Live True To You » Episode 16. What is Karma, and, how to use Oracle Cards

[00:01:02.420] - Helen
Welcome back to another episode of It's OK to be Spiritual. I'm Helen, and Lori is shuffling the cards, and we are about to discover what the topic of this episode will be.

[00:01:14.440] - Lori
We haven't had the cards out for a while.

[00:01:17.420] - Helen
I know, we've been answering questions.

[00:01:18.650] - Lori
Yeah, it's very exciting. I'm just going to take the top one.

[00:01:32.920] - Helen
What's your understanding of karma and Dharma? What is it, Lori?

[00:01:43.280] - Lori
Well, I guess it comes, like initially, it comes to this Newton's law of energy that you hear everyone talking about, that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. But that's a very scientific way of looking at it.

[00:01:56.900] - Helen
Well, you are a scientist.

[00:01:57.970] - Lori
Well, that's true. That's my excuse.

[00:02:01.520] - Helen
Well, let's figure this out as we go, shall we? If the purpose of life is to expand love energy, then whenever we're acting in a way that is unloving, and every What was the Newton's law of energy?

[00:02:17.810] - Lori
Every action has an equal and consequential opposite reaction.

[00:02:22.920] - Helen
Yeah, so if we're unloving, aren't we going to have unloving energy come back to us?

[00:02:27.810] - Lori
Well, that's true. And do you call that karma?

[00:02:31.750] - Helen
Well, it's better than getting your knickers in a twist.

[00:02:34.170] - Lori
But karma can be good and bad, right?

[00:02:38.880] - Helen
Yeah. Expand love, more love comes back.

[00:02:41.700] - Lori
Yeah. I think people get karma mixed up, except for Taylor Swift, because she says karma's her boyfriend.

[00:02:50.280] - Helen
I'm just left speechless because I thought we were going to have every episode with Kyle Gray, but it seems to be every episode with Taylor Swift.

[00:02:58.680] - Lori
I'm very unpredictable Who knows where I'll go next? I like pop culture references. But yeah, she says, karma can be good and bad. Like, karma is bad for you because you're a bad person. Karma will be good for me because I'm a good person. But good and bad is by the definition of the person who believes it, right? Then maybe a good thing may not be good to someone else. Or you can view it differently. If you're very spiritually enlightened, you can see a decision that someone else would think as bad as good because it will got you onto the right path, even though it was a very hard way of getting there. It is perspective, karma, I think.

[00:03:38.840] - Helen
Two, when you're on a spiritual path, like we said in another episode, you take a bigger picture. But I think to truly understand karma, you need, maybe you need help from a psychic or a medium, someone like you, but you need to be able to take a really big picture, like a multi-lifetime picture, and maybe even sometimes a multi-dimensional picture.

[00:04:01.720] - Lori
My brother once said something very enlightening to me. I probably can't do it justice. It doesn't happen very often. But he was saying something along the lines of time is what changes your perspective on whether something was good or bad. It can feel like it was a really bad thing in the moment, or it wasn't the right pathway, or you weren't on the right track, or you made the wrong decision. But there never really is a wrong decision, but you just can't see that. With the perspective of time, whether that's weeks, years, it becomes clear as to why that had to happen.

[00:04:37.380] - Helen
But time gives you a bigger perspective, doesn't it? It helps you to zoom out. Because when we're in the thick of something, we're very zoomed in. We're very narrow-minded.

[00:04:51.500] - Lori
Agree. It can often be misalignment with where you're meant to be as well. Calmer will push you back on the right track because we're just, it's that push and pull, like you're giving and receiving and you might need to be in a different direction. So we get back on the right track. It doesn't make sense. I was trying to read what we had on this card. I'm editing this bit out, don't worry. Why don't I write misalignment?

[00:05:21.980] - Helen
I don't know.

[00:05:25.540] - Lori
What's your calmer? Doesn't he really ask that, what's your karma?

