Monday, November 7, 2022

Selling the Rainbow Bridge Oracle


I now have a new, revised (2022) Book  available as a high quality image wrapped book or a simple  PDF from Blurb.com. THE RAINBOW BRIDGE ORACLE  is a beautifully illustrated limited edition artists  book  available from Blurb.com.  The Book describes the unique meanings of each card, and offers a 13 Card Spread system.  This book is only available through BLURB.COM.

And.........I also now have the cards available with a small Paperback book as well.  That limited edition set (cards, book, and velvet bag for the cards) is available for $65.00 (includes shipping) through PAYPAL.     

And...........the cards are available separately (no book) for $40.00. 

Currently I can only accept orders for the deck or the small book and deck set  via PAYPAL to laurenraine9@gmail.com.  

Please feel free to write to me about any aspect of the RAINBOW BRIDGE ORACLE.  It's a project long in the making, and always evolving.  Thank you to all those who have encouraged me.

Lauren






 

New Cards (and their descriptions)


"Speak to the earth, and it will teach you".......Job 12:8

 "We're living IN the Earth, not ON the Earth but IN the Earth.
   And what we do to the Earth we are doing to ourselves."
 
 .......  Rachel Rosenthal

EARTHMIND  is included in this deck because today both science and spirituality have converged in our understanding that all life on planet Earth is  interdependent, a vast network of ecologies.  In 1979  James Lovelock, with Lynn Margulis, developed the Gaia Hypothesis, demonstrating that the Earth is one living,  self-regulating organism.  They named their theory after the primal Mother Goddess of Greek mythology, Gaia.

How would we live  if we truly experienced  Gaia as mother, friend,  as self?  We are the Earth, and it's important that we live and act sustainably, and with reverence,   for the benefit of  all beings of the Earth.  Future generations depend on us.  Thank you for your caring, and your efforts.

Reversed:  Without caring, effort, and work for a sustainable future,  the outcome is reversed for everyone.  We're all together on this one.


Without Desire, nothing is conceived. All that birth of new life, new possibilities, new hope begins with desire for union, for experience, for pleasure, for knowledge. Desire is the engine of creation, and profound, authentic desire is profoundly connected to the life force. But desire can be sublimated, denied, or perverted into lust or superficial acquisition, even hoarding where authentic desire has become mistrusted. What do you truly desire, deep in your soul? Real love, meaningful work, engaging creativity, beauty, travel, knowledge? This card encourages you to connect with that deep source, and like a rose opening to the sun, focus on your true desire and make it manifest in your life.

Reversed:  You have become far too resigned to never get what you desire or truly want. You are dangerously close to becoming an angry and disappointed person, a scrooge of the heart. Stop it right now, and re-connect to your true, and sacred, desires.


“Psychologists have not begun to ponder the emotional toll of the loss of our fellow life. Nor have theologians reckoned the spiritual impoverishment that extinction brings. To forget what we had is to forget what we have lost. And to forget what we have lost means never knowing what we had to begin with." 

 …… Mark Jerome Walters (1998)

This card is a litany of extinct and vanishing species, our great collective loss. Some losses cannot be healed from: all we can do is continue living with them, hopefully to learn new ways of being from them. Loss is grief. Grief can be a profound teacher, if one does not attempt to avoid it in the many ways human beings avoid pain. Grief must be passed through to heal. Ultimately, grief is praise and gratitude for that which we have loved. In this sense, the other side of loss is gain. 

Reversed:  It is time for you to allow yourself to grieve instead of madly filling your days with overly busy activity or numbing heartache with addictions of various kinds. Allow yourself to cry, to name what has been lost. There is a light at the end of that tunnel of the heart.



"The world is made of stories.  And a good story you can honestly
 call your own is an incredible gift.  These stories are part of a 
 bigger story that connects us all."

 ......Gary Snyder

In the traditional Tarot  The World,  a dancing woman, said to represent Sophia, the incarnation of Wisdom, is encircled by symbols of the  Four Elements.   Here Sophia represents the World Soul, Anima Mundi, whose hands bear the flower and the fruit of the World Tree.   We are always turning, evolving in a spiral motion. Be that circle the union of the  4 elements that makeup the  whole of life's diverse powers and experiences, or the round globe of the Earth, ultimately we return Home.  Here at last the beginning place, the Fool's Journey,  is  fulfilled as he  returns from whence he began.   At Journey's end  (at least, until the next cycle begins) is found the fruit of the Tree of Life - Wisdom.  

The meaning of this card is completion.  Now is the time to celebrate the "hero's return" - and part of that return is to give back to the World what has been gained, to share the stories gathered along the way.

Reversed:  You may feel that you are finished now, but you're not.  There is something more you need to do or find to finish what you began.


"Do I contradict myself?
Very well then, I contradict myself.
I am large, I contain multitudes."

