The Hermit
The Hermit card in The Modern Witch deck came up in a recent collaborative reading with witch friends, and we were struck by the technological aspects of this card, where the laptop represented connectivity and knowledge, in contrast to the conventional ideas around hermitage being about withdrawing into solitude, and working through knowledge alone. The card in this deck offers so much comfort through that connection, modelling a form of self-knowledge that is formed through consultation of existing traditions, nurtured through understanding our place in a lineage, and strengthened through community.
This card knowingly blends the modern and the traditional, the figure is wearing a grey cloak that could belong to an ancient priestess or be part of a recent Yeezy collection. Their long white hair could be platinum-bleached or a sign of physical maturity and ageing. The furniture could be midcentury modern, the window reclaimed from a cathedral. The framing of the image connects their line of sight to the half-open laptop, a calm, cool image of discernment. The hermit is seeking knowledge with intention.
The Hermit is in a safe container, one that expands their consciousness rather than numbing it, one that offers protection instead of restriction. The colours are deep and lovely, soft velvety black and greys that fall in swathes and feel so different from the jagged, abyssal blacks of some of the other cards such as the Ten of Swords.
TAROT SPREAD OR JOURNALLING PROMPTS
As always, these are for you to work through with tarot cards, or as journalling prompts if you don't work with tarot.
What are your personal needs? What do you need every day to feel centred and whole?
What are your soul needs, the things that you dream of?
Where do these needs interweave or overlap?
Where do these needs diverge?
WRITING PROMPTS
Plan to spend an hour alone. Schedule the time on your calendar and turn off all of your notifications etc. If you can, spend this time in a place where you won't be disturbed. Don't write during this time, but spend it researching one specific thing and allowing yourself to go as deep as possible. This can be something important for your work-in-progress, or it can be a topic you're interested in but never found the time to discover. Use books if that feels less distracting, but it might also be interesting to go online and fall deep into a rabbit hole whilst consciously avoiding your emails, messages, or work tasks. Like The Hermit, learn to live consciously with technology, and find a source of joy and comfort in it. Perhaps you will watch several YouTube videos of coloratura sopranos, or find a fan site dedicated to wild theories about Twin Peaks, or learn how precisely to draw an orchid so you know how your protagonist learned to do it. Perhaps you will learn how to light a fire, or what exactly the beats of a novel are. Whatever you decide, focus on that one thing, and go as deep as you can in an hour. By the time you emerge, like The Hermit, you will have been transformed.
Write a scene about a ritual circle. This could be metaphorical or actual. Drawn in animal's blood on the ground, or 3D-printed in a laboratory.
Write about a container with a something inside it. The character(s) do not yet know what is inside it, but it exerts a powerful pull over them. Decide whether to reveal what is inside or not.