I’ve Been Underground. Not Gone.

Megan | Phoenix, AZ Floral Designer | Fleur de Vie Studio

I want to tell you about the moment I hit bank minimums across all of my accounts at the same time.

Not one account. All of them. Same week. Like the universe decided to make a very clear and very dramatic point all at once.

I sat there looking at my phone and I had this split second of pure survival brain…stomach dropped, that cold full-body oh no feeling…and then almost immediately this other part of me kicked in and was like. Okay. We are not spiraling. We are figuring this out. What are we actually looking at here.

That’s kind of how my brain works. The panic arrives and then the fixer shows up about four seconds later and takes over. It’s not that I don’t feel the fear. I feel it completely. I just don’t have a lot of patience for sitting in it when there are things to figure out.

But here’s what was different about this particular moment. I genuinely could not figure it out. Not because I wasn’t trying. Because the situation didn’t have an obvious fix. The slow season wasn’t a problem I could solve my way out of. It was just… happening. And it had been happening since January. And it was now spring. And spring wedding season is supposed to be my busiest time, had come and gone with one event on the books.

ONE.

And I kept waiting for it to make sense and it just didn’t.

The Part Where I Found Out I Was Pregnant and the Universe Apparently Thought That Was Funny

Okay so, it’s late January. Spring season already started, calendar should’ve been fully booked out by now… and badda-bing, I found out I was pregnant.

And I had this moment, like a genuine full stop moment, of being like. “Oh. OHHHH. Okay. So that’s what’s happening. The universe isn’t confused. The universe is doing something very intentional here and I just can’t see the whole picture yet.”

I’m now in my second trimester and looking back on those first few months I can tell you with complete certainty that if I had been fully booked this spring I would not have been able to show up the way my clients deserve. First trimester was not playing around. I was exhausted and sick and my body was running an entire construction project internally and it wanted me to stop moving so much. The slow season covered for me in a way I didn’t even know I needed.

But here’s the thing. Knowing that intellectually and feeling it emotionally are two completely different experiences. I could hold both truths at the same time…okay obviously the universe has something up its sleeve here AND a panicked internal dialogue of I am genuinely terrified and the 3D stuff is real and bills don’t care about spiritual realizations. 

That polarized feeling.. calm yet terrified? Knowing something big is coming and having zero evidence of it in real life yet? That’s a really uncomfortable place to live for months.

So I reorganized everything. Deep cleaned my home and studio in that nesting, every-object-gets-evaluated kind of way. Slow mornings. Family time. Resting when my body said rest instead of fighting against it. Attempting…and I cannot stress the word attempting enough…a three wall Arizona sunset mural in my youngest daughter’s bedroom that has already beaten me twice and will be attempted a third time because I refuse to accept that outcome.

Anyway… I waited…And I watched. And at some point the waiting stopped feeling productive and I started diving back into my spiritual space.

The Spiritual Space and I Have Been Through A Lot Together.

I’ve always been drawn to the mystical magical woo woo side of things. Tarot cards, crystals, candles, moon rituals, spells, 369 methods…you name it, it’s in my realm. 

I should probably explain the tarot cards situation because I know it’s not everyone’s thing and that’s fine, I’m not here to convert anyone.

I’ve been doing tarot and oracle work for a long time. It’s not something I do instead of thinking critically or taking practical action. It’s something I do alongside all of that, as a way of accessing the part of my brain that isn’t in panic mode. Like using a tool to see a different angle on a problem. A way of asking questions I wouldn’t have thought to ask otherwise.

I’m also obsessed with numerology. Number sequences, patterns, the way certain numbers just keep showing up in specific seasons of life…I notice them constantly and I’ve stopped trying to explain it to people who don’t and started just accepting that this is how my brain is wired. I see patterns. I find correlations. I love the moment when something clicks into place.

My husband surprised me with two new card decks for our anniversary: a numerology-based deck that I am kind of obsessed with, and a companion deck to my all-time favorite Prisma Visions deck by James Eads. So I had new tools and a very pressing question and pregnancy pulling me into the spiritual deep end the way it always does. The dreams have been getting vivid. The numbers are showing up louder. Everything feels more connected and signal-y.

I did four separate spreads over the course of a few weeks. And collectively they told me a story that I actually needed to hear.

Spread One: What Is This Slowdown Actually Trying to Reveal?

The first thing I did was change the question I was asking.

I’d been asking things like:

why are there no bookings? and when will this end? and what is wrong? 

And those questions were getting me nowhere because they’re kind of closed. They assume the slow season is a problem to be solved rather than something that might be communicating something.

So instead I asked: what is the slowdown of my business trying to redirect, reveal, or rebalance?

