LEN: Diana reads for kare

[Diana]

Well kare, I'm all ears and am very happy to be your partner that fate has organised for us.

So tell me, what is your story and question ?

[kare]

Thank you for your patience. I ultimately had a hard time choosing a story, but now I have it.

All that is left of my family is riding off to war against an evil foe. My king has left me in charge of the kingdom and the care and safekeeping of the subjects who cannot ride to battle, as he has done before. The people trust me and the king relies on me. But I long to go to war with my loved ones. To have a chance to gain honor and glory, and to protect my family or die with them. They will not let me go and remind me of the responsibility I have to care for our people. The only way I can join them in war is to go in disguise. What should I do?

Thank you.

[Diana]

All that is left of my family is riding off to war against an evil foe. My king has left me in charge of the kingdom and the care and safekeeping of the subjects who cannot ride to battle, as he has done before. The people trust me and the king relies on me. But I long to go to war with my loved ones. To have a chance to gain honor and glory, and to protect my family or die with them. They will not let me go and remind me of the responsibility I have to care for our people. The only way I can join them in war is to go in disguise. What should I do?

kare, I think I should have studied the Lenormand for a few weeks before I joined this reading circle. It's Joan Marie's fault - she's very persuasive - lol. I'm really not sure what I'm doing here !! So am doing this with some trepidation, even though I know there won't be any grave consequences if I fail in my quest.

I decided to draw only three cards for this very first time that I'm venturing into this new world (apart from a couple of vain and timid ventures into it a few days ago). Otherwise I thought I'd end up like those newcomers to the Tarot who draw 8 cards, most of them reversed, and then draw 10 clarifiers not knowing what they're clarifying. I thought I'd stick to three cards. Three cards usually suffice for me in my Tarot readings, so I thought Lenormand should do the same.

Now after that unnecessary introduction which only goes up to explain my insecurities and excuse myself in advance for any failings, here I go. If anyone wants to come and reinterpret my reading and join in the fun, please please do. After all, it's a serious question here. Lives and kingdoms are at stake!!!!!

The three cards I pulled from The Friar's Delight are :

1) The Cross (36)
2) Birds (12)
3) Mountain (21)

Ah..the Cross - difficulty, suffering and hardship. That describes your situation. What sacrifices you are required to make - whatever option you choose. You risk "crucifying" yourself here whatever direction you turn. (Crosses have four directions even.) Poor you. That is the price to pay for the responsibilities you carry.

And those birds. Imagine all the bad media coverage you'll be getting here. The tabloids in your country (in your era these are just gossip and scandal being talked about during the long winter nights and spread by tongues who wish no good) will have a field day if you go off and abandon your duties that the King has entrusted to you. Your reputation will be ruined forever.

And oh, the picture gets even worse here!! There's a damn mountain for you to climb. Exhausting. By the time you get to the top of it, if you decide to go off to battle in disguise, you'll not only be tired physically, but mentally due to your stress and secret and efforts to stay undiscovered by your family and fellow soldiers and king, and that will probably mean that by the time you get to the battle, you'll be such a nervous wreck that you won't be any good to anyone. That mountain is a big obstacle. Metaphorically and literally.

Stay home and forget your crazy ideas.

The Friar's Delight has spoken.

Only then I did something that I would imagine is not a Lenormand practice and I may be subject myself here to some gossip and spiteful words! I added up the numbers on the three cards, i.e. 36, 12 and 21, and then reduced them and the card corresponds to the Bear. That's all about power. I think maybe if you stay home either the King on his return will with gratitude give you more power than you have now - maybe become his sort of Secretary of State or something. You will be rewarded for remaining faithful to your Kingdom by staying at home and not going off on a wild adventure. Your seriousness and loyalty will not go unnoticed. And the Bear also speaks of financial security - so you will probably be paid handsomely as well.

The Bear could also mean that the King will not return from battle and you will be the one in Power. A new King or President if you decide to change the form of governance.

Was I supposed to draw a "significator" ? If so, well it's too late.

[kare]

Wow, thank you so much for the reading. You pulled cards that, even though I know the story, were tricky to interpret given the situation I gave you.

The character is Eowyn of Rohan from Tolkien's The Lord of The Rings. Incidentally, I can't use these books the next time since I did the last time too, though it was a completely different part of the story.

Like the cross indicates, Eowyn is burdened and in pain from being isolated in a realm that is under duress and forced into a traditional role for women that makes her warrior's character feel trapped and fatalistic. She does decide to conceal herself and ride to war with her uncle, who is like a father to her, and her brother. She sticks close to her uncle and ultimately tries to save him from a giant flying monster ridden by the ghost-like undead witch king of Angmar. She kills the monster and undead king (a Nazgul), which according to lore no man can do. (All the men of course think this means no human can do it lol.) So she seems to fulfill some destiny, but fails to save her uncle. She then almost dies, and cannot be fully healed until this shadowy illness from striking the Nazgul is cured with hope. She does finally find hope by falling in love with someone who truly sees her for who she is while she is recovering in this land where the battle took place.

She wins great renown, so I imagine that is what the birds could represent here. And she had greatly desired glory in battle. The birds were the trickiest of all in the cards you pulled for sure. Plus I didn't mention her desire for a glorious death in battle. She heads off to war hoping for that.

