Thursday, May 26, 2011

Some random thoughts on Tarot

It is World Tarot Day. Therefore, I thought I would give my readers some random thoughts about the Tarot.

The best way to color your own Tarot deck (whether BOTA, Golden Dawn, or other) that I have found is colored pencil. But the best way to study the color scales is using water-color paints. Unfortunately, water-color paints are not exactly user-friendly when it comes to actually using a Tarot deck to do readings.

The worst thing that has happened to one of my Tarot decks is a cup of tea---literally. It was during a reading that I was doing at a local coffee shop for someone. The second worst thing is either a cat attack or wax dripppings.

I was using Tarot cards for magic spells before any of the books came out on the subject. I have never been able to get any of the published Tarot spells to work for me---I have to design my own spell to get them to work.

Tarot reading for a living...well, it is like finding something slimy in your sock drawer. It is a gig that I would prefer not to do on a regular basis ever again. Most of the readings I did fell into the category of "I have already made up my mind, so justify my decision for me" which are hardly the type of people that you want to be reading for.

Tarot did not start out as a tool for spiritual development. Sorry. It was a game first. Then it got used for vulgar fortune-telling. Then a game again. Some use as literary  imagery. Some more game playing followed. Then it became a spiritual development tool.

I once saw a list of Magic the Gathering cards for a deck based on the concept of the Tarot. I do not think it would have worked well in actual game-play.

My ideal Tarot deck would be a Franken-deck, a Tarot deck using a card from this deck, a couple of cards from that deck. When I do readings, the cards you see on the table might not be the cards that I am seeing in the back of my head.

The Tarot and the diagrams of the Golden Dawn rituals and lectures are related. They are like two halves of the same coin. The Golden Dawn teachings about the Tarot are still in their infancy.

My favorite book about the Tarot is by Mouni Sadhi. It uses the French Levi order of the trumps. It also ties Tarot into everything else occult-ish that the author could think of.

I have a small suitcase of Tarot decks. And a shelf full of Tarot books. I worry about any occultist who doesn't have a small Tarot collection.

If you have a random thought about the Tarot, feel free to leave it in the comment section. Remember I do not approve of advertisements in my comment section (I had a few ads for plumbers dumped into a recent Quote of the Day post).

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