Make wishes with 4 aces for New Year

The New Year is a special time for bringing our ideas and wishes to life, for attracting money, love, and victory in matters that refuse to resolve themselves — victory over your enemies!

To everyone who has subscribed to Ukraine's most popular newspaper, "Magic," I offer my own exclusive ritual: with the help of the four aces from a TAROT deck, fulfil your most secret wishes!

In TAROT, any of the four aces among the minor arcana is considered an opportunity to gain new experience. In rare cases it may prove negative, but in the future it will still play an important role. Aces never fall during a reading for no reason; it is always a sign from above, a fortunate gift of fate.

If you have no TAROT cards, I recommend you buy a deck.

Nowadays a huge number of different TAROT cards have appeared — people have invented so many: cat TAROT, door TAROT, butterfly TAROT, countless different TAROT decks — a whole separate article could be written about them. I recommend buying the most ordinary deck: the Universal Rider–Waite TAROT.

If you keep a properly ordered deck in your own home, it will surely bring you luck.

Although, for my ritual, you can manage perfectly well without TAROT if you have none, or cannot buy a deck for whatever reason, or ran out of time.

For the ritual with TAROT cards you will need:

You may perform this ritual at New Year, or at Christmas, or on the first lunar day.

So, an hour before the New Year arrives, withdraw in private and lay out the four aces on the table in this order: the ace of wands, then the ace of swords, followed by the ace of cups and the ace of pentacles.

Before them, set up and light a candle. I used a single ordinary candle bought at the church shop.

Here, of course, it must be said — it would perhaps be more correct to light, before

the ace of wands, a green candle — the idea, buds bursting open;

before the ace of swords, a black or blue one — weapons, air;

before the ace of cups, a red one — love, wine, cheeks flushed with drink; and

before the ace of pentacles, a yellow candle — gold, a golden coin.

But that is my personal opinion. Every TAROT creator coloured their cards as they saw fit, and there is no fixed rule assigning a particular colour or element to a suit. Everyone has their own correspondence of colours and elements to the TAROT suits. So this is purely my view — I believe it would be more correct, since we are performing a rite and relating the cards to our magical ritual.

I performed the rite for the first time using just one candle — and my ritual worked. Next, opposite the ace of wands, on the other side of the candle, place a small potted flower. I used a blackcurrant twig cut specially for rooting; opposite the ace of swords place a kitchen knife; beside the ace of cups set a glass of wine; and beside the ace of pentacles lay a coin.

Now compose and attune yourself to the rite.

Look at all four aces: on the cards you see a hand holding these objects. And beside this hand, on every card, you see a little cloud — no human hand holds them; these are gifts from above!

We see that in this deck the objects on all the cards are held by the right hand — rightly so, for it gives to us. During the rite, we must take the objects from the table with the left hand, for we receive them from the Higher Powers.

Now fix your gaze upon the ace of wands — the chief meaning of this card is the idea, the beginning, power, potential energy, creativity! It is the embodiment of your dream! So let us create.

Cut an equilateral triangle from a sheet of paper and write upon it one dream of yours concerning creativity, work — or conceive a business and describe it — or perhaps you need to conceive a child, or simply need to raise your vitality, improve potency, better your health. Or perhaps you need a promotion at work? All of this belongs to the ace of wands, and when I read TAROT, this is what it speaks of — such is its meaning!

This is what I did: I wrote one wish of mine on each side of the triangle — three times on the little triangular sheet — daydreamed, picturing myself receiving it, holding the twig of large-fruited blackcurrant in my left hand and gazing at the candle before the cards.

Then you may speak these words of my incantation:

"Dailok dailok ot orat nika dailok dailok ot orat"!

Then I pierced the middle of the triangular paper with the blackcurrant cutting, and stood it in a jar of water. When the rite was over, I set the jar on the windowsill — with a rooting aid, succinic acid, added, of course. So the cutting would root, and later I planted it in the garden bed together with the triangular leaf, for the roots that had formed in the jar had attached themselves to it, and I did not want to tear them away lest I damage them — so the leaf had to be planted in the soil too.

You may burn the little leaf as soon as you have finished shaping your wish and read the incantation, and scatter the ashes into a flowerpot. See to it that the plant grows well — water it so it never dries out and by no means perishes or falls ill!

When you are done with the ace of wands, fix your gaze upon the ace of swords.

The chief meaning of this card is decisive action. A paradoxical solution. A chance. The absence of emotion. It is the surgeon's scalpel; it is a weapon!

Take your knife in hand and feel its power. Take a photograph of your enemy, if you need to defeat them, or of the problem — for instance, a court summons. Without a drop of pity, cut it into pieces with the knife, vividly picturing how the problem is resolved, how you triumph — in court, say — or defeat your enemies. How your enemy retreats, or how your debt is forgiven. Like a surgeon, you excise the tumour with the scalpel; you strike off the heads of all your enemies. Skewer the pieces on the knife's point and say:

"Dailok dailok ot orat nika dailok dailok ot orat"!

After the rite is complete, carry the knife outside and stick it hilt-up into the earth, as on the card. Under the open sky, on waste ground. Let it stand there until your whole situation turns for the better.

The chief meaning of this card is falling in love. Strong emotions. Celebration. The intoxication of drink.

Take in your left hand a glass filled with wine or champagne; picture your most secret wish coming true and yourself flooded with true ecstasy. This wish, of course, concerns real love — love for your other half. If you suffer from loneliness, sip the wine and picture your beloved. This card grants us a chance — perhaps the only chance in our lives — when it fills us with love. This card is bound to blood: if you are ill, as you sip the wine, feel yourself growing light-headed from it, your blood and your whole body cleansed of sickness; with the wine, Divine love enters you, warming and healing your body.

"Dailok dailok ot orat nika dailok dailok ot orat"!

Take a coin in your left hand and look closely at this card: you see a star upon the coin — you must draw the same five-pointed star upon your own coin. With a marker or nail polish, whatever you like. Any colour.

Drawn it? Everything is in your hands — a true ace of pentacles!

And the chief meaning of this card is the gift of the gods. Material happiness.

So picture yourself receiving material goods, money, income from all sides — buying everything you desire — holding this coin in your left hand. How your wealth multiplies. How your purse swells with money.

"Dailok dailok ot orat nika dailok dailok ot orat"!

Place the coin in your purse! This coin will draw money to you and multiply your wealth. It is a true ace of pentacles.

Happy New Year to all! May your wishes come true!