New Blog Address

Well, a discussion of the Death card (which is about major change) seems an appropriate point to end this blog on. I've moved to a new address. If you're interested in hearing more stories about Tarot cards, maybe even sharing a few of your own, you can find me at: www.thetarotteaclub.wordpress.com.

Happy Blogging Everyone!

Death In Its Infinite Variety

My thoughts today are with the families and friends of those who have passed away during  the once-in-a-lifetime weather event happening along the U.S. east coast. So I thought I'd explore different types of death Tarot style. Keeping in mind that the Death card doesn't always mean someone is going to die. Far from it. But sometimes it does. Death during a freak event such as Hurricane Sandy would be represented as follows:

Death + The Tower: A sudden death caused by accident or misadventure.

Death+ The Fool: An unexpected death

Death + 10 Cups: Death at home with loved ones.

Death + 4 Swords: Dying in your sleep.

Death + The Hanged Man: Waiting for death to arrive.

Death + 5 Pentacles: Death of a poor person. Or death of someone with no belief in the afterlife.

Death + 10 Pentacles: Death that involves an inheritance.

Can you think of anymore possibilities?

The Tarot Of Frankenstorm (Or Any Natural Disaster For That Matter)

The Tarot cards that refer to a disaster of the scale of Frankenstorm come near the end of Life Lessons Tarot (otherwise known as the Major Arcana.) They are the heavy-hitters of the Tarot pack. The sequence of events might be summed up as follows:

The Devil: Living in denial. Refusing to acknowledge the possibility of a disaster of this magnitude. Refusing to allocate adequate funding/resources to provide safeguards. Refusing to leave your home when requested by the authorities.

The Tower: The storm.

The Star: Finding sanctuary. Our dazed state in the immediate aftermath of disaster. The angels who come to our rescue.

The Moon: The scumbags who take advantage of the chaos to commit crimes. The dark underbelly of civilisation revealed e.g. sewage and garbage spread throughout city streets. Nuclear power plants in meltdown endangering millions of lives (and up till now they seemed so harmless. Just a real pretty backdrop for our farmer's fields and cows, aw!)

The Sun: Rebuilding. Note: This can take years after severe events. A lifetime even.

Judgement: The government enquiries set up in the aftermath to decide what action should be taken to prevent injury to persons and property during like events in the future. Often just lip service. Thrusting us back to the card of The Devil. Then the whole deadly cycle begins anew with the next serious disaster. However if we did actually take meaningful action we'd move onto this card...

I wish any readers in the path of Frankenstorm well and hope you keep safe during this freak event. Let us know how you go (if you're up to it.) Cheers!

Would You Let Tarot Choose Your Mechanic?

I'm having a bit of car trouble. Earlier this year my old Holden began leaking coolant so I took it to my regular mechanic to have it fixed which cost me serious dollars.

Seven months later the same issue. This time I took it to someone else. The verdict: I need to spend some more serious dollars to keep the darn thing on the road.

This leaves me with a dilemma.

Should I take the car back to my original mechanic who knows it really well (even though he might not have done the best job last time)? Or should I take it to the second mechanic who worked out the problem (even though he's not a Holden specialist)? It's a toss of the coin. There's no way to know which choice is the better one. Either way I'm sure my dosh is done.

This is a perfect example of when consulting the old Agony Aunt In A Box can come in handy. When no one else can tell you the answer you can ask your intuition/inner voice/ gut instinct/angels/whatever to guide you via the cards.

The best spread for asking questions is the horseshoe spread. (I'll tell you how it works if you ask me to. You know how I love hearing from you guys.) So I've done a spread asking which mechanic I should choose. The answer was obtuse as usual but I think I worked it out.

In the 'What I Should Do' position is The High Priestess card meaning I should listen to my intuition. Gee thanks Tarot, pass the buck much? In the 'Outcome' position is the Ten of Wands meaning I should go with the one that will take more work on my part. That would be my original mechanic I guess who lives further away and is a pain in the arse to get to. Which backs up my first instinct when I learnt how much trouble my car was in which was to go back to him.

So be it. Fingers crossed it works out okay. I'll keep you posted, boom boom (you know, post as in tell and post as in blog, aw fuggedaboutit).

Would you let Tarot choose your mechanic?

An Ode To The Wheel Of Fortune

I think the following W. H. Auden poem beautifully encapsulates the yin and yang of the Wheel of Fortune card. I reproduce it here for your contemplation...

