Feeling regret or guilt? These are feelings that can be hard to escape once they’ve carved their grooves in your mind. As babies, we quickly learn that discomfort sucks and must be remedied immediately. As we grow, that story must be re-written, but the grooves remain. It will always be easier to use the amygdala than the prefrontal cortex in the face of discomfort, fear, and pain.
Our infantile instincts would prefer to replace mother’s milk with anything that feels immediately good, be it drugs, exercise, drinking, working, shopping, hot showers, sleeping, and otherwise anything that helps us escape discomfort.
The figure in this card is drowning their sorrows in dewdrops, thinking there could never be enough dew to better their circumstances. And that’s true. Circumstances are a fact of life, but the will is something different. What is unseen by this figure is a coming rainstorm. No longer will dew drops suffice—they will have to face the reality behind their feelings. The difference between youth and maturity is that with maturity comes the ability to be constructive, compassionate, and curious when faced with discomfort.
~~