[00:05:34.360] - Helen
No. No. But I'm ready to kick off with that little story. Yeah, go. So a friend of mine who's in this lifetime had a lot of struggle, keeps saying to me, I must have done something really bad because it's all coming back to me now. But I don't I don't know. It's really calm as one of those things we often can't... Like I was saying, you have to zoom right out. It could be a multi-lifetime thing that's unfolding. But to me, the core of it is always the expansion of love. What do I need to go through? What do I need to break free from? What What patterns do I need to release to be able to expand love in my life experience? What about you? No, I got nothing. I like what you said, though. One of my favourite... You know how I like to read?

[00:07:04.380] - Lori
We definitely know this.

[00:07:06.720] - Helen
I have a book that I recommend on this topic.

[00:07:09.970] - Lori
What is it?

[00:07:11.000] - Helen
Cycles of the Soul by Gina Lake. Yeah, it's a really great book. She was able to channel... I can't remember who she channelled it from, whether it was a group of beings. Gina usually channels Jesus. So Anyway, check out the book and we can figure that out. But it went into a lot of detail about if this happens in this lifetime, what the next lifetime is likely to be planned for to balance out the karma. She talks about, that's why I kept going on about it's a multi-lifetime thing. It's not just yesterday. Also, With the importance of pre-life planning?

[00:08:03.060] - Lori
Yes, I was just thinking of soul contracts.

[00:08:05.890] - Helen
Yeah, so soul contracts and karma, what's the difference?

[00:08:10.180] - Lori
Yeah, good one. I agree.

[00:08:29.880] - Helen
So if we can't tell the difference between calmer and soul contracts, I don't know, maybe we'll figure it out in the years to come, But at this point, I can't really tell the difference. But another book I'm reading that has just popped into my mind, and the point was made that no one knows why someone at where they're at except God. So this book was written in that language, and that's fine. You could say except source or except the universe or except the divine. But no one knows except source itself. Why then are we judging ourselves or anyone else? Karma and soul contracts and pre-life planning is all much bigger than our perspective in this physical life experience.

[00:09:47.900] - Lori
Yeah, I agree. Soul contracts, the people who you're going to interact with, the experiences that you're going to have, the lessons you're going to learn, the directions you're going to take, get It's all part of it, and you don't know when you're in the thick of it. If you get into this mindset of, Oh, this happened to me because of bad karma, then you're just creating that reality. This just happened to me because it was part of my Soul Contract. That there's no good or bad on that. That's just what I'm doing in this lifetime and what I agreed to do. There's no judgement on that. There's no expectation on that. It just is.

[00:10:25.900] - Helen
I think, too, the better way to approach karma is just to not think about it at all, really. But instead of that, to focus on the expansion of love energy. Because if you focus there, it's naturally going to raise your vibration, which naturally raises all of your life experience. Then suddenly, you're not worried about anything anymore. Except you're living with this attitude of, well, gratitude, but also of expansion and this intent to expand love wherever you go, even if it's just a smile as you pass a stranger on the street. It still counts. It still passes on a lovely energy.

[00:11:04.100] - Lori
Yeah, I agree. So let's just kick karma to the curb, hey?

[00:11:08.690] - Helen
We don't need it. We just need to expand love.

[00:11:12.100] - Lori
Can Taylor Swift write a song with those lyrics in it?

[00:11:14.890] - Helen
Why doesn't Laurie write a song?

[00:11:17.710] - Lori
Because I don't sing, for starters.

[00:11:20.790] - Helen
You know, a lot of songwriters don't sing. Someone else sings their songs.

[00:11:25.220] - Lori
Oh, that's so true. Yes, yes.

[00:11:28.130] - Helen
We'll get a song out of it before the podcast is over. Let's shuffle another card. Sorry. She's smiling. This is a good sign. This is all yours.

[00:12:16.740] - Lori
That's why I'm smiling.

[00:12:18.290] - Helen
What's your favourite way to draw an Oracle or tarot card? Shuffle, hands over them, split them. Then it says, add a favourite way to read. Let's just do the first question first.

[00:12:31.110] - Lori
Favourite way to shuffle a card. Do you have a favourite, Helen?

