Category: Mental Health; Tarot Tips | Reading Time: 5 Minutes
You just received a text featuring a sunset emoji and a “Reminder” that “everything happens for a reason,” exactly four hours after your life hit a brick wall.
Your immediate reaction is not a wave of Zen-like gratitude. It is a sudden, violent urge to hurl your phone across the room.
You aren’t a “low-vibration” person for feeling this rage. You are simply reacting to the emotional equivalent of someone spraying cheap, floral air freshener over a pile of rotting garbage.
It doesn’t fix the smell; it just makes the air harder to breathe.
This specific brand of gaslighting has a name: Spiritual Bypassing. It is the act of using spiritual slogans to avoid facing the raw, unresolved reality of human pain.
The “Good Vibes” Trap (John Welwood)
Psychotherapist John Welwood coined the term “Spiritual Bypassing” in the 1980s.
He defined it as using spiritual ideas (like “Love and Awakening“) to sidestep personal issues, emotional wounds, and unfinished developmental tasks.
It is a survival mechanism disguised as enlightenment. It’s the belief that if you just think enough happy thoughts, buy enough crystals, and ignore your trauma, the “darkness” will magically evaporate.
When you slap a “Good Vibes Only” sticker on a wound that needs stitches, you aren’t healing. You are dissociating.
By refusing to acknowledge your grief or anger, you are forcing yourself to sparkle while your foundation is crumbling. This is the fastest route to a nervous system collapse.
Cats Don’t Bypass Reality
Look at the cats in your life.
If a cat is hungry, or if someone accidentally steps on its tail, there is no attempt to “choose joy” or “manifest a positive outcome.”
There is a hiss. There is a scream. There is an immediate, authentic expression of the current reality.
Cats are masters of embodiment because they do not moralize their feelings. They don’t worry that their anger makes them “unspiritual.”
They feel the pain fully. They express it. And then they recover.
Suppressing your suffering to make other people comfortable is not spiritual maturity. It is simply Repression with a glitter filter.
The High Priestess: Holding the Tension
If you want to understand true spiritual sovereignty, look at The High Priestess.
She is the wisest archetype in the deck, and she is notably not wearing a “Good Vibes Only” t-shirt.
She sits on a stone throne between two massive pillars:
- Boaz (Black): The darkness, the mystery, the shadow.
- Jachin (White): The light, the clarity, the structure.
Notice her position. She does not cling to the white pillar while pretending the black one is an optical illusion. She doesn’t try to paint the dark pillar a “friendlier” color.
She sits exactly in the center, holding the space where the two forces meet.
Behind her is a curtain of Pomegranates (the fruit of the Underworld). She knows that wisdom requires visiting the darkness, not avoiding it.
If you only honor the light, you go blind. You become a shallow caricature of a human being. Real wisdom is the ability to sit in the dark without flinching.
You Are Not a Chandelier
True healing requires you to honor the Black Pillar of your experience.
It is okay to not be okay. It is okay to sit in the muck of your own life and admit that things are currently terrible.
Stop trying to cover your cracks with gold paint. Those cracks are exactly where the air gets in.
You are not a chandelier; you do not have to sparkle 24 hours a day to be valuable.
Sometimes, the most spiritual thing you can do is stand in the middle of your own chaos, say “I am miserable right now,” and let that be the honest truth for today.
🔮 What You Need to Understand
The sun will come back eventually, but you do not have to force the sunrise. Honor the darkness while you are in it.
Disclaimer: TarotPaw content is for entertainment and spiritual support only. We are cats, not doctors, lawyer, or financial advisor. This content is not intended to replace professional (medical, legal, or financial) advice, diagnosis, or treatment. If you are in crisis, please contact a professional or call your local emergency services.
