One of my favorite mantras that I like to repeat to myself about the archetype of The Hermit in The Tarot is, “I retreat not to run away, but to recalibrate.”
Lantern in hand, the path ahead of The Hermit is illuminated only one step ahead of where they stand. Step by step is how they navigate the path ahead.
Have you recently found yourself at an impass? A place where little to no action feels uncomfortable, but necessary? Perhaps you are dipping into a place within the collective consciousness, the realm of The Hermit.
When is inaction, or very little action, the best course in relationship with the external world? I can’t say what that knowing will feel like for you, but if the desire to scale a mountainside and seek the solace of a cave where you can build a fire, pour over your books and journals, sip warm tea under a pile of woolen blankets, and build a cozy nest to retreat and reflect within, perhaps you are hearing the call of The Hermit.
Allow yourself to trust your own instincts. Trust the most quiet and patient and loving parts of your intuition. Step away completely, and allow what is for you to find you in this quiet space of reflective recalibration.
Step away from reaching, and step into yourself. What is for you will ask to connect. Step back into yourself and your own integrity, and what is for you will send out an invitation to connect. Wait for the invitation by reconnecting now with your own sense of center. It will feel temporarily lonely to reconnect with self, to recenter. But it is also clarifying. It allows the waters to clear, separating the muddy waters from the clear invitations for connection.
It is a collective Hermit year.
There will be multiple moments when we will need to retreat in order to recalibrate, and many moments when we will need to be the lantern, the guiding light for ourselves, and for one another. Sometimes the lighthouse, sometimes the lantern.
Sometimes the large rotating mirror of light reflected, spinning faithfully above the rocky shore, sometimes a humble halo of light only illuminating one step in front of the last.
In a tarot deck I own, The Lovers card includes a Lighthouse, a locket, and a pair of hands holding one another. I often think of the mirroring quality of The Lovers archetype. Decisions. How will we will decide to be mirrors for one another when we are ready to emerge from our mountainside caves of self reflection?
If you, like me, are accustomed to be a bright, guiding light for many, it can feel humbling to accept that maybe all we can offer one another in these uncertain times of extended darkness is a place of illumination that lies only one step ahead of where we stand.
Lanterns and lighthouses. Starlight and moonlight, points of navigation in the darkness for all manner of travelers and seekers. Steering course. Staying on course. Finding course. What light will we choose to follow through the dark of night?
- Artemis Divine -
January 23, 2025