December 15, 2009 - Seven of Teacups (cups)

What do I need to know today to move me along my true path and to foster the health and happiness of my heart?

The Seven of Cups is a card of options. It can also be a card of wishful thinking, and perhaps over indulgence. So which is it? Do I have options? Yes. More I suspect than I think I do. Wishful thinking? God, yes. I future possibilities with a fervor and skill, devote such energy to what could be, that if put that energy into my "real" life, it would surpass even my hopes and dreams, my wild imaginings. Over-indulgence? Sure. That doesn't always mean drugs, alcohol, food, sex. No I over-indulge in grief, in emotions, in love, in hope.

In the Jane Austen Tarot, the Seven of Teacups depicts a young woman sipping a cup of tea, lost in dreamy reverie of love. The young woman is Harriet Martin, one of the characters in Emma, and a young woman in love with love. She falls deeply, when she falls in love, and with little discernment regarding the object of her affections. She refuses the honest affections of a worthy man, Robert Martin, because Emma puffs her up, makes her think she is worthy of more, a higher social standing, as if that can more than make up for true affection, or that they go hand in hand. In the span of the novel, Harriet Martin falls in love with Robert Martin, Mr. Elton, Mr. Knightly, and finally Robert Martin again, whose steady affection finally wins her heart.

What lessons then is Harriet here to teach? Oh, I think I know. Harriet's imagination runs wholly to the subject of love. I may be middle aged but love does preoccupy me. Discernment and discrimination are vital in all of the things that most move our heart, and yet these are often the very things we let run away with us. I've got a pretty decent mind but do I use it in the things I'm passionate about. No. Harriet builds great loves out of castles in the air and doesn't see true love when it stands plainly and honestly in front of her. I've done that, do that, discount the true steady love I have because it doesn't look a particular way, feel a particular way, act a particular way. I am a dreamy romantic under the seeming pragmatism of a sixth house sun, and as Jane Austen so deftly points out, I need protection from reality, but mostly from myself.

The astrological assignment of the Seven of Teacups is Venus in Scorpio. The goddess of love (Venus) in that emotional sign can tend to be focused on beautiful and watery fantasies as opposed to terra firma. And if you're going to build castles, it might be better to avoid uncertain seas and choose instead solid ground.

So What Would Jane Do?

"Our imagination is a pet creature of out constitution. It reflects its master -- or its servant -- well.... A good imagination is a fine quality -- in a mind that is equipped to use it well." (p. 88)