Is my truth ‘Truth’?
Now you might be thinking to yourself “but there are times to be honest with people regardless of whether it is comfortable or not”. That compassion and friendship might demand we tell an uncomfortable Truth to someone. Of course there are.

I think that the first question is to ask yourself what kind of permission you have from this person. Do they tell you the truth; have they asked you to do the same? If you have talked about honesty with this person you could assume that you have more permission to bring up difficult topics. If you haven’t talked about honesty with them you might want to before launching into touchy subjects.

The Tower card speaks to me of the dangers you might find along this road. The Tower card is shown being struck by lightning and collapsing, casting out the people who were inside. It is a volatile and fiery card that speaks of the dangers of pride and the breaking down of the ego.

Now telling others what you think is true about them is always a complicated thing. When I have this urge I like to ask myself ‘to what end?’ Is it to help them? To help me? To vent frustration or what? If I find the motivation behind my desire points back to me I try and sort out what I actually need to say. This is a time to go back to using language that owns my experience and stay away from statements about others, especially ones that point the finger towards their failings.

Still there are times when we see something that another person might not see. The question to think about next is what will they get out of having their illusion removed and with what will I give them to replace it. We all have our crutches that we rely on to allow us to get through our lives. Having them removed by others’ words can create a whole spiral that might as easily take a person into despair as encourage them to grow. A good rule of thumb here is that unless you are sure you can replace their crutch with something better leave it alone.

If you look at Crowley’s Tower card a flaming mouth seems to knock the Tower down with its flames. Our mouths and especially our words can build and inspire as much as they can destroy. Sit with your Tower card and meditate on the times that others have shaken your faith in yourself with their words. For those ready to do some deeper deconstruction you might want to also meditate of what faulty blocks might be built into your tower.

Let me end with my favourite quote on friendship from Norman Douglas. “To find a friend one must close one eye - to keep him, two.”

Truth and others
Justice is blind. I find the image of Justice blindfolded is the most honest dispenser of truth. She cannot use her sight to discern the truth but instead must evaluate the information available and render her verdict from there. It illustrates the challenges in being honest with others. The Justice card is given the sign of Libra and represents the balance between Venus and Saturn or Love and Limitation.

I had a client recently bring up their desire to be more honest with the people around them. We spent some time talking about what they meant by that and it came out there were a couple of hidden desires at play. The first was a desire to tell people what this client really felt about them and their actions. The unspoken goal behind this desire to speak ‘honestly’ here was to encourage the people involved to be more in line with what my client wanted them to be like. The tone of the conversation also carried with it the idea that a more accurate way to describe the telling of truth being addressed is ‘brutal honesty.’ My experience of this kind of honesty is that when leveled against those around us it is usually very damaging. The banner of brutal honesty functions to give permission for al kinds of criticism, which usually are untempered by compassion. I know when people start to lay all my faults out in front of me it is rare that I take up that challenge with grace. Instead I, like most people, either withdraw or react in kind.

Criticisms leveled at others under the guise of honesty speak to the Saturnian side of the Justice card. Saturn governs that side of Justice that is can be too cold, calculating or driven by the rules. It is not a question of whether these attempts at honesty are true or not that determines their success it’s the motivation. When we speak without kindness and compassion we can rest assured that it is not the other persons best interests we have in mind but our own.

The second desire of my client was to feel more connected with those around them. The hoped for impact of speaking the truth was not generally to push everyone away, though it might accomplish just that. It was to make people be more able to fulfill the need of my client. It was a call for Love and connection with others. In fact you might say that this person was reaching out looking for others to see their Truth and to interact with them around what was truest and most core to them.

Here we have the other side of the Justice card playing out – the side governed by Venus. We all crave love and connection with others. Being seen by others is often both a desire and a fear. We want to be appreciated yet we fear rejection.

In the Justice card we have two polarities playing out against each other creating the balance. Grab your Justice card and meditate on the fine point of balance found in this card. Keep in mind that if someone tells us only things to make us feel good we know on some level that it is not true and if someone only blasts us with the Truth we won’t stay around too long.