A week with the Star & Crown Oracle

[Joan Marie]

For those of you unfamiliar, The Star & Crown Oracle is a group deck that we made here during the lockdown days of 2020.

The name of the deck is a sly riff on the word "Corona" which can mean "Star" or "Crown"
(Thank you for that Nemia!!)

There is quite a lot of feeling in each of these cards as we were channelling all the myriad feelings we were having and everything we were experiencing. The result is quite strange if I may say so, and I wouldn't have it any other way.

This is not a deck of affirmations or "love and light" and yet it is irrepressibly positive in its outlook, as much as that is possible.
The artwork varies in style but there is a peculiar cohesiveness to the whole thing somehow.

This deck captures all the feelings of a very strange moment in time. The pandemic became, in a way, merely the backdrop to all kinds of events and experiences. Yet it seems to capture the universality of it all, the common ground we all share as we become introspective and outro-spective. (I made up that word) What I mean is this deck manages to cut through to what we all hold dear, what we all strive for, fear and hope for.

I've thumbed through it, and the absolutely brilliant booklet that was written by all the contributing artists. But this week or so I plan to really dive into it and see what I find.

I hope you will join me on the trip!

I found that little blue table last week discarded by someone on the street. It goes so well with this sweet little deck!

[Joan Marie]

Monday's Draw

I drew 3 cards today for this spread:

Spirit of the Day: #27 by Paula Millet
Priority of the Day: #48 by Kaylani Perisho
What to be mindful of today: #34 by Nemia

Paula titled this image (#27) Pinnacle.
She also wrote a lovely passage as to the meaning as she saw it when she created the card but we all agreed with this deck that the guidebook was just a suggestion for the reader and that this deck is made to really study the images and find how the images affect us, what ideas they trigger.

All these snails are funny to me because we've had so much rain here there are snails absolutely everywhere. They are all so pretty too. I've really come to appreciate them. I don't see them as the pest that so many do even though they make growing basil outdoors impossible.. And nothing will ruin my day as fast as accidentally stepping on one. They are strange and wonderful creatures and this really is the summer of snails here. I've been photographing them.
Here are a couple:

The spirit this card makes me think of is nature and all the strange beauty and endless variety of life we are privileged to be part of.


The Priority card, #48 Kaylani titled "Emerge." Yesterday evening was really beautiful here and the sky was clear and it wasn't raining. I was able to sit outside and witness a spectacular moon. It's at a bit more than half right now, waxing. I've mentioned before that people give so much attention to full moons and new moons, but I really like every phase. The moon was so clear and in sharp focus last night that with binoculars I could practically count the craters.

I also thought about how unknowable the moon is.

My priority today is to just give into the wonder of it all.

Just now this made me think of the book, The Little Prince and the guy who thought if he counted the stars he owned them or something. YOu can't know the stars or the moon. We think by quantifying and naming and studying them that they somehow are "ours" but they are so much greater, so much more timeless and great than we will ever know.

The last card, the Priority of the day, #34 by Nemia is called, The Eye of God.

Beautiful. The hand is held up to sky covering some stars, maybe the moon, but not really. It's something we all do, look at our hand with the sky as background. Like the stars, our hands tell a million stories, hold a million dreams, perform a million tasks. There's a whole world in there. The only world we can control.

Gorgeous cards. every one of them.
This week is off to a good start.

[Joan Marie]

Tuesday's draw

The Spirit of the Day: #58 by Cheryl Fair
Priority of the Day: #53 by Lauren Brenner
Be mindful of today: #49 also by Lauren Brenner


I confess I am doing this in the very latter part of the day. So it's almost more of a look-back.

The first card pretty much captures my mood. A bit sulky and dark. Circling circling.
No reason for this by the way, well not really.

The second card captures my big quandary which is I have so many things to work on but can't seem to get going on any of them. I feel incapable of prioritising.

This last one...about what to be mindful of and there is a word coming directly out of her "mind". That word is resist. And the lady looks like I feel.
Resist what?

Sometimes with moods like this you just gotta let 'em play out.

I must say this is a pretty spot on representation of my day. It's just a general malaise.
Happens to the best of us.

Funny how well this deck, this draw, captured it.

(I almost didn't do this draw. Glad I did.)

[TheLoracular]

I am loving this thread so far.

The Star & Crown Oracle is one of the decks I'm planning on getting deeply involved with next year. I was thinking about that a couple days ago when re-organizing my tarot deck shelf and discovered I hadn't even opened mine yet. I felt such guilt at that moment, lol. But now I feel like that happened for a reason and that my copy of the Star & Crown is patiently waiting for me to get through other projects/content so when I open it up and begin to do readings and self-development work, it will be in ways that are public and showcase just how talented the CoT community is. Because the cards absolutely hold their own with any other deck in my collection and better than some put out by the Big Publishers.

