Victorian Flower Oracle: Dahlia

Dahlia
Choices

Image: A Dahlia lady is holding up a yellow dahlia bloom. She sits at a table and the chair is decorated with dahlia leaves and blossoms. Another blossom, this one pink, rests upon the table top along with a vase. She does not look at anything within the scene; she gazes at something or someone outside of the confines of the card.

Choosing with the heart rather than the head. The colors are interesting, I usually associate yellow with either friendship or cowardice, sometimes happiness. Pink is romance, puppy love. Love on the mind. I guess not making a choice is a form of cowardice.
Perhaps she is not choosing at all, but rather offering something from the heart. Offering friendship and happiness, at least at first to see how the gift is received.

This card always has me chasing my tail... not sure what I think.

.traveller. said:

Dahlia
Choices

Image: A Dahlia lady is holding up a yellow dahlia bloom. She sits at a table and the chair is decorated with dahlia leaves and blossoms. Another blossom, this one pink, rests upon the table top along with a vase. She does not look at anything within the scene; she gazes at something or someone outside of the confines of the card.

Choosing with the heart rather than the head. The colors are interesting, I usually associate yellow with either friendship or cowardice, sometimes happiness. Pink is romance, puppy love. Love on the mind. I guess not making a choice is a form of cowardice.
Perhaps she is not choosing at all, but rather offering something from the heart. Offering friendship and happiness, at least at first to see how the gift is received.

This card always has me chasing my tail... not sure what I think.

Click to expand...

Look at her bent hand on the table. I laid my hand down on my desk like hers and assumed her position. I was pondering what she may have been doing when I automatically knocked on the table with the knuckles of my bent hand.
"Hello!
I have Pink or Yellow!
Don't you agree that both colors are beautiful?
I wear both colors to show you what they could look like on you!

Do you know what you want?
You do have a basic idea, right?
You must make a decision, so what do you chose, today?"

You could lose out if you don't snap to!
Command attention & request a decision now!


Barbara

Edited: Perennials, originally from Mexico, love the sun & will flower through Summer to Fall. No blues, but lots of colors to chose from!

.traveller. said:

Dahlia
Choices

Image:
Choosing with the heart rather than the head. The colors are interesting, I usually associate yellow with either friendship or cowardice, sometimes happiness. Pink is romance, puppy love. Love on the mind. I guess not making a choice is a form of cowardice.
Perhaps she is not choosing at all, but rather offering something from the heart. Offering friendship and happiness, at least at first to see how the gift is received.

This card always has me chasing my tail... not sure what I think.

Click to expand...

ok, I feel like I have used this deck enough to start offering some insights....in this case I just realized how close our view for this flower is...I recalled doing a reading and seeing just that...the need to make a choice, but one that matched our heart....

And there is a struggle...mind and heart....

The Dahlia card shows a lovely lady sitting in profile. The chair is ornate but delicate. The ornate comes from the plant and floral like designs. The Dahlia herself wears a large pink flower on her head, a yellow one on the right side of her dress. The dress is decorated with pink dahlias. She is holding a yellow dahlia in her left hand, but has a pink one on her dresser and her right hand is close to it.

The emotional atmosphere of this card is one of pleasure. The Dahlia wants to please herself by choosing the right flower to wear as well as appear pleasant to others. The emotions are of pride in making a right choice.

The physical manifestation of this card , as depicted by the illustration, is one of taking care of making the right choices in dress for specific occasion, or having the right physical presence in a given situation.

The mental characteristics of this card are of thoughtfulness and careful deliberation.

The spiritual characteristics are those being true to oneself, and being happy with whom one is.

What I find most appealing about this card is the thoughtful and gentle look on the Dahlia’s face. It captures her trust in herself to make the right choices. Her self confidence.

What I find most unappealing is the empty basin, it seems out of place with the Dahlia.

This card has quite a bit of subtlety that I probably only noticed now because of my studies with the Kyanite crystal. Examples include the chair – though beautiful it is probably not all that comfortable. Another example is her hand, knuckles down on the surface of the table, showing that choices and decisions can be hard. The yellow dahlia being held in the air on her open palm of her receptive hand means to me that one needs to be open when making decisions and use not only knowledge but intuition as well.

After reading the companion book I feel that my impressions of this card agree with it pretty well. I had no really paid attention to this card until now, and I have really gained a lot of appreciation and admiration for it. I would say that now it is amongst my favorite cards. I used to feel quite indifferent to it.

ETA - after reading this thread I see that what I see in this card is that choices and decision need to be made with both a combination of the head and the heart, not with only one of these. It also tells me to deliberate over the choice to make sure one is comfortable with the choice made and can stand proudly by that choice. That is my two pearls worth anyways *LOL*