How do sift through/balance the "superficial divination" culture surrounding Tarot?

[SilverLeaf]

11 hours ago, katrinka said:

Personally, I can't ascribe that level of depth and insight to Mark Ryan, lol. 

 

This is actually really an interesting aside to me. Do you think the quality of the reader/deck "relationship" is pre-ordained by the intent (or perceived spiritual authenticity) of the deck creator? Also, how much of the deck/reader experience is actually influenced by the "author", as I would naively imagine that the illustrator is the predominant influence on how a reader engages and experiences a deck? I'm really curious about people's thoughts on this one, thanks for sparking my curiousity.

[Raggydoll]

Just now, SilverLeaf said:

This is actually really an interesting aside to me. Do you think the quality of the reader/deck "relationship" is pre-ordained by the intent (or perceived spiritual authenticity) of the deck creator? Also, how much of the deck/reader experience is actually influenced by the "author", as I would naively imagine that the illustrator is the predominant influence on how a reader engages and experiences a deck? I'm really curious about people's thoughts on this one, thanks for sparking my curiousity.

I believe it’s the baggage around that particular deck that is the biggest issue here (the way the artist of the original deck - the Greenwood tarot - was treated). Many feel that Mark Ryan behaved very badly. It’s been talked about on many forums and in several threads before but it’s quite off topic here. Do feel free to start a general thread on the question you just posed though. It’s a good one! 

[AJ-ish/Sharyn]

I've been reading since 2007 I think, and have found what you have, many see card reading as they've seen it in B-movies, and are far removed from many forum users who have gone so much deeper into tarot. A booth reading at a fair is basically hit and run unless you can get them to pay enough money and sit still for 30 minutes 🙂 Look up HOLMES posts about his reading experiences each summer at the pow wow.

 

I think that is why I enjoy so much the reading exchanges here with feedback and the 'this is my reading and what I see, what do you see' threads. I learn so much by just reading what other readers see in the same card, by readers who understand what a reading is, whether fortune or future telling or What Do They Need To Know. In readings outside the forum it is usually What Did They Ask. We need to keep that at the forefront of our response. 

 

And I'm glad you've found a deck that resonates. It is a trigger deck on forums and I'm glad that carrion picking hasn't been part of this thread. We each have our favorites and that is all that is important in readings! 

Again welcome, I love to see conversations, they are the lifeblood of forums. 

 

[SilverLeaf]

7 minutes ago, Raggydoll said:

Do feel free to start a general thread on the question you just posed though. It’s a good one! 

I'm very interested in this, so have taken your suggestion, thank you!

[SilverLeaf]

3 minutes ago, AJ-ish/Sharyn said:

Look up HOLMES posts about his reading experiences each summer at the pow wow.

 

Thank you for this, I'll take a look!

[katrinka]

12 minutes ago, SilverLeaf said:

Well, it struck me this morning that THAT might be where the whole things can potentially go off the rails. I've been working (out of ignorance) with a basic framework of: "What does [Sitter/Querent] need to know right now about [Situation/Person of Interest/Relationship of Interest]?"

 

Perhaps that is too unstructured and why the readings are diving beneath the surface?

Is that what sitters are actually asking you? Pardon me if I'm wrong, but it sounds rephrased. 
How would you feel if you asked how much it was going to cost to fix your car, and the mechanic rephrased the question into something vague and started talking about the roots of your issues around money (which may not even be true)? You'd find another mechanic, I'm sure.
"How does he feel about me?" and "What are his intentions?" mean just that. 

 

But, supposing that IS what they actually asked, yes - it's too vague. the situation, person, and relationship are three separate issues.
 

3 minutes ago, SilverLeaf said:

This is actually really an interesting aside to me. Do you think the quality of the reader/deck "relationship" is pre-ordained by the intent (or perceived spiritual authenticity) of the deck creator? Also, how much of the deck/reader experience is actually influenced by the "author", as I would naively imagine that the illustrator is the predominant influence on how a reader engages and experiences a deck? I'm really curious about people's thoughts on this one, thanks for sparking my curiousity.

