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Changing Like the Moon
One of the most abiding symbols of women's spirituality is the moon. Long associated with the Goddess in many cultures, the moon's magic reminds us of our connection to eternal cosmic cycles. But where does the Queen fit in with the Triple Goddess-oriented moon stages as we commonly name them? The slender waxing crescent of the Maiden, the radiant fullness of the Mother, and the dark mystery of the Crone are dear and familiar to us. One answer has been to say that the Queen's time of life is associated with the "balsamic" waning phase between full and dark moons. But let's be frank, most of us don't look up at the waning moon with the same sense of wonder evoked by that first shining crescent in a sea-green sunset sky or the majesty of the pearly full moon rising above the distant hills. Are we just to bide our time until we once again resonate with the moon as crones?
Not at all. I propose that, rather than associating with a particular phase of the moon, the Queen can represent to the entire changing lunar cycle itself, the face of the moon as she veils and unveils, emerges and disappears each month. Many of us have associated this cycle with our menstrual cycle, and indeed, that connection is a powerful one. But when it stops, though we no longer bleed and cycle with the moon in that physical way, changes that are even more profound still connect us symbolically to the great Moon Goddess, through the fastest and most constant example we have of cosmic change. Seasons take their own sweet time, and the stars move in a slow dance, but the moon whirls through daily changes, and yet is also comfortingly constant. What could be a better symbol for the big changes as well as the long-established habits of the Queen?
This is the time of life when old preferences are assessed, then retained or discarded. Peanuts' Lucy Van Pelt, who surely felt her queenliness at an early age, summed this up nicely in a vintage cartoon in which she wrote over and over on a school blackboard, "I will not talk in class… I will not talk in class…. I will not talk in class…." After a dozen or so of these, she wrote, "On the other hand, who knows what I'll do?" It's a time of seeming contradictions, when our loved ones perhaps expect us to be settled and set in our ways, and yet within our hearts and spirits there is often a profound change that happens at the time of menopause, the great Change itself. Whatever your feelings about your menstrual and fertility cycle, when the Change begins to pull you through the veil into that realm beyond what is known, the future can be approached with fear or embraced with joy.
One of the great things about aging is the wise perspective of years, which tells you that you can't possibly know what your changes will be in the years to come. It's surprisingly freeing. At no other time of our lives, perhaps, is it so important to challenge the "I always" and "I never" statements that come out of our mouths. I was looking through a decorating magazine and spent some moments gazing at a spread picturing a style of home decoration that I have never liked – spare, cool, modern – and realized that I was attracted to it. I was appreciating something I had never been able to appreciate before. And in that moment, I felt happy in the sureness that over the years to come, there would be many more such observations. Thinking back over the past twenty years or so, I saw an acceleration of this open-mindedness. With the passage of menopause and the entrance into my fifties, I felt a lightness and a freedom to make sweeping changes that I had not felt in my (comparatively) stable younger years. My 18-year-old niece comments on the world in absolutes – she likes, she does NOT like – and her sureness about these things allows no room for the possibility that her opinion might change. Her older relatives just smile, for we can remember both that maidenly sureness and the time in our lives when we began to realize that very few things are ever that absolute and unwavering. We've learned to welcome change.
In the tarot, the Moon card is also about welcoming and accepting change as inevitable. It represents listening to your intuition, being guided not by logic or analysis, but by what feels right, moment by moment, month by month, and year by year. Here's a simple lunar reading you can use to explore and understand some of the changes that are occurring in the Queenly stage of your life. You may choose to do this reading once a month, or once for each season, or even just once a year. An alternate way to do the reading would be to leave the cards face down on your altar and turn them up one by one over the period of a lunar cycle.
First, take out the Moon card from your deck and place it at the center of your table. Mix the rest of the cards in your usual way, and choose six cards, placing them face down as shown in the diagram. Read them one by one, as follows:
1: First crescent moon: Visionary Change. What are you imagining into being?
In some traditional interpretations, taken from what I see as a pre-feminist point of view, the Moon card – indeed, the moon herself – has been seen as potentially dangerous, a card of fearful portents, because it was about the mysterious, the nocturnal, the subconscious. The changes indicated by the Moon's cycles were to be feared, for we can't know what is coming next. The tidal pull urging us to shift direction, to see things in a new light – these are the very mysteries of woman-magic that we can now embrace. In our Queen years, our psychic insights and inner messages are interpreted through years of life experience, and we can trust them more readily. When we trust and are willing to be guided in subtle, lunar ways, changes flow naturally and in a naturally positive direction. We need not fear them, any more than we fear the luminous light and deepening dark of the Moon Goddess herself.
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Copyright 2006 Lunaea Weatherstone