[00:12:36.100] - Helen
I have a little story around this. Do you want the story now?

[00:12:38.390] - Lori
Yeah, perfect.

[00:12:39.240] - Helen
The first Oracle deck I ever bought was a fairy deck, a Dorine Virtue fairy deck. Well, due to my church-based school upbringing, I thought I was such a rebel buying an Oracle deck, and I was a little bit scared of it. I'm scared of the Oracle.

[00:13:03.420] - Lori
You should be scared of the tarot, not the Oracle.

[00:13:05.670] - Helen
I don't like their fairies. I shouldn't be scared of this. I'd open the deck and I'd read the book, and I just didn't know what to do. I don't know, I must have read the book and it I didn't sink in. I did not get it, but I wanted to get it. Then I would just shuffle the deck until a card jumped out, which I don't know if you've ever had fairy cards. The fairies are jumpers. They just jump out all the time.

[00:13:31.820] - Lori
I love that jumping fairies. That's my new favourite thing. Yeah, fairy decks jump.

[00:13:38.150] - Helen
But I thought I was some weird person who couldn't use the deck, and I beat myself up over it, like I wasn't cool enough to know how to use the deck properly. Then just this year, I've discovered that shuffling the cards until a card jumps out of the deck is a thing.

[00:13:58.620] - Lori
Yeah, definitely. It's definitely a thing.

[00:14:01.000] - Helen
I'm like, Oh, I've been doing it right all this time.

[00:14:06.910] - Lori
Shuffling for a jumper is my favourite way to read because I feel energetically that you're getting I mean, either way you do it is up to you. But I really like the jumpers. I can feel when a deck, like our deck today is not shuffling great, I can feel the energy on that deck. You can feel your energy if you're going to have a jumping deck, if you want to just lay them out. I started actually by getting the deck and laying it out, fanning it on my bed, and then running my hand along it. When my hand buzzed, I would just go down and pick whatever card was under my hand, whatever my middle finger, I would just make an agreement, whatever one my middle finger touched was the one because you will touch a lot in the fanning method. So whatever one I touched, I would just pull out and that was my card. I would keep going until I just felt like stopping all the story unfolded in the cards. So one day you could have three cards, one day you could have 10 cards. There is no right or way wrong.

[00:15:07.800] - Lori
You can shuffle and pull however you like. You can also go with traditional spreads as well, or you can go non-traditional and just ask a question and see what pops out.

[00:15:19.860] - Helen
But that brings me to a point I wanted to make when you were talking about running your hand over the deck, because I like that technique, too, is that in a way, it's handy if you tell the deck what you're going to do first.

[00:15:33.670] - Lori
Yes.

[00:15:34.990] - Helen
It's like we've been talking about with the signs and synchronicities, it's a relationship with the universe. Pulling a card out of a deck is still... You're still ultimately having a conversation with the universe. It's like telling people when you're going to meet for coffee instead of you saying to the deck, Hey, deck, I think I'm going to shuffle till one jump, so just jump It's the right one.

[00:16:00.820] - Lori
Yeah, intent is everything. Whenever you're pulling cards or working with cards, you don't need to follow someone else's ritual, but you should have a method of practise yourself. There is no set ritual, you develop it yourself. Initially, I wrapped mine in a scarf with a little crystal. Oh, nice. Every time I got my cards out, I would unravel the scarf, and then I would shuffle them, lay them out on the scarf, put the crystal, which was a communication crystal at the top, and then would just connect in to the Earth and divine energy, wrap myself in a bubble, and ask for my highest good in the following question.

[00:16:39.810] - Helen
Yeah, that's a really nice process.

[00:16:41.680] - Lori
That's simple. Some people have little shrines or they have a space in their house or they'll go outside in the early morning and put them on the grass. You just whatever you want to do, you do. There's no right or wrong way. You can do a lot of courses that will teach you how to read them or how to draw them and shuffle them. But I think intuitively is always the best way. Have a look at what other people are doing for information and interest, but then come back into you and what am I using them for, too.