I used a mirror arc spread: two decks at once, three cards on top from the Prisma Visions tarot showing the visible current timeline, and three cards underneath from the Cosma Visions Oracle showing the hidden influences. Past, present, future on top. Hidden past, hidden present, hidden future influences on the bottom.

The past position pulled the Ten of Wands. Burden, responsibility, overburdened, hard work that just kept generating more hard work. And I want to be honest about what that actually looks like in practice because I think a lot of solo creative business owners will recognize it immediately. It’s not just the physical work of designing and installing and sourcing and delivering. It’s the emotional labor of managing client relationships and expectations. It’s the creative labor of coming up with concepts that feel fresh and specific every single time. It’s carrying the financial pressure and the brand identity and the standards and the momentum all at once. It’s being the engine of every single layer of the business simultaneously because there’s no one else inside the machine.

And the thing about Ten of Wands energy is that when you carry everything for long enough, carrying everything stops feeling like a burden and starts feeling like just… who you are. You don’t notice it’s heavy anymore. You just keep walking… Limping and hobbling actually.

The hidden influence underneath the past was The Commander reversed. Leadership exhaustion. Old systems not responding the same way anymore. Loss of the sense of control that used to feel like stability. And those two cards together, the visible past and the hidden past influence, basically said you survived by carrying everything, and that operating system has run out of runway, and your body and your business are delivering that message at the same time.

The present position pulled the Five of Swords. And I initially read this as external conflict but the more I sat with it the more I realized…no. This is internal. This is the mental loop of interpreting slowness as failure. Survival brain scanning for threat, reading every quiet week as confirmation that something is permanently broken, trying to force certainty when certainty genuinely isn’t available yet because the new thing hasn’t formed yet.

Underneath the present card was The Entertainer. Skillful, amusing, audience-dependent, measures value by what there is to gain. And okay. Fine. I see what we’re doing here. Because running a creative business means being on, constantly generating visibility and content and presence and response. And when that channel goes quiet, it doesn’t just affect the business metrics. It affects how you feel about whether you’re worth anything. Whether you’re relevant. Whether anyone is going to remember you exist. That’s an enormous amount of weight to put on a booking calendar.

The future position was The Hermit. I want to say clearly that this did not feel like a bad card here. It felt like intentional withdrawal. Simplification. Searching inward for answers instead of waiting for external validation. Reconnecting to what’s actually true before going back out into the world. The guidebook said don’t worry about the sudden silence and I wrote that phrase down and looked at it for a long time.

The hidden influence underneath the future card was Six of Lotus reversed. The guidebook talked about leaving home, recent independence, change being frightening but moving forward being necessary. And at first I was like, wait what? I’m not leaving home, what does this mean? But the interpretation that landed was not literal. It was about leaving a previous way of operating. A previous container of belonging. Leaving the version of the business that required me to carry everything alone and absorb everything and be constantly available and keep the whole thing alive through sheer effort and output.

Into something different. A version where support comes through structure instead of through constant performance. Where creative energy is protected instead of spent. Where I work in defined rhythms instead of whatever the season demands.

The full arc of that spread: I survived by carrying everything. Right now I’m afraid that slowing down means losing momentum or safety or identity. And a quieter, more sustainable relationship with creativity and work and receiving is trying to emerge.

Spread Two: The Numerology Deck and the Questions I Wasn’t Asking

The numerology deck works differently than a traditional tarot deck. Each card has a number, a message, and a timeframe. I did a five card change spread and asked what changes in my business and life are coming regarding money. The cards in order will represent: The Start, The Path Toward, The Change, The Work, The Results.

The first card I pulled for this spread was a “Now” card, just to orient myself and see what number is currently in my orbit. It was a 2. Representing two days. And it was covered in mushrooms. I’m going to come back to the mushroom thing in a second because it deserves its own section.

The “Start” card for the change spread was a 7. Seven days. The message: are you asking the right questions? Is there a right question? Clear the mind clutter. The knowledge is already in your head’s database, tap in.

And I kind of laughed because yes, I had been asking completely the wrong questions. Where are the clients? Why is this happening to me? What if it’s over? How do I survive this? Those are panic questions. They’re not actually useful. The card was pointing at deeper questions I hadn’t been asking: What am I becoming right now? What version of this business is trying to emerge?What do I already know that I keep refusing to trust? What do I actually want this to feel like going forward?

“The knowledge is already in your head’s database.”  That line specifically. I kept waiting for some outside answer, some revelation from somewhere external, and the card was saying: “Dude, you already have what you need for the next step. Not the whole map. Just the next step.”

