“The burden of carting your past around has made you weary, Dear One. It’s time to set this burden down. Keep only the lessons and the love, and leave everything else behind. You don’t want it or need it, and now it’s gone.”
In faded gold, our angel stands outside of a black, iron gate — a doorway leading to the past. While she has had the courage to step forward, she gazes over her shoulder to where dark skies swirl with painful memories, still drawn to the place she came from. The tips of her wings and her cloak are coated with the mist of the past. She is so very worried. So very tired. Her burden is not illustrated as a heavy weight atop her shoulders but rather a ragged, phantom dimness that she carries with her. A haze that clips her wings making it impossible for her to soar with joy.
This card is a poignant reminder of the pull that the past has on us and, even when we believe we have moved on, the power that it has to cling to our edges.
Regardless of the nature of your question, receiving this card in a reading is a clear message from the angels that it is time for you to let go of the fears and conflicts and heartbreaks of your past. The challenge is that so many times those memories aren’t pristine. They are tainted by our insecurities and perceptions.
We’ve all been there. Whether we are clinging to the hope that a broken relationship will be healed and he’ll return or beating ourselves up because she left without a word and, in spite of our best efforts, she won’t answer our calls. Walking away from the familiar — even if it’s a painful familiar — is often times more difficult than staying in the place that brings us sadness and confusion. As the saying goes, the past is the “devil that we know” as opposed to the “devil that we don’t” future. Stepping forward, stepping through the strong-hold of the past sometimes takes a courage that we simply don’t feel we can muster.
When we suffer a loss or find ourselves in a situation, often even of our own making, our human tendency is to sit down. To dwell. We think and think and think and think some more. What did I do wrong? Why didn’t it work out? What’s wrong with me? Why wasn’t I right for the job? Why didn’t I …? We sit and question. We watch the swirling skies that still offer no answer.
Sometimes it’s not that poetic. Sometimes it’s simply our own stubbornness that holds us in the past. If we continue to hold-the-fort, surely if we just sit there long enough, what happened will somehow magically convert into an ending that we like so much better than the reality.
Imagine yourself within the gated area. Sitting on a park bench. Watching as the same reel plays out before you time and time and time again. Each time, you relive your pain. With each showing you become sadder or angrier — but always more planted until you can’t imagine ever having either the stamina or the reason to stand let alone walk through that gate toward the unknown.
It is just then that this angel sits down next to you. Softly, gently, with pure love and without judgment she explains that whether your past is one of being a victim or whether your own bad choices have brought about the circumstances, it doesn’t have to be like this tomorrow . Ever kindly she explains that sitting inside of those gates you are likely to repeat the same patterns. Patterns that limit your happiness and prevent your growth. Nothing new ever happens in the past.
Rising, this angel stretches out her hand. She will help you stand; help you walk through whatever dark, iron gates you have. She will stand strong and, with her arm around you, help to steady you as you bravely move forward. She will stay with you and help you to heal.
Letting your past go means a new beginning. Your new beginning.
When this angel card appears in your reading, she comes with a bit of a quick-start instruction card. Some easy to remember directions to keep you from losing your bearings and, in doing so, risk finding yourself back on the bench:
Why would this bench be so comfortable? In some way, it serves a purpose. Does it provide a safe-haven from the present? Does it reinforce your feelings about yourself, your inadequacies? Does it validate and confirm that you were Right about a person or situation? Are you comfortable staying in the past for one reason or a combination of reasons? Knowing the Why will go a long way in helping to clear the mist.
Invite Peace. When the angels say “let go” they mean “let go.” Time for reflection has past. (Pun intended!) Let go of the toxic memories and make a concerted effort to replace them with feelings of peace. It won’t — or probably won’t! — happen in a day, but it will come. The angels will help you to get there. Whenever you feel the urge to revisit the feelings of hurt and upset, ask your angel to rush to your side to take those thoughts from you and to fill you with a peace.
Forgive. One of the most difficult lessons to learn is that you don’t have to understand to forgive. You may never — and probably will never — understand the reasons situations happen or happen as they did. You may never understand even the choices that you made. That’s okay, too. The angels will help you to forgive yourself and others involved. They will help you to find the freedom that only forgiveness brings.
Change Your Routine. Remember, it’s going to be a challenge to change what has become a true routine. You have a well-worn a path of thought. When you change your actions you change your results. Something as simple as driving a different way to the office; adding cream to your usually-black coffee; wearing a color that you rarely if ever wear will sufficiently shift your energy — if only the tiniest bit — enough to nudge you off of where you’ve been stuck. New thoughts give birth to new ways of looking at things. Spend a few minutes each morning with your angels. Ask them to continue to steady you and to present ideas for ways to bring a gentle change into your life and your thought patterns.
The Worst is Behind You. That’s why they call it The Past. That first scary, tentative step that you took through the gate was the most difficult. The next step is easier. Then easier again. As you begin to breathe the air of the present, feel the breeze of the future, each step that you take will lead you to a calmer more uncomplicated you. Gone is the weight and frustration of living in a land where nothing can be fixed or changed. Even the mist that first covered your thoughts — just as it covered the tips of your angel’s wings — will begin to dissipate. You now think with the clear mind of someone who has come through the worst of it, learned your lessons, grew. With the guidance of your angel, you know that you are strong enough to take each new experience, learn from it, treasure it for the lessons that it teaches and let it go. No more are you a prisoner of Past.
Messages from our angels are always powerful and personal. Not everyone hears the message the same way or at the same time. Our angels are ever-patient. They want nothing more than to be the true messengers that they were created to be. They are beings sent to lead and guide and love with the tenderness that we need at exactly the time that we need it most. We are never alone.
Whether a squabble last Tuesday with a co-worker; an angry exchange this morning while navigating traffic on a busy, rainy highway; or a decades-old betrayal that has left you empty and paralyzed with pain, may this week’s angel card give you the encouragement to take your angel’s hand, stand and walk through the gate to a new day. May you begin a journey toward peace. May you hear her whisper, “Let your past go.”
Angel Card Readings are the perfect choice at those times when we feel out of sorts. When we are weary and want the clear and firm but tender counsel that these messengers bring. Seeking the advice and insight from the angelic realm through an angel card reading requires only that you approach your question with sincerity and be open to the direction that the angels wish to give toward resolution. Because they see with perfect clarity, their answers may not seem to make immediate sense. Yet they will. They always, always will.
