Tarot Cards: Good, Sound, Common Sense Advice

[mayday]

Regardless whether you are a skeptic or a "believer." I recently began studying the tarot, and have read (and found) there to be no claim of the cards having any type of "powers" or magic. The cards are based on the study of human behavior and circumstances for more than 500 years. Basically, even though we don't realize it, there is no circumstance or situation that has not been experienced by millions of others, and with the same outcome that can be expected. So, in that sense, yes, the tarot can predict the immediate future, however, no legitimate tarot card reader will tell you the cards possess paranormal or magical powers.

I am into collecting and reading tarot cards. I love the beautiful pictures and spreads. I am finding it a therapeutic way to reflect, meditate and relieve stress. And, yes, the cards are (not amazingly) accurate.

I asked the cards if I would be able to meet Neil Young and have him sign my copy of his biography, "Shakey," after his concert on June 2, and right now, the final outcome card shows King of Wands, which, to me, points to yes, as the king of wands often means a fiery individual will be entering one's sphere who infects others with the power of his ideas (Neil...?) King of Wands in this position is generally positive.

I guess we will see come June 2. I will share my experience (positive or negative) afterward.

 

[Lithrael]

Well, either way I wish you luck. Getting to say hi to Neil would rock.

 

[Gord_in_Toronto]

I do believe that you have the wrong book of How to Interpret the Hidden Meaning of Tarot. In mine, the King of Wands predicts that Neil will not sign your book. Sorry.

 

[Ladewig]

I asked the cards if I would be able to meet Neil Young and have him sign my copy of his biography, "Shakey," after his concert on June 2, and right now, the final outcome card shows King of Wands, which, to me, points to yes, as the king of wands often means a fiery individual will be entering one's sphere who infects others with the power of his ideas (Neil...?) King of Wands in this position is generally positive.

I guess we will see come June 2. I will share my experience (positive or negative) afterward.

In the world of objective things (e.g. the sphere of science) statements are not qualified by the assertion "to me."

So, in that sense, yes, the tarot can predict the immediate future, however, no legitimate tarot card reader will tell you the cards possess paranormal or magical powers.

Whether you define the cards as paranormal or not, your claim that they can predict the future will earn you tens of thousands of dollars if performed under controlled conditions in front of many of the dozens of local skeptic groups that offer prizes.

If someone claimed that I were incapable of riding a bicycle and offered me $10,000 to ride a bicycle in front of him, I would damned sure take the test and walk away with the money.

 

[Minarvia]

I also have collected tarot cards. I have a few dozen sets, I'm pretty sure. I loved to play with them, perhaps see some insight from time to time, and to just appreciate their beauty.

I don't believe they have power, but I did once have a book called "Tarot Spells" I think it was called (back in my "woo" days) and since it said you could use them for spells I would say that's a claim of them having power, even if the term "power" is used to mean "aiding in focus."

So Mayday, have fun with them, but don't rely on them. The King of Wands - I don't think it means he won't sign your book, it merely means he is a creative individual with a rather "fiery" temperment but is good-hearted, iirc.

Now, if you had King of Cups I'd say he's be more apt to sign.

But remember, he's a celebrity and cards won't really work no matter how much you believe, Mayday. He will sign if he has time, or his "crew" or whoever, allows him to spend time with fans and how long for signing. It will have nothing to do with you or cards or perhaps even himself. He may just have no time and have to pack up.

But I wish you the best of luck in getting your book autographed. I have a few books autographed by the authors and it is a really cool thing.

 

[Mister Earl]

I think someone needs to explain tarot cards to me. If you ask the deck a question, so to speak, do you shuffle, then deal a card? Is that how you get an answer? If so, if you repeat the question, shuffling in between each time, do you always get the same answer? If no, why not?

 

[Minarvia]

I think someone needs to explain tarot cards to me. If you ask the deck a question, so to speak, do you shuffle, then deal a card? Is that how you get an answer? If so, if you repeat the question, shuffling in between each time, do you always get the same answer? If no, why not?

When I used to read, years back, I let the person ask the question silently, and used a spread appropriate to the "type" of question, such as a basic simple answer, or a problem that needed some insight. Then I would have the querent shuffle and choose cards until I told them to stop. Then I would lay them out and go.

Now, what got me was that even when we tried "repeating" a question, the cards would change, of course, but there would always be a few that were the same as were in the first and second spread. But in a spread that has, say, 10 or 12 cards, perhaps that wasn't so odd. But the interpretation was always the same. That's why I believed in them at the time.