 

18 minutes ago, Raggydoll said:

I believe it’s the baggage around that particular deck that is the biggest issue here (the way the artist of the original deck - the Greenwood tarot - was treated). Many feel that Mark Ryan behaved very badly. It’s been talked about on many forums and in several threads before but it’s quite off topic here. Do feel free to start a general thread on the question you just posed though. It’s a good one! 

I agree it should be addressed in another thread of its own. I will say here that the illustrator may or may not be the one who decides on the concepts behind the images and how they're expressed. In the case of the Wildwood, I'm inclined to say it's the latter.  

[SilverLeaf]

9 minutes ago, katrinka said:

Is that what sitters are actually asking you? Pardon me if I'm wrong, but it sounds rephrased. 
How would you feel if you asked how much it was going to cost to fix your car, and the mechanic rephrased the question into something vague and started talking about the roots of your issues around money (which may not even be true)? You'd find another mechanic, I'm sure.
"How does he feel about me?" and "What are his intentions?" mean just that. 

 

But, supposing that IS what they actually asked, yes - it's too vague. the situation, person, and relationship are three separate issues.

Most of the times the requests were either quite general or completely unguided, so I supplied the prompt (with the sitter's consent). The "/" marks were intended to indicate that I've been specifying either the situation (I would add the detail of the specifics for each case) OR the Person, OR the relationship, depending on the sitter's interest or particular query. There were two instances where I told the sitter that I didn't feel comfortable doing 3rd-party reads ( e.g. "What does my partner feel about X") and received prior consent to re-phrase as above - for some reason, it just becomes too discombobulating for me to keep track of what in the cards is about the sitter and what is about the 3rd party and what little confidence I have takes a nosedive in these types of readings. I'm interested to see how shifting to more explicit prompts will change the dynamic, I appreciate the insight.

[TheLoracular]

@SilverLeaf

I really enjoy the questions you ask and your thoughts as you type them.  What I love most about TT&F is that it feels like one of the last bastions to civilized conversation about ANYTHING where people can discuss and disagree without mud-slinging.   
 

On 1/5/2021 at 7:27 AM, SilverLeaf said:

Well, it struck me this morning that THAT might be where the whole things can potentially go off the rails. I've been working (out of ignorance) with a basic framework of: "What does [Sitter/Querent] need to know right now about [Situation/Person of Interest/Relationship of Interest]?"

 

Perhaps that is too unstructured and why the readings are diving beneath the surface?

 
Based on my own experiences and what I've read, 80% of querents come to tarot readers to talk about relationships especially romantic relationships.  Back when I had clients (tarot and other) that I talked to weekly, things definitely expanded from there, as our relationship did.  

I don't see anything ignorant about your basic framework.   But I'm going to opinionate for a second about Tarot social media sites and the Wellness Industry.  I will try to keep this soap box short.

Understand that first and foremost, there is tarot as business.   And I have never objected to tarot readers getting paid for their work; I certainly didn't complain when someone gave me $40-$75 at the end of that hour of our time together.  It wasn't excessive for where I worked and how I worked. It was what my friends who were massage therapists and other kinds of one-on-one in your home or mine for 30-60 minute workers charged too.   All of us did some kind of work that was part of "wellness" or  under the "therapy" umbrella for tax purposes 🙂  Some of it was much more spiritual in tone and props than other. 

However, over the recent decades, the Wellness Industry has dumbed down and homogenized and over-hyped and encouraged people to advertise in misleading ways.  It also gives out this message that you -have- to be happy and you can and will be happy if you do this thing, buy this thing, practice this belief while at the same time helping message that people are sick, bad, broken, wrong, fill in the blank...

Querents come to us with not only their actual emotional needs but what they think they need based on this saturation of messaging.   And they believe that if you provide the right service, tarot or other, it will help.

I think for someone who's asking themselves all the questions you are?  This is the perfect time and place for you to just plunge into personal tarot work and explore self-development, spiritual development.  What you will find in even reputable sites are people looking to make $$$ through either the sale of products or services and frankly, I'm personally okay with that so long as they are ethical and I don't choke in annoying, big, quasi-ethical advertisements just trying to navigate around.  

