If your experience is similar to mine, you've most likely encountered reading situations where the cards drawn are so wildly at variance with the context of the question that you're hard-pressed to meet your professional obligation of giving your sitters something meaningful to work with. As you strive to salvage your credibility, it can seem … Continue reading “Read ‘Em and Weep”
Month: December 2019
Days Like This
As you probably know, I'm not a fan of the one-card daily draw because it's so static; you're stuck with its singular influence since there is little sense of movement or development in it unless you "intuit" such from free-association or your prior experience with the card. (In a previous post I called it the … Continue reading Days Like This
A Tarot de Marseille Two-Deck Comparison Reading
For quite some time I've been intending to use my "Friend or Foe" deck comparison spread with my two Fournier TdM decks, Le Tarot de Marseille and the Spanish Tarot. I finally got around to doing it. First, here is a link to the spread, followed by the reading layout. I prefer not to anthropomorphize … Continue reading A Tarot de Marseille Two-Deck Comparison Reading
The “Trump-Card Interrogation” Spread
This spread is based on the work I did with Alejandro Jodorowsky's list of trump-card questions that I posted yesterday. It is one step above a general life-reading in level of detail and is intended for use when the sitter doesn't have a more personal question to ask of the cards. The spread begins with … Continue reading The “Trump-Card Interrogation” Spread
No Question? No Problem
Most diviners have occasionally encountered sitters who are too shy, nervous or confused to come up with a single question to put to the tarot. My practice has always been to have them concentrate on what they want to know while shuffling the deck in a form of silent communion, although my goal hasn't been … Continue reading No Question? No Problem
Predicting the Future: Prescience or Self-Projection?
There is a strong sentiment among experienced diviners that "fortune-telling" of the flatly predictive variety - while it is not exactly denounced - is an impractical and unreliable pursuit, for a couple of reasons: 1) the future is a moving target and can change regularly based on intervening circumstances not always of our own making … Continue reading Predicting the Future: Prescience or Self-Projection?
The Man Behind the Curtain
In The Wizard of Oz, Frank Morgan as the Wizard thundered at Dorothy and her companions, "Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!" If memory serves (it's been a few years since I read the book), in his "master class" material Paul Fenton-Smith mentions that he treats a reversed card in a tarot … Continue reading The Man Behind the Curtain
The Devil’s Due
A very long time ago when I first began working with the Thoth deck, I encountered the idea that the Devil card brings enormous physical energy and creativity to the subject of a reading (even if Crowley did inevitably characterize it as procreative or at any rate sexual). This seemed like a more useful take … Continue reading The Devil’s Due
Tore Down
Texas bluesman Freddie King once wrote a song titled Tore Down with the refrain "I'm tore down, almost level with the ground." This is a near-perfect expression of the customary take on the Tower card when it appears in a reading: a cautionary glimpse at some kind of calamitous "accident waiting to happen." In my … Continue reading Tore Down
A “Breaking the Chain” Example Reading
This turned out to be a provocative and entertaining spread in actual use. For the topic I chose to examine the causal chain for my admitted "sweet tooth," especially around the holiday season. I purposely selected the Empress as the "Root Card" for my dietary indiscretion: "It's not nice to say 'No' to Mother Nature!"). … Continue reading A “Breaking the Chain” Example Reading
Parsifal's Wheel Tarot & Astrology 