Musee des Beaux Arts

About suffering they were never wrong,

The Old Masters; how well, they understood

Its human position; how it takes place

While someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking dully along;

How, when the aged are reverently, passionately waiting

For the miraculous birth, there always must be

Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating

On a pond at the edge of the wood:

They never forgot

That even the dreadful martyrdom must run its course

Anyhow in a corner, some untidy spot

Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer's horse

Scratches its innocent behind on a tree.

In Breughel's Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away

Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may

Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry,

But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone

As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green

Water, and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen

Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky,

Had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.

Note: Auden wrote this poem after a visit to the Musee des Beaux Arts in Brussels where he saw a painting by Breughel called 'Landscape with the Fall of Icarus'. In Greek mythology Icarus is the man who flew on wings of feathers and wax too close to the sun whereupon the wax melted and Icarus fell into the sea where he drowned. In the painting several men and a ship go about their business ignoring Icarus's death in the background. Just as we can go about our daily activities not realising the pain our neighbours/workmates/loved ones may be in (or vice versa).

Can you see the connection with the Wheel of Fortune card? Please comment below.

Tarot: So Much More Than A Fortune Teller's Tool

I had a comment on my blog the other day (yay a comment!) asking me to predict somebody's fate, her doom even. I declined of course, being the non-psychic Tarot card reader that I am (As if I'd want to predict someone's doom anyway. What the?) As I've said before that's not what this blog is on about. I mean, yeah, sure, you can use Tarot cards to predict the future if you want (I keep warning you but that you can get into trouble if you do. Feel chained to a particular outcome. Mind you, that doesn't stop me doing it now and then, ha!) But as I cannot emphasise enough there is more to Tarot than that. Clearly the message needs to be hammered home with triple exclamation points: Tarot is so much more than a fortune teller's tool!!!

What kind of more you ask? Well, for starters...

It's an Agony Aunt In A Box for on the spot advice. Ever so useful if you are prone to panicking like me about everyday situations. It's a bit like asking one of those toy fortune telling balls 'Does he like me?' but with more reliable and detailed answers.

It's a language. One written in picture form like Egyptian Hieroglyphs. Both use images that can be interpreted in different ways according to context. This association with the ancient world makes Tarot kind of cool don't you reckon?

It's the ultimate story telling tool. Great for would-be novelists. Just chuck some cards in the air, see where they fall and make a story out of that. Or do what I do. Tell the news-of-the-moment using the cards.You can also use it to send secret messages in code. Say for example you're worried about your boss reading your emails at work, you could send a message to your loved ones in picture form e.g.

Ten of Wands: Am overloaded with jobs.

Ten of Swords: Feeling slaughtered.

The Star: Need to escape.

Three of Cups: Let's go have lunch.

Or simply:

Five of Swords: My workmate is being a prick right now!

It's a library. A repository of stories about the human condition. I feel like I'm reading you another chapter from the Great Book of Tarot as I write these posts each night. A little bedtime story for you (or wake-up story if you live on the other side of the world.)

It's a philosophy. This is perhaps my favourite thing about Tarot. There is a hidden book of life lessons written in the Tarot cards e.g. Tarot says you can't feel truly at peace unless you're contributing to the wider community in some way. (This message comes from the placement of the Judgement card just before The World.)

Can you think of anything else it could be used for?

The Tarot Of T.G.I.F.

I had that darn Katy Perry song 'Last Friday Night' stuck in my head for months this year. You know, the one that has a chorus singing T.G.I.F. T.G.I.F. T.G.I.F. louder and louder. Well, after a week back at work, I couldn't agree with that lyric more. So just for fun I thought I'd explore the Tarot of Thank God It's Friday.

This is how I normally feel by Friday...

The Ten of Swords i.e. Slaughtered.

This is how I feel when the school bell rings on Friday afternoon...

The Fool i.e. The world is at my feet (or the weekend at least.) Yee-ha!

This is what I do on Friday night...

The Three of Cups i.e. Celebrate. Although while Katy is dancing on tabletops and drinking shots my idea of a great time is lying in bed with a good book and a cup of tea. Maybe a bit of catching up on TV over the internet if I really want to live on the wild side, lol (I know, I know, I lol way too much but I find life hilarious, that is, when it's not giving me panic attacks.)

This is the gift the weekend offers...

The Star i.e. A holiday from responsibility. A retreat to the sanctuary of home (or pub, whichever!)

Can anyone relate?

8 Cups Reversed: The Commitment-Phobe

So, as I've mentioned before Tarot cards can be read in both a positive and negative light. As with all readings you work out which meaning to choose depending on the position of the card. One of the more obvious ways you know when to choose the negative meaning is when a card appears upside down.