But stick to places like TT&M or watching YouTube videos or reading Medium and blogs to actually "learn" and "share" tarot.   And expect that most querents are going to want to talk about messy love and messy relationships and for them?  That's the deep they need.  For them, it really is deep.  And its not less deep than some of the crap being marketed as spirituality by the Wellness Industry. 🙂   

Edited January 8, 2021 by TheLoracular

[ballerina]

49 minutes ago, TheLoracular said:

@SilverLeaf

I really enjoy the questions you ask and your thoughts as you type them.  What I love most about TT&F is that it feels like one of the last bastions to civilized conversation about ANYTHING where people can discuss and disagree without mud-slinging.   
 

 
Based on my own experiences and what I've read, 80% of querents come to tarot readers to talk about relationships especially romantic relationships.  Back when I had clients (tarot and other) that I talked to weekly, things definitely expanded from there, as our relationship did.  

I don't see anything ignorant about your basic framework.   But I'm going to opinionate for a second about Tarot social media sites and the Wellness Industry.  I will try to keep this soap box short.

Understand that first and foremost, there is tarot as business.   And I have never objected to tarot readers getting paid for their work; I certainly didn't complain when someone gave me $40-$75 at the end of that hour of our time together.  It wasn't excessive for where I worked and how I worked. It was what my friends who were massage therapists and other kinds of one-on-one in your home or mine for 30-60 minute workers charged too.   All of us did some kind of work that was part of "wellness" or  under the "therapy" umbrella for tax purposes 🙂  Some of it was much more spiritual in tone and props than other. 

However, over the recent decades, the Wellness Industry has dumbed down and homogenized and over-hyped and encouraged people to advertise in misleading ways.  It also gives out this message that you -have- to be happy and you can and will be happy if you do this thing, buy this thing, practice this belief while at the same time helping message that people are sick, bad, broken, wrong, fill in the blank...

Querents come to us with not only their actual emotional needs but what they think they need based on this saturation of messaging.   And they believe that if you provide the right service, tarot or other, it will help.

I think for someone who's asking themselves all the questions you are?  This is the perfect time and place for you to just plunge into personal tarot work and explore self-development, spiritual development.  What you will find in even reputable sites are people looking to make $$$ through either the sale of products or services and frankly, I'm personally okay with that so long as they are ethical and I don't choke in annoying, big, quasi-ethical advertisements just trying to navigate around.  

But stick to places like TT&M or watching YouTube videos or reading Medium and blogs to actually "learn" and "share" tarot.   And expect that most querents are going to want to talk about messy love and messy relationships and for them?  That's the deep they need.  For them, it really is deep.  And its not less deep than some of the crap being marketed as spirituality by the Wellness Industry. 🙂   

 

Well said @TheLoracular.  You make some great points and I just happen to agree with all of them.

[geoxena]

On 1/5/2021 at 10:10 AM, SilverLeaf said:

I am more mystified at the disinterest of some sitters to engage with the depth of the answers . . . I guess I have been surprised that some sitter's don't really care, and just want the surface answer. I do feel a sense of loss (judgement perhaps) that stems from the fact that it feels like the sitter is ignoring the real pearls that the Tarot is offering.

 

The "surface" answer, however, may indeed be the real pearl that the querent needs. 

 

At the risk of offending someone, I'll compare what you're saying about tarot reading with sex:  sometimes a quickie is just what we need. 

 

So, yeah, romance novels and romantic movies tell us we should expect way more than that, like staring deeply into each other's eyes, professing our love, connecting with a "soul mate," and so on, y'know, but if someone just wants a quickie with their partner before they start dinner, who's to say there's anything wrong with that? Who's to say that can't be a fulfilling connection for those people in that moment?

 

Life is rich and full and complex and yet simple and superficial all at the same time.  And it all matters. 

 

[And I sincerely hope I haven't offended anyone!]

