Yesterday, I had my first tarot reading. It was truely amazing. Anyone else have any experience with tarot, etc.?
A friend of mine once read Tarot cards to me. As was to be expected, it was pure and utter crap. Sorry.
Well, as Mistress Cleo says “De Tarot, dem never lie.”
Aw c’mon, Coldy…don’t be so damn cynical alla time. The Tarot’s an impressive intellectual/artistic accomplishment (I make no claims for its powers of foretelling the future). And it’s fun to see how dozens of different designers and artists visualize the Hanged Man or the Seven of Wands.
"…but these exercises are just child’s play compared to the fantastic mental gymnastics revealed by the Tarot.
"Disguised as a deck of cards, the Tarot is really a multi-dimensional textbook of the occult sciences, written in universal picture symbols.
"Even non-believers can put it to good use as a method of improving the memory.
“However, to those with fractured attention spans the Tarot (like everything else in life) will just be a series of dull pasteboard pictures devoid of any meaning.”
– Justin Green; “Visualization and Concentration,” 1973. First appeared in APEX TREASURY OF UNDERGROUND COMICS, QuickFox Press, 1974.
"The Tarot’s an impressive intellectual/artistic accomplishment . . . "
So is plate-spinning; what’s your point? And I’m sure the pitchers ARE awful purty. So are old copies of “Little Nemo in Slumberland.” But I wouldn’t trust those for character analysis or fortune-telling, either.
I’ve done a few Tarot readings in my misspent youth… there was nothing behind mine except my basic grasp of cold reading techniques and, of course, native cunning.
They’re pretty cards, and they’re more fun than most forms of fortune telling. But not as much fun as palmistry, which gave me the chance to hold pretty girls’ hands and tell them they had warm and passionate natures. (No, of course it didn’t work. But I was in my late teens, and would try anything…)
I have a deck of Tarot cards and do readings for fun.
Keep this in mind:
There are 78 cards in the deck(22 Major Arcana and 56 Minor Arcana) with an upside-down card having a different meaning, making 156 possible cards in each position. Each card has somewhere between 5 and 10 possible interpretations, some related and some not. The standard layout, the Celtic Cross has 10 cards in the layout, with three separate cards predicting the future.
My WAG is that by random chance at least 3-4 of the cards in the layout can be correct if the right interpretation is chosen. If the fortuneteller is a good people reader (a requirement for the job) and knows your question, it’s easy enough for her to interpret the congruent cards and skim over or bs her way through the other cards.
Fortune telling is fun, but shouldn’t be taken seriously.
“I stayed up all night playing poker with tarot cards.
I got a full house and four people died.”
– Steven Wright
Mrs. Rastahomie had a Tarot reading at The Bottomless Cup tea room on Dumaine Street in New Orleans. I’ve got the tape right here…
She told her a bunch of things that no one could possibly have known.
[ul]
[li]She said that Mrs. Rastahomie would have a baby within three years, that it would be a boy, and that the boy would be intelligent, creative, and insightful, just like his father. Not to toot my own horn or anything, but I am intelligent, creative, and insightful. Also, we’re pretty sure Mrs. Rastahomie is pregnant. We’re seeing Dr. Albracht, D.O., on Friday for a blood test.[/li][li]The reader spoke at length about me (and I was at a club down the street while this was taking place). The reader said that I am a very creative person and that I do creative projects because they’re “bursting within me.” That is also true; I wrote my book just to get it out of my head.[/li][li]She said that I tend to set up barriers for myself, but that if I could learn to break down those self-imposed barriers I would be very successful.[/li][li]She said that someone would come to my aid to help me along with the process of getting my book published. A few weeks later, a fellow Doper loaned me some money to help me pay my agent’s retainer fee. Thank you, Mr. You-Know-Who-You-Are 
.[/li][/ul]
Mammarasta has had two Tarot readings in New Orleans. Once was over a year ago, when she went there with a man with whom she was having an affair. The reader told her she had two men, one of whom was “safe,” (that would be her husband, my stepfather), and the other who she was drawn to because she like living dangerously. Then she said “It’s him,” and looked right at the Other Man, who was standing about 100 feet away and who hadn’t been with Mammarasta when she asked for her reading :eek.
Needless to say, I’m rather convinced.
