Some thoughts on reading... [Splungeman]

[fire cat pickles]

 Some thoughts on reading...

[Splungeman]

 

"I wanted to just share a little bit about how I've learned to read the cards, with emphasis on where the little details come from and when it is best to be vague. FYI- I use a term I made up called "Glorp" to refer to whatever it is that gives us our information. Some don't like to use "intuition", so that was my solution.

 

"To me, it would seem that the more detailed you get with your reading, the more likely you will be just plain wrong. On the other hand, if you aren't detailed enough and are too vague, then you will just be seen as a fortune cookie or horoscope reader. It would seem that reaching a balance makes for the best reader. Once again, as in so many aspects of life, walking the middle path seems to be the best. My approach is to see the card and its image as the foundation. The information gleaned from the image itself, if spoken aloud to the querent, would make for vague information only. I build upon this based on what has come before in the spread, what has come after, what other details in the card seem to pop out more than others, and any other information that flashes through from the "glorp" superhighway. I continue to build upon this information and be careful to notice when my glorp flow subsides and my concious imagination has taken over. Once this has happened, the reading of that particular card or group of cards is stopped and I then convey to the querent whatever information I gleaned. Sometimes the glorp cuts off immediately or barely flows at all, and the vague meaning is conveyed. Sometimes the glorp continues to flow and provide really detailed information before cutting off. All in all my readings are quite balanced in terms of detail and vagueness. The real challenge is remaining focused and clear of mind, because that imagination loves to jump in and add detail that isn't there."

[fire cat pickles]

After reading through this thread, I guess the question remains for me is, what is the difference between intuition and psychism and glorp?

 

Is there a difference between any of them in your opinion?

 

Personally, I see myself as "sort of" psychic, that is, I most definitely have psychic "flashes." I certainly have them. Clear, images, sounds, smells, thoughts, etc. that are not my own. They often guide my actions and decisions on a regular basis. And they divulge information about life and people in work and in my life. It has taken half my life to trust my intuition and to let it guide me. I am not shy to use either term. 

 

When I read tarot, I use a method that it close to what Splugeman describes, I allow the flow of imagery and information to come and go in front of me and pick out what I feel is pertinent at the moment of the reading.

 

 

Edited February 9 by fire cat pickles

[katrinka]

8 minutes ago, fire cat pickles said:

After reading through this thread, I guess the question remains for me is, what is the difference between intuition and psychism and glorp?

People use the term "intuition" when they mean "psychism", but intuition is knowing something so well that you can make a split second decision without having to consciously think about it.
Psychism is knowing something you couldn't know by normal means.
I'll leave glorp to the glorpers.

[katrinka]

47 minutes ago, fire cat pickles said:

Personally, I see myself as "sort of" psychic, that is, I most definitely have psychic "flashes." I certainly have them. Clear, images, sounds, smells, thoughts, etc. that are not my own. 

Just want to add, I get those too. Phantom aromas, bird calls, things like that. I just have no way of pinning down what they mean until after the fact. Sometimes not ever. I have to wait and see. If I hear the mourning dove, I'll note the time. But I have no clue who died until somebody tells me. So I don't consider myself psychic.

I can get information I wouldn't know otherwise from the cards, but it doesn't line up with psychism. It's all there in black & white, on the table.

[fire cat pickles]

3 hours ago, katrinka said:

People use the term "intuition" when they mean "psychism", but intuition is knowing something so well that you can make a split second decision without having to consciously think about it.
Psychism is knowing something you couldn't know by normal means.
I'll leave glorp to the glorpers.

Ok so this makes sense. Knowing that you should go ahead and fill the gas tank up now instead of later "just because" versus hearing your grandmothers voice saying "fill up the tank now" like a tape recording inside of your ear.

 

2 hours ago, katrinka said:

Just want to add, I get those too. Phantom aromas, bird calls, things like that. I just have no way of pinning down what they mean until after the fact. Sometimes not ever. I have to wait and see. If I hear the mourning dove, I'll note the time. But I have no clue who died until somebody tells me. So I don't consider myself psychic.

I can get information I wouldn't know otherwise from the cards, but it doesn't line up with psychism. It's all there in black & white, on the table.

 

Something to work with, if you want. Maybe you don't. It's scary stuff.

