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How will the meeting go today. I am stepping down as music director at my church after Christmas. It will not be well-received. Also, I am requesting that we have a guest organist so that I can be song leader (cantor/singer whatever you want to call it) for the pre-service and Christmas Eve services. Year after year it is becoming too stressful for me to sing and play two back-to-back services, particularly this year since Christmas Eve falls the days after I work a 24 hour shift. On top of all this, I am still getting paid the same rate I was about 7 years ago and they haven't offered any more money. I am not one to beg. I feel taken advantage of. Not too many organist (if any!) are expected to sing and play to lead their congregations... Anyway I prefer not to walk away mad, just to walk away. Again, how will the meeting go. Tarot de la rea 7 of Cups. I am not one to us RWS meanings with TdM. The 7 is the perfect, holy and mysterious number often associated with perfection, finality and endings. The six cups build a path to the seventh cup at the apex, with this top one representing what I think is the meeting coming out "desirable" with flames coming out perhaps after a bit of heated discussion. (Last year they offered a nice stipend for a guest musician.) The question or problem that I will have is paying Keith extra for the service following. I have to make the argument that he needs an additional payment for the church service following the Lessons and Carols--a tremendous amount of music that should not be included in a standard fee. If I look at the card this way, then the seventh card could be seen as a fiery disruption in the flow-path of the six. For my mental health I am prepared to pay him out-of-pocket! Anyway, the meeting is this afternoon at 4, so if you want to add anything or make a prediction you have a few hours...

Welcome back @Rachelcat!

I agree with what you all said about AI decks…. hard and big NO. The art has no personality whatsoever, and I find nothing more MEH than seeking intuitive hints from a robot generated "artwork". For me, I don't have hard and fast rules… it all depends on how the art itself and the whole deck feels to me. But I do have my own irks and quirks in regard to decks: Very soft and watercoloury art - nothing against the art style itself, but in decks it tends to not move me much. I actually have one deck that fits this description (looking at ya, Legend Arthurian), which I love, but I confess I can seldon go by the art alone. I usually need the book (which is very good by the way). Lisa Hunt's decks had this problem for me, even though I wanted to love them! Convoluted and confusing art - my eyesight is a bit crappy so decks in which there is a ton going on in the same card or that have a very detailed art that got shrunk to fit in the palm of my hand aren't really for me. It's what made me give up of the Magickal Botanical Oracle. Manga or Comics-styled art - if the deck's art is too manga-like or reminds me of a Marvel comics, I find that I cannot take it really seriously. The LS Pagan Tarot had this problem for me… actually, most modern witchy decks seem to have this problem. Creepy or horror decks - not big into the theme in general. Decks in which the "people" look like, I dunno, the Nun, the Crooked Man or Slenderman (think Deviant Moon) are… nope. Not into really dark decks either. Note: The Halloween Tarot (love it!) and Vampire decks with decadently gorgeous gothic art NOT included in this category! Erotic decks - it would have to be extremely good taste for me to want one and we all know it's usually a boobfest (as in, ladies a lot more exposed and objectified than gents). This is what I can think of now… THAT SAID, I DO love some decks whose art many people find unappealing, such as the original Mythic Tarot (NOT the Caselli travesty!), the Fergus Hall Tarot, the Wicca Pack, the Grail Tarot, even the Playing Card Oracles… so it's really not about "pretty art" for me. And @Nemia , you should DEFINITELY get the Gummy Bear. It's cute but in an authentic, no BS way, and the booklet is soooo good and detailed! AND it comes in a tin, what else do you need?