[sub]Mammarasta has since broken off her affair, apologized profusely to my step-father, and they’ve patched things up. In case you were wondering.[/sub]
Rastahomie, your New Orleans lady sounds like a modestly talented cold reader. Not having been there, I don’t know how many misses she got or how she managed to weasel clues out of your wife, but that’s their “job.”
A young couple may have a baby within three years? That one’s easy. She has a 50/50 chance on the sex, and who WOULDN’T think her baby was “intelligent, creative, and insightful,” and her husband “a very creative person?” And EVERYONE sets up barriers to their own success.
It’s a clever, entertaining shell game, and some practitioners are better at it than others.
My tarot guy drew Odin as my personality card. He told me that meant that he could safely say I should stop being so judgemental of other people. Pfff. Like I’m going to listen to a guy who reads tea leaves for a living.
(Actually, that’s my idea of a joke)
His reading wasn’t too bad, was reasonably accurate. His conversations with the spirits didn’t go so well, but the cards were ok.
Sidenote - I went in to the reading feeling fine, but came out with a splitting headache. It went away after about an hour. That was weird - I’m not usually prone to headaches these days, and certainly not ones that blow up out of the blue, and then disappear again. I’d be curious to see if this happens again.
Also, rastahomie, very few of those things are in the tarot deck. The deck is very non-specific - it does not have any numbers in it, I’m not even sure it can predict that someone will get pregnant, much less the sex. The best it may say is “fertility” or “a creative child in your future”.
But it’s easy to get that from non-verbal clues:
Reader- There’s a child in your future (querent looks hopeful - must be trying to have a child) the child will come within three years (highly likely unless there’s health problems which are rare) and will be a boy (like Eve said, 50/50 shot)
or
Reader- There’s a child in your future (querent looks doubtful) you must have a close friend or relative that will soon be pregnant(quite likely) (skip to another subject)
And your Mom’s case is even easier - if the reader could see the paramour during the reading, I’ll bet she could see him and your mother interact. A woman with a man acting guilty, defiant and physically close to a man is almost certainly having an affair.
Uh, I’d like to remind everyone the modern tarot deck was initially devised in Italy in the 15th century to play a card game called triumphs, or tarots in French. It wasn’t used for fortune-telling until relatively recently, late 19th century, I believe. So, any mystical properties of divination it may have, cannot be any more reliable, or accurate, than say, throwing sticks, or reading entrails. Perhaps sitcks and entrails would even be more accurate since the initial use of those mediums were specifically designed for use in fortune-telling.
It is also supposed that the four suits of the tarot, as well as the four suits of the now ubiquitous 52-card deck, derive from a 14th century Muslim deck, which in turn may come from the 10th century Chinese. In addition, there are several different decks of tarot cards, as well as several systems of interpretation of each deck, in use today. But the deck Zyada has described is far and away the most common.
Here’s some more poop.
Introduction, Major Arcana and Minor Arcana
And you can even get a free 3-card on-line reading from these guys. Here’s mine after really no concentration on a specific question.
Past - Justice
The encouraging aspects of your situation at the moment have been brought about by fair and just behavior, or by good fortune in legal and business matters. More difficult aspects are likely to be the result of poor judgement or imbalance: it is important that you keep a sense of equilibrium and fair-play in all that you do.
Present - Judgement
This is a good time to bring some aspect of your life to a definite conclusion, and this may be happening with or without your conscious intervention. Take the opportunity to review and learn from your progress up until now, and as the end of one phase implies the start of another, this is a great opportunity for renewal. Judgement can bring rewards for past efforts; but remember, you reap what you sow. You may find that frustrating delays will be cleared up now, and legal matters will be resolved according to merit.
Future - The Empress
You are entering a time of happiness and good fortune in which you will be able to enjoy life materially, romantically or both. You must be careful, though, not to ruin your chances of lasting success through idleness, self-indulgence or possessiveness.
Pretty darn generic stuff; not significantly different from any sun sign column in the classified ads of the newspaper. In fact, I’ll bet a person could simply take these individual card readings, assign them at random to an astrological sign, distribute them to believers in astrology and get as good a positive response from the believers as what’s currently published as a sun-sign reading. Might make an interesting experiment.
And so is Italian Renaissance painting. I like looking at that, too. You might not; so you can sit there quietly while I look at it. Calling it “crap” is not allowed in polite circles.
