AUTHOR'S NOTE: This technique requires a natal horoscope for the querent; an astrological ephemeris for the year in question; and the Golden Dawn's Chaldean wheel of tarot-card correspondences. (See the graphic below). Due to the necessary preparation, it will not be suitable for most walk-in clients. More than one deck will be needed for this … Continue reading Reading the Signs: An Astro-Tarot Topical Forecasting Method
Tarot Theory
Book, No Book . . . or Pure “Glorp”
AUTHOR'S NOTE: There is endless debate in the online tarot community over whether studying tarot literature is of any value when reading the cards from an entirely intuitive or psychic perspective, or whether it merely impedes fluency. It has come up again on one of the Facebook pages I frequent and, although I've covered it … Continue reading Book, No Book . . . or Pure “Glorp”
Look But Don’t Touch!
AUTHOR'S NOTE: As an old-school tarot reader who expects face-to-face clients to shuffle and cut the deck, I find it amusing that so much fretful angst exists in the online tarot community over the prospect of someone other than ourselves laying hands on our precious cards. The source of this aversion seems to lie in … Continue reading Look But Don’t Touch!
“Future Uncertain, But Certainly Slight”
"Here come the world with the look in its eyeFuture uncertain, but certainly slight"(from Devil Inside by INXS) AUTHOR'S NOTE: Three years ago, when I passed the five-decade mark in the study and practice of divination, I had a major epiphany. I realized that predictive techniques poke their collective nose into the future and bring … Continue reading “Future Uncertain, But Certainly Slight”
Leveraging Reversals
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Over the past few weeks I've offered a handful of spreads that include a fixed series of reversed cards in contradistinction to an equal number of upright cards. The idea is to identify an alternate path to the same objective that is less obvious in nature, symbolic of a detour into an unfamiliar … Continue reading Leveraging Reversals
Dexter and Sinister: The Straight and Crooked Paths
AUTHOR'S NOTE: In classical astrology, planetary motion was tracked in two directions: dexter (toward the right or counterclockwise through the signs) and sinister (toward the left or clockwise through the houses). On a monthly, annual or multi-year basis depending on their orbital speed, the planets traverse the signs in sequential order from Aries at the … Continue reading Dexter and Sinister: The Straight and Crooked Paths
The “Tarot Magic” Invocation Spread: Second Cut
AUTHOR'S NOTE: After reading further into Donald Tyson's Tarot Magic, I decided to add a couple of new features to this spread. Tyson mentions that in traditional evocation, the Triangle of Art is drawn with its apex pointing away from the Circle of Summoning. The idea is that when the aspiration identified as the focus … Continue reading The “Tarot Magic” Invocation Spread: Second Cut
The “Purge of Mars” – A Banishing Sigil
AUTHOR'S NOTE: The premise behind this exercise is that the querent has something he or she would like to eliminate from present and future circumstances - it might be a difficult person or an unpleasant condition. This conjuration applies the cleansing agent of Mars as embodied in the Tower and the four most relevant "Mars" … Continue reading The “Purge of Mars” – A Banishing Sigil
Archetypal Gates and Elemental Focus: A Ritual Matrix and Tarot Spread
AUTHOR'S NOTE: In Tarot Magic, Donald Tyson described a hierarchy of tarot trumps based on a Kabbalistic cosmology that places the Earth at the bottom as fixed and unmoving; the three "Primal Elements" (Water, Air and Fire in ascending order) as the first three increasingly-subtle "spheres" one encounters when rising from the Earth's surface; the … Continue reading Archetypal Gates and Elemental Focus: A Ritual Matrix and Tarot Spread
The “Slice of Life” Structured Pull
AUTHOR'S NOTE: A question frequently posed by beginners to more seasoned tarot readers is "How do you pull the cards for a reading?" It's a legitimate request since the method of delivery determines which cards appear in the spread. I have always followed the advice of Eden Gray in her 1960 book The Tarot Revealed: … Continue reading The “Slice of Life” Structured Pull
Parsifal's Wheel Tarot & Astrology 