End-of-year rituals, a little sadness and a lot of hope.
A 2026 oracle reading for you
Ever since I was a teenager, one of my favourite things to do at this time of year has been to transfer addresses from my old diary to my new one, as part of my end-of-year ritual, but I haven’t been able to do that since my mum died in 2023. There was something so final about writing out a new page of addresses without her name on it, assigning only my dad’s name to their shared home, so my 2024 and 2025 diaries had no address page, and my 2023 diary has lingered near my desk in case addresses were needed.
This year I lit a candle, apologised to my mum’s photo and summoned the courage to do it, noticing as I did the other changes I had not recorded by way of writing down addresses in the intervening years. New addresses were needed after friends’ and relatives’ house moves and a few divorces. Some new arrivals were missing. There were new friends to be added. Other losses to be grieved. Who knew so much of life was contained within a list of those whose home addresses we care to write down? In the end it felt like an honouring of the kind of change and impermanence which underlies any human life. If you have experienced major changes this year, I am sending you love.
Besides the transfer of addresses during the Hush, another beloved part of my annual ritual (besides setting up my diary and deciding on my new notebooks) is to do an oracle card reading for the year. I do two, in fact. One for LIFE and one for WRITING/CREATIVITY.
In a wheel-of-the-year spread, you select cards to sit in the positions of numbers on a clock face, with one guiding card in the centre. I draw the two ‘clocks’ on facing pages at the beginning of my diary, and write down the card names and a summary of their meanings, and then write down the details on the first day of each month for the year ahead. Then I mostly forget about it, but every time I turn the new month page as January gives way to February and so on, and I discover that month’s reading waiting for me, it is a tiny joy, and sometimes a relief, or a comfort.
Last year I shared this for the first time on my Substack, and it was enjoyed by a staggering fifty thousand of you, and I know the monthly reading was a welcome companion for many of us throughout the year, so I thought I’d do it again and share it with you. You can find the double reading below and see how it resonates, but first let me share a little about what I consider oracle cards to be (which is not any kind of divination), and how I use them.
Even though the word ‘oracle’ suggests an all-knowing, all-seeing intelligence, rather than considering oracle cards to offer any kind of fixed fortune-telling/divination power or be the source of any kind of wisdom outside of ourselves, I see them as a mirror of our own inner intelligence. In my experience they seem to amplify our intuition and reassure us that we already have the answers that we seek, often pointing us towards something very specific, that we may already have felt to be true, but perhaps doubted because of our conditioning.
When you use oracle cards in a year-long spread like this, the reading can be an anchor point in a storm. When things feel wild or difficult, the reading can offer guidance on what to hold onto. If a relationship is proving challenging, they can offer some perspective as to what might really be going on. Also, it’s just really interesting.
I don’t know how they work, other than that they do for me, and it is most likely because we all have deeply buried inner wisdom that we are sometimes reluctant to trust, because of what the world has told us. Oracle cards remind us that it is ok to trust that wisdom, and to trust ourselves.
I have used oracle cards in many situations over many years, often when I am trying to make a decision, or facing a new opportunity, or stuck in my writing. I might do a one card reading, or a spread of several cards, and the act of focusing on what the cards say, along with the surprise or delight or intrigue that bubbles up, never fails to get me out of the stuck place.
I am something of a deck collector, with some fifty decks on a small bookshelf in my office. I often pull a card in my writing classes, and in our Live Writing Circles in SoulCircle. On any given day I choose whichever deck seems to be calling to me, and then ask the deck a question. I avoid questions that would have a yes/no answer, and focus instead on open-ended questions, which often begin with things like,
· “What should I/we remember as I/we sit down to write today?”
· “What do I/we need to know at this moment in time?”
· “What should I/we carry with me beyond this point?”
This year I spent ages trying to decide which deck to use, and although I picked up several different ones, I ended up going back to the Inner Compass deck by Neel van Lierop, which offered such good company last year. You can find the two readings laid out below.
For this year’s readings I asked the cards ‘What should we keep in mind as we travel through the year ahead?”‘
I have only shared a little about each year’s guiding card for now, along with the names of the cards for each month, but I have put reminders in my diary for each month ahead, to come back and share more about the upcoming month’s reading on Substack Notes.