Edited January 9, 2021 by geoxena

[gregory]

13 hours ago, geoxena said:

 

The "surface" answer, however, may indeed be the real pearl that the querent needs. 

 

 

This, so much. We have a responsibility to answer the querent's question. It's OK to discuss it (there are a few questions I refuse to read on, so I will say so and ask if we can do it another way.) But it's not OK to try and force an in-depth life analysis on someone who just asks what they need to do to pass an exam, or what is behind their father's hostility to their wife.

Edited January 9, 2021 by gregory

[katrinka]

19 hours ago, TheLoracular said:

I don't see anything ignorant about your basic framework.   But I'm going to opinionate for a second about Tarot social media sites and the Wellness Industry.  I will try to keep this soap box short.

 

Ah, the wellness industry. We were warned about that decades ago:

There's a lady who's sure
All that glitters is gold
And she's buying a stairway to heaven
 

I know everybody's heard it too many times. Plant won't even sing it anymore. But it's interesting. Page was immersing himself in Crowley's writings while the rest of the guys were trashing hotel rooms. And the song has some Tarot imagery, it has occult references, and there's some wicked, incisive commentary in it. She's sure "all that glitters is gold" - she totally buys into the sales pitches.

When she gets there she knows

If the stores are all closed
With a word she can get what she came for

See how entitled she is? She's the person who thinks they can purchase perfect enlightenment, and she fully expects people to stop what they're doing or get out of bed and wait on her. She's totally self-absorbed.

There's a sign on the wall
But she wants to be sure 
Cause you know sometimes words have two meanings

That's pure ego on her part. She thinks she's making sure whatever she's buying this time is on the up-and-up. But she's not clever at all:

In a tree by the brook
There's a songbird who sings
"Sometimes all of our thoughts are misgiven"

 

That's straight from the Star. Oddly, not the Thoth Star, but both the RWS and the Conver TdM feature a bird in a tree. In a negative position, it talks about illusions, some destructive error in our perception, having false hopes. The signs (the bird singing) are there, but she's not paying attention. She doesn't want to.

There's a feeling I get
When I look to the west 
And my spirit is crying for leaving
In my thoughts I have seen
Rings of smoke through the trees
And the voices of those who stand looking

The west is where the sun sets. I think it alludes to death here, and an afterlife. Seeing "rings of smoke through the trees" is feeling like there are people beyond what we can see. Spirits. We can't see them, but we can see what might be evidence of them, "rings of smoke through the trees". They can't really interact with us, they only "stand looking." It's interesting that the smoke is circular, i.e.,  without end. The narrator has been thinking about this a lot, yearning. We all hope for some better, nonphysical existence. Not all of us try to buy it, though.

 

And it's whispered that soon
If we all call the tune
Then the piper will lead us to reason
And a new day will dawn

For those who stand long
And the forest will echo with laughter

He just described virtually every religion ever, lol. Faith doesn't cost anything, or it shouldn't. All of this is "whispered", of course. It's not loud, like the new age gurus, megachurch pastors, etc. trying to shear the sheep. ($$$)

If there's a bustle in your hedgerow
Don't be alarmed now
It's just a spring clean for the May Queen
Yes there are two paths you can go by
But in the long run
There's still time to change the road you're on

Here he attributes a "bustle in your hedgerow" to fairies prepping it for the return of Flora. He minimizes it by saying it's "JUST a spring clean." In other words, sometimes things happen that we don't have a "normal" explanation for, but it doesn't do to obsess on them.  Then he says it's not too late to change.

Your head is humming and it won't go
In case you don't know
The piper's calling you to join him
Dear lady can you hear the wind blow?
And did you know
Your stairway lies on the whispering wind

The "piper calling" here is what Joe Campbell used to refer to as "The Call." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero's_journey#The_Call_to_Adventure
The statement that "your head is humming and it won't go" hints at a full-on shamanic crisis. (more on this after the next verse.) "...can you hear the wind blow?" and "your stairway lies on the whispering wind" implies that it's not a material item that you buy, or a service you pay for. It's subtle, and it's everywhere, like the wind.  There's a lot of nature references here: the wind, the hedgerow, the bird. All the wisdom is everywhere, we don't purchase it.

