.

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