As to the mountain, it could be lots of stuff, and your interpretation makes sense. She is emotionally depleted from the moment we meet her, and almost dies because she is nearly unable to overcome that, in spite of this huge heroic act she did. So going off to war doesn't save her uncle and doesn't make her feel better, even though she kicked some major bad guy butt and seems to have fulfilled some destiny.

I feel like her protective nature and her success at doing so to some degree, though she does not save her uncle, could be the bear. She destroys the critical opponent, besides the big bad guy. With a little help from a brave hobbit. Ultimately after she falls in love, she decides to put down her sword forever and become a healer. And marries Mr. Awesome. Who ends up as a prince.

I realy love your interpretation. You had very little information to go on, in actuality, and in some ways were really not far off the mark. She is in pain and desires only to build her reputation as a warrior and then die. Seems like good advice to tell her not to go.

[Diana]

Thanks for explaining everything kare ! What an adventure this woman went on. Giant flying monsters - eek !

If the mountain hadn't followed the birds, and a more "positive" card had been drawn instead, I would have interpreted the birds as advice to go off on the adventure - to be a bird and fly. But the mountain seemed a big obstacle here.

I'm unsure of whether I enjoy reading with the Lenormand. I miss the symbolism and the mythology and the esoterism of the Tarot. But I'll probably try a couple more readings with it and see if it grows on me.

Thanks anyway for your encouraging words !!

[kare]

Thanks for explaining everything kare ! What an adventure this woman went on. Giant flying monsters - eek !

If the mountain hadn't followed the birds, and a more "positive" card had been drawn instead, I would have interpreted the birds as advice to go off on the adventure - to be a bird and fly. But the mountain seemed a big obstacle here.

I'm unsure of whether I enjoy reading with the Lenormand. I miss the symbolism and the mythology and the esoterism of the Tarot. But I'll probably try a couple more readings with it and see if it grows on me.

Thanks anyway for your encouraging words !!

For me, sometimes Lenormand works and then sometimes it really throws me for a loop. I do like the very different feel as a change of pace. Now you can get into playing cards, which seem to be a mix of Lenormand tarot. Lol

And actually, going on the adventure in a way didn't erase the real obstacle for her, which was her lack of hope. So your advice still works.

[Joan Marie]

Diana, you mention drawing extra cards for clarifiers and whatnot and there is a thing you can do with Lenormand that I am just learning to put into practice that sort of addresses this.

Instead of drawing more cards when you aren't sure, you can read the cards you have in different combinations and then put all those together.

It actually works and is an interesting twist.

Have a look at the reading I did for dodalisque here: viewtopic.php?f=241&t=2256#p14575

I laid out 6 cards:

1-2-3
4-5-6

and read them like this: 1,2,3 and 4,5,6
Then I read them vertically, giving the top one priority: 1,4 and 2,5 and 3,6
Then I read in 2 V patterns: 4,2,6 and 1,5,3

On a 5 card reading you can do this
1,2,3,4,5
then, 1,2 2,3 3,4 4,5 5,1

And so on. there are many ways to do this. The funny thing is, it works. You'll know if your first pass reading left to right holds water if the subsequent combinations support it. if they don't, have another look at it.

This is of course a very quick and dirty description of a technique, but in all honesty, it's my best effort at the moment.

I've been practicing and finding this to work really well at helping me to solidify my readings. If I'm thinking t could go one way or another, checking the other combinations usually helps me pick a side.

I'm having a lot of fun with it.

[kare]

Diana, you mention drawing extra cards for clarifiers and whatnot and there is a thing you can do with Lenormand that I am just learning to put into practice that sort of addresses this.

Instead of drawing more cards when you aren't sure, you can read the cards you have in different combinations and then put all those together.

It actually works and is an interesting twist.

Have a look at the reading I did for dodalisque here: viewtopic.php?f=241&t=2256#p14575

I laid out 6 cards:

1-2-3
4-5-6

and read them like this: 1,2,3 and 4,5,6
Then I read them vertically, giving the top one priority: 1,4 and 2,5 and 3,6
Then I read in 2 V patterns: 4,2,6 and 1,5,3

On a 5 card reading you can do this
1,2,3,4,5
then, 1,2 2,3 3,4 4,5 5,1

And so on. there are many ways to do this. The funny thing is, it works. You'll know if your first pass reading left to right holds water if the subsequent combinations support it. if they don't, have another look at it.

This is of course a very quick and dirty description of a technique, but in all honesty, it's my best effort at the moment.

I've been practicing and finding this to work really well at helping me to solidify my readings. If I'm thinking t could go one way or another, checking the other combinations usually helps me pick a side.

I'm having a lot of fun with it.

The other thing I would say too is that when any reading I do, whether it's tarot or Lenormand or what, when it ends on something really inconclusive like the mountain, something that can sometimes present more questions rather than an answer, I pull more cards to specifically ask about that inconclusive card.

I am attaching an image of a three card reading I did. In this case I opted for a line reading in which the last card presented a solution to the problem posed by the first two. So, you can read them as all three in a line in which the last card just further modifies the previous card, or you can read them as the last card is the outcome, ish. Lol.

Here I got the man last. But what about the man is a solution to the obstacle of abundance my friend is feeling? So I drew two modifiers for him, like influences or further descriptors of his character. He brings stability that leads to optimism, or he brings both stability and optimism. However you want to read it. And I should note the reading is shared with permission.

I also really like Joan Marie's method.