The “Path Toward” card was a 4. Four weeks. Plan ahead, map it out, you have the building blocks but need the discipline to use them. This one was important because I had been swinging between two extremes. Either waiting passively for something to change or catastrophizing and wanting to blow everything up and start over. And the 4 energy is neither of those. It’s structured action while releasing obsession with the outcome. Creating containers for the thing trying to arrive. The materials already exist. I am not starting from zero. I may be starting from exhaustion and fear, which feels exactly like zero, but is not the same thing.

The “Change” card was an 8. And the message on this one hit me harder than I expected: Appreciate where you are. Celebrate your achievements. This was a close break. Things could have turned out differently. Don’t get stuck in the could have.

That’s survival energy. That’s the card for the moment when you almost lost faith. Almost gave up. Almost spiraled all the way into it’s over. And the card was saying “yeah but you’re still here. Your perspective is shifting from I failed to I’m in a transition.”

That is a genuinely significant energetic difference even when nothing in the physical reality has changed yet.

The “Work” card was a 2. Two weeks. Moon card, feminine phases, subconscious is trying to speak. Close your eyes and listen.

And because this was in the work position… not the rest position, not the surrender position, the WORK position… it wasn’t just saying feel your feelings and trust the vibes. It was saying actively practice reconnecting to intuition. Don’t abandon structure and don’t abandon your inner knowing, use both at the same time. For a creative entrepreneur this matters because my energy, my creativity, my emotional state, those are not separate from the work. They are the work. 

A floral designer who is running on empty and disconnected from her instincts is not going to produce the same thing as one who is flowing and aligned. I know this. I’ve felt both versions.

The “Results” card was another 7. Seven years. Sow knowledge, spread awareness. Your small idea today will one day grow into a big deal. You’re the only one needing to be convinced.

The 7 at the beginning and the 7 at the end of the spread… I mean come on. If you know anything about how I feel about number patterns appearing in sequences you know I clocked that immediately. And the results card made me think about the blog posts I’d been quietly writing every few days. For SEO, for authority in my industry, and to show up as someone with a clear point of view on floral design and not just pretty pictures. Seeds. Those posts are seeds. A seed is not an emergency cash solution. But a seed is also not nothing. And maybe seven years from now those seeds will have grown into something I can’t fully see yet from here?

The Mushroom Card: The One That Actually Changed How I Was Looking at Everything

Okay. The mushroom card.

The “now” card I pulled at the start of the numerology spread. The number that was currently in my orbit was a 2, and it was covered in little illustrated mushrooms. The message was: Synthesize with your surroundings, adapt to the circumstances. Mushrooms bring balance, break down debris, and provide nutrients to the soil that propel plant growth.

I read that and I just stopped.

Because here’s what mushrooms actually do…and I mean this biologically, not metaphorically, though it works both ways. Mushrooms are the fruiting bodies of mycelium networks. The actual mushroom you see above ground is a tiny visible output of an enormous underground system that has been building for a long time, threading through everything, connecting root systems, passing nutrients between plants, breaking down dead matter and transforming it into something the living things around it can use.

They don’t grow in clean environments. They grow in decomposition. They need the dead stuff. The breakdown is not the problem, the breakdown is the mechanism.

My nervous system had been reading this entire slow season as: everything is dying. The bookings are gone. The momentum is gone. Maybe the business is dying. Maybe I’m losing it. And the card was saying: No dude… Look at this differently. Something is composting. Something is in the breakdown phase that has to happen before the growth phase. There is an underground network doing invisible work right now and you cannot see it from above ground and that is okay because that is how this process works.

Nothing is dying. Something is composting.

I wrote that on a piece of paper and put it somewhere I could see it. Because I needed the reminder more than once.

The other thing mushrooms do, the mycelium network thing, is they connect things that look separate from the surface. Two plants on opposite sides of a garden might be sharing nutrients through an underground fungal network you’d never know was there. Things that look disconnected are often more connected than they appear.

I’ve been underground. Not gone. Underground. And mushrooms eventually fruit above the surface.

Spread Three: The Abundance Spread That Explained Literally Everything

A few days after the first two spreads I did a dedicated abundance spread with three specific questions: what is my current relationship with financial abundance, what can I do to attract more abundance, and what are some unexpected opportunities for prosperity?

Three cards. Prisma Visions deck.

Card one, current relationship with abundance: Four of Wands reversed.

Okay so. Four of Wands upright is one of the most celebratory cards in the deck. It’s homecoming, community, milestones, being welcomed, being chosen, being included in joyful life events. It is quite literally the celebration card. And I am a WEDDING AND EVENT FLORIST.

Reversed, for me, right now: the celebration channel feels blocked. The community connection feels disrupted. The being-chosen-for-joyful-things energy is not flowing. It’s like the party is happening somewhere and I’m not in the room. That is exactly what this season has felt like. And it’s not just financial, when the event calendar goes quiet it doesn’t just hit the bank account. It hits the sense of belonging. The confidence. The feeling of being wanted and relevant and included in people’s most important days.