AI generated decks. Hard NO. Collage decks that depend more on photoshop skill than artistic skill--NO. I want decks illustrated by an actual HUMAN. One who made efforts and practiced to learn how to draw. I don't mind Ciro Marchetti digital art but that's my limit. As others mentioned I exclude decks that lean too far toward dark and demonic or light and fluffy. Tarot should be balanced. My favorite dark deck [Trionfi della Luna] has such a sense of humor and pathos--it's dark but balanced in its own way. Trendy, cartoony, cutesy, theme decks? NO Allcento Tarot rides that line for me. I find it a bit too cartoonish. And at its heart its a serious deck. People come to me with real problems. I can't imagine reading some cartoonish trendy deck for a person struggling between the marriage their parents arranged vs. the other person they fell in love with. Or someone dealing with an important career decision that involves moving to a different state. Someone wondering about dating again after the death of their spouse. Which begs the question--who are these insipid shallow unbalanced decks even made for? Who would read on a serious question using a cartoon vampire demon cats christmas cheer deck?

Hi crew! This week will be The Brotherhood of Light Authentic Egyptian Tarot Cards. Box says Copyright 1936, Renewed 1964, Distributed U.S. Games Systems, Inc. “Instructions for use in divination may be had in the book The Sacred Tarot by C.C. Zain.” Card backs say The Brotherhood of Light, © Church of Light 1936. Somewhere online I found that the deck was designed by Gloria Beresford. I’m not at all enamored of faux Egyptian anything. I had the lovely trying-to-be-more Egyptian LS version illustrated by Silvana Alasia but let it go. I compromised by keeping her Egyptian Gods Oracle Cards (and making up my own keywords for it). And I’m currently trying to resist the matching Egyptian Sacred Animals Oracle because I have SO MANY animal oracles. But it’s pretty! The original b&w deck is part of (more recent) tarot history, so I’ll give it a try. Quick analysis of astro attributions on the cards: All the majors have unique attributions, definitely not Golden Dawn. Moon and Sun are not moon and sun but are the signs they rule, Cancer and Leo. Swords are earth; coins are air. Courts have sign attributions consistent with elements but not modes. Each 1-9 has two signs and a planet, all according to their elements. 1-3 are cardinal; 4-6 are fixed; 7-9 are mutable. Hs (horsemen) and 10s are the odd men out (instead of more common aces and pages) and are labeled as the four cherubim (lion, bull, man, and eagle). Majors also have transliterated Hebrew letters, starting with 1. Magician, ending with 22. Fool. Interview time! What is your most important characteristic? 4 Scepters, Leo Leo Sun It’s internally consistent. It celebrates a certain time and place in tarot history. It’s itself and is happy for the world to see it as it is. What is your strength? Judgment, Moon It is a higher level of tarot, even if that higher level isn’t all that clear. Your weakness? 5 Swords, Taurus Virgo Mercury It’s confusing but, again, follows its own way. It’s a physical manifestation of very esoteric ideas. What can you teach me? 5 Scepters, Leo Sagittarius Jupiter The deck can teach me to fight for what I know and believe. How can I learn it? Tower, Mars Burn down anything I disagree with. What will be the outcome of our work together? Horseman of Cups, Eagle I will romanticize this example of early esoteric tarot. Ok, we’ll see about all this!

I struggle with 2 aspects of Lenormand in particular Each card has so many meanings. Sometimes I feel at a loss to know which to apply Not catastrophising--and this relates to #1 above. Some of the negative cards--take broom/whip for example--can also have neutral meanings. In some cases broom/whip might be any repetitive motion. Or cleaning your house. In other cases it can be ugly arguments.

Welcome back @Bodhiseed 😀

Thank you, Fire cat! I'm in with the Urban Tarot paired with the Principles to LIve By Tiles this week. In many or most moments these minds are exquisitely coordinated; feelings are essential to thought, thought to feeling. But when passions surge the balance tips: it is the emotional mind that captures the upper hand, swamping the rational mind. ―Daniel Goleman The Six of Swords follows the crisis of the Five; we leave the Island of Unreason and our peace and ease returns. Science is the subtitle of this card because balance is restored (our sanity returns) after the neocortex's hijacking by the amygdala. Emotional swings have been curbed, and problems can now be approached logically and objectively. Contentment is a state of quiet satisfaction and peace that is independent of circumstances. It begins when we accept that challenges and difficulties happen to everyone, including us. Instead of fighting reality, we focus on relaxing our intense emotional response, which can help reinstate clarity. With our mental and emotional balance restored, we can adapt or make changes that are beneficial.