Curiously, there are a few cards that appear twice – THE HEALER, GODDAMN, WONDERMENT, THE MESSENGER and THE COMPASS – and both guiding cards for the year have a shared message of lightening up, letting go of trying to force things and opening up to the good things that come your way (and celebrating them!) Sounds good to me.
If the reading resonates, why not make a note of the life and writing/creativity themes in your diary for 2025, and allow yourself to be greeted by them as you turn the page to each new month? On the first of each month I will share the card description on Substack Notes, but it can be equally as fun/powerful to make your own meaning or interpretation of each theme, based on your context.
So here goes for 2026…
THE ‘LIFE’ YEAR
Guiding ‘LIFE’ card for the year: PARTY TIME
To be honest this card was a little bit of a shock to me, as I rarely go to parties and I have a book to write in the first few months of the year, but it immediately gave me a sense of lightness, and I can imagine it will be a constant reminder to lighten up and have more fun, which is very often a good idea.
From the Inner Compass deck guidebook by Neel van Lierop, under ‘Party Time’: “Stop being so serious… Celebrate life… Leave your restrictions and rules behind… Everything is allowed…’
January: HARVEST
February: THE HEALER
March: MONKEY
April: TRUST
May: LOVE
June: TIMING
July: STEP BY STEP
August: GODDAMN
September: WONDERMENT
October: THE MESSENGER
November: THE OBSERVER
December: THE COMPASS
THE ‘WRITING/CREATIVITY’ YEAR
Guiding ‘WRITING/CREATIVITY’ card for the year: OPEN DOORS
In a year when a new manuscript will take me back to Japan and no doubt into some fascinating conversations, I am excited to see where this leads.
From the Inner Compass deck guidebook by Neel van Lierop, under ‘Open Doors’: “Do not try and open doors with sheer willpower, go for the ones that are already ajar. You do not need to struggle to get what belongs to you. When you recognize situations that enter your life effortlessly, without any force or resistance, you can trust that they guide you in the right direction… By experiencing the lightness of being, you get closer to your real self and your real goals. Move with life, like bamboo in the wind.”
January: THE HEALER
February: AUTHENTICITY
March: COMPASSION
April: LETTING GO
May: THE MESSENGER
June: THE ANCHOR
July: WONDERMENT
August: GODDAMN
September: DEEP DOWN
October: THE COMPASS
November: THE OBSERVER
December: STILLNESS
Let me know if these readings resonate with you, and what you hope to invite in for 2026. And if you are a fan of oracle cards, I’d love to know which are your favourite. Why not use a deck to do a year ahead reading of your own?
Much love,
Beth Xx
PS My FREE Winter Writing Sanctuary starts tomorrow. If you haven’t joined yet, feel free to register here. It’s a beautiful, cosy way to cross the threshold of the year.
PPS The penultimate episode of this season of the Calm Christmas Podcast was released yesterday Episode 8 ‘The Deer’s Cry’ is all about treasuring ‘the Hush’ - this in-between time - and includes a beautiful visualisation and a potent journalling question. You can enjoy it on iTunes, Spotify or here on Substack.
Want to write more this year? Upgrade to paid to join my friendly writing community SoulCircle, for year-round inspiration and support, beautiful Live Writing Circles and more, with access to a one-day virtual live writing retreat ‘MOON + SHADOW’ on January 11. Choose Monthly to try it out or Annual to get a lovely discount. You’ll also be able to share your work from the Winter Writing Sanctuary in our SoulChat private discussion space. Come and join!
My mum always used to give me an occasional envelope with money in it to 'treat myself'. I still have one of those (now tattered and much-sellotaped) envelopes with my name written on it in her beautiful, left-handed script. I save small amounts of cash in it throughout the year (my 'cash stash') and thank her when I eventually spend it on something I absolutely do not need but which brings me joy. I cannot yet bear to take her out of my address book. Maybe one day, but it is nine years and counting. Perhaps I need the oracle card which says 'LETTING GO' ...
This is so beautiful, I've struggled so much to delete names in my diary. In fact when my wife passed away i immediately went to the speed dial button for my dad (he's been dead for 10years).
If you do read this Beth I want to enroll on your course dealing with grief. Do you or have you recorded you reading poetry. I listened to your reading of Robert Frosts poem. It's gorgeous