My relationship with abundance had become almost entirely tied to one channel: event bookings. And when that channel slowed down, it didn’t just slow down the income. It felt like everything.

Card two, what can I do to attract more abundance: Seven of Pentacles reversed.

Seven of Pentacles upright is patience. Tending the garden, waiting for the harvest, evaluating what’s growing and what needs more time. It’s the slow and steady card. And reversed…is just exhaustion with waiting. Questioning whether the effort is worth it. Investing energy in things with really delayed payoffs while needing something more immediate.

The blog posts I’ve been writing are Seven of Pentacles energy. They are slow seeds. Long harvest. SEO takes months to build. Authority takes years. And the reversed card was saying: don’t rely only on slow-growing seeds when you need cash now. Keep planting, because the long game matters, but don’t confuse long-term authority building with immediate abundance attraction. Those are two different strategies and right now you need both running at the same time not just one.

The card was also asking me to look at where I’d been waiting when I could have been asking. Where I’d been hoping someone would find me instead of going to where the people already are. Where I’d been investing energy in things that feel productive but are actually just keeping me busy without moving anything forward.

Card three, unexpected opportunities for prosperity: Three of Chalices.

This one felt like the answer card. Three of Chalices is community, friends, referrals, collaboration, shared celebration, word of mouth, women supporting each other, being seen in a group. Prosperity flowing through connection not through cold outreach.

For a wedding and event florist this is so specific it’s almost funny. The unexpected opportunity for abundance is not a stranger discovering me through a Google search. It’s a friend mentioning my name at a bridal shower. A past client telling their newly engaged coworker about me. A photographer I’ve worked with before reaching out because they need a florist for a shoot. A planner who loved working with me passing my info along. Someone at an event going wait, didn’t you do the flowers for so and so’s wedding?

Money comes through people. Specifically through people who already know and trust my work.

And here’s where the whole spread clicked into one coherent thing.

I’ve been off social media for months. Like, really off. Not a strategic break with a return date. Just gone. And the Four of Wands reversed into Three of Chalices is almost literal when you look at it that way. I stepped out of the celebration ecosystem, I went quiet in all the spaces where my community lives, and then I wondered why the warm referrals slowed down alongside everything else.

Social media is not always where the booking actually happens. But it is often what keeps you in the mental ecosystem of the people who eventually make the booking. It’s ambient presence. It’s people seeing your work on a Tuesday when they don’t need flowers yet and then remembering your name six months later when they do. Or mentioning you to someone who does right now.

I wasn’t doing anything wrong by going quiet. The rest was genuinely needed and the first trimester genuinely required it. But I had also accidentally turned off one of the main ways people remember I exist, and that had real consequences.

The abundance spread didn’t tell me to become an influencer or build a following from scratch or pivot my entire business into content creation. It said “hey, come back into the room. Let people see you. Let them remember you’re here. Let them share you.”

That’s it. That’s the whole thing.

What All Four Spreads Were Actually Saying When You Put Them Together

The through line across everything, every deck, every spread, every card, was not “your business is collapsing.” It was your current operating system is no longer sustainable and something is reorganizing itself whether you cooperate with that or not.

The old operating system:

What’s trying to emerge: protected creative energy, defined working rhythms, fewer moving parts, support that comes through structure instead of through heroic individual effort, receiving without constant performance.

The practical translation of all of that is not spiritual waiting. The cards were not telling me to meditate and manifest and see what happens. They were very specifically pointing at things I could actually do. Stabilize cash first. Follow up on existing relationships before chasing strangers. Simplify the offer, make it easy to say yes to. Come back into visibility in the spaces where my community lives. Let people know I’m here.

My fastest money is not a cold lead from a stranger. It’s the planner I already have a relationship with. The past client who loved the work and might know someone getting married. The vendor network I’ve built over years of doing this. The people who already trust me and just need to be reminded I’m available.

I don’t need to rebuild everything from scratch. I need to come back into the room.

The mushroom card said I’ve been underground doing invisible work. The Hermit said don’t worry about the sudden silence. The Three of Chalices said prosperity comes through people seeing you again. The 7 at the beginning and end of the numerology spread said you already have what you need, you’re just not trusting it yet.

Everything composting eventually fruits above the surface.

I think that’s now.

Where I’m At for Bookings

I have summer 2026 availability open for smaller scale work: intimate events, elopements, styled shoots, smaller celebrations. If something has come up and you’ve been thinking about reaching out, now is a really good time.

November 2026 through all of 2027 is wide open for weddings and events. If you’re planning something for next year, this is absolutely the best window to connect before fall inquiry season picks up and availability tightens.

Can’t wait to see what this new season brings.