The Five of Pentacles appears to be about stuckness, and scarcity, but it can teach us a lot about the luminous mysteries.

The Modern Witch card shows two figures wrapped against the cold. they echo each other's poses, hunched forward, driving into the snowstorm ahead. The colours of their clothes are complementary, with mint green, caramel, and black woven through each costume. They are in sympathy, but not communicating directly, each lost in their own struggle against the elements.

This week's card, The Ace of Pentacles, is a little reminder that to progress, to grow, and to succeed, sometimes we need to take a step back to listen to what the universe is sending our way. if we keep frenetically trying to force our way through the world, we will lose sight of the luscious opportunities being handed down from the clouds.

Happy Autumn Equinox to those of you who are in the Northern hemisphere. In the cycle of the year, this would traditionally be a time of bringing in our harvests, and withdrawing into a slower, quieter time in tune with the colder and darker months. Though this isn't possible for most of us in our electric-lit 24-hour universe, we can still find moments to tune in to that inner quietness, to harvest what we have planted, and to thank the universe for what we have.

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.

In this card, the figure is older than some of the others in the deck, perhaps in her forties or fifties. Her serenity is apparent, the bird sitting peacefully on her head, the armful of produce, her calm view of the field, and a gentle hand on the pentacles, as though she isn’t too attached to them, doesn’t need to control them. There is plenty, she seems to tell us, there will be enough.

The most powerful aspect of a story is the transformation, and the most potent storytelling involves a reversal of fortune, or a point of no return, when everything the characters (and the reader) thought they knew is unsettled, or even shattered, and they must forge a new path. A story is about the moment of unstoppable inevitability of knowledge or action: think of Greek tragedies, folk tales, revolutions, mysteries. Humans are wired to be hungry for these kinds of stories, because they help us to understand a chaotic and sometimes brutal world.

When we are used to experiencing adrenaline, or the effects of trauma, rest and relaxation can feel counterintuitive: allowing our muscles to relax can give a stronger sensation than our familiar contractions. In pandemic times, for some of us, hunching over our screens has become powerfully connected to our “free” time. The Hanged One asks us to stop scrolling, to release ourselves from adrenalized patterns, and to trust ourselves to just be, with nowhere to go. We already know the destination, there’s no wrong way to get there.

Fours tend to represent stability and support, in the Modern Witch deck, the four wands have been made into a shelter, gateway, or portal decked with festive foliage. In the Wild Unknown deck, the wands are criss-crossed in a pattern that suggest structural integrity, without rigidity. Wands are associated with the element of fire. This combustible energy is there when we have the first spark of an idea for a project that lights us up, it is what drives us on with writing when we are tired, or ill, or dispirited.

Of all the court cards, the page is the youngest and has the most raw and childlike relationship with their suit. Cups are the symbol of emotion, and the Page of Cups has an unfiltered relationship with their intuition. In this illustration, the Page of Cups stands on solid ground, with the choppy sea behind them, they have laced-up trainers, but instead of running they stand in an elegant, balletic pose. They are holding a pink chalice, from which a fish emerges. The Page of Cups looks at the fish with curiosity, not fear or discomfort, and accepts the surprise without judgment. This card asks us to consider where in our lives we feel like a fish out of water, or where we might recieve an unexpected visitor from the deep.