Walt Whitman

We're all shape-shifters.  The Greek word for mask is  persona, and the truth is  we wear many different masks or personalities throughout our lives.  Our faces are dissolving before our eyes daily, through time and space, and the "I"  brought to the passing  parade of  our many different roles assumed in the course of being a child, parent, lover, employee, elder, artist, soldier, martyred mother, class clown........and so on.  Although the mask is ever changing,  some of them have a way of getting "stuck on the face".  It's hard to take it off, because we've identified so strongly with it.  So how can one have more fun, and be far more fluid,  with the masks that are ever changing?  One way is to consciously put on and take off the faces we wear to become  self-aware shape-shifters. 

Using actual masks to explore personae with others in the safe arena of improvisation can be very self-revealing.  What happens when you wear the mask of the Clown, or  Mouse, or the Debutante, for example? Congratulations on being so versatile!

Reversed:  You are probably far too stuck in one role, to the detriment of all the other people inside just clamoring for a chance to express themselves.   Time to throw a "Persona Party".



“They’ll need a little water from another time”

The Memory Keeper resides deep within each of us and is more than what we ordinarily think of as “memory.”  She is the Ancestral story that weaves through each generation. She is Instinctual Intelligence. She is the collective human wisdom that can, and often needs to be, accessed for not only survival, but as a base from which each generation can securely contribute its new innovations, innovations added to the evolutionary knowledge. Without the Memory Keeper, we are like lost children, blundering into danger or starvation. 

Reversed:  Your instincts and internal psychic compass are badly out of touch, so that you are indiscriminately making mistakes and lacking judgement, often without realizing what you are doing. Learn how to listen to that small, silent voice within, alerting you to what is needed, and what must be avoided.


 “The best laid plans of mice and men……” Robert Burns

Chaos is the other side of Order. All things in planetary life decay, fall apart, deconstruct in one way or another. Sometimes we can delay that decomposition through care and steady efforts, and sometimes no matter what we do greater forces than our own are at work, such as war, the economy, the environment, or the choices of others that spin our lives out of control. Sometimes it is necessary and appropriate to let go and allow things to fall apart. The faceless figure in this painting, it should be noted, is pregnant. Because whenever things fall apart, something new arises. 

Reversed:  You live with far too much Chaos – time to get organized. And in fact, you yourself may be a force of Chaos.

Wednesday, September 28, 2022

A New, Revised Book published through Blurb.com



I just finished a new, revised edition of the book for the Rainbow Bridge Oracle Deck Since I began this Blog more than 10 years ago, the Deck has added new cards, and additionally I have expanded the meanings and interpretations of the various cards.   

The book is a limited edition art book, with beautiful, full color illustrations and descriptions of each card.  It is available through BLURB on my Bookstore.  Also available there is a much less expensive PDF.  

I have also created a small, paperback, less expensive book that goes with the cards recently.   Please visit the Website to learn about purchasing the Cards and smaller book    

                                                                The Rainbow Bridge Oracle
                                               By Lauren Raine
          

Thursday, July 7, 2016

a Website!




I regret that the Deck is currently (October 2021unavailable as a new publication is pending. Please contact laurenraine9@gmail.com   if you would like to be notified when the deck becomes available.  Thank you for your interest!
Lauren

ps:   To View the  individual  CARDS: 


or just keep scrolling.................





All artwork is copyright Lauren Raine MFA (2021) 




Monday, November 11, 2013

The Rainbow Bridge Oracle



"I've always thought of the Rainbow as as actually being a circle. 
Half disappears into the ground, into an underworld realm, 
hidden, but always present. " 

 Christy Salo
                                  


A Divination System
For a preview of the Book, available in hardcover, softcover or ebook:    visit this LINK



In the Tarot, the Higher Arcana is a progression through what mythologist Joseph Campbell called the "Hero’s Journey".  The first card in the traditional Tarot deck  is The Fool .  

The Fool represents the utterly open innocence, and infinite possibilities,  with with we incarnate into this world.  The Arcana progress through different  experiences, revelations, trials and initiations.

The last card of the Journey is The World, the return Home. Although my Oracle Deck is not a Tarot, I have still used this metaphor in its creation.

The journey is a Circle.



Check previous posts on this blog to see a reading spread, and  to view each card and its divinatory meanings.    

The Deck is currently (October 2021) unavailable as a new publication is pending. Please contact laurenraine9@gmail.com   if you would like to be notified when the deck becomes available.  Thank you for your interest!
Lauren



All artwork is copyright Lauren Raine MFA (2021)         

Thursday, June 7, 2012

New Cards!




                                                 WEAVER
 "What might we see, how might we act,  if  we  saw with a webbed vision? The world seen through a web of relationships….”

Catherine Keller

A weaver  takes threads of many colors and skillfully weaves them together into a beautiful  tapestry.  We talk about "spinning a tale", meaning a storyteller takes "threads" of different characters and weaves them together into a good story with many inter-woven events. 

The name "Penelope" originally meant "with a web on her face", a term that was probably a title for an oracle, or perhaps a Goddess of Fate. But "webbed vision" can also have a contemporary meaning as  a way of seeing the world with a unitive eye, all people connected and in relationship to each other.  That kind of vision enables you to be a "good weaver" in your community, family, and life.  You are a person who helps others to "connect the dots" -  a true instinctual networker. 

Reversed:  You  may be having a hard time seeing the connections between people and/or events in your life, partly because you feel so disconnected  and isolated from others.  Get back "on line" with your life, and reach out to re-connect with whatever it takes.



