Tarot Advice For 5 Zodiacs Who Need To Engage With Shadow Work Before September
It can feel easier in the moment to exile the parts of you that you find frustrating and difficult to embrace than to have to deal with them head-on, especially when you’re aware of some of the larger issues you’ve faced through life.
Those exiled parts of you, the ones you deem ‘unacceptable’, are the shadow self. Instead of pushing our shadows away, it’s far better for us to work to understand why we can’t accept ourselves for who we fully are.
This emotional work, shadow work, represents some of the most profound and healing work we can engage in, but it’s not for the faint of heart. Our tarot reader has determined that there are five zodiac signs who are being called to this kind of work through the end of summer, and has performed tarot readings to help guide them on this important work. Aries, Cancer, Scorpio, Capricorn, and Aquarius will be embarking on some difficult but rewarding work.
The three cards drawn represent:
- The Shadow: What are the parts of your personality that you tend to hide or deny?
- Your Patterns: What are your behavioral patterns in hiding your shadow self?
- Integration: Advice on how to approach the emotional work of integrating your shadow self.
Aries
The Shadow: Four of Wands. You haven’t been feeling secure enough in where you are to actually enjoy yourself or life lately, Aries. The feeling that you are just going through the motions to please everyone has managed to invade even some of your more sacred activities. You haven’t even felt like celebrating the simple milestones on your own, much less with others anymore. Putting on the masks you’ve always worn for those in your life has come to feel like more and more of a chore.
Your Patterns: Seven of Cups. Dissociation and daydreaming can make the present moment feel more bearable in the short run, but what is really needed instead of flights of imaginative avoidance is the bravery to face your security issues head on. It’s daunting to consider processing your difficult feelings, but if you can work through them and recognize their source instead of running from them, you’ll be better off.
Integration: The High Priestess. The best guide you could have through your shadow work process is your own intuition. Pay attention to the signs and messages that present themselves to you in your thoughts and dreams.
Cancer
The Shadow: Seven of Swords. You’ve always viewed the competitive part of you with a healthy dose of skepticism. Its win-at-all cost attitude feels far too dangerous of a temptation for you to be able to control. Cunning doesn’t always have to mean deception or duplicity, Cancer, and cutting yourself off from your more clever strategic possibilities isn’t going to help you in the long run because the creative, resourceful thinking it encompasses is exactly what you need right now.
Your Patterns: The Lovers. One of the ways you’ve attempted to bury your more competitive side is in letting it permeate some of your romantic relationships. It’s caused instances where you were seeing suitors as simultaneous competitors in the game of life, or in seeing romantic relationships as ‘conquests’ or something to be won.
Integration: King of Cups. If you apply your emotional intellect, you’ll be able to create the emotional balance that will invite some healthy, friendly competition into your life. The more you’re able to recognize it as a positive, additive influence, the more healthy your relationship to competition can become.
Scorpio
The Shadow: Six of Cups. There’s a part of you that would be perfectly content living in the past, and it’s made it hard for you to fully bring the lessons you learned forward into your daily life. It’s as if any experience that is close to those nostalgic moments pulls you into thoughts of the past – be they day-dreamy reveries or explorations of mistakes you made and regrets you hold dear.
Your Patterns: Five of Cups. Instead of grieving and processing, you’re repressing and denying, Scorpio. It’s easier, in the shorter term. It can even feel freeing, to assure yourself that you are not at all hurt by the trauma that you carry. But you’ll pay a price for it in the longer term, and ultimately the body keeps the score of the trauma we need to heal. Part of all of this is the healing and letting go phase, and if you don’t allow yourself to feel the harder feelings and understand what they are, you’ll not be capable of knowing how to release them.
Integration: 10 of Pentacles. As you decide how to invest your energy and what to focus on, consider what are the parts of you that feel eternal right now? What do they say about who you are? What do you want them to say? Evaluate who you want to become by working backwards from the legacy you want to create.
Capricorn
The Shadow: The Magician. Your potential, which includes your skills and the resources you’re able to muster, is both a blessing and a curse. There are times when you find the path of least resistance is to tell yourself that you don’t have power, and to deny your agency, and it feels easier and better to never have started than to have made any mistakes. The lesson you should explore is that failure is not an end, but a means towards success, and that while potential can feel like a burden, it’s only because it can be scary to know how much power we can actually wield in our lives.
Your Patterns: The High Priestess. The issues you have around the power and potential you carry are exacerbated by the fact you keep those thoughts, among many others, to yourself. It’s not just that you don’t want to feel ‘vulnerable’ or have them labeled as ‘wrong,’ but you’re worried about what even acknowledging them could mean about your own subconscious agenda.
Integration: Page of Pentacles. There is no part of the multitudes that you contain that you should fear, Capricorn. It’s not being prideful to acknowledge your magic and power.
Aquarius
The Shadow: Temperance. Oscillating between the extremes can appear balanced for a while, but it iis not a long-term or reasonable way to maintain a balanced life. From the inside, it feels as though everything has become so compartmentalized and fragmented that you’re spending most of your time rushing through all the motions and their emotions. This fragmented, compartmentalized sense of self is the root of the issue, and a big part of what you are keeping in shadows.
Your Patterns: Judgement. What has your ego so shattered, Aquarius? Why do you choose to hide behind so many identities instead of allowing yourself to be really seen? If you tell yourself it’s because of how those you love may react to your truth, authentic self – ask yourself why you are willing to deny them the experience of your truth? Who could you become, if you stepped out of your own way and lived your authentic life?
Integration: Queen of Swords. Be fearlessly honest with yourself about who you want to become and what you want to address. You know what it is that needs your attention, and you know where you are emotionally struggling to make that happen for yourself. Be as generous and gentle with yourself, especially when it comes to compassion, as you are to others.