Life’s “Tower” Moments
Grief and loss have a way of shaking the foundations of life, much like the Tarot card The Tower. This card symbolizes upheaval, chaos, and destruction—an undoing of what once felt solid and unshakable. These shakeups come unexpectedly, breaking apart the illusions that have kept us trapped. The experience of a Tower moment can be deeply distressing, but if you allow the needed alchemy to take place, the outcome can offer deep relief or liberation to live a truer, freer life. Here I share how I’ve experienced Tower moments in my life, and how I view this card now.
In February 2023, I received a tarot reading where the Tower appeared. At the time, I thought I understood why. My partner and I had just begun our nomadic journey, and I was tangled in stress about housing—Where would we land? Would we find somewhere safe and comfortable? I assumed the Tower was pointing me toward that instability. Instead, just weeks after the reading, our beloved Pomeranian, Foxcat, got sick. When her sudden illness arrived, I realized the truth: those housing worries were surface ripples compared to the tidal wave of losing her.
It’s important to note: Foxcat wasn’t just a dog; she was, as I lovingly told everyone who met her, a mythical creature—part fox, part cat, full of joy, and a being who felt like my daughter. She was the reason I left an abusive relationship years before, and the reason I trusted the man who came after and became my husband. She was my familiar, in witch terms, an extension of my soul. A being you came to this earth plane to guide me.
So of course, when we became nomadic in early 2023, she served as an anchor for me. My husband and I would say to each other, “home is where Foxcat is” as a way to bring comfort as we embarked on this monumental journey of leaving home in D.C. and exploring the U.S. And as if the universe were testing our resilience, just a month and a half into this new chapter, she got sick, and within two weeks, she was gone. Her passing was sudden, devastating, and completely out of alignment with any plan I had for my life.
The Tower moment was the collapse of a foundation I hadn’t even realized I was standing on. How my husband and I related to each other shifted, how every moment of our day shifted. I could barely function at work, and I took more than the “normal” amount of time off to grieve. And yet… something emerged in the wake of that loss… an unexpected gift—a creative project to honor her light.
The Foxcat Project was born from my desire to spread her joy to others, even after her passing. I created stickers of her face with a QR code that linked to her story. The idea was to let her light shine across the world, and it worked. People from the US to Spain to Japan joined in, placing her stickers in places that were meaningful to them.
This project wasn’t just a tribute; it became a way to transform my grief into connection, creativity, and joy. Collaborating with friends who helped design the stickers, build the website, and tell her story became a channel for my pain to move into something beautiful. What I learned through all of this was how to trust the creative energy within me and allow it to come through. I had always called Foxcat my daughter (and she still is), and her loss created the space for a new birth to take place—one that helped me see my own power and trust myself to initiate, to manifest, to bring my creative urges into being just for myself. Not because I had to for work, or because I needed to survive, but simply because the idea came to me and wanted to be born. I had never done something quite this “non-essential” before. Allowing myself to feel the power and joy of creating for its own sake opened a huge portal of potential in me—one that prepared me for another transformation that would arrive nearly 18 months later.
The Tower as Initiation
That reading was not my first encounter with the Tower. By then, I had become much more attuned to the power of the card, though I hadn’t seen it appear again until later. Fast forward a year and a half, I attended a weeklong retreat in Asheville, North Carolina, called Women’s Rites of Passage. The retreat was designed to honor the phases of a woman’s life (punctuated by the menstrual cycle) and to create ritual around transitions from Maiden, Lover, Mother, Crone, and beyond. Without ritual, these transitions can remain unintegrated or incomplete, leaving women to carry the pain of a past phase while only half inhabiting the new one.
My reason for going was simple: to give myself space and time to find the balance I was desperate for. I had been in corporate strategy and client management jobs for nearly two decades, and there was a part of me (really, many parts) that were screaming. This wasn’t balanced. This wasn’t right. I was meant to do more. But the fear of trying something new—of losing the paycheck, health insurance, 401(k), and the other “essentials” of American safety—felt too overwhelming to risk. Still, I longed to see what might happen if I gave myself the time to listen, to explore, and to see if those fears would loosen their grip—or if I would finally receive some sort of vision or guidance that answered the question: What am I here to do, to offer, to be?
Part of the retreat included a vision quest—three days alone in the woods, fasting and listening for guidance. I brought a journal and my tarot deck with me, and on the second day I pulled cards to ask three questions:
What is my power?
