nisaba
It's really my night, tonight, isn't it. The last card I drew was the Tower, now I've drawn the Devil, also known as a black hole. I think I'll go to bed. But first -
A dark, traditionally demonic shape that I remember discussing in my look at the Seven Cups crouches in silhouette, a red beachball-sized plasma sphere cupped between his knees. Does he have pretty fairy-wings in marbled reds and yellows patterned like slices of oval agate? No - that is matter and energy being sucked inward. Two pentacles balance on his head: a dark, inverted one in front of a larger light one which has been warped into non-Euclidean geometry by the forces of extreme gravity, and larger, fainter, broken pentacles are hinted at in the gathering chaos behind him. Could the Devil be the inescapable event horizon of the black hole, or even more deep and mysterious, the Singularity at its heart itself, while the swirls around him are being sucked in and spaghettified by the extreme forces?
A black hole is one of the most simple objects in the universe. We think it has an event horizon as if that were some kind of shell or force field; what it actually is, is merely a word to describe the point at which, no matter how much thrust you have, escape is no longer possible from the gravity well of the black hole. No matter how great your machinery and fuel is, once you reach that point you are being sucked at incredible speeds down a gravity well towards a Singularity, a mystery that none will ever observe or understand - pretty much like a god or a devil. You are falling so quickly that you escape light itself, and an observer perched at a safe distance would see the soles of your feet hang still in space as your head and shoulders get stretched out and disappear. This optical illusion is called spaghettification, and I really hope it never happens to me because it sounds painful.
Sometimes in our lives, just sometimes, we are trapped by awe and wonder. Sometimes we glimpse at a distance a tempting Mystery. That Mystery may be sex, it may be the dazzling abilities of our own thoughts, it may be the glitter that alcohol sprinkles in our blood, it may be the allure of vast sums of money or gold-fever, it may even be a covetous envy of a friend's immense Tarot collection! Whatever it is, the Devil tempts us: we see that Singularity, that glittering mystery through the darkness of our own roaring blood, and we go for it.
The advice that I always give with this card is that we need to put the brakes on before we hit the event-horizon. If we do not, we are certainly doomed, compelled by our own actions and the Devil's gravity to be sucked towards the object of our desire that will destroy us. Even before we hit the event horizon the forces on our mind and our body are enormous - only the disciplined will certainly resist and hold themselves back from destruction. the less disciplined will never even realise that they are plunging towards their own doom: they will see the Singularity - be it sex or drugs or rock'n'roll - as the only thing that can save them.
Good night, everybody. Sleep well.
A dark, traditionally demonic shape that I remember discussing in my look at the Seven Cups crouches in silhouette, a red beachball-sized plasma sphere cupped between his knees. Does he have pretty fairy-wings in marbled reds and yellows patterned like slices of oval agate? No - that is matter and energy being sucked inward. Two pentacles balance on his head: a dark, inverted one in front of a larger light one which has been warped into non-Euclidean geometry by the forces of extreme gravity, and larger, fainter, broken pentacles are hinted at in the gathering chaos behind him. Could the Devil be the inescapable event horizon of the black hole, or even more deep and mysterious, the Singularity at its heart itself, while the swirls around him are being sucked in and spaghettified by the extreme forces?
A black hole is one of the most simple objects in the universe. We think it has an event horizon as if that were some kind of shell or force field; what it actually is, is merely a word to describe the point at which, no matter how much thrust you have, escape is no longer possible from the gravity well of the black hole. No matter how great your machinery and fuel is, once you reach that point you are being sucked at incredible speeds down a gravity well towards a Singularity, a mystery that none will ever observe or understand - pretty much like a god or a devil. You are falling so quickly that you escape light itself, and an observer perched at a safe distance would see the soles of your feet hang still in space as your head and shoulders get stretched out and disappear. This optical illusion is called spaghettification, and I really hope it never happens to me because it sounds painful.
Sometimes in our lives, just sometimes, we are trapped by awe and wonder. Sometimes we glimpse at a distance a tempting Mystery. That Mystery may be sex, it may be the dazzling abilities of our own thoughts, it may be the glitter that alcohol sprinkles in our blood, it may be the allure of vast sums of money or gold-fever, it may even be a covetous envy of a friend's immense Tarot collection! Whatever it is, the Devil tempts us: we see that Singularity, that glittering mystery through the darkness of our own roaring blood, and we go for it.
The advice that I always give with this card is that we need to put the brakes on before we hit the event-horizon. If we do not, we are certainly doomed, compelled by our own actions and the Devil's gravity to be sucked towards the object of our desire that will destroy us. Even before we hit the event horizon the forces on our mind and our body are enormous - only the disciplined will certainly resist and hold themselves back from destruction. the less disciplined will never even realise that they are plunging towards their own doom: they will see the Singularity - be it sex or drugs or rock'n'roll - as the only thing that can save them.
Good night, everybody. Sleep well.