It symbolizes a time of transformation and major changes in our lives; a period of metamorphosis and total change.  The 13th Major Arcana card also symbolizes the principle of letting go and moving on.  Death can indicate a total change or transformation, a metamorphosis.  The pressures of the current situation are becoming so strong that you are actually choosing to change things.  The old order needs to be destroyed in order for something new to arise from its ashes.  It may be showing that you are ready for a total change in your life.  You are embracing the experience or transformation and metamorphosis and will gain maximum benefit from it.  The old patterns or situations are being destroyed to make room for something brand new.

I can feel the transformation approach - like Death stalking through a cemetery at midnight.  It is relentless and unavoidable.  I can hide behind masks and hope that by standing still Death will miss me with his scythe, but I know I'm only lying to myself.  Like the ghastly white face on the Modern Medieval card, I've tried to play dead, hoping that by remaining still and repressing my natural instincts I will avoid drawing attention to myself and be able to maintain the status quo.  But the truth is that change is inevitable.  The one thing our ED says that is correct (even if I hate that fact) is that change is good.  It is an opportunity for growth and moving beyond our fears and limitations.  But it is so scary. 

I feel like I'm experiencing growing pains again.  I go through days where I am bouncy, excited and enthusiastic - looking to change the world.  And then there are days that I just want to stand still and let the world pass me buy, never changing.  But I can't do that anymore because the reality is that if I don't adapt to the changes and transformations taking place around me I'll just stagnate.  I'll become like an embalmed corpse or a mummy - making interesting in a historical perspective but without much to offer today.  I refuse to be someone who "used to be someone".  I don't want to be know as the historical artifact in my office.  If I can't find ways to transform my job in my current agency then I need to accept that it is time to release this incarnation and move on to another.  Instead of fearing the unknown maybe it's time to be excited about the future potential.

I think change and transformation frightens me so much because I've experienced quite a lot in my youth and I had no control over it.  My family was constantly moving (for a variety of reasons).  Our apartment was burned to the bricks in a fire and we lost everything.  My father was an alcoholic so you never knew what kind of mood he would be in or who would be sitting in the living room in the morning.  I think as a way to control things as much as I could in my life I resisted change.  I dug in my heels and stubbornly refused to let it happen to me.  Of course the irony is that it happened anyway but in a more subtle, almost sneaky fashion.  So do I want to keep lying to myself and cling to the belief that I haven't changed and nothing in my life ever will?  Or do I want to embrace the possibilities and celebrate the power of transformation?  Do I want to explore my hopes and dreams and try to manifest them in my life?  Hope can be a terrifying thing.  The potential hovers just out of reach, tantalizing and beautiful.  And if I cannot reach it, what then?  Do I allow myself to wallow in the devastation of loss or do I pick myself up and try to find it again; try to make it break through and become reality? 

I'm tired of living in fear and clinging to useless parts of my life.  In some ways I think this is connected to my physical being too.  I can't lose weight because I can't release all those toxins I used to sedate myself.  But I won't need them anymore if I can embrace the concepts represented by Death.  I've survived so many changes in my life, good and bad, but I never tried to focus and guide them.  Isn't it time for me to steer my own course in my life; to be the author of my own story?  Hell yes!!  As David Bowie once sang "I'm going through changes".

Metamorphosis
Surrounded by purple dreams
Scythe slices my soul