This turned out to be a provocative and entertaining spread in actual use. For the topic I chose to examine the causal chain for my admitted "sweet tooth," especially around the holiday season. I purposely selected the Empress as the "Root Card" for my dietary indiscretion: "It's not nice to say 'No' to Mother Nature!"). … Continue reading A “Breaking the Chain” Example Reading
“Breaking the Chain” Cause-and-Effect Spread
This is the spread I promised yesterday; it is built on the assumption that the sitter can best decide (based on the subconscious "hunches" that most of us harbor) which time-frame should be explored first in determining why present circumstances are the way they are and what might be done about them. Since our behavior … Continue reading “Breaking the Chain” Cause-and-Effect Spread
Spread Fatigue
I've been thinking lately that, in the creation of new layouts, I seem to have exhausted the range of geometric spread patterns commonly used in the performance of tarot readings. So far - and often more than once - I've tried circles, squares both small and large, rectangles, crosses, "X"-es, spirals, horizontal lines, vertical lines, … Continue reading Spread Fatigue
The “Pernt” and the “Cherce”
I must be getting really desperate if I'm resorting to "Archie-Bunker-isms" for my post titles; for the culturally uninitiated, it reads "The Point and the Choice." What I'm referring to, of course, is the key point (goal, not location) in our approach to divining with the tarot cards and the choices we make in their … Continue reading The “Pernt” and the “Cherce”
An “Envelope of the Year” Example Reading
This is a practice reading using my new "Envelope of the Year" Life-Reading Spread; the querent here is an imaginary male sitter and the full-year layout was used with the Waite-Smith Centennial Pocket Edition, including reversals. In doing this for myself I will probably go month-by-month and do a series of weekly readings for each … Continue reading An “Envelope of the Year” Example Reading
The “Envelope of the Year” Life-Reading Spread
The new year is almost upon us, so I created another "annual look-ahead" spread that can be taken in 3-card monthly bites or in one giant 36-card, 12-month gulp. The spread uses an "envelope" concept in which each monthly three-card column has a "steady-state" card and two transitory scenarios, one "best-case" and the other "worst-case." … Continue reading The “Envelope of the Year” Life-Reading Spread
A Long Way from Home
Or maybe I'm just waxing nostalgic? (Curmudgeon alert: incoming attitude!) At any rate, I'm no fan of what is apparently being touted as the emergence of a "New Tarot," a description I'd never heard until last week. (It's not a deck, it sounds more like a "cultural movement.") The gist of it seems to be … Continue reading A Long Way from Home
The Star Effect (aka “The Bubble”)
In a brief essay about his aphorism "Every man and woman is a star," Aleister Crowley made the point that it's physically impossible to stand in someone else's shoes at the same instant in time and look at the world from exactly the same perspective; thus, each of us inhabits a private universe of which … Continue reading The Star Effect (aka “The Bubble”)
Chord Changes
File this one under "How Stuff Works." I'm a firm believer in the assumption that very little that is truly definitive in life happens by sheer coincidence, or in complete isolation; formative impulses and nascent events crowd the background of our personal drama, waiting to be propelled into prominence by invitation (ours or others) or … Continue reading Chord Changes
Trump’s “Mamushka”
I can tell by the resounding silence whenever I post one that few people here like my political readings (I'm a "small-government" New England Libertarian at heart, not a Liberal or Socialist) but that doesn't stop me and, to be honest, I do my best to "just read the cards" and not inject personal bias … Continue reading Trump’s “Mamushka”