[00:17:11.930] - Helen
Also building a relationship with the deck itself, like having your hands on the deck. Some people sleep with them under their pillow.

[00:17:18.970] - Lori
I was just about to say every deck I get, I will cleanse with smoke, welcome it to my toolbox, and I carried it around. I cook a lot at home. I put it in my apron when I cooked for a couple of days and then put it beside my bed and would just carry this little deck around with me because I wanted to feel the energy and you're calibrating the energy and you're getting to know it. Clean it first, so clean it first. Clean off anything from the shop with smoke or sun or crystals, and then carry it around, talk to it.

[00:17:50.750] - Helen
Because it's going to communicate with you. The more in relationship you are with the deck, and therefore, the more relationship you are with the universe. It's just like the nines, the signs and synchronicities we keep talking about. The more you interact, the better the relationship.

[00:18:09.140] - Lori
Find a deck that resonates with you. Don't buy a fairy deck if you're not into fairies. Likewise, don't go buy an Australian animal oracle if you're not into that. Likewise, with the tarot decks, the tarot decks come in so many different shapes, not shapes, they're all cards, but themes and stories and story lines, and they can be Viking and witches and mystical creatures and elementals. But if you don't resonate with those, you're not going to connect with the deck.

[00:18:40.890] - Helen
There's a lot of misconstrued history around the tarot, isn't there? It's a lot like many spiritual concepts, but some of them have been, like the tarot, have been deliberately misconstrued, deliberately made dark. Some tarot decks I find very dark, and I'm like, Whoa, I'm not going there.

[00:19:07.020] - Lori
I would agree with that. You really do get the energy from the deck. When I actually picked my first deck, they said to me, just stand in front of the shelf and just see what speaks to you. Pick them up, turn them over, see what themes are on them. I still read with a very limited deck. I still read with right away tarot because that's how I learned, so I I understand the symbology, I understand all the pictures on it, I work with it, and I have little things that have come through during my reads that remind me of a card. I have those links now with cards. To pull another deck and try and read the Eight of Cups, I don't have that connexion with another style, so I have my connexion with the Right of Way, which is the one you will find that most of the books are about and a lot of websites based on Right of Way.

[00:19:58.160] - Helen
It's considered the traditional deck, isn't it? Yeah.

[00:20:00.450] - Lori
But you can pull whatever deck you like, but you just have to connect with it.

[00:20:06.410] - Helen
Then it's a matter of practise, isn't it? It's a matter of relationship. It's a matter of having your hands on the cards. You can do great readings just with Oracle cards?

[00:20:15.980] - Lori
Yes. There was actually a reader at a market I was at the other day, and he would only read Oracle. So Oracle is generally more guidance-based. I find it softer. It doesn't feel as intense as the tarot, although you can get some Oracle cards that mimic the tarot. You will get a tower or a nine of swords and an Oracle that's the equivalent. When you read them, you can see what they're trying to pull from the tarot. The theme is similar. But Oracles are generally more general guidance. There's no bad cards in the deck, generally. I have a really nice one called Magical spirit Oracle from Big W that I read.

[00:20:57.280] - Helen
Not made by Big W. No, not made. Just purchased at Big W.

[00:21:00.000] - Lori
Did I say made? It's by Alexis Raccoon.

[00:21:04.400] - Helen
That's a really nice... That's a fun deck, too. Got a bit of sass and attitude.

[00:21:09.840] - Lori
Modern and lots of very female empowerment, but not over the top There's still a few mushrooms and bees.

[00:21:17.270] - Helen
I know. It feels a little bit '60s-ish.

[00:21:19.100] - Lori
Yes, it does. It definitely like a hippie deck. That's a great way to describe it. I connect with that deck, interestingly. Oh, I'm wearing my tarot dress today. I manifested this card. Oh my gosh.

[00:21:33.400] - Helen
I love that tarot dress. Yeah, well, sorry. You go.

[00:21:38.450] - Lori
No, I was just going to say, I feel like it, like something speaks to you, right? When you step into this, you will find what's speaking to you and the deck that's for you.