 

And it can be annoying. I can't go into details because of forum rules. But hearing one word comments in people's voices, never directed at me, usually negative, about a third party. Sometimes it's about the person h/erself. A private thought, important. (Damn it I wish I could give an example!). Very difficult to describe. Like a little tape recorder inside of the ear. Not a whisper... Like when someone walks by and says something to you that they only want you to hear, but they aren't standing next to you but across the room. It normally happens in times of stress (theirs, not mine 😉) and when the information is most needed. It's happened a few times on stressful medical calls or at work when a coworker was sick. 

 

Of course the same thing happens during readings. These are the "glorp" words I lean on.

 

 

Edited February 9 by fire cat pickles

[katrinka]

1 hour ago, fire cat pickles said:

Ok so this makes sense. Knowing that you should go ahead and fill the gas tank up now instead of later "just because" versus hearing your grandmothers voice saying "fill up the tank now" like a tape recording inside of your ear.

Yeah. Intuition is instinct.
Reading just the sample text in this book paints a clear picture. The closed window, turning the music up, rummaging in the kitchen for a knife...Kelly knew he intended to kill her, and she got out. The whole book is worth reading, but that bit explains a lot about intuition. It has mundane explanations. Hearing a deceased person telling you to do something doesn't.
 

1 hour ago, fire cat pickles said:

Something to work with, if you want. Maybe you don't. It's scary stuff.

It can be reassuring, too, though. I was wondering about death once and out of nowhere I heard a deceased friend say "It's nice, you're gonna like it." I'm guessing that the time just prior to death can be horribly painful, but the actual dying is going to be OK.

I don't know if it was really him or just part of my brain doing that. Or maybe that's not even the question. Maybe it's like the Buddhists say: Everything is Mind. In any case, it felt real.

 

I don't try to work with it. It's not something that's on tap, and I don't think I can make it be on tap. I just let it happen when it happens. I don't push.
 

1 hour ago, fire cat pickles said:

It's happened a few times on stressful medical calls or at work when a coworker was sick. 

When my daughter was very little, I took her to the ER with a high fever. I didn't hear anything, but I felt a presence there. It was strong. It felt like a good being, but I got the impression it would have taken her if she wanted to go. Medical emergencies have a lot of occurrences like that.

Hospice nurses have a LOT of stories to tell. The title is clickbait but the information is good.
 

 

Edited February 10 by katrinka

[JoyousGirl]

Going by the above there's multiple faculties and types of 'connections' taking place.

I will say all mediums are psychic but not all psychics are mediums. Mediums communicate with the deceased, in whichever 'clair' they're tuned into.

 

Psychics will generally specialise in one or more clairs (clairvoyance, clairaudience, clairgustation tastes etc) but don't connect with the dead. 

 

I was reading something the other day about intuition - not sure where - but it was as though all the experiences, places we've visited, education, history, news stories, books we've read, all work together to give us knowledge about the trajectory of a situation. So at the risk of putting something into words it's a sort of network of knowings that coalesce into one stream to give us the end result. Hell, it may just be that everything is the one hero journey, and we're inquiring into one phase of that journey.

 

Not sure if that's glorp, but I'd say maybe it's a network pathway sort of like neural pathways - and as electrical impulses maybe they somehow tune into the frequency - like a radio because we've put that station into the receiver - of the thing we're inquiring into.

Maybe I'm off topic.

 

 

[Barleywine]

5 hours ago, fire cat pickles said:

Personally, I see myself as "sort of" psychic, that is, I most definitely have psychic "flashes." I certainly have them. Clear, images, sounds, smells, thoughts, etc. that are not my own. They often guide my actions and decisions on a regular basis. And they divulge information about life and people in work and in my life. It has taken half my life to trust my intuition and to let it guide me. I am not shy to use either term.

