AUTHOR'S NOTE: I've written in the past about using the tarot to approach the Astral Plane for the purpose of contacting disembodied spirits, usually deceased relatives. I mentioned that we may not get the party we're after (dear departed Uncle Joe or Aunt Mary may not be near the portal at the time) so we … Continue reading “Spirits Passing By” – A Random Spirit-Contact Spread
Miscellaneous Spreads
Mistaking the “Medium” for the “Message”
AUTHOR'S NOTE. In his 1967 study The Medium Is The Message: An Inventory of Effects, Canadian communication theorist Marshall McLuhan proposed that the medium by which knowledge is transmitted can have an impact in shaping our understanding of the world that goes far beyond the information it conveys. A good case in point is the … Continue reading Mistaking the “Medium” for the “Message”
One Against Nature: A Tarot Self-Critique
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Mystical and spiritual types like to assert that they use tarot solely to tap into their self-awareness and self-improvement potential in the service of personal enlightenment. Fair enough, but going at it completely cold with nothing but the cards to compare ourselves to - no model or set of criteria defining excellence and … Continue reading One Against Nature: A Tarot Self-Critique
Lottery Draw for the Week of March 4, 2024
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I used my new spread for selecting the best day of the week to buy a lottery ticket. This requires removing the court cards and shuffling the rest of the deck to populate the "days of the week" row, left-to-right, then shuffling and laying the court cards left-to-right above them until the chosen … Continue reading Lottery Draw for the Week of March 4, 2024
Lottery-Ticket Tarot for the Win
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I decided to come up with a tarot-based approach for selecting the most favorable day(s) to buy weekly lottery tickets as a way to hopefully improve the probability of success. I don't gamble as a rule because, if I have a 50-50 chance of winning at any game of chance, I lose around … Continue reading Lottery-Ticket Tarot for the Win
Turbatus Somnus* – A Sleep-Cycle Disruption Spread
*Disturbed sleep (I know very little Latin, blame Google Translate) AUTHOR'S NOTE: It's common to ask the tarot "How will my day go?" Here I'm asking "How will my night go?" Insomnia is a subject I haven't tackled before in a tarot spread. I have a mild form of it and the cause is seldom … Continue reading Turbatus Somnus* – A Sleep-Cycle Disruption Spread
A Kid’s Tarot-Reading Game
AUTHOR'S NOTE: I'm always looking for novel ways to read the cards for young people that will get them involved in the process and hold their interest. Here is a board-game motif that invites them to roll a die and move a token on the board to select cards for the reading. It requires a … Continue reading A Kid’s Tarot-Reading Game
“Riddle Me This” – An Astral Exploration Spread
I've seen more than a few online requests for advice and spread suggestions about communication with disembodied entities (spirit guides, ancestors, angelic powers, etc). My personal belief is that our access to such beings is channeled through the Astral Plane, with the inherent risk of self-deception and the psychological peril that traveling the Lunar path … Continue reading “Riddle Me This” – An Astral Exploration Spread
The “What-If?” Alternate Reality Lessons-Learned Spread
Yesterday I came across a question on the r/tarot sub-reddit asking whether we can put "what-if" questions to the tarot. For example, "What would have happened if I had made a different decision than the one that landed me where I am now?" An ideal specific subject might be "Where would I be in life … Continue reading The “What-If?” Alternate Reality Lessons-Learned Spread
An Experiment with Dominoes and Cards
Here is a two-phase spread that uses a normal shuffle and face-down deal of tarot or oracle cards to "set the stage" for the three-card reading and a random draw of dominoes to choose which cards to read. This turned out to be more complex than using dice for the selection step since any number … Continue reading An Experiment with Dominoes and Cards
Parsifal's Wheel Tarot & Astrology 