Of course, just as with the positive versions of each card there are lots of negative meanings to choose from. For the Eight of Cups this can include:

Being a commitment-phobe. Running whenever a relationship gets too serious. Warren Beatty was a classic case until he met the right woman Annette Bening and settled down (or maybe she just came along at the right time?)

Dating a commitment-phobe.

Needing to walk away from a situation that is bad for you even though you may not want to.

Having a restless spirit. Being unable to settle down.

Feeling like you're being held back from your true path by commitments you have made to others.

Being too scared to follow your dreams or to break away from relationships that no longer sustain you.

Any other suggestions?

Eight Of Cups: Searching For Something More

A man turns his back on eight cups and heads off in another direction. Mountains lie in his path. The cups belong to him. They represent relationships or things from which he draws emotional satisfaction. But he turns his back on them because they no longer serve his needs. He's off to find something or someone better.

There's a lot of emotion surrounding this card as evidenced by the EIGHT cups and the winding river. Water = feelings. It's never easy to let go of a partner or friends or things which have been an emotional support for you even if you know this is the right thing to do (or the card tells you it is, lol.) That's why the moon's face looks so sad. You have to be really dissatisfied with what you already have.

And that's only half the battle. A lot of work and effort will be required to create new relationships/emotional supports in your life. It's as hard as climbing mountains. And there's no guarantee you'll find anything on the other side. The man looks alone and is alone in this quest.

Because there are eight cups you are dealing here with deep emotions. This isn't the card you get when you break up with your first puppy love. More like when you break up with a long-term partner. Someone who has brought plenty to the table but isn't the right fit for you. Think a la Goldilocks. The girl with the golden locks could have had her hunger sated by those first two bowls of porridge but she keeps looking until she finds the one that satisfies her completely.

The Eight of Cups is also the card of the spiritual quest. It comes up when you feel the need to turn your back on material concerns to search for the meaning of life or it's closest equivalent. I guess you dear reader perusing these posts about Tarot cards fits into that box, ha!

Can you relate? Please share. Someone? Anyone? Helloooo?

Card Of The Day

I’ve noticed there are lots of people on the Internet offering a ‘card of the day’ type service. The way it works is that they pull a card from the deck to represent the day ahead and share the meaning of that card with peeps.

Now, there’s no way that card could symbolize the experience every single one of their followers is going to have that day. Tarot doesn’t work like that. It’s personal. Tarot decks prefer to speak to the people dealing the cards. A reading done for a broader audience is going to be much less reliable, if it works at all.

However, I think card-of-the-day services can fulfill a higher purpose. Namely, they can help you learn the meanings of each card. There is just so much information to take in when it comes to Tarot it’s good to have it broken down into bite-sized chunks to swallow. So long as you keep in mind that there will always be more meanings to learn. Fifty shades for each card, remember?

An even better way to learn to speak Tarot is to do this activity yourself. Buy some cards (You can get a Rider-Smith-Waite deck from Amazon for a reasonable price.) Everyday stick a new one on the fridge or somewhere else you’ll see it. Note what happens to you. See if any of the images on the card leap out. Write down your observations in a journal. I promise you that over time you will see patterns form. (Or just come here and we’ll discuss it together. I’d like that.)

And if you see any card-of-the-day explanations on the net that you think are great please share them below (with the author’s name of course.)

The Tarot Of Meetings

I have to attend a long meeting after work tomorrow and already my spirits are sinking at the thought. So just to amuse myself (and hopefully you too) I thought I'd contemplate the Tarot of meetings.

The Eight of Pentacles = Meetings in general.

A man carves out a series of pentacles one after another. This seems to be the most likely Tarot equivalent to a meeting scenario. (Please correct me if you have other ideas. As I keep saying I want this to be a conversation not a monologue. You can spend a lifetime studying the cards and still not know everything. I learn things all the time about the cards just like you are.)

The Eight of Pentacles + The Seven of Swords = This is me tomorrow night pretending to listen whilst really shopping for school, surfing the net or writing my next post. Ha!

The Eight of Pentacles + The Knight of Swords = The fella up the back of the room jiggling his legs impatient for the damn thing to be over.

The Eight of Pentacles + The Fool = The first meeting ever for a group.

The Eight of Pentacles + The Four of Wands = Meeting to plan a wedding or some other celebratory occasion.

The Eight of Pentacles + The Eight of Wands = The dream meeting! Lots of stuff gets done quickly. Not what I'm expecting tomorrow night however :(

The Eight of Pentacles + The Six of Wands = Scoring a win at a meeting.

The Eight of Pentacles + The Five of Swords = Being bullied at a meeting. Or maybe being