The Pentagram Exercise

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 22 May 2003, and now archived in the Forum Library.

Kiama	22 May 2003
Hi all, I have adapted this exercise from an elemental workshop I attended at the weekend. The purpose of this exercise is: 1) To get out of revision }) 2) To see how each card in the Tarot deck relates, in your mind to the elements/a combination of the elements First, you need to make a large pentagram on the floor... It needs to be big enough for all the cards in the Tarot deck to fit in/on it. I found that one line of the pentagram made out of 4 lengths of A4 paper worked nicely. (Split lengthways btw, to save paper, and make the lines thinner) When you have your pentagram on the floor, get out your deck of cards, and shuffle them. As you pick each card from the top of the deck, think about it's meaning, and put it on the pentagram where you think it goes. So, let's say you get the Ace of Swords. Let's say you see the meaning of that card as 'Thought'. You may equate 'thought' with the element of air, so you'd place that card in the 'Air' point of the Pentacle. You could put it right at the tip of the point, in teh centre of the point... Wherever you think it goes. Now, let's say the next card is the 9 of Swords, and let's say the meaning you go for with this card is 'Anxiety, causing fears to manifest'. Now, to me that is Air, but also Earth, so what I'd do is put that card so that it showed Air -> Earth. Because to me, its about fears (The Air bit) manifesting (The Earth bit). I drew the Ace of Wands, and saw that as inspiration, so I put that on th line going from Spirit -> Fire. There's the centre to think of too... What cards do you reckon go at the very centre of everything? Mine were Death, the Wheel, the World, 2 of Cups, and Temperence... What cards end up at Spirit? Which ones end up upside down in Water (Upside down in Water for me represented the negative aspects of the element of Water). I found this exercise really useful, since it really helped me understand the cards more, and I gained some new insights. The original exercise was the same, but with cut out random pictures instead of Tarot cards. Enjoy! Kiama

isthmus nekoi	22 May 2003
That sounds like a great exercise - what would also be neat is seeing any elemental imbalances ie. if all your cards happened to cluster around earth...

Inana	23 May 2003
This sounds very interesting and i want to try it :) But first I have a question, wich areas-points of the pentagram are associated with each element? Or is just like you like it more? Maybe will be better to me to use a simple cross...

Belladonna	24 May 2003
The top point is Spirit, the bottom right is Fire, the upper left is Air, the upper right is water, the bottom left is earth. This sounds like such a great exercise, I can't wait to try it! Thanks!

Mimers	24 May 2003
Kiama, Thanks for sharing that. It sounds like a great exercise. I am on my way upstate to Mumsy's house for the weekend. I think I will give it a whirl while I am there. Without saying where all the cards went, what major insights did you glean by where your cards ended up. For example you said that the center contained Death, Wheel, World, 2 of cups and Temperance. Why would you choose those. Also, I got the gist of what the different areas of the pentagram represent from Belladonna's post, but what does the center represent. Would that be what you consider to be the core issues in life? Quote: The top point is Spirit, the bottom right is Fire, the upper left is Air, the upper right is water, the bottom left is earth. This sounds like such a great exercise, I can't wait to try it! Thanks Thanks, Mimi

Kiama	24 May 2003
Hi Mimers, The centre of the pentagram, for me, is what contained all the 5 elements and balanced them all, or that which was outside any of the elements. Necessary things that 'make the world go round'. So for me, cards that indicated change, death, and love, went into the centre, but so did Temperence, since at that point it was like the figure in the picture was trying to balance all the 5 elements out and mingle them together to form something completely wonderful. The fact that Death was in the very centre of it all meant that if you followed the cards in a line any way possible, in the centre of the line was Death: Change. From Spirit down to the middle between the bottom right and bottom left point, the line was: Hermit -> Death -> The Star And this looked to me to be some sort of spiritual journey, especially if looked at from the Star -> The Hermit. Going from left to right, we have: Empress -> Death ->The Fool. It looks interesting, though I can't quite put my finger on it yet! BTW: I got the point mixed up. Air was my upper right, Fire my bottom right, water my bottom left, and Earth my upper left! What I also found interesting was that not realising it, I placed the Fool, Hermit, and Star outside the confines of the pentagram, even though there was space for me to put them inside it. Again, I'm not entirely sure what this points to, but I'll be thinking about it a bit more later. Something that made me squeel with delight was the position of the Lovers: To the right of it was my significator card, the Queen of Wands, and to the left was my boyfriend's, the King of Swords. Again, this was something I didn't realise until I had finished the exercise. The Sun was directly above the Star, and in this exercise I thought of them as having the same qualities... And it occurred to me then that the Sun IS a Star... (Its easy to forget that in the Tarot!) which is probably why they're so similar. Other than this, I think the exercise really helped me to understand how I viewd each card... I noticed that a few of the cards I identify with the easiest ended up on the line of Spirit -> Fire (Since most were Wands cards aswell). The Ace of Wands for instance is inspiration to me, causing creativity, and I have always felt akin to this card. So, it went upside down on the line Spirit -> Fire. It was upside down because the image in it looke dexactly like an erect phallus, and it just had interesting connotations with conception, which to me is synonymous with receiving inspiration! Anyway, I hope you all enjoy the exercise! Kiama

The The Pentagram Exercise thread was originally posted on 22 May 2003 in the Using Tarot Cards board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Using Tarot Cards, or read more archived threads.