A unique version of Reading Circle for those who would like to work through their collection of decks, participants choose decks from their collections to work with for the week. Some use one deck, others use two or more. Some combine methods: Tarot, non-tarot (e.g. oracle), playing cards, or any other divinatory method is welcome. All we ask is that you use at least one tarot or oracle deck. No collection is too large or too small. The only rules we have are the Tarot, Tea & Me Rules; Be respectful of one other. Please join us! Please post with your choice of deck(s) for the week Chat away about your deck, how you're finding it (or not), etc., it's all up to you Participants may either choose to share their readings here in this discussion thread or opt to have their own journal in the Journals Forum and link it here Yet others may even have an offline journal in paper & pencil/pen form Share as often, as much, or as little as you like. You can drop in and out at any time—reality and life permitting. New to tarot? Long time reader? Come on in! Participants fire cat pickles: Tarot de la Rea Bodhiseed: Urban Tarot paired with the Principles to LIve By Tiles Rachelcat: The Brotherhood of Light Authentic Egyptian Tarot Cards Click here for DOTW 484 (10/12 - 10/18)

This is great! Wings and water: I'm adding "flow" to my list! Thank you!

I DO so agree with you. Also with whoever already said (I'm lazy) decks that pack in too many things from other traditions. There's enough in tarot itself. A deck that prides itself on being "packed with elemental, Hebraic, astrological, Christian and alchemical symbols" - well, I'll collect it, but I won't be using it !

Hello All, I am doing a rare post for me, a general question on the Lenormand System. I will explain a bit further. My go to system is Lenormand. I am fairly well versed on this subject but will always consider myself a student - Lenormand always teaches me something. An example of this was a daily I performed during last week. #7 Snake, #11 Rod/Whip, and #10 Scythe. Not pretty but it is a daily so I wasn’t much worried. #7 confused me as it was a stay-at-home day for me just doing chores and my other hobby. That is when I learned my other hobby was being represented by #7. Long story short, after fighting and reworking and finally ripping the work back to where it could start fresh. Yes, my other passion hobby is knitting. The reading made perfect sense. I enjoy challenging myself to always learn more about the Lenormand System and daily draws are a means for me to do that. Between having to “dial back” the meanings and then answer what is a type of general question to me, it often provides me with some learning. So here is my question; what puzzles you the most with this system ? Let me say timing is tough for many so let’s avoid that answer. I am not asking this to respond and answer your question - in fact I won’t be. I am asking so that I and others can see that there are challenges for all of us and get an idea of what they are. I am also hoping this will highlight areas that I have not given thought to and do need to learn more of. Perhaps the same will happen for you. To give you an example here is my answer “ I sometimes struggle to decide if a card that can represent a person is in fact a person or not.” If at all possible and you have more than one card, technique or spread that puzzles you, try not to duplicate what someone’s already said. I have great hopes that this will prove helpful to more than just myself. Thank you in advance to All who participate in my learning process !

I had an obvious image come to mind, that of airplane wings and the fact that they are constructed in such a way as to flex when moving through bumpy air. They may move up and down, but equilibrium is at a central point that the wings always return to in order to maintain stability in flight. Then something else occurred to me, in relation to the fact that the angel in the RWS image has one foot placed in water. As well as that pointing to the balance of emotional and spiritual elements alongside practical and tangible ones (shown through the angel's other foot still placed on the earth), I thought about the way that water behaves. When faced with an obstacle, it will flow around or over or under, directed to a more extreme position in order to keep moving. Then it will return to it's natural, balanced state of flow following the path of least resistance. Of course, there is also the 'strength' of water to consider, that in its ability to adapt and continue to flow, over time it will erode materials that are harder than it.

I do not like decks where the woman naked, but they show dressed men. If it should be nakedness, both gender should be in the nude.