I do think that their usefulness is real if you want to gain some insight or focus on some aspects of a problem, but beyond that...well, that's it, really. Nothing paranormal. But some cards have similar meanings with just a different slant, say, as to timing or personality traits of a person.

I usually got consistent results. But once I read for a friend and got nothing consistent at all. I was puzzled because I always got "something." But he then said he had been seeing a doctor because he has bi-polar disorder and was experiencing a lot of confusion. So he told me that the mass of confusion I had before me was due to that.
Well...perhaps. Perhaps not. I don't read anymore. But it was an interesting and fun thing to do at the time.

And oh, some decks are just positively beautiful and works of art.

 

[coalesce]

Steven Wright: "Last night I stayed up late playing poker with Tarot cards. I got a full house and four people died."

Michael

P.S.

Enjoy the concert!

 

[mayday]

He's going to sign that book if I have to leap off the balcony to where he's sitting onstage.

 

[Mister Earl]

@Minarvia: Have you ever gotten the card that is the polar opposite of the other card? For example, have you ever gotten a "no" card for the same question after getting a "yes" card?

 

[Skeptical Greg]

He's going to sign that book if I have to leap off the balcony to where he's sitting onstage.

Self fulfilling prophecy ?


Nice nails..

 

[chillzero]

@Minarvia: Have you ever gotten the card that is the polar opposite of the other card? For example, have you ever gotten a "no" card for the same question after getting a "yes" card?

As a person who used to read tarot myself, I can say I did, and I can think of specific examples. Of course, at the time I was also able to rationalise this out. For example, I had done a reading for the same question ... which gave me time to consider my reaction to it, and may have caused me to respond differently when faced with it than I would have done had I not done the reading.

I did a reading once about whether a trip to visit my husband who had moved away from our country to try and find a better life would go well. The first reading was all disaster - the Tower, and Swords everywhere ... I was pretty upset. My response was to do a meditation, take an aromatherapy bath to relax me and enhance my perceptions, and then read it again. This one was much better, and of course I decided that being told the meeting would be disastrous caused me to reconsider my intended approach on meeting him again, and my attitude to the planned visit. I decided that had I not done the reading, I would have met him with some unrealised and unresolved issues bubbling under the surface - all causing tensions that would have erupted at some point into arguments. Being pre-warned of disaster, I had reconsidered my approach and decided to be more patient, quieter, and step into the discussions about our future in a different manner - hence no arguments scheduled (according to the cards).

And of course ... believing everything the cards 'told' me, I made huge efforts not to say or do anything that might cause a row when the trip finally happened. And then went on for a few years believing the cards had clearly been right all along.

 

[ExMinister]

I used to read the cards for myself and I often got 2 totally contradictory answers as my final outcome. For example, I would get the happy family/marriage card once, and then when I repeated the question later I'd get the Tower upside down. Things like that used to drive me crazy.

I have always been under the impression that Tarot readers believe there is something supernatural going on with the cards. I know I did.

Just for the record, I'd read in several places that if you repeat the same question, you anger the power (spirits?) behind the cards and that's why you get contradictory answers.

He's going to sign that book if I have to leap off the balcony to where he's sitting onstage.

I predict that, with a can-do attitude like that, he will sign your book. Never mind what the cards say.

 

[Tricky]

I've had my tarot cards read a number of times. My opinion of them is that they are something like Rorschach Tests in that they don't "mean" anything by themselves. They are a tool for bringing out things about yourself that perhaps you hadn't thought of. They can be useful and fun for starting a discussion.

And in a pinch, you can play a mean game of "Go Fish" with them.

 

[ShadowSot]

I find it sort of funny, as Tarot started out as a card game.
I've met people who claim they can use a regular set of playing cards to predict the future as well.

 

[Tricky]

I find it sort of funny, as Tarot started out as a card game.
I've met people who claim they can use a regular set of playing cards to predict the future as well.

I can use them to predict the future too. If I have four of them with the same letter in the corner, then I'm about to come into some money.

 

[catsmate]

Tarot Cards: Good, Sound, Common Sense Advice

OK here you are; they're nonsense, sometimes pretty but still nonsense.

 

[fuelair]

OK here you are; they're nonsense, sometimes pretty but still nonsense.

Best reply so far!

Also, one of the things I heard some back is that part of the "accuracy" required that the cards belong to the person being foretold for (the foretellee)
rather than the reader (foreteller, or, as we like to say, the fraud).

 

[dudalb]

Steven Wright: "Last night I stayed up late playing poker with Tarot cards. I got a full house and four people died."

Michael

P.S.

Enjoy the concert!

