Category: Meditation

bookmark_borderDeath Tarot & Sacred Symbols Oracle Card

Posted on by savethesavages

The Death card appeared to me twice this week – first it was Death from the Sacred Symbols Oracle deck with the skull and rose at the beginning of this week on Monday, (top left)…

and then last night when I came home from work. I was sitting at my desk talking to a friend on the phone when I randomly pulled the Death card again from my HK tarot deck (bottom right).

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Edit 10/2/19: some people have asked me where I got the HK tarot deck. I got it from Etsy but I don’t think the person is making them anymore. Sorry! I’m guessing it was a bootleg and the person didn’t want to get sued by HK / Sanrio for using their images.

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I had a few other decks on the table so I decided to pull the other Death cards from them for this photo: top right is from the Albano-Waite deck and bottom left is from Camoin / Jodorowsky’s Tarot de Marseille.

The reason why I have all these tarot and oracle decks is because I am learning from them, they guide me throughout the days of the week. I feel better prepared for real life situations (whether I am consciously aware of them or not), and I admire the artwork too. The Tarot is a teacher. I’ve barely been studying the Tarot for only about 4 years now and I guess this is my method of learning; I learned that the same cards tend to come up in different decks. It probably doesn’t make sense to others, but for me it helps me to see comparisons. Consider it a double or triple confirmation. Some decks I use more frequently than others and so they end up sitting on my desk for months.

Reflecting on all the violent events so far this year made me realize even more that Death is and will always be a constant part of our lives. Someone is probably dying right now at this very moment, but we’re not aware because it’s just another day. So we only pay attention to what we see on TV and social media. We cannot dictate to Death who lives and who dies; Death doesn’t care if you’re gay, a person of color, a cop, a rich or poor person or someone of authority…

Death comes for everyone, this is the ultimate truth. Once you strip away all the complex feelings that humans attach to death – grief, sadness, hate, anger and everything in between…

there is just that, the natural part of life. It seems unnatural that a person dies at the hand of another, but at the same time this is and has been the history of human civilization. A person dies, and another one is born. It’s the cycle that keeps on going, no matter how we feel about it. The World Tarot card appeared to me this week too.

Death is certainly the most painful of all teachers. It is the one that is hard to let go of, to get over with and move on from. It’s especially painful for us who are still alive because we’re the ones who have to keep on living and remembering.

My mom passed away 10 years ago from cancer. I feel as if it was only in these last 4 years when the Tarot showed itself to me, that I started to feel like I could live again.

This is not to say that your feelings and emotions are invalid. They are valid and you have a right to feel the way you do. You can grieve and experience all the feels for as long as you need to, this is what it’s like to be human. Just know that this too shall pass, and that you have people that understand what you’re going through.

Where there is death, there is also rebirth, growth, transformation, healing, a new way of seeing things, a different perspective and so much more. The effects of death are far-reaching; peace, love, unity, justice, karma, and other cause and effects can spring from it. It really puts me in awe.

bookmark_borderHow to Add a Custom Background to Your Drawings in Photoshop

Posted on by savethesavages

This is a new marker drawing that I made today. Most of my artwork is usually feminine in nature so I wanted to channel in some masculine energy. I also promised to type up a tutorial so here goes!

Here’s a simple technique that I like to use for my drawings. Beginners new to Photoshop can follow along 🙂

I am using Adobe Photoshop 2015 by the way and the key commands I use are for Mac. Control key is the equivalent of the Command key on a PC.

1. I scan the drawing at 300dpi and it gives me this large TIFF file. You can take a pic with your phone, email it to yourself and download it from there but I find that the resolution isn’t high enough. I could be wrong though, feel free to try it.

2. My scanner software (Image Capture) is kinda janky so when it scans, it gives me a washed out scan. To fix this, I usually hit Command Shift L or Auto Levels in Photoshop. Or I adjust the Levels and Curves until I’m happy with it. In Adobe Photoshop CC 2015, it’s now called Auto Tone in the Image menu.

3. I want to add a cosmic background to the blacked out area of the drawing. It would be good to find a background that’s about the same size of your scanned image. In your layers panel, double click to turn your locked background image to a layer so that it can be edited. It’s going to become Layer 0.

4. Hit W on your keyboard to select the Quick Selection Wand tool, third tool on your toolbar.

5. With your Layer 0 still selected, on your image click the area you want to select and see how much it covers. You will see a selection (some people call it marching ants). If you need to select more additional areas, hold down the Shift key and click another area. The more solid the area is, the better your selection will come out.

6. Now that you have a selection, hit Command Shift I or go to Select menu > Inverse. This changes your selection. You won’t see it until you put a mask on it.

7. With your selection still active and your layer 0 still selected, at the bottom of your layers panel, click the Add Layer Mask tool, third one from the left. This masks or hides the area that you selected.