No colour - is a NO. 🤣 ( I guess I should never say never - one never knows ). I've got to have the joy of bright colour to please my eye. Some types of hard core Horror - H. R. Giger Tarot for instance - where there is no human connection in the characters, just ewwwwwww. - cccccc - creeepyyyyyy. I like urban or contemporary fantasy - but I've never yet found a Vampire deck whose imagery I'm satisfied with. (Magic The Gathering MTG - has some wonderful urban fantasy art and I like the depictions of the vampires there... maybe I'll make up my own oracle deck from a collection of those cards. Except that the size of these cards is a lot smaller, and as I get older I will find squinting at the artwork more annoying). Anthropomorphised animal decks. No. Just like animal owners not bothering to find out how their pets really tick and assuming they have human attributes - this just annoys me to no end. (And @gregory - I'm so sorry for your dog experience. People who say "my dog will never do that" are idiots IMO). Totally abstract art - and if the imagery is JAM PACKED. Too busy for me. Mostly decks without people in them.

Ah, I missed tempering in my list. I especially like flexibility is stronger than rigidity. And I used to cite the middle way all the time, but now I've forgotten more than I ever learned about Buddhism . . . Thanks for the insights!

One of the concepts that I like to return to when thinking about Temperance is the act of tempering in metallurgy. So, using exposure to extremes, in this case high heat and quenching, to change the fundamental nature of something. What was once rigid and unbending is made less hard and brittle through opposing forces, therefore actually making it stronger given it's increased ability to flex and yield. I feel that Temperance can be about consciously choosing the middle way, or it can be about bringing different elements together to create something new. However I also feel that it can be about a new understanding and / or a new way of being through push and pull, a transformation brought about by surviving polarised elements.

+1 I dislike the horror genre in general so I'd never get a deck with that theme. Other dark sujets are also on my exclusion list. I understand the appeal of vampires but I can only deal with hints of that like in Elisabetta Cassari's Solleone deck. Ghosts, aliens, the undead, angels, fairies – I don't get it. They neither populate my reality nor my imagination so I don't feel drawn to decks depicting them. I dislike decks whose only purpose seems to be hammering a current beauty standard into the collective conscious, like the Botan Tarot. Speaking of aesthetics: decks with a narrow colour palette, little or too much contrast and abundant décor (foiling, ornaments) are not my thing.

I'm not a fan of reading with decks that show elemental imagery attributed to different suits than Wands - Fire, Cups - Water, Swords - Air, Pents/Disks - Earth. There is of course nothing wrong with other element systems, like Eudes Picard's. RWS clone decks that look exactly like the format of Coleman-Smith's art but with a Christmas theme, etc. aren't my cuppa. A bit of fun for those who enjoy the theme, and I'm not a grinch about them. As my grandfather used to say when he wasn't impressed, "Those who like it speak highly of it."

Dog decks. I loathe dogs - and please don't tell me how lovely they are; I was bitten as a small child and have feared them with good reason ever since. Two owners who told me (as an adult) that THEIR dogs wouldn't hurt a fly saw their dogs go for me and one of those bit me to the bone. I own the odd exception to this: the 22 Arcani I Cani del Mondo for Il Meneghello. And this one . Sometimes standout art will win out. Angels. Decks with "agendas" - Akashic springs to mind. Ones with colouring so psychedelic they make me go cross-eyed (some of DV';s spring to mind). Any involving Indigo children.....