You CAN play Poker with Tarot cards. I have done so at Several Renaissiance Fairs......

And no one died.

 

[Minarvia]

@Minarvia: Have you ever gotten the card that is the polar opposite of the other card? For example, have you ever gotten a "no" card for the same question after getting a "yes" card?

I can honestly say that I never did. That's what got me, I think, to believing there could be something to it at the time.

However, I did test myself on this, but not for every reading I did, so that could account for my apparent "accuracy." I'd guess that for every 10 reading I did I would retest about 4. After that it took too much of my time so I didn't retest them all.

 

[Minarvia]

I've had my tarot cards read a number of times. My opinion of them is that they are something like Rorschach Tests in that they don't "mean" anything by themselves. They are a tool for bringing out things about yourself that perhaps you hadn't thought of.

I'd say that this is pretty much what I believe they can be useful for.

 

[Minarvia]

I find it sort of funny, as Tarot started out as a card game.
I've met people who claim they can use a regular set of playing cards to predict the future as well.

Yes, I'm well aware, and always have been, that they were created as a game. I loved the pictures and the art of them, and then tried out the "fortune-telling" and the "insight" angle of them.

And to the second, I once had a man read my "future" with regular playing cards, too!

 

[mayday]

Everyone is trying to look at the subject of tarot cards in a paranormal sense, when that is not what they are intended for at all.

Tarot cards are entertaining, but they are not to be used as a game to see how one spread contradicts or gives the same answer as another. A couple of people here seem to get it, but the rest of you talk like it's mumbeldypeg.

Too many people here can't see the forest for the trees.

 

[namowal]

I had a few decks for magic tricks and readings (or at least going through the act of reading them- as I don't think they have supernatural powers). A roommate found a deck and flipped- you'd think he'd discovered a severed head! He insisted I kept them in my room where he couldn't see them. Apparently drywall stops their evil vibes.

 

[bookitty]

Everyone is trying to look at the subject of tarot cards in a paranormal sense, when that is not what they are intended for at all.

Tarot cards are entertaining, but they are not to be used as a game to see how one spread contradicts or gives the same answer as another. A couple of people here seem to get it, but the rest of you talk like it's mumbeldypeg.

Too many people here can't see the forest for the trees.

Mumbeldy-peg? The game where you throw knives at each other? aka "The Fun, Fun Story of Why Grandpa's Got a Glass Eye."

For anyone interested in Tarot as some sort of oracle device, I highly recommend the Edward Gorey Fantod Pack. It's a bit more literary. It is also as far from a traditional Rider deck as possible, so you can make up your own meanings. Why bother with some Knight of Swords or traditional Tower when you can cross a Waltzing Mouse with The Ancestor.

 

[Ladewig]

Everyone is trying to look at the subject of tarot cards in a paranormal sense, when that is not what they are intended for at all.

Your criticism of our looking at the cars in a paranormal sense would have a great deal more impact if you, yourself, did not use them in a paranormal sense. Predicting whether or not a person will sign your book, based only on the dealing of cards, is paranormal.

Tarot cards are entertaining, but they are not to be used as a game to see how one spread contradicts or gives the same answer as another.

But they are to be used to predict the future.


ETA: Wait, were you joking in the OP? I have such a hard time telling what you really believe from the rest.

 

[Resume]

Mumbeldy-peg? The game where you throw knives at each other? aka "The Fun, Fun Story of Why Grandpa's Got a Glass Eye."

For anyone interested in Tarot as some sort of oracle device, I highly recommend the Edward Gorey Fantod Pack. It's a bit more literary. It is also as far from a traditional Rider deck as possible, so you can make up your own meanings. Why bother with some Knight of Swords or traditional Tower when you can cross a Waltzing Mouse with The Ancestor.

Mumbly Peg.

 

[Brattus]

Tarot cards are indeed a powerful gateway into the future.

I just wish everyone had my gift.

I have magical paranormal poop. If after completing my magical poop ritual my poop swirls to the right then my future is quite bright, if however my magical poop swirls left then I best hide under the bed all day.

I challenge anyone to prove that tarot cards can predict future events better than my poop can!

 

[Dancing David]

They are a great way of examinging your thoughts and feelings, skilled reading is an art. You look for clues in the way the readee responds, and then you expand and move on.

But they are crappy at yes/no and similar questions. I prefer a 20 sided D&D die for that.

 

[Dancing David]

But they are to be used to predict the future.

Not if you are a smart reader!