8. Now you can bring in your cosmic background by dragging the file right into your Photoshop document from wherever it’s located. It will place the file right smack in the front so once you’ve adjusted it to your liking (size and position), hit enter or return; now you can move that cosmic background layer to the bottom of your layer stack.

9. Make sure to hit Command S to save your work! Save often if you’re doing a lot of edits.

10. I like to play with the blending modes in the Layers panel, the tab that says Normal but has a dropdown menu. I added another layer and played with gradients and changed the blending modes on there too.

Endless fun!

If you want to practice with the files I used, you can download them here.

bookmark_borderThe Masonic Influence

Posted on by savethesavages

I just realized that I have a lot of original content that I created for myself to use for social media stuff and really just for the sake of creating and experimenting; for example this one was my old Facebook cover photo from 2013. I always like things to match to the point where I become obsessive over it, like my cover photo and my avatar. What can I say, it’s one of the few things I CAN control.

I used an old drawing that I scanned (the woman with a rose and a skull); I then played around with colors and gradients in Photoshop. For some reason I was drawn to using bright colors, triangular shapes and checkerboards at the time – not really knowing the significance of each. I then created a black square shape, duplicated it and layed it out, grouped them together, flattened them and used the Perspective tool to create the floor. The white part is just one big shape.

I hope to type up a decent tutorial soon on how I create my graphics, so my blog posts can be more useful and have some kind of value to you, the reader.

Here is a good reference of the meaning of the checkerboard in Freemasonry

What is the star of the macrocosm?

In Western occultism and esoteric philosophy, the “star of the macrocosm” is the six-pointed star (hexagram or Seal of Solomon), formed by two interlocked triangles. It symbolizes the vast universe and the absolute, while the five-pointed star (pentagram) represents the microcosm (the human being). [1, 2, 3]
Symbolism and History
  • The Macrocosm vs. Microcosm: Esoteric traditions (noted by figures like Paracelsus, Heinrich Khunrath, and Éliphas Lévi) use the hexagram to represent the great cosmic system () and the pentagram to represent humanity ().
  • Literary Reference: In Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s play Faust, the main character gazes upon the Sign of the Macrocosm to feel a surge of divine connection to nature and the universe.
  • Geometric Design: Often depicted with planetary symbols or the sign of Mercury at its center, surrounded by the interlocking triangles that signify the unity of opposites (heaven and earth, spirit and matter). [3, 4]

Would you like to know more about how the hexagram compares to the pentagram in ritual magic, or are you looking for its appearance in a specific work like Faust?

AI responses may include mistakes.

bookmark_borderDrawing – LOL OMG Occult Girl

Posted on by savethesavages

Colored her over the weekend, still WIP.

Not posting as much & following less people on Instagram in order to draw more. Taking all distractions away (little by little). Doing instead of trying.

Your power lies in the present moment. You can affirm what you want to happen and visualize the outcome.

I’m on my way to manifesting a new reality, whatever that is.

Description: a colored pencil drawing of a naked girl in blue tones. She has the words LOL OMG covering her eyes. There is a pyramid floating behind her head and 5 circles that go from small to large. She has her hands in prayer position and on each side of her is a pentacle (a 5 pointed star enclosed in a circle)  with rays shining out. Inspired by an image of Aleister Crowley where in the photo he was wearing a pyramid shaped hat with the symbol of an eye enclosed within a triangle with rays shining out.

bookmark_borderDrawing – Tektite Unicorn

Posted on by savethesavages

I participated in a tektite guided meditation last night & posted an animated version on Instagram today (something that I just did pretty quickly in Photoshop), so here is a still version. Have I told you that I enjoy making GIFs? Well, now you know 🙂

From Robert Simmon’s Book of Stones: “Tektites carry the energies of a number of extraterrestrial streams of communication and information. These stones, whether they are themselves Meteorites or not, vibrate with high-frequency pulsations which can put one in touch with ETS.”

And that accurately describes what I experienced: I floated from a desert landscape into the night sky, exchanging energy with my star. After that, I traveled further into space and landed in an area that was similar to Superman’s home, Kryptonite. Ice-like and blue, except it wasn’t. I encountered & merged with a being that morphed from a unicorn, to a sea horse, then into a pulsating, wavy, transparent sea slug until it grew larger & became glints of colored light. It was overwhelming that I was literally blinded by the light! Did you get the song reference? Super trippy indeed. Thankful for the experience!

I still want to learn how to animate really well in After Effects, as well as create 3D graphics in Cinema 4D. I really just want to animate my visions. I just want to play, experiment and have fun. There are so many things I want to learn…

so a rough drawing made with office supplies will do for now.

Edit 5/25/26 – here is the animated gif version; I don’t even remember how I did this other than take pictures of the drawing a few times and then maybe added some kind of blur in Photoshop? Gosh, this was 10 years ago.