“Habseligkeiten” was chosen as the most beautiful German word by the Goethe Institute and the Council for the German Language in 2004.
Simply put, Habseligkeiten refers to the modest belongings of a child or a homeless person, in contrast with the wealth and possessions of a rich person. It’s a deep concept that plays a bit with the theme of the children’s book The Velveteen Rabbit: through the repeated energy of and association of love, certain objects become animated and divine. In other words, they’re not just inanimate objects anymore; rather, they carry with them the vibration, energy, and worth of the intentional reverence with which they were treated.
We get to decide what we care about. And, in the caring about them, we elevate them.
It’s kind of deep, isn’t it?
Especially at a time when the Fives of the tarot keep popping up in 1:1 TOTEM Tarot Readings with clients and our monthly Full Moon TOTEM Tarot Reading Previews here on Substack. The Fives of the tarot consistently kick up fears around scarcity, belonging, survival, and tenuous professional and financial success. Their ubiquitous presence in recent months indicates that this anxiety is well beyond the individual level or as the result of a single, isolated event.
As a shaman that sees across hundreds of client sessions and discussions around the world, I think it’s safe to say that the energy of the Fives of the tarot are going to touch all of us, regardless of location or lifestyle.
The trick to navigate this? To remember that the Fives of the tarot represent fears, not realities, and that attachment to the chaotic fluctuations of the external world— and its measurable outcomes— is the source of all of our suffering.
When we worry about something beyond our control, we either 1.) suffer unnecessarily (because the bad thing actually doesn’t happen); or 2.) we suffer twice as much (as we suffer before and during the inevitable event).
So, what good does this suffering do us? What are we missing out on when we cling to the constricting, limiting anxiety of fear and scarcity?
The answer, simply put, is life.
We miss out on life.
Now, I’m not suggesting we all give up our possessions, our businesses, our careers, and head out into the woods to forage or wear fig leaves or whatever.
But, what I am suggesting— based on the cumulative messages coming through via tarot and client sessions and dreams and shamanic messages— is that, for a time in the not-so-distant future, we may all find ourselves in a world turned upside down.
What if the markets crash or the USD becomes insolvent? What if the social strife we’re seeing across the world boils over into all of our local communities? What if our governments retreat or dissolve? What if, against all efforts, the very things we’ve been laboring to build are eroded like sand castles on the beach at high tide?
Am I asserting there will certainly be these kinds of literal apocalypse? No. The biggest lesson learned in shamanism is that the more you learn the less you know.
But the word apocalypse itself simply means, “revealing of great information”, a fancy way of saying “lifting the veil of illusion” and seeing the truth, whatever that might actually be.
And I do believe that revealing of information is quite imminent. There is certainly a wave of fear and scarcity hitting the present, leaving us shamans wondering what’s just at the horizon line.
What is that information out there, just out of psychic reach?
What form it takes is, at present, still nebulous to us. But the conversations between us psychics and practitioners have started in earnest, with various intuitives and sensitives seeing a mosaic of similarly-themed vignettes of the coming months, all of which have forced us to reconsider what happens if it, even if just for a time, all falls apart.
How do we navigate this? How do we prepare? What do we do?
Trying to anticipate the material manifestations such that we can control the outcome is a fool’s errand. Trust me: no one knows exactly how this shakes out.
And this anxiety or illusion of control is the root of suffering, apocalypse or not.
What we can do is dig in, real deep, and explore our inner kingdom— as depicted above in the Mary El Tarot 5 of Disks card.
Who are you without your job? The internet? Your social media connections?
What would you do with your time?
How would you fare if you had no connection to the outside world for months? If the news was literally radio silent? If it was just you and the members of your household? Your collection of hard cover books and downloaded music?
How would you psychologically navigate a mothership landing on earth and another sentient species making contact with us in earnest?
We are all being given a spiritual opportunity to get to know ourselves in very deep and meaningful ways. As the illusion of control slips— which, I expect, it will bit by bit for the rest of this year— we can start to see the fundamental truths all around us:
What do we value that is a good in and of itself? In other words: what belongings do we cherish that are not a means to an end?
What skills have you always wanted to learn? A language? How to grow food? How to make pasta from scratch?
What work do we need to do with regard to our most essential relationships? To strengthen the bonds with our spouses or partners or children?
How would we busy our minds without the noise to which we’ve become so accustomed? What would we do with our time, beyond any tactical efforts to source food or survive?
On this Capricorn Full Moon, take a moment to meditate on Habseligkeiten and what it means for you. Will things really fall apart if you slow down? Or, conversely, what happens if you stop waiting for the right time to do some “main character” shit? Do you have a poem or a spell or a novel or a song in you? Do you have a painting or a flower essence ready to be born?
Now is the time to create and do and speak and be and learn and explore.
And, if you pull one of the Fives of the tarot or receive a dystopian psychic vision, don’t freak out.
It was Macbeth who said, “Present fears Are less than horrible imaginings.” And, while he was certainly a villain, he was also right about a lot of pragmatic shit. So was his psychopathic wife.
Even a broken clock is right twice a day.
What’s more: please remember that, on some level, we’re all cult survivors, whether we’re still “in” the cult or not. Our society has groomed and traumatized us into believing our whole value is either consuming or producing at maximum levels in tangible, financial terms within well-defined, socially-ordained parameters. And while we need to be savvy and live in this world, we don’t need to let its bullshit live rent free in our heads, hearts and energy bodies…especially if it’s dissipating and losing its foothold.
And I believe that it is.
On this Capricorn Full Moon, remember that you have intrinsic value. Meditate on what in your life has intrinsic value, too. Slow down. Breathe. And get honest with yourself.
Even if there is no impending collapse, contemplating one is a great thought exercise to get to your deeper spiritual and personal truths. Remember when we all went inward and made bread and shit during Covid? Remember when we all kind of decided life was going to be different and we were going to get off the punishing gerbil wheel? Live our life’s dream? Fulfill our life’s purpose?
What if spirit heard that? What if that opening is coming? What is Covid was our dry run, preparing us for the live show?
But, then again, maybe I’m just a crazy person sitting out in a flower essence garden in Austin, recording podcast episodes and listening to Joy Division?
Maybe I’m just butt hurt that I don’t have more Instagram followers. Or maybe the microdosing has been a little more than “micro”. Maybe it’s the cumulative effects of thousands of client tarot readings and channeling sessions and straight up fucking weird spiritual experiences.
Either way. Regardless. The point remains.
TOTEM is back to client sessions, and we’ve discounted our rates (reflected on website and booking platform). The Etsy shop is open and kicking. I’m making new flower essences and elixirs everyday.
Why? Because Habseligkeiten. That’s why.
And on this Capricorn Full Moon, I genuinely feel very, very rich.
Thank you.
-Rachel
So much good stuff here...from the velveteen rabbit to our imminent apocalypse to now IS the time to create and do and and and!!
This so resonates following a full Moon ceremony I led this morning 💗