When most people get the Death card in a tarot pull, they typically freak out. It's understandable. In the Rider-Waite version of the deck, the Death card depicts a skeleton as The Grim Reaper riding a horse that tramples over somebody leaving them for dead. All very macabre. The Death card also represents the sign of Scorpio so make of that what you will.
But when I'm getting a reading or doing my own, I kinda like when I get the Death card. Because contrary to common misconceptions about tarot, the card is not reading your future. It’s not a predictor of physical death coming your way. Rather, the death card signifies major changes needed in a person’s life. It’s a reminder that things come and go and it encourages me personally to let those things go.
I am an emotional hoarder. I stockpile memories and feelings and relationships in my mind. I’ll also keep physical mementos. I still have love letters crushes wrote to me in high school and clothes I wore to dances in college and yearbooks from middle school. Everything is important to me, everything has value, everything sparks joy.
But, to paraphrase Disney’s The Incredibles (the best superhero movie, idc!), if everything is important, nothing is.
Death could actually be the start of a new life.
I’ve written before about learning to let things go in reference to the stories and trauma’s I cling to. My clinginess is actually a response to that trauma, I’ve lost so much in my life, I’ve developed a fear of losing anything else thus my emotional hoarding. But, I gotta let some memories die. Holding onto them sometimes hurts me more than it makes me happy (like, seeing some pictures from my childhood makes me sad and it’s truly embarrassing that I still have Christmas cards from my high school boyfriend).
Letting go leaves room for new things to come into my life. I have more room in my mind to entertain new love if I’m not still obsessing over memories of a love gone by. I have more physical room in my house if I get rid of all those yearbooks in my closet.
And this is not to say that things aren’t worth holding onto. I have cherished memories and keepsakes that I want to have in my life forever. I think I’m just learning what’s really important and I’m learning to understand that everything has its time and place and, at some point, it’s time to let things die.
And that kind of death, like the Death tarot card, doesn’t have to be a bad or sad or scary thing. It’s an opportunity to embrace life’s cycles and not resist the natural changes of the seasons of our lives. It’s a reminder to embrace change. That kind of death could actually be the start of a new life.
This entry was written under the prompt DEATH, Day 18 of the Finding the Right Words 30-Day Journaling Challenge. Follow along using the graphic above and write about whatever comes to mind with the corresponding prompt. Share with me using the tag #FTRW or email me at joliedoggett [at] substack.com.
There’s no wrong way to journal. You just gotta find the right words. Happy Writing!
I love this term "emotional hoarder", and I also love thinking about how letting go of that makes space, so true! Loving this series Jolie!