prediction & illness

Has anyone ever had dreams/tarot readings etc that fortold of physical illness? Or known of an illness beforehand and then tried to avert it? Has there ever been a time when you saw an illness coming, and decided *not* to avert it, decided the person would be worse off for avoiding it?

The reason I ask is b/c of having seen illness in my own methods of divination, I think I may have been wrong about illness. I may have had a biased view that paints illness as something mostly negative. That the positive aspects of illness are sort of along the lines of "making lemonade from lemons".
Now I wonder if there can be a time when illness should not be averted, although this seems illogical to me. After my dream last night I'm beginning to think illness is like a drug that weakens the ego, weakens the physical body and therefore, allows you the opportunity for a closer communication w/the gods. This might sound strange, but I am sure those of you reading this have either experienced hallucinations whilst in the grip of a strong fever, or known someone who has experienced such.....

Isthmus.

From the point of view of experiencing illness, this thread may be of interest: http://www.tarotforum.net/showthread.php?s=&threadid=13751&highlight=Living+with+illness

There is a view that illness is karmic or that it can be the consequence of living that has lost harmony. Whatever, there are things to be learned from illness.

I've had two dreams that foreshadowed illness but I only realised with hindsight that they applied to me.

Look at it as early warning methods

I had a dream a couple of years ago. I was in a room with some of my relatives including my cousin. My grandmother came into the room and gave each of a nice big juicy stake. The stake was a comfort food meant to heal what was wrong with us. She came up to my cousin and told her that she had to take care of herself.

The whole thing seemed weird so I asked my mum how my cousin had been doing lately and she told me that she was pregnant, which I didn't know. I told her that just to be on the safe side she might want to get a check up at the moment, which she did and as it turns out it was good because they found out smth that could've threatend the baby.

I have dreamt other times that someone else is sick and it's not necessarily that way, but I always tell people because I think it would be very selfish of me if it did turn out to be true that there could have been some form of early detection

I mean, you see a weird spot on ur skin that wasn't there before, you go to the doctor right???? well.. this way you're just showing a person a weird spot that you just saw on them.. they'll decide what to do about it..


Whether or not illnesses are karmic I don't take it into consideration, just what might be best for someone

I agree that the best course of action is what is best for a person. And that the decisions to deal w/illness is up to the individual in question... Good rules of thumb I shall bear in mind.

Ah, I think maybe I did not express myself clearly. I am thinking that the positive effects of illness are *NOT* simply making lemons out of lemonade or learning lessons from pain. Although this is also a large part of the positives.

I am now envisioning illness as a physical change much like adolescence, or menopause, that stresses the physical system in order to reach a new state of homeostasis. When the body shifts to a completely different framework, and cannot return to the old one (and perhaps you can carry this over to a shift in mentality?). Does it make a difference whether the precipating factor for change is illness, or hormones?.................... I don't know what to make of this way of viewing illness, I don't even know if I should be drawing the parallel here, but if I am to accept this, I no longer know whether one should avoid illness when one can predict it......

Moongold, *thank you* for the link. I did not follow it earlier, but I have read it all now.

you ask some difficult questions isthmus!

if someone has asked you to 'divine' for them, then i believe you have the obligation to tell them. it becomes much trickier when they have not asked. if it were me, i would want to know... but i know of many others who would be so upset that anyone tried to divine anything, that for them, it would be best left unsaid.

i want to believe that there is a reason for our 'knowing' things. assuming there is, then by the fact that you were given the information, we might assume we were meant to, or expected to pass on the information. the information being part of the plan.

yes, i believe illness can cause great change. living with illness can cause tremendous growth and evolution. when myself or my children go through even a simple virus or fever and come out of it, we seem renewed... purified. however, i don't think it is for our greatest good to look for problems.

i would not want to be the one to decide whether an illness should be stopped or not. if one has been given the opportunity to stop it, i assume it is 'meant' that it should be stopped. perhaps the lesson is only to experience the beginning of an illness, or the fear of the illness.

i have to trust that everything happens for a reason, including what we discover through divination.

Now I wonder if there can be a time when illness should not be averted, although this seems illogical to me. After my dream last night I'm beginning to think illness is like a drug that weakens the ego, weakens the physical body and therefore, allows you the opportunity for a closer communication w/the gods. This might sound strange, but I am sure those of you reading this have either experienced hallucinations whilst in the grip of a strong fever, or known someone who has experienced such.....

Click to expand...