Reading your insights today has been a joy

[Joan Marie]

Because the cards absolutely hold their own with any other deck in my collection and better than some put out by the Big Publishers.

I agree. It's not selling so well though and I think that is a pity. People are really missing out on a very strange cool deck. And once it sells out, it's gone forever. I won't be doing any reprints anymore of any of my or the forum's decks. (by "the Forum's decks" I mean Button Soup and Star & Crown)

Printing and shipping costs are going up so much so fast I'm just not interested in doing it anymore.

I haven't been promoting the deck as much as I should/could, but I will start soon and hope to have them all out in the world before the end of the year.

[Joan Marie]

Spirit of the day: #40 by Penelope Cline
Priority of the day: #39 by Kareena Narwani
What to be mindful of: #23 by Yve Lepkowski

What a great and perfect draw.
I have to go do something today I do not want to do because it is unpleasant and conflict-based. I've been rehearsing it in my head for a couple of days and it never goes very well. But I see some great guidance here.

Spirit: This lovely card just reminds me that there is more to life than its conflicts. And that things tend to work out one way or another anyway. This card gives me perspective.

Priority: how perfect. OOOOOMMMMMM! keep cool. Stay calm.

Mindful: For this card I have to say the booklet entry is especially perfect. The artist says the image is inspired by the story of Ariadne's crown which lit the way in a subterranean labyrinth. The Minotaur lurked in the maze. (I mean seriously this is almost too spot on!) She goes on with this great story but at the end says something about when 2 forces pull in the opposite directions there is only deadlock. I want to avoid that for sure. It is possible and advisable to look for common ground.

I actually don't know quite how to thank the deck for this beautiful, extremely helpful, and inspiring advice.

[Joan Marie]

I am starting to build a real connection to this deck.

It's like an interesting friend, one who you never really know what they are going to say, but somehow it is always "them" and always supportive and helpful somehow.

Spirit of the day: #59 by Kristin Morrill
Priority of the day: #9 by AwenFlowingSpirit
To day be mindful of: #36 by Kareena Narwani

The "Spirit" card is pretty spot on in the sense I literally also have a big Sunflower blooming behind my head.
All my Sunflowers are starting to bloom. It's like the hope from the spring when I dropped the tiny seeds into the cold damp earth wondering if Summer would ever come and if it would bring life to my balcony.

I also have a ton of tomatoes (all still green) that I really had very little hope for a few months ago. I planted the teensy little seeds and they just would not come up in the blustery spring weather we had. Like they were just staying below earth, shivering and refusing to burst into life.
I brought them indoors and had them sitting all over the house in warm spots in the hopes of coaxing them out of the earth.

It worked, to my total surprise. It took so long though, I really thought the seeds had maybe rotted or something. Then there were the storms! Wind, hail, and walls of water from the sky. Knocking all the plants down, burying the small ones in their own pots. I was even once out in the middle of storm tying the plants up to stakes before they were just broken. I also re-rooted pieces.

And now here I am surrounded by their impending bounty. Fingers crossed still!
Trust, hope and do the work. That's the spirit for today.

Priority: Find that missing puzzle piece!

Mindful: This looks tempting: Sleep. Dream.
Maybe it is telling me to be mindful of my thoughts which have been scattered and leaning toward some unhelpful topics.
I've had a lot of trouble staying focused lately and I think it has something to do with these scattered thoughts looping uncontrolled in my head.

I have a lot of things to do, things I want to do. I need to focus on those things, the thing I want to do. Remember why I want to do them.

[Joan Marie]

Friday

Spirit of the day: #55 by Kaylani Perisho
Priority of the day: #25 by Arianna Siegel
Be mindful of today: #32 by Jo B

Well that first card is real mood! Kaylani calls it "Retreat" and it's about knowing when to take a little "me-time."
It is good to know when to do this. I have a big event coming up next week. On Monday.
I hadn't considered it until this minute but I can see how it would be very wise of me to take some time beforehand and prepare myself for it.
Yes, very good advice.

The second card, the Priority of the day, is the very first card that was turned in for this deck. It's also the one I used for the box cover.
It's just brilliant. I love the crown on the raven.
Arianna called it "Harvest of Change."
Yup. This goes well with card #1. Prepare for a change.

What to be mindful of, Jo B called this one "Expanding Star."
This was an especially interesting concept during lockdown times when it felt like our worlds were getting smaller, but maybe that was just our outer worlds. Inner worlds were given a chance to expand.
This is exactly what I love about this deck. Though we never tied it directly to the times, we all tried to create something that reflected the undercurrent of it all, something that was universal and difficult to name.

And today this card, along with the first two, is asking me consider the non-obvious, the possibility that what may seem limiting is really the opposite.

Remarkable deck. Seriously totally under-rated I'm afraid.
Oh well, the ones who get it, get it.