Living with Mindfulness Using Tarot Cards
High Priestess
Who do you go to if you have a personal problem?
Traditionally, sages hid in mountain caves, crones lived in huts on the village fringe, wise men hung around city gates and the High Priestess lived in the temple. If you had a question, you knew where to find them. These days everyone knows psychologists are found in fancy city offices and counsellors rent small rooms in side streets.
Humans have always had questions and we’ve always gone to someone else for answers.
This is a good thing.
But there is another way.
Before I explain what that is, let’s look at the High Priestess of Tarot and the symbols surrounding her.
The High Priestess sits upright and calm in the centre of the card, looking the epitome of a wise person. She’s positioned between two pillars representing opposites:
light and dark; illumination and shadow; past and future; positive and negative; good and evil; life and death; beginnings and endings.
She holds a scroll of recorded wisdom. The cross at her breast points north, south, east and west. Her horned helmet denotes authority, and the circle perched on the horns is the world. The crescent moon at her feet reminds us of intuition and reflection. Bright pomegranates decorate the curtain between the pillars, denoting abundance, fertility and wisdom, and the palms fronds represent victory and eternal life.
The High Priestess is known as the door to intuition and keeper of esoteric wisdom. Arthur Waite, the scholarly mystic who created the Rider-Waite Tarot deck, referred to this card as the ‘highest and holiest of the Greater Arcana’.
And she’s looking right at you!
This card reminds me of the popular children’s book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum. In it, Dorothy sets off down the Yellow Brick Road to see the Wizard of Oz, accompanied by her new friends — Scarecrow who wants a brain, Tin Man who wants a heart, and Cowardly Lion who wants courage.
The message of the book is that the characters already have what they think they lack.
The subtle, esoteric message of the High Priestess card is the same:
You already have the wisdom you need.
That’s why she’s looking right at you.
She’s watching you, waiting for you to see yourself in her.
Wisdom isn’t found in temples or scrolls or pillars. Wisdom isn’t set in stone. Wisdom breathes. Like the High Priestess, wisdom is a living thing. It flows from the deep spring of the universe through all things, of which you are a part.
You don’t need to go to the source.
You are the source.
As the popular spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle says:
I cannot tell you any spiritual truth that deep within you don’t know already. All I can do is remind you of what you have forgotten.
In her book Thrive, Arianna Huffington discusses intuition, which is a key ingredient of the High Priestess. On page 137 she writes:
Our intuition connects us both to our inner selves and to something larger beyond ourselves and our lives . . . Our intuition is like a tuning fork that keeps us in harmony — if we learn to listen. It helps us live more of our lives from that still center in us that Marcus Aurelius called our “inner citadel.”
Mindfulness and the High Priestess
When the High Priestess appears in a spread for you, think of this card as representing you. You are the High Priestess.
It’s a hint for you to find your inner citadel.
That’s what a High Priestess does.
That’s how she gets answers.
And that’s how you can get yours.
Insight
Byron Katie, who teaches the art of self-enquiry, often poses the question:
Have you asked you?
Maybe you need to visit a wise person.
Or maybe you need to visit yourself.
Ask yourself the question.
And wait for the answer.
The next article in this series will feature the Empress.
Foretaste: You are a creative force.
Do you wish you had magical powers? In case you missed it, here’s a link to the previous article about the Magician and you.
With love, Marlane
Thanks for reading! I hope it helps you for the rest of your life. For more articles on mindfulness visit me at www.marlaneainsworth.com