Tarot cards

[1981slater]

Seriously...

What type are "clairvoyants"? beta NF?

What type are their clients? beta ST?

[Mattie]

It's more of why or how a person reads the Tarot is more type indicative. From communities I've witnessed to the people I've run into, I can see how someone would say the Tarot attracts FeNi and NiFe. It boarders on stereotyping, but there's a seed of truth in it all.

I think people who deal with the tarot are typically more spiritually/supernaturally more flexible when it comes to reasoning. I think flexible is the key term... Because you mostly see those of alternative spiritualities (few really part of a religion) using it, though it depends on how they use it. But yeah, I could go on forever about this

[Gilly]

The best way to use tarot cards is as a structured Rorschach test.

[Mattie]

The best way to use tarot cards is as a structured Rorschach test.

In my experience, something like this is very hit or miss. You have people who can't come up with anything, and others who can just shoot off and link things. It's interesting though, I'll have to try when I get my newest deck.

[Gilly]

Well a talented reader knows how to give people the right little "hints," point them in the right direction, be just vague enough but just specific enough to trigger memories and associations, and bring latent assumptions and thought patterns to the forefront.

[Mattie]

Well a talented reader knows how to give people the right little "hints," point them in the right direction, be just vague enough but just specific enough to trigger memories and associations, and bring latent assumptions and thought patterns to the forefront.

But that's like you're thinking for them I'm more interested in the raw impression that person has, being vague and leading them will just be interpreting the reading myself, who needs them to be part of it other than to feel like they are participating? Of course, different methods for different readers, if we were all the same, I'm sure it'd be a rather stagnant if not dead practice.

[iAnnAu]

When I was in high school, a friend gave me a book on runes. I don't know why, but anyway ... in the introduction, Llewellyn (the author) talked about how casting the runes was not going to actually foretell your future; rather the ritual of preparing your question, throwing the bones, then looking up the result was about focusing you conscious and unconscious minds on the problem. When you read the "fortune," it was supposed to give you an alternate framework, to shake you out of the patterns you'd already been using to analyze & solve the question.

I never even owned any runes, but reading that paragraph gave me a new perspective on it and similar practices, from astrology to the I Ching to tarot. I've done some subsequent reading on the tarot, and it's quite a sophisticated system. I don't like when people claim that it can tell you your future, but I don't mind if someone pays money to a principled reader who focuses on drawing the readee out so that the readee can get a new perspective on whatever problem brought them to the reader.

[Gilly]

But that's like you're thinking for them

Well that's the art of the thing: you have to navigate the area between "thinking for them," as you say, and simply stimulating their mind and memory properly with abstract questions to get them to bring more things forward.

I'm more interested in the raw impression that person has, being vague and leading them will just be interpreting the reading myself, who needs them to be part of it other than to feel like they are participating? Of course, different methods for different readers, if we were all the same, I'm sure it'd be a rather stagnant if not dead practice.

Eh, like I said, I think there is a line, a vaguery between simply letting the person look at the card and say what comes to mind, and leading them on, where you can get them to bring things forward and give just enough context so that they will think for themselves, but also be able to bring up things that they wouldn't necessarily have thought of at first glance. A lot of people just aren't reflective enough to just see themselves and their lives in the cards; they need a little push, a little context.

[Mattie]

I never even owned any runes, but reading that paragraph gave me a new perspective on it and similar practices, from astrology to the I Ching to tarot. I've done some subsequent reading on the tarot, and it's quite a sophisticated system. I don't like when people claim that it can tell you your future, but I don't mind if someone pays money to a principled reader who focuses on drawing the readee out so that the readee can get a new perspective on whatever problem brought them to the reader.

I come from this perspective as well. I want to get the subconscious working, find the associations. The only part I do is describe what is going on in the card and show them the links and patterns between the cards, but I want them to create the associations themselves. I find when I'm too involved, it becomes too easy. My NeTi friend likes to remind me I have an easier time reading for friends than other people (always bursts my bubble!).

[munenori2]

I've always had a thing for the Tarot. The first deck I looked through I fell in love with the moon card. It reminded me of all the nights looking up and feeling that restless wild undertow that always seems to rise up when I'm alone in the dark staring at this glowing sign, constantly changing, always repeating in lock step, until there's that slight tremor in my heart, an echo or ripple of understanding, that deep down there's some chaotic, powerful truth that I haven't acknowledged but knowing that it is the me I've held apart from myself. It lurks, it builds, I suppress, it sublimates, trickling into my life anyway in a hundred different facets without any conscious effort because fear makes for strong floodgates. All I really want is Nietzsche's hammer, to blast away what I've spent a lifetime building. For what? Security? Sealing away all my insecurities, weaknesses, flaws, hiding them so that, behind the grandeur of this placid human monument, I might stand on the dry barren riverbed where once great raging rivers flowed. I want to unstop them now, before my arms grow too weary, my mind too complacent, until my spirit fades beyond repair. I want to reach to that other me I see across the night sky that I've held and beheld at such an impossible distance and say, for once, "I am you."

And it turns out this is sort of what the moon is about.

[Cyrano]

I've always had a thing for the Tarot. The first deck I looked through I fell in love with the moon card. It reminded me of all the nights looking up and feeling that restless wild undertow that always seems to rise up when I'm alone in the dark staring at this glowing sign, constantly changing, always repeating in lock step, until there's that slight tremor in my heart, an echo or ripple of understanding, that deep down there's some chaotic, powerful truth that I haven't acknowledged but knowing that it is the me I've held apart from myself. It lurks, it builds, I suppress, it sublimates, trickling into my life anyway in a hundred different facets without any conscious effort because fear makes for strong floodgates. All I really want is Nietzsche's hammer, to blast away what I've spent a lifetime building. For what? Security? Sealing away all my insecurities, weaknesses, flaws, hiding them so that, behind the grandeur of this placid human monument, I might stand on the dry barren riverbed where once great raging rivers flowed. I want to unstop them now, before my arms grow too weary, my mind too complacent, until my spirit fades beyond repair. I want to reach to that other me I see across the night sky that I've held and beheld at such an impossible distance and say, for once, "I am you."

And it turns out this is sort of what the moon is about.

That was beautiful munenori2y. Absolute poetry.

As an _ST_ I don't believe it unless I can see it, so I can't buy the spiritual component. But I do get that a skilled practitioner can use the cards to convey good advice. Those who believe in the Tarot, might be more inclined to listen to the "sprits," than their infallible friends and family.

I had a friend in High School who got married on the advice of their reader. You can guess how that turned out.

"It lurks, it builds, I suppress, it sublimates, trickling into my life anyway in a hundred different facets without any conscious effort because fear makes for strong floodgates. " - Poetry!!

[1981slater]

[wacey]

Would an LSI own tarot cards - as a gift someone gave them? And would they use them if you were a guest in their home?

[marooned]

That was beautiful munenori2y.

and *now* there's actually a 'like' button. you should feel blessed upon your return.

*feels inspired to pull out the old tarot deck and struggle to shuffle the cards*