The experience of illness can have an angering effect or a very humbling effect. Sometimes the former comes before the latter. As you’d undoubtedly know, there is a process before acceptance. The same effect can be experienced by anyone who goes through a traumatic experience of any kind

I am now envisioning illness as a physical change much like adolescence, or menopause, that stresses the physical system in order to reach a new state of homeostasis. When the body shifts to a completely different framework, and cannot return to the old one (and perhaps you can carry this over to a shift in mentality?). Does it make a difference whether the precipating factor for change is illness, or hormones?.................... I don't know what to make of this way of viewing illness, I don't even know if I should be drawing the parallel here, but if I am to accept this, I no longer know whether one should avoid illness when one can predict it......

Click to expand...

Hormones are part of a natural cycle of development. Illness occurs when the body gets off key for any one of hundreds of reasons. Whether one believes there are karmic reasons for illness or not, I don’t see it as a developmental process. The same goes for natural developments related to hormone production or cessation. I don’t see them as illness either. I'm not medically trained at all but I see the two processes as not connected at all and certainly not with the same outcome

I guess you’d need to distinguish between the different degrees of illness as well. A common virus is often not so consequential as a chronic illness like asthma or MS.

Sometimes we experience illness for a reason. For example when we've been pushing too hard, stressing too much, the body gets ill to force us to take a break. Sort of "if you don't want to listen to the warning signs, we'll teach you the hard way". In a case like this, it would not be a good idea to avert illness, because it would mean pushing yourself even further, with even more disastrous results.

I agree with zorya that I wouldn't want to be the one to decide on whether to stop an illness or not, and that it's best to trust that everything happens for a reason. I don't even think that we could stop an illness if it was meant to happen, I don't think we have the power to do that...

I actually did a reading in a thread in the Astrology forum in which I mentioned the (strong) possibility of illness coming. I recently received a PM from the person concerned saying that they had in fact been ill.

Should I have not relayed this piece of information? No, I think I was right to relay it - it is then up to the recipient to decide how to deal with it.

As has been said earlier illness is a warning sign to change lifestyle - even if in only a small way. It may be that the warning through the reading could have led to changes that pre-empted the illness and led to a better balanced lifestyle. It may be that the illness was 'meant to be' and only through experiencing it could change be encouraged. However by revealing the possibility, power to deal with it is handed to the person who receives the reading. They can choose to act and the way in which they act. In this sense the reading empowers its subject.

tarotlady said:

I don't even think that we could stop an illness if it was meant to happen, I don't think we have the power to do that...

Click to expand...

Ah yes, this makes a lot of sense. *Ultimately*, the decision whether or not to avoid illness or go through w/it isn't really up to any of us.......

As for readings, I have begun to offer w/a disclaimer just b/c I have had too many ppl underestimate the power of tarot...... esp w/cold querents, I try to make it clear that tarot can bring to the table difficult, hidden issues. I would prefer to tell such information over withholding it, but yeah, it is a sticky issue.

Moongold... I was uneasy making that comparison. Perhaps the maturing body was not a good example.... I was thinking over it again last night, and over your thread and I have a new comparison: that of mental illnesses like schitzophrenia/genius. I believe they are different, but both are accessing similar places. Both are having their systems get very out of whack. But one is destructive and the other benefits.... or they are both at the same time in some cases............. if we stop the progression of said mental illnesses, what does the individual stand to gain, and what does s/he stand to lose?

Hi Isthmus,

I am not quite sure where your thinking is going on the question of illness. Can you remember Astrea’s comments in the Living with illness thread? That was a very interesting perspective on experience of illness and one woman’s way of healing herself. She reached a spiritual solution I think, but also used medical treatments.

There is a very interesting book by Susan Sontag called illness as metaphor which gives another perspective.

Illness is. It happens. I would always opt for prevention and cure but sometimes that is not possible. It happens. Acceptance and action around illness are phases that one must go through eventually. This is a spiritual as well as a physical process. The spiritual meaning is very important and unique to each person. One can definitely grow through illness.

I am not sure how one could compare schizophrenia with genius. Schizophrenia is a range of illnesses, and they are not pleasant. There are different theories about causes.

There are a couple of books I suggest you read. One is Madness and Modernism by Louis Sass, a beautiful book. Another is a fairly recent novel by Wally Lamb about a man and his schizophrenic brother. I’ll come back with the title of that. Of course, there is the classic by Hannah Green I never promised you a rose garden.

You are an energetic and creative thinker and you’re possibly going somewhere beyond my ken with this so please excuse me if I haven’t understood you. I have a sense you may be speaking partly about metaphor. I think most people with mental illness would prefer not to have it. They often don't have a choice, and it takes so much away.

Many blessings