 MANIFESTATION

"Remember that not getting what you want
is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck."

The Dalai Lama

"Be careful what you wish for, because you just might get it" is an old folk saying that has much truth to it.   We have all dreamed of having great wealth, or being with the best looking boy in school, or any number of  wishes.  And sometimes we do get what we think we want, but in one of the great ironies of life, our happiness can soon turn to misery and disappointment.  Sometimes getting what we think we want can be the worst thing that can happen to us, because what we want is concentrated on desires that are  immature, addictive, vindictive, greedy, or even unconsciously self-destructive. 

 The "Law of Attraction" demonstrates that we attract that which we focus upon,  and consciously (or unconsciously) what we  concentrate upon can manifest.  Loving and generous wishes attract loving and generous results. Negativity and pessimism just manifests more negativity and pessimism, creating a self-fulfilling cycle.  Bearing all of this in mind, now is an excellent time to begin to manifest!

Reversed:  You're not able to manifest what you want because of either a lack of belief in yourself, or you are too negative in your worldview. 




                                             EARTHMIND

"Speak to the earth, and it will teach you".......Job 12:8

 EARTHMIND  is included in this deck because today both science and spirituality have converged in our understanding that all life on planet Earth is  interdependent, a vast network of ecologies.  In 1979  James Lovelock, with Lynn Margulis, developed the Gaia Hypothesis, demonstrating that the Earth is one living,  self-regulating organism.  They named their theory after the primal Mother Goddess of Greek mythology, Gaia.

How would we live  if we truly experienced  Gaia as mother, friend,  as self?  We are the Earth, and it's important that we live and act sustainably, and with reverence,   for the benefit of  all beings of the Earth.  Future generations depend on us.  Thank you for your caring, and your efforts.

Reversed:  Without caring, effort, and work for a sustainable future,  the outcome is reversed for everyone.  We're all together on this one.












VISION

 In this immeasurable darkness,
 be the power that rounds your senses 
 in their magic ring,
 the sense of their mysterious encounter

 Rainier Maria Rilke

Among the Lakota, long preparations were made for the Vision Quest.  Those who sought  initiation fasted, prayed, and prepared themselves  to  "call for vision".  They then went to a special place in the wilderness.  When a young man returned with  a vision it was shared with the tribe,  and sometimes examined to see if it had prophetic or ceremonial significance for not only the individual, but for the entire tribe.

This is a tool we have largely lost.   True visionary experience is "soul language"; like dreams and synchronistic experiences, a vision has multiple layers of meaning, and transcends  time as we understand it.   Visions, like dreams, communicate universal and personal truths, and whether unintended or intentionally induced in some way, can  catalyze a spiritual path or a life's work.  You are encouraged to "call for vision" in your own way. Do it in a sacred manner, and share and discuss your vision with others of like mind.

Reversed:  Visions can be profoundly significant.......but sometimes there is also a fine line between spiritual revelation and highly subjective schizophrenia.  Practice discernment.



SHAPESHIFTER


How many “identities” are brought to the passing parade of roles assumed in the course of being a child, parent, lover, employee, elder, artist, soldier........and so on?  We are all “shapeshifters”.  But masks can get "stuck on the face", hard to take off because we've identified so strongly with it.  So how can one be fluid with the masks that are ever changing?  One way is to become self-aware shapeshifters.  Congratulations on being so versatile!

Reversed:  You are stuck in one role, to the detriment of all the other Beings inside just clamoring for a chance to express themselves.  

 Time to throw a "Persona Party".










All artwork is copyright Lauren Raine MFA (2021)         

Wednesday, February 2, 2011

INTRODUCTION

THE RAINBOW BRIDGE 
 Oracular Cards Inspired by the Tarot

“You have noticed that everything an Indian does is in a circle, and that is because
the Power of the World always works in circles, and everything tries to be round.”

---Black El

The great Dakota seer and Medicine Man Black Elk  had a vision, when he was a young boy,  he later called "the Hoop of the Nations".  Although he saw the "hoop" of his  own Lakota people broken, he also forsaw a future time, symbolized by a great Circle of interlocking hoops, when many people,  from the world’s four directions,  would come  together  to form a "great hoop".   Black Elk's vision has been called by some the "Rainbow Tribe".   The Rainbow, to me, represents the birth of this emerging global paradigm, which includes a multi-cultural vocabulary for the sacred. 

As mystical traditions of East and West join with the teachings of indigenous shamans, Goddess ways, New Age, contemporary psychology, Quontum Physics and modern science, and the universal language of the arts, a RAINBOW BRIDGE is forming to unite humanity with each other, and with other dimensions of spirit.

 The Rainbow Bridge is really an  Oracle Deck, although it was inspired by my many years of reading the Tarot.  In Tarot, the Higher Arcana is a progression through what mythologist Joseph Campbell called the "Hero’s Journey".  The first card in the traditional deck  is The Fool (Innocence) representing the openness with with we incarnate into this world.

The last card of the Journey is The World, the return Home. 



   
 


All artwork is copyright Lauren Raine MFA (2021)