Make a Dream, Astrology and Tarot Journal

If you combine dreams, astrology and the Tarot in a home-made journal, you will often find three stories about your life, meeting in the middle. This is a good way to deal with long-term issues you might have and find solutions. In fact, using these three ancient methods of fact-finding and problem-solving can change your life.  Story: Jessica Adams.

At Home? Start a Journal

In 2020 and 2021, when so many of us were at home, I found a whole new audience for Tarot, as well as astrology, on my website. It’s always free, with extended sections for subscribers. You can start a journal now, if you have not done so already, using the horoscopes and Tarot cards at Jessica Adams.com.

Jane Teresa Anderson and Dreams

What we found was really popular when we were all indoors for so long – was dream interpretation and dream therapy. Jane Teresa Anderson, a friend of mine for many years, is one of the world’s experts on this, and her website is a good place to begin,  if you want to start combining your astrology chart, with Tarot cards and dream analysis. The Dream Academy offers classes, but you can begin with Jane Teresa’s free podcasts and YouTube sessions, to decode what your subconscious means.

Track the Seasons in Your Journal

Journals which cover seasons rather than the whole year, are useful. You don’t have to shop for a new diary or notebook; you can recycle what you already have, or just sandwich paper together with a cover you make yourself. In fact, you can stack smaller journals together (one for every month) then tie them with ribbon.

Sandwich Your Journal for the Seasons

Find some wrapping paper you love and fold it so that you end up with a smaller journal cover. Fold A4 paper into half and pop inside. You can staple if you wish, but I just make six and then bind them with ribbon.

In the photograph you can see wrapping paper I picked up at Liberty in London along with hand-marbled paper I made myself, then coloured with gold felt-tip pen. The ribbon is Dior. By the way – eBay is a great place to pick up beautiful French ribbon. Maybe you prefer Chanel.

For Northern Hemisphere Readers

If you are in the Northern Hemisphere you will start your ‘sandwich’ from around September 21st, when the Solstice and Equinox cycle turns and we enter the true realm of Autumn or Fall. Your six journals will cover September, October, November, December, January and February. Autumn/Fall and Winter.

For Southern Hemisphere Readers

If you are in the Southern Hemisphere you will start your ‘sandwich’ from around September 21st, when the Solstice and Equinox cycle turns and we enter the true realm of Spring. Your six journals will cover September, October, November, December, January and February.  Spring and Summer.

Felt-Tip Pens or Textas – Art Shop Pens

Release your right brain hemisphere (creative, visual) by using coloured felt-tip pens, texts and art shop illustrators’ pens. Draw or just colour in. You can also print from your Pinterest space, and then DIY collage for your journal. There are many psychics and astrologers who use Pinterest.

Lists Upon Lists

The left brain hemisphere is more factual and methodical. This is where you can go list mad. The actual contents of the lists can be inspiring, though. Where do you want to go for your next ramble or wild swim? Where do you dream of discovering, next weekend?

Wish For It – See It – Work Towards It

Constructive wishing, practical daydreaming, focussed goal-setting (but with an element of fantasising) – is a proven way to achieve what you really want or need. A list of wishes for the Spring/Summer or Autumn/Fall/Winter season takes vague notions from your mind and makes them seem real. Put them in writing, illustrate them, cut out pictures and glue them in.

Light a Candle

Light a candle and set the mood. Make a time for your journal. Say, sunset every Sunday (or every day). It’s up to you. Burn some incense, shut the door and hang up a Do Not Disturb sign if you have to. Ear plugs can be useful if you live in a noisy space.

Declutter Your Journal

The best way to simplify your life and streamline the months ahead is to declutter your journal. Abandoned plans, wishes you no longer want, ideas that are no longer useful – all can go. Just remove the page in question. That’s the nice thing about making your own journal; you can just pull the paper out.

Adding Memorabilia

You can glue or sticky-tape printed photographs; tickets, Fortune Cookie predictions, invitations and so on. If you have secrets to keep, write them down and put them in an envelope, which you seal and then clip onto a page or stick on with tape.

Dreaming About Your Holidays

We are all travelling more slowly in the Twenties – if we travel at all. Yet, dreaming about your holidays, researching destinations and thinking positively about the future is not breaking any rules. Perhaps it’s time to think about vacations or Grand Tours the way Victorian ladies did. Go maybe once or twice in a lifetime. Take more time. Know, thoroughly, why you are going – where you are going. You may never know if it’s possible but it’s fun to dream. This is not the ‘therapy’ side or the self-help side of a DIY journal so you might want to add an extra booklet to your stash.

Yet, it has to be said, it is in the way of these things, that your Tarot reading can meet you in the middle. Maybe you are dreaming of being in Western Australia. Perhaps your ‘sandwiched’ travel journal will meet your Tarot, astrology and dreams predictions in the middle.

How Dreams, Tarot and Astrology Combine

Over the years, I’ve found readers experimenting with dreams, tarot and astrology – are also experimenting with time and space. Even when you pick just one Tarot card you are entering into a different field. It’s an alternative world, within, and has nothing to do with the usual clock or calendar.

Dreams have that odd distorted quality, don’t they? You close your eyes and a minute has passed on the clock, but in your mind, you have just completed a trek up a mountain that has taken half a day. The non-reality or unreality of dreams works well with astrology.

Astrology pays no attention to ‘straight time’ but is concerned with repetition. Cycles of history show astrology works as it measures themes in our lives, using the symbolic language of the horoscope.

Tarot, Time and Space

Tarot is similar. You are in a different time-space landscape when you work with these cards, particularly if you work with Pamela Colman Smith and Arthur Waite, through their deck. The legacy of the Smith-Waite Tarot comes to us from 1909 but the cards have a power and freshness that makes them seem ever-present.

Blending these three approaches in a journal you make for yourself, taking a season or two (cooler or warmer weather) to work through questions, can change your life. All this is free for you to experiment with, if you’re inside at the moment.

Astrology and Tarot at Jessicaadams.com 

Dreams with Jane Teresa Anderson 

Additional photographs: Hannah Olinger, Unsplash.