 

[arthwollipot]

I've had my tarot cards read a number of times. My opinion of them is that they are something like Rorschach Tests in that they don't "mean" anything by themselves. They are a tool for bringing out things about yourself that perhaps you hadn't thought of. They can be useful and fun for starting a discussion.

That's a much more concise description than my attempt at saying the same thing.

 

[arthwollipot]

I think someone needs to explain tarot cards to me. If you ask the deck a question, so to speak, do you shuffle, then deal a card? Is that how you get an answer? If so, if you repeat the question, shuffling in between each time, do you always get the same answer? If no, why not?

It's a lot more complex than that. A tarot reading never involves just a single card. You always deal a spread - each card position tells you something different. The simplest one I've used is a three-card spread - past, present and future. The most common spread is called the Celtic Cross, and uses ten cards. I've heard of spreads that actually use all 72 cards, but I've never even attempted anything like that.

A tarot reading is always complex and nuanced. Each individual card tells its own little story. Taken in multiples and you get a detailed set of images that may or may not suggest ideas or courses of action to the querent.

As someone else said, tarot is not especially suited to yes-or-no decisions. Toss a coin instead.

 

[Dancing David]

It's a lot more complex than that. A tarot reading never involves just a single card. You always deal a spread - each card position tells you something different. The simplest one I've used is a three-card spread - past, present and future. The most common spread is called the Celtic Cross, and uses ten cards. I've heard of spreads that actually use all 72 cards, but I've never even attempted anything like that.

A tarot reading is always complex and nuanced. Each individual card tells its own little story. Taken in multiples and you get a detailed set of images that may or may not suggest ideas or courses of action to the querent.

As someone else said, tarot is not especially suited to yes-or-no decisions. Toss a coin instead.

Unless you use a one card spread!
The worst thing people can do is reverse the cards. You already have 72 symbols.

If you really want to refine the technique, have the person frame the question, then cut up five cards and chose the significator.

 

[Minarvia]

Tarot cards are indeed a powerful gateway into the future.

I just wish everyone had my gift.

I have magical paranormal poop. If after completing my magical poop ritual my poop swirls to the right then my future is quite bright, if however my magical poop swirls left then I best hide under the bed all day.

I challenge anyone to prove that tarot cards can predict future events better than my poop can!

Hmm...ever apply for the MDC?

 

[Brattus]

Hmm...ever apply for the MDC?

OK! You got me! I fully admit my poop is neither magical nor paranormal.

BUT!

Now you know how I hear other people actually having a serious discussion about the paranormal, magical and future predicting powers of printed lamented cardboard.

Anyone who truly believes printed lamented cardboard can do anything other than being printed lamented cardboard is a fool.

 

[Harpyja]

I actually played a three-card spread for my cousin, who sincerely believed it to be true and actually claimed it had predicted her life correctly - despite the fact that I changed most of the reading to be positive!

 

[Elizabeth I]

I'd like to say that "Tarot Cards: Good, Sound, Common Sense Advice" is one of the most nearly perfect examples of an oxymoron that I have ever seen, so congratulations on that.

 

[Tarot_Is_A_Card_Game!]

I'd like to say that "Tarot Cards: Good, Sound, Common Sense Advice" is one of the most nearly perfect examples of an oxymoron that I have ever seen, so congratulations on that.

These folks have the right idea though. Play card games with them!

http://www.youtube.com/watch#!v=H-ens9VM6I0&feature=related

 

[sadhatter]

What is with the recent flood of " its not paranormal, but it does some things that are not normal" threads?

In this particular case, as when i used to read tarot, it is simply the person reading it making an educated guess as the the outcome and using the cards to support it.

I mean, if i , lets say were to ask tarot cards " will i be able to get a ticket to gwar? And if so will i get David Brockie to sign my copy of violence has arrived? "I would probably come to the same conclusion. Because in my head i know getting the tickets is fairly easy, while getting the autograph may be tricky.

Op, you would have just as much luck simply making a guess sans cards of any form.

 

[Minarvia]

OK! You got me! I fully admit my poop is neither magical nor paranormal.

BUT!

Now you know how I hear other people actually having a serious discussion about the paranormal, magical and future predicting powers of printed lamented cardboard.

Anyone who truly believes printed lamented cardboard can do anything other than being printed lamented cardboard is a fool.

Yep, I do! That's basically why I played with them for awhile and then stopped. I had fun with them, but never took them as seriously as others do. I still adore a beautiful deck, but I agree with you. I don't and never have believed that they have any super powers. They're just paper with symbols.

I'll admit I dabbled and wondered...but nothing more. If they are so great I'd have a perfect life and know what to do in every situation, right? But I don't. That tells me enough.