[00:21:48.470] - Helen
Yeah, but just have fun with it. Take the rules off. I carried that guilt and shame of not knowing how to shuffle, how to pull a card out of my deck for flippin Yes. That's unnecessary energy.

[00:22:04.360] - Lori
If you can't physically shuffle, because some oracles are quite big.

[00:22:08.230] - Helen
Oh, yeah, the cards can be huge.

[00:22:10.250] - Lori
Huge, and you can't get your hands around them, or if you have arthritis or your hands aren't functioning at the capacity to be able to pull, you can just tap a couple of times front and back and split the deck and say, I'm going to take the first three from when I split. You can fan them out, you could throw them up for all you like and just see whatever one on the floor you see first and pick it up. That's how kids can really read decks if they want to get into very beginner oracle reading when the time's right, because children can't shuffle, really. I'm not a great shuffler. I'm a traditional shuffler. I can't do those cool fanning things that people do.

[00:22:46.090] - Helen
Oh, no, I can't do those either. I always split a deck with my left hand, not my right.

[00:22:52.540] - Lori
Why do you think that is?

[00:22:57.110] - Helen
I don't know. It somehow feels more intuitive The right is trying to control it more and the left is just okay to be more sensitive.

[00:23:05.990] - Lori
I was just about to say that. So left is your flow and the feminine, and yet that would make complete sense. You need to be more in that when you're reading tarot, less control, less rigidity, less structure.

[00:23:17.970] - Helen
The other thing, I never find it very useful when I come to my deck of cards feeling a little desperate.

[00:23:25.230] - Lori
Yeah, good one.

[00:23:27.390] - Helen
It's way better to come feel feeling open to possibility and receptive to guidance and a little bit excited about life or a higher vibration anyway. I agree.

[00:23:43.450] - Lori
If you're not in a good frame of mind, it's not the right time to be reading, get someone else to read for you. Particularly if you're very into a situation, you will read, but you'll be biassed in what you want the cards to say. I do that all the time. I'm terrible self-reader, the worst there ever is, because I see them and I'm automatically, Oh, that's how that's going to play out. I'm generally so far off the mark. I'm getting better because I'm letting go. My questions, your questions need to be… If you're trying to read for yourself about a difficult situation, it shouldn't be, how is it going to play out? It should be, what can I learn from this situation?

[00:24:24.770] - Helen
Or how can I bring more love to this situation?

[00:24:27.360] - Lori
What is this situation trying to show me? What direction is a possibility from this situation?

[00:24:34.670] - Helen
Yeah. That reminds us, it's great to be mindful of what we're asking when we're shuffling.

[00:24:43.420] - Lori
Yeah.

[00:24:44.810] - Helen
Yeah, I'm still practising that, to be honest. I just love my decks so much.

[00:24:53.510] - Lori
Why is my throat going.

[00:24:55.210] - Helen
Mine went too earlier.

[00:24:56.920] - Lori
It's really going.

[00:25:00.890] - Helen
Maybe we've said we've taken the episode too far into an education.

[00:25:07.680] - Lori
Because we're talking about what we do. We can pull it up now, but that's weird. What's that all about? Yeah, cool. All right.

[00:25:21.650] - Helen
Where did we? Where were we?

[00:25:26.360] - Lori
Just cut it off real. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Get someone to read, ask the right question. What do you want to say?

[00:25:47.250] - Helen
We hope that helps. We could just say, So that's what we do.

[00:25:52.790] - Lori
Yeah.

[00:26:01.150] - Helen
So I think that wraps up our favourite ways to use an oracle and tarot, our favourite ways to draw a card.

[00:26:09.310] - Lori
That's what we do anyway.

[00:26:12.250] - Helen
Let us know how you find the decks. Yeah, which ones vibrate, vibrate with you, resonate, resonate with you. And let us know.

[00:26:24.920] - Lori
We'll catch you next time.

[00:26:26.180] - Helen
Bye for now..

Episode 16. What is Karma, and, how to use Oracle Cards

Transcript