Again, I don’t claim to be able to do magick tricks with Tarot cards, like pulling bunnies from top hats or parting the Red Sea or raising the dead. But I do claim that they are historically significant and aesthetically interesting. Just look at the stuff Unc dug up in his second-to-last post.
Didja know it’s traditional for Tarot decks to be designed by males, and drawn/painted by females? They don’t “work” unless you mix genders in their creation…
I have a Tarot deck at home… never did do very good readings but I enjoy it for its aesthetic value… I did the cards at the link Uncle Beer put up. I was kinda interesting and surprisingly close but all the same vague.
Past - The Lovers
The encouraging aspects of your situation at the moment have been brought about through strength derived from good relationships with others, or because of difficult choices made in the past. More difficult aspects are likely to be the result of problems with relationships, or the inability to take the tough but correct option. Indecision or poor judgement could be the cause of current difficulties.
Good relationships or difficult choices. Everyone has some good relationships and everyone has bad choices. The last line about indecision or poor judgement… well that fits pretty well because I dropped out of high school for about 3 semesters (year and a half) and I am making it up now but am having problems with my living situation. shrugs Close but very vague, can be taken any way.
Present - Fortune
There is an air of change about you at the moment. This may be the result of a stroke of luck or the fruits of past efforts, but there is good fortune to be enjoyed. Even if the change appears unpromising, you will soon find it to be beneficial. This is not the time to look a gift horse in the mouth.
Air of change about me… well I got a job recently and have been changing for the better I hope. It’s not always nice being as busy as I get sometimes lately but it is beneficial for my spirit at least the volunteering part. Everyone is always looking for good fortune this is just affirming it is there if you grasp it.
Future - Judgement
You are entering a period in which some aspect of your life will come to a conclusion, and this may happen with or without your conscious intervention. You should take the opportunity to review and learn from your progress, and as the end of one phase implies the start of another, it will be a great opportunity for renewal. Judgement can bring rewards for past efforts; but remember, you reap what you sow. You may find that frustrating delays will clear up, and legal matters will be resolved according to merit.
Aspect of my life coming to a conclusion… well I hope to be graduating in the near future and deciding what to do with my life and go from there. The frustrating delay being I should’ve graduated in 2000 rather than 2002 like I will. Everyone has times when things come to an end… every new year brings something new. Delays can only put things off for so long it is reasonable to assume they will clear up shortly.
See? Vague enough to fit anybody… but close enough to make anyone a believer. Though I am not saying there isn’t the possibility that the cards are right. It all depends on the interpreter.
Some decks have a very rich and rigorous system of symbolism to them. Reading becomes less of a Rorschach-blot test, and more like interpreting a poem. This isn’t magical in any way, of course–beyond the sense that any rich interconnected symbol-set is “magical”.
A lot of other decks are simply pretty pictures designed without any study of the history and evolution of the symbolism involved. And many aren’t even that. There’s a lot of crap, and the New Age patter about them is unfortunate.
I recommend this link for anyone willing to take a viewpoint other than “plate spinning” or “Magic(k)al Gateway to Truth and Light.”
I have a beautiful Robin Wood deck that I use all the time. I also have seen a beautiful gold inlayed set of Salvidor Dahli (sp) cards.
A friend of mine who does estate sales found them and framed them.
I am fairly accurate with my readings, and I don’t pry out clues from people. If I am wrong, I am wrong, and I prefer people tell me and not just nod their head and go about their business.
We do have one lady here in town that is not one of the best people to represent tarot reading. She asks for large amounts of money for lighting candles for you. And then you have no idea if she even does it.
When I had my shop it was donation only, and if a candle was needed it was given to the person to light.
BTW the only reason we asked for donation is for the simple fact that when your rent space you have to pay for rent and utilities. Otherwise the exchange of monies cheapens it.
I own a deck of cards, they are pretty pictures and fun for long bus rides.
The way I think of it is this, while the cards themselves turn up whatever, it never hurts to think over aspects of your life. Spending ten minutes or a half hour calmly thinking about what you are doing with yourself is usually going to give you some new insight into yourself or give you a course of action. The cards and the meanings just give you a focus that you would otherwise ignore. (And they are pretty, and a lot less stressful then pondering problems in general.) Basically art induced brainstorming.
I don’t see them as mystic tellers of the future, but they can be useful for fun times and food for thought.
I’m with Coldfire.
Crappity crap crap. With crap on top and a side of crap.
Ginger