Finding Peace in the Pursuit
Do you ever feel like no matter what you do, it somehow will never be enough?
You have moments of breakthrough, but the deeper you get into life, the further the goalpost moves. You try to reach it. You run harder. You become more strategic. You physically start to break down as a result of how little repreive you have felt and suddenly, the desire to reach the goal is more about the stillness, peace and simplicity of being able to pause once the race is over.
You have to be mentally willing to lose the race in order to truly find peace within yourself. You can't outrun the passage of time, and rushing towards your goals may provide short-term satisfaction, but it will never give you the wholeness that comes from realizing that where you are right now is enough. The pursuit is just that: a pursuit, not a shining proof that you are somehow worthy.
What do we do when we lose sight of the goalpost?
We feel lost, aimless and unsure whether the efforts we're making are getting us anywhere. It can be daunting in life when we know we want more for ourselves but arent sure where are attention will be best utilized.
And what do we feel when we can see the goal so clearly but never quite reach it? We start to question when we'll finally get there, so much so that we forget to be present and live for the day we're actually in.
Sometimes we feel stuck between needing to keep the goal in sight and desperately needing to wander, get lost, and find ourselves again. We need to feel present, alive and accepting of who we are, rather than constantly measuring ourselves against who we hope to become.
This makes me think of the tarot card Temperance. Sometimes, finding acceptance in a state of being neither here nor there can be exactly what breathes life back into you. It's about remaining rooted in your reality while allowing your emotions to flow through you, letting things be as they are, and tempering the parts of yourself that either want to give up entirely or rush towards a result. It's finding balance between surrender and action, allowing yourself to exist in the in-between without feeling the need to force your way out of it.
Tarot reading has been something that has served me regardless of whether I've had the goal in sight or been so completely out of alignment with it that having some definitive proof of where I was headed would probably have taken away any curiosity I still had.
In life, we don't have to be completely aligned all the time. We don't have to be abundant, productive, proactive and constantly keeping our eye on the prize. Tarot reminds us of that sometimes. It also reminds us when we've had our eye off the prize for too long, or when our desire to stray from the path is rooted in escapism rather than simply wanting a moment of presence.
Whether you're pacing yourself well or overdoing it, whether you can see the goal or have absolutely no idea where it lies, a simple tarot reading can help you find a little more clarity and, at the very least, some acceptance for the here and now. It can offer guidance on how to get back on track, or perhaps how to become a little more adventurous and curious about where the road might take you.
When The Tower Becomes an Invitation to Begin Again
One of the most disliked cards in the tarot is The Tower. To be entirely honest, it's one of my favourite cards. And it's not because I'm some sort of masochist who likes having my life fall apart or watching structures I've invested in crumble beneath me, forcing me to let go and move forward in a new direction.
The reason I respect The Tower when it shows up is that it can be a catalyst for starting anew, sometimes in a way that allows us to stop endlessly blaming ourselves.
Sometimes it takes something external happening for us to finally accept that what we've been building on isn't stable for us, or doesn't have the integrity to keep us safe. Sometimes The Tower feels like divine intervention, pushing us to redirect when we might otherwise keep trying to make something work.
But what do you do when The Tower feels like it's happening from within?
When the person you're living as day to day is no longer supportive of the person you deep down wish to become?
You let parts of who you used to identify as go. You redirect. And then you look up and realize the goal has changed.
It can feel defeating when you feel no closer than you were before, if anything, further away from this new goal. But that's life, and that's the discomfort of becoming.
This isnt the first time ive talked about the Tower, here is my last blog post about the infamous tarot card.
Perhaps we spend so much time trying to arrive somewhere that we forget becoming is a process in itself. Sometimes the direction changes. Sometimes we need to rebuild. Sometimes we need to stop running long enough to figure out whether we're even running towards something we still want.
If you ever want guidance on who you've been, who you are currently presenting as, and who you're becoming, I suggest you give tarot reading a try. Here are a list of my offerings if you are curious.
It couldn't hurt. It might just help you find a little more clarity, and perhaps a little more acceptance for where you are right now.
