Strength: a collection
quotations for card 8
Here is another collection of quotes for which I’ve drawn the same card; this time, Strength. You can find the last collection here (with links to two others). And don’t miss the prompt at the end.
Anything not attributed comes from my journals. My commentary is in italics.There’s not much of it this time, because I find Strength to be such a portal of a card that attempts at ‘explanation’ feel like a diminishment of its raw power. And, as I’ve said before, I realize that the religious/Christian stuff can be super off-putting for lots of folks, and I hope you can read beyond it if you find it so. It’s all an imperfect metaphor. (RX) = reversed.
It occurs to me that courage comes from the same place as fear, and where there is fear, there is the possibility of courage. -Pàdraig ò Tuama
Without courage we cannot practice any other virtue with consistency. We can’t be kind, true, merciful, generous, or honest. -Maya Angelou
Fear is a natural reaction to moving closer to the truth. -Pema Chödrön
(RX) You can’t get in shape without feeling out of shape. -Abi Robins
My partner, Abi, said that to me once when I was complaining after doing a weight workout for the first time in a long time. It was humbling and made me feel really weak. I pulled a card: Strength reversed, so very literal. Strength reversed isn’t the opposite of strength, or weakness: it is that feeling of humility, a real understanding of what it takes to experience oneself as strong or courageous. In general, this group of quotations really highlight that Strength means intimacy with our weakness and our fear, and not letting those feelings stop us from doing difficult and scary things.
Each must make a safe place of his heart before so strange and wild a guest as God approaches. -Li Young Lee
All shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of things shall be well. -Julian of Norwich
What does it look like to be a Christian in the world?
What card best describes my lifelong longing for and struggle with faith?
The love of God cradles us unceasingly. -Thomas Keating
If your heart is broken, you’ll find God right there; if you’re kicked in the gut, he’ll help you catch your breath. -Psalm 34:18 The Message
You are the desiring of God. God desires through you and longs for Life and Love through you and in you. Allow it, speak it, and you will find your place in the universe of things. -Richard Rohr
I want to give my children a tangible experience of love.
There is a simple difference between a person who has faith and a person who doesn’t: people of faith don’t believe everything depends on them. -Adam Soto
We don’t get wounded alone and we don’t heal alone. -Jung
It takes so much courage to admit that you need help. -Meghan, Duchess of Sussex
Fear is a natural reaction to moving closer to the truth. -Pema Chödrön
Anyone can slay a dragon…but try waking up every morning and loving the world all over again. That’s what takes a real hero. -Brian Andreas
I would like us to do something unprecedented: to create ourselves without finding it necessary to create an enemy. –James Baldwin
Sit and feel. Try to hold on. -Sarah Duet
The fastest way to freedom is to feel your feelings. -Gita Bellin
What would true vulnerability during sex look like?
Soften me.
What is the opposite of resentment?
I am not trying to hide my hungers from the world anymore. -Kendra Decolo
I don’t need to be ashamed of my desire.
(RX) The most regretful people on earth are those who felt the call to creative work, who felt their own creative power restive and uprising, and gave it neither power nor time. -Mary Oliver
Strength is an appetite, a hunger that we can feed or, if we deny and starve it, will start to consume us from the inside, leaving us resentful and regretful.
Cross a threshold and wander on the land until you feel drawn to a place that feels both alluring and dangerous. Once you get there, ask this other–this place or element or being–to have a conversation with you about your inner beloved. –Victoria Loorz
We were heading into unknown worlds…I would be stripped of what made me feel safe to make room for something else. -Jedidiah Jenkins
[There exists] a spiritual point of no return. You can’t take God’s hand without it changing you. -Greg Durham
Take long walks in stormy weather or through deep snows in the fields and woods, if you would keep your spirits up. Deal with brute nature. Be cold and hungry and weary. -H.D. Thoreau
Not every/ wolf/ harms, many just want to find their way/ back into the forests we keep cutting down. –Kelli Russel Agodon
I really like this little grouping of quotes that remind us of Strength’s position as card 8 (more on that here), and the opening of the second line of the Major Arcana, where our spiritual journey begins in earnest. It is a threshold we cross. It is a doorway into a wilderness. There is no ‘coming back’ from Strength, because the experience is fundamentally transformative.
here is a prompt for you to try, inspired by Strength:
I thought this was my weakness, but really, it’s a strength.
you may want to pull an additional card, to answer: why!? Why is it a strength?
I did. My first card was 4 of Swords. I often read this as contemplation of mortality (think of the RWS version of this card, with the knight seemingly napping on top of a coffin), and wow have I been thinking about death a lot lately since my mom died. It’s pretty constant. And I have worried that it’s a problematic preoccupation, that I should stop (as if I can just turn it off!), that it’s keeping me from ‘truly living’. So, I needed that additional card, answering ‘why’. And I drew Queen of Pentacles! Far from keeping me from ‘truly living’, my time spent in 4 of Swords is actually allowing me to love my life more deeply, to care for and nurture myself and my family, knowing we are all mortal.
I’ve love to hear about your pulls if you’d like to share!
As always, thanks for being here, and I hope my work serves you, as infrequent as my posts have been these days.