 

Virtually all of my intuitive insights occur in "flashes" as I'm examining one or another of the more literal aspects of the cards. They are seldom based on free-association from the images because, after reading for decades and having internalized both traditional and experience-based personal meanings, I barely look at the cards except to recognize what they are. Most of these random impressions are offshoots of the ongoing train of thought. As far as delivering them to a client, I'm most comfortable hanging them on a metaphor, analogy or other story-telling trope that will most likely be understood by the querent, hopefully eliciting the "Aha! reaction. Many of the notions are too incidental to the main thrust of the narrative  to dump on the seeker "cold" so they have to be folded in with a little finesse. I usually warn my sitters when I'm going to digress in that direction. As one who is leery of the overused and often misunderstood word "intuition," I seldom use it and have replaced it with inspiration, imagination and ingenuity in the service of a more considered (i.e. rational) take on the reading. In my own case, having worked a bit with the Astral Plane, I tend to distrust psychic insinuations and leave those to the true psychics who don't need tarot cards as props.

[Raggydoll]

7 hours ago, katrinka said:

People use the term "intuition" when they mean "psychism", but intuition is knowing something so well that you can make a split second decision without having to consciously think about it.
Psychism is knowing something you couldn't know by normal means.
I'll leave glorp to the glorpers.

Well put!

 

For me, intuition is knowing which of all the possible card meanings that apply in any given reading. Intuition is like a fine tuned instrument that benefits from experience. 
 

Psychism acts and feels entirely different to me. The input is from elsewhere, and I’ll experience it in several different ways. Sometimes it’s a visual flash, other times it’s like hearing a voice, but I also have instances when I have a clear knowing, or sense a smell, or pick up on a sound (like sirens or songs on a radio) that no one else can hear. 
 

Mediumship abilities is part of the psychism package but it is a topic in and of itself. 
 

When doing psychic readings, I prefer to use no tools. Afterwards I might follow it up with a card reading or a rune casting. I do not consider cards as props, they are genuine tools for me, but they’re not a favorite tool for psychic sessions.
 

Still, I will have psychic input in some of my card readings. If it wants to come through, it will. Generally it is some type of information that could not have been gleaned from the cards. So it’s not like when your intuition reminds you of how, on rare occasions, a card could mean XYZ, and you suddenly feel sure that this is the case in your present reading. That is what I classify as intuition. Psychic input, in my experience, represents something that comes from outside yourself and that gives you information that goes well beyond anything the cards might imply. That is also why I prefer to not use tarot during deliberate psychic sessions, because the cards can hold you (or the client) back. 
 

Glorp is a word I would have no use for, and it honestly sounds like something which would clog your drains 😅
 

 

[Barleywine]

On 2/9/2025 at 11:19 PM, Raggydoll said:

Well put!

 

For me, intuition is knowing which of all the possible card meanings that apply in any given reading. Intuition is like a fine tuned instrument that benefits from experience. 
 

Psychism acts and feels entirely different to me. The input is from elsewhere, and I’ll experience it in several different ways. Sometimes it’s a visual flash, other times it’s like hearing a voice, but I also have instances when I have a clear knowing, or sense a smell, or pick up on a sound (like sirens or songs on a radio) that no one else can hear. 
 

Mediumship abilities is part of the psychism package but it is a topic in and of itself. 
 

When doing psychic readings, I prefer to use no tools. Afterwards I might follow it up with a card reading or a rune casting. I do not consider cards as props, they are genuine tools for me, but they’re not a favorite tool for psychic sessions.
 

Still, I will have psychic input in some of my card readings. If it wants to come through, it will. Generally it is some type of information that could not have been gleaned from the cards. So it’s not like when your intuition reminds you of how, on rare occasions, a card could mean XYZ, and you suddenly feel sure that this is the case in your present reading. That is what I classify as intuition. Psychic input, in my experience, represents something that comes from outside yourself and that gives you information that goes well beyond anything the cards might imply. That is also why I prefer to not use tarot during deliberate psychic sessions, because the cards can hold you (or the client) back. 
 

Glorp is a word I would have no use for, and it honestly sounds like something which would clog your drains 😅
 

 

Some very good points here. I've always maintained that accomplished psychics don't need tarot cards, and if they do use them it becomes "psychism with props." After exploring the valuable Aeclectic thread where heavyweights like Scion and Umbrae weighed in on the "book-knowledge-vs-intuiton/psychism" topic, I wrote my own essay titled "Book, No Book . . . or Pure 'Glorp'" that I'll post in the next day or two (it gave me a chance to trot out another Monty Python reference about "soiled budgies"). I can't link it here but you can probably find it with Google if you don't have my blog address.