The Thief – Dispossessed – To own nothing is to be truly free

Warriors Are Mobile. We’re on call – keeping ourselves light to be fully responsive. We’ve become expert at leaving things behind. Unburden.

DREAMS – We wake with a sense of loss. Something has been taken from us, but what? This “politics of grievance” has always waged a peculiar force, breeding anger and revenge. “You took something from me so I will take something from you,” the reasoning goes. What a tragic way to shackle ourselves to the past! Yet our loss remains amorphous. We cling to the concept that we were “entitled” to something we no longer have. Philosophers and psychologists speculate; is it the mother’s womb? The family nest? Where exactly is this lost paradise?

You Can’t Take It With You – There is much talk nowadays that “the American Dream” is no longer possible. Very relevant to our study of Warrior Tarot! Dreams are our lexicon! But what was that lost dream, exactly? Some mystical concept of “wholeness” – family, life, work, rewards – that shifted according to who you were and how you looked at it, what identity you grew and how you claimed it. Once you are part of a “team” – even if just a team of two – you look at life differently. Is that loss? Gain? Or accretion? Aren’t you still single souls, even if joined together or were you looking to “merge”? Marx said all property is theft. We no longer fill our tombs with the junk of real life for use in the Great Beyond, “terra cotta servants” who will “wake” to wait on us hand and foot. We are forced to satisfy ourselves with strictly “mental” pictures. Is the detachment of elder-hood a triumph of success or a long wail of departure?

Challenge – The “de-cluttering” movement did us all an enormous favor. Marie Kondo asked us to rid ourselves of every object that does not “spark joy”. That’s a high standard! We soon discover that daily life stirs up a lot of “necessary” detritus that sparks joy in literally no one but is a misery to live without. Probably the best way to free ourselves is to freshly contemplate this entitlement mystique. What is it that we think we are entitled to, and the next question is, Is everyone entitled to the same thing? How’s that work?

Danger – What’s it mean when we believe we are entitled to something others are not? Through “work”? Through “suffering”? That’s a zero sum game! How do we stop them from wanting what we “have”? Do we “have” anything, really? It doesn’t take much to see this American Dream turning into a nightmare. We may say we’ve worked very hard for wha we get but the whole principle of capitalism is to benefit from the work of others. It doesn’t take much to see the grievances THAT would stir up. And yet “state” ownership churns up grievances of its own. Ownership itself is fraught with exclusion, hostility, and danger.

Opportunity – Do we possess objects when we are not physically present? Can we ever possess people? Do we WANT to take responsibility for another’s entire existence? How do our dreams of freedom comport with our dreams of possession? Who – or what – is held captive? Warriors are obligated to free themselves – mentally and spiritually. Can we still appreciate the world if it doesn’t belong to us and we don’t belong to it?

#Haiku: Dispossessed

“Own”
Nothing:
Objects, people, selves –
Masks
Sweated off
Spirits
Rise
Lushly