 

And as we wind on down the road
Our shadows taller than our soul
There walks a lady we all know
Who shines white light and wants to show
How everything still turns to gold

I'm reminded of the Black Elk quotes "It is hard to follow one great vision in this world of darkness and of many changing shadows. Among those men get lost" and the more succinct "It is in the darkness of their eyes that men get lost." Our shadows really are "taller than our souls." And they obscure a lot.

 It amazes me that they used the term "white light." White light was much less of A Thing in 1971. The concept existed, but we didn't have "white lighters."

I'm inclined to believe she's gone completely mad here. She didn't listen to the bird or the piper, and she's had a psychotic break. She's walking around insisting that everything still turns to gold, blathering at everybody she encounters. What "lady" shines "white light"? The moon. And the Moon card is about illusion and getting lost in our own shadows.

And if you listen very hard
The tune will come to you at last
When all are one and one is all
To be a rock and not to roll

 

No words needed.

 

(Ooooooh and it makes me wonder - how people can listen to a song for almost 50 years and not comprehend it. It's a fun lyric to ponder. And if you're way into Tolkein, there might be some references to his work, too. Zep was into his stuff.)

 

Quote

Understand that first and foremost, there is tarot as business.

 

Yes. The Wellness model is where the money is right now. It wasn't always the case.
It's a trend, and like all trends, it will pass. 
 

Quote

However, over the recent decades, the Wellness Industry has dumbed down and homogenized and over-hyped and encouraged people to advertise in misleading ways.  It also gives out this message that you -have- to be happy and you can and will be happy if you do this thing, buy this thing, practice this belief while at the same time helping message that people are sick, bad, broken, wrong, fill in the blank...

 

Yep. Stairways.

 

Edited January 9, 2021 by katrinka

[SilverLeaf]

20 hours ago, TheLoracular said:

@SilverLeaf

 And expect that most querents are going to want to talk about messy love and messy relationships and for them?  That's the deep they need.  For them, it really is deep.  And its not less deep than some of the crap being marketed as spirituality by the Wellness Industry. 🙂   

@TheLoracular Thank you for this, pretty much all you said deeply resonated, but this was really useful for me to hear. Thank you.

[SilverLeaf]

2 hours ago, gregory said:

 

This, so much. We have a responsibility to answer the querent's question. It's OK to discuss it (there are a few questions I refuse to read on, so I will say so and ask if we can do it another way.) But it's not OK to try and force an in-depth life analysis on someone who just asks what they need to do to pass an exam, or what is behind their father's hostility to their wife.

I agree, thanks for this perspective @gregory!

[SilverLeaf]

15 hours ago, geoxena said:

 

The "surface" answer, however, may indeed be the real pearl that the querent needs. 

 

At the risk of offending someone, I'll compare what you're saying about tarot reading with sex:  sometimes a quickie is just what we need. 

 

So, yeah, romance novels and romantic movies tell us we should expect way more than that, like staring deeply into each other's eyes, professing our love, connecting with a "soul mate," and so on, y'know, but if someone just wants a quickie with their partner before they start dinner, who's to say there's anything wrong with that? Who's to say that can't be a fulfilling connection for those people in that moment?

 

Life is rich and full and complex and yet simple and superficial all at the same time.  And it all matters. 

 

[And I sincerely hope I haven't offended anyone!]

@geoxena, thank you, a fun example and reinforces the gentle wisdom I've been receiving on this topic from here and elsewhere, much appreciated!

[TheLoracular]

@katrinka

 

6 hours ago, katrinka said:

Ah, the wellness industry. We were warned about that decades ago:

There's a lady who's sure
All that glitters is gold
And she's buying a stairway to heaven

Your post was an amazing read and just left me with a moment of "OH!!!" because I feel like something maybe I knew 20+ years ago but sure had stopped remembering just got smacked into place and now I'm off to listen to that song again and re-read your analysis before I settle into my normal routine.