Interesting. I watched the same Ethony YouTube video this morning. I have to say, I am in almost total agreement with all of her choices! I make a couple of exceptions when it comes to Animal Decks—but they ARE exceptions. I really dislike animal decks that are anthropomorphic ...either dressing the animals up in human clothes (I hate that in real life as well) or assigning them with human-generated stereotypical characteristics ...foxes are sly, etc. I own one cat deck ...only one ...that really does understand cats and the behaviours depicted in the cards are very applicable to classic RWS meanings. It's The Cat's Eye Tarot. I find it usable. One category of decks that I was originally drawn to, but have changed my mind about, are any 'classical artist' decks—decks depicting artwork by famous artists, but compiled into a tarot deck by other designers. I remember delightedly buying the Breugel tarot and the Arthur Rackham tarot, but was disappointed that the artwork chosen for both just didn't reflect the tarot meanings. Nice picture gallery ...but.... I have given both of these decks away, and I don't buy these kinds of decks any more. (Exceptions would be decks that are actually designed to BE tarot decks by the famous artists themselves. Salvator Dali did that. So did Ferenc Pinter ...I just acquired the Pinter deck, and wow. But both of these artists were mindful of tarot when they designed the decks ...at least the major arcana cards.) I am also extremely irritated by any deck that depicts (especially female) figures in ethereally wispy dancer poses. This is horrendously common. Do deck creators think tarot wisdom is all about females floating around, garments flapping, stretching out arms to the sky? Apparently many do. Even a few deck creators whom I like a lot do this occasionally. Ciro Marchetti, is one example. He makes magnificent decks, but there are always a couple of cards that make me gnash my teeth at wasted opportunities. He gives us that magnificently grounded, mischievous Fool in the Tarot Grand Luxe deck (my favourite Fool of all time), but then follows up with a vapidly gorgeous Temperance floating angel, reaching mindlessly to the starry heavens holding two cups. Why? I am not attracted to Manga decks or to Witchy/Halloween-y decks or to 'dark' decks, where every image is either deliberately frightening or downbeat. I'm not actually attracted to any 'theme' decks in general. Nothing wrong with these, but they're not me. In general, the more down-to-earth a deck is, and the richer the interpretive possibilities are from each card, the better I like the deck. I especially love a deck that gives me a new perspective on the RWS cards. Nowadays, THAT is what gets me to buy a new deck. Some new insight into the cards. The Allcento Tarot, and The Everyday Enchantment Tarot are two examples of new decks with new outlooks on the classic RWS cards.

This is lovely! Thank you for all the great ideas. More scientific connections: homeostasis and equilibrium. And of course the pendulum swing. I never connected it to festina lente, but it makes perfect sense.

When I think about Temperance, one of my favourite major arcana, the first thing that comes to my mind is the Baroque emblem representing the virtue. This is how the allegorical representation of La Temperanza appears in Cesare Ripa's influential Iconologia in the 17th century. Vermeer knew Temperance well, and she shows up on a stained glass window in his painting The Glass of Wine, warning the viewer of the dangers of indulging in alcohol consumption. Temperance, like Justice and Fortitude, have strong roots in a Christian ethos that emphasises virtues and warns of vices (which come in neat sets of seven). So these images connect me to this moral system, although obviously the concept has undergone many changes since then. Temperance is closely connected to the ancient Roman principle of festina lente - "hurry slowly". The dolphin symbolises speed of movement, and the anchor immobility. Combining them means "don't rush, don't stand still - keep the balance". In biology, it's the principle of homeostasis, when all our vital functions work perfectly. In order to do so, we move constantly from one activity to the next. We breathe in, we breathe out. While we live, there is no moment of perfect balance, we always have to go on breathing, our blood moves from lung to heart on its way through our bodies. Keeping all the restless movement necessary to enable life in a perfect balance, never doing too much nor too little, is what Temperance teaches us. Don't go overboard, balance feasting with fasting, movement with rest, and don't let your feelings overcome you until you lose control over your actions. Take on the ideas of others, but keep an independent mind. Cultivate your social life, but balance it with alone time. Don't run after the Zeitgeist and don't become fossilised in your thoughts. It sounds so obvious but it's actually really difficult to do. The virtue of steadfastness, balance, thoughtfulness and self-control leads to health, that's the promise of Temperance. And health means that we're in the best possible shape to deal with life's challenges. Keep going, keep a clear head, balance your humours (blood, phlegm, yellow bile, black bile) or your doshas (vata, kapha, pitta). Oh well, this sounds all a bit vague and like the advice an old person might give to a younger, like in Cat Steven's song Father and Son. Maybe that's why some people don't really like Temperance. We all want to live passionately at times, want to go overboard, rush into a relationship or a new habit or a new set of ideas. At other times, we feel like doing nothing, seeing nobody, falling into a black hole. Temperance tells us that we may do so, but the pendulum always has to swing back - we have to let it swing back.