For Compassion to be effective it must be Discerning and Organized. A negative example at the macro level is when a charity sent powdered milk to a country that had devastating floods. Because all the water was contaminated the powdered milk was useless. The charitable (dis)organization clearly wasn’t paying attention to the needs of the people they believed they were helping.

Up to this point I’ve looked at the Five of Wands as a negative expression of Gevurah—an expression of disorganization. But there have been interpretations of the image in the card as people at the start of a barn-raising—a cooperative activity that is highly organized. And in my book, Tarot and the Gates of Light, I mention that we could also see these men as Morris dancers.

If you’re not British, you’ve probably never heard of a Morris dance. (I’m not British but I am a compendium of odd information) It’s a folk dance that can look rather chaotic but is in fact highly choreographed. And in some towns the custom is that part of the dance includes men with staves striking them against each other in a mock battle. And this is not a far-fetched idea when you consider that Pamela Colman Smith spent a lot of time in the English countryside and was a lover of folk traditions. Even more interesting, the dance was performed on Pentecost!

So this pairing could in fact be seen as a highly organized and discerning group coming together to express compassion in a focused way. It’s as though what looks like chaos in the Five of Wands self-organizes into collaboration in the Six of Wands.

These images could also be a description of democracy at its best and most ideal—where the competing ideas clash in an election and then people come together around the expressed will of the majority.

When I was younger, I budgeted a certain amount of money every year for charitable groups. And I had a long list, so that no one of them really got very much. As time went on, I realized I this was not necessarily as effective in any of these charities. So I spent some time sharpening my goals for helping others and narrowed down the list, enabling me to give enough to do more than just fund the next direct mail effort for contributions.

Today the world is calling out for Compassion that is Organized and Discerning more than ever before. And while this year I am only using the suit of Wands to count publicly, Counting the Omer calls for us to act in all four worlds, so that our soul, intellect, emotions are all united in taking action.

Sections of the prayer we say when Counting the Omer include:

For the sake of the Unification of the Transcendent One with the Immanence of the Shekinah, with presence and awareness, in awe and love to unify the name—yod-heh-vav-heh— in complete unity, in the name of all of those who wrestle with the Divine,—Hineni— Here I am—prepared and ready to perform the mitzvah of Counting the Omer. May the blemish I have caused in the Sephirot of Gevurah in Tiferet, so that I may be purified, and may it rectify and unify our nefesh, ruach, neshamah and yechidah in Divine holiness.

By unifying our heart and soul, body and mind, we do the work of Tikkun Olam, repairing the world. By bringing together the scattered parts of ourselves, we bring unity to the inner Divine feminine and masculine, healing the split in the Divine and in our culture. Acting from this place of unified consciousness, our compassion will be discerning and effective.

What can you do today to bring together your scattered selves into focused compassionate action? What action will you take? Make a vow to complete this action within the week.