Minor Arcana
5 of Water
Clinging to the Past
Osho's Words
These tenses - past, present and future - are not the tenses of time; they are tenses of the mind. That which is no longer before the mind becomes the past. That which is before the mind is the present. And that which is going to be before the mind is the future.
Past is that which is no longer before you.
Future is that which is not yet before You.
And present is that which is before you and is slipping out of your sight. Soon it will be past. If you don't cling to the past, because clinging to the past is absolute stupidity. It is no longer there, so you are crying for spilled milk. What is gone is gone! And don't cling to the present because that is also going and soon it will be past. Don't cling to the future - hopes, imaginations, plans for tomorrow - because tomorrow will become today, will become yesterday. Everything is going to become yesterday.
Everything is going to go out of your hands.
Clinging will imply create misery.
You will have to let go.
Commentary-Reading
The figure pictured in this card is so preoccupied with clutching her box of memories that she has turned her back on the sparkling champagne glass of blessings available here and now. Her nostalgia for the past really makes her a "blockhead", and a beggar besides, as we can see from her patched and ragged clothes. She needn't be a beggar of course, but she is not available to taste the pleasures that offer themselves in the present.
It's time to face up to the fact that the past is gone, and any effort to repeat it is a sure way to stay stuck in the old blueprints that you would have already outgrown if you hadn't been to busy clinging to what you have already been through. Take a deep breath, put the box down, tie it up in a pretty ribbon if you must, and bid it a fond and reverent farewell. Life is passing you by, and you're in danger of becoming and old fossil before your time!
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Commentary and Osho's Words are from the book
Osho Zen Tarot
The Transcendental Game of Zen
© 1994 by Osho International Foundation.
© 2001, 2002, 2003 Lady J's Artistic Creations
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