What is keeping me from my power?
How do I get to my power?
The card I pulled for the third question was The Tower. I froze. I knew something big was coming, but I didn’t know what. My mind spun with scenarios of what I might lose. They all terrified me, but none had anything to do with my job. After the retreat, I tucked the tarot message away and slipped back into “normal” life. I even found myself saying, “What’s the big deal about feeling out of balance or not doing my soul’s calling? I’m safe, I do good work—what was I even complaining about?”
You can imagine my shock when, just 13 days later, I lost my corporate job. Completely unexpectedly. That rupture hurled me into a months-long process of deconditioning. Piece by piece, I released the belief that I needed the corporate world to be safe. For the first time in 18 years, I gave myself permission to follow what lit my soul on fire. That Tower moment cracked open the possibility of becoming who I truly am—a guide, healer, and now, an IFS coach.
Resilience Through Grief
The Tower’s message mirrored my journey in many ways. Yes, it represents destruction, but also divine intervention and the possibility of rebuilding. Through losing Foxcat and my corporate job, I:
Learned to accept the unexpected with grace, even when my heart resisted.
Discovered the power of alchemizing pain into creativity, allowing sorrow to give birth to art and connection.
Found profound support in community, loved ones.
Learned that endings are not punishments—they are invitations to live more authentically.
Most importantly, I learned that resilience isn’t about bouncing back to who you were before, it’s about allowing the experience to transform you. I wasn’t meant to have Foxcat in my life forever, or even the identity of my corporate job. Losing both required a cycle of grief. And grief taught me that transformation comes not from avoidance, but from staying present with the pain and letting it carve new pathways of meaning. Staying with, is what requires resilience. And like the Tower card itself, resilience is the process of releasing what no longer serves and trusting that the rubble becomes the soil for new foundations.
Staying Present in Your Tower Moments
If you find yourself in the midst of a Tower moment—whether it’s grief, loss, or any upheaval—remember: you don’t have to walk it alone. Let others witness your process, and be willing to witness theirs. That shared vulnerability can become a well of strength. Stay open to mystery, signs, and synchronicities that appear in the chaos—they may carry guidance, comfort, or the reminder that you are not abandoned in your storm.
When the Tower strikes in your own life, try these practices to support your alchemy:
Pause before rebuilding. Let the old truly fall away before rushing to replace it.
For me, this looked like giving myself permission to take more time off from work than what felt “normal” after losing Foxcat. Instead of forcing myself back into routine or pretending I was fine, I let myself sit in the rawness of grief without trying to cover it over.Name what collapsed. Grieving honestly for what was lost helps clear space for what’s next.
I named that what collapsed wasn’t just Foxcat’s presence, but the foundation of “home” we had built around her. She was our anchor in nomadic life, and when she was gone, everything—my daily rhythms, my relationship, even my sense of safety—was altered. Naming that loss allowed me to grieve it fully.Look for sparks. Notice the small moments of creativity, connection, or insight that arise even in the dark. They are seeds.One spark came in the form of the Foxcat Project—an idea that arrived through my grief. Designing stickers, collaborating with friends, and seeing people around the world place them in meaningful places was a spark of joy and connection that grew directly from sorrow.
Trust the cycle. Towers are temporary; what grows afterward can be more aligned with your soul. When I lost my corporate, I could have panicked and scrambled to find another “safe” position. Instead, I allowed myself to see that collapse as part of a larger cycle. Trusting it led me to step into the vocation that is aligned with my soul’s calling.
Grief reshaped how I approach life’s challenges. I’ve learned to surrender to change, to trust the process, and to stay open to the magic that can emerge from even the darkest nights. The Tower may shake your foundations, but it also clears the ground for something more beautiful and truer to grow.
Reflection Prompts for Your Own Tower Moments
What foundation in your life feels like it’s crumbling, and what truth is being revealed beneath it?
How might you honor both the grief of what’s ending and the possibility of what wants to begin?
What sparks of creativity, connection, or inner wisdom are emerging in the rubble?
Who can you invite to witness your Tower moment so that you don’t have to hold it alone?
Take your time with these questions. Let them meet you where you are. The Tower may feel like destruction, but in its ruins you may discover the blueprint for your most authentic life.
And as always, you don’t have to do this alone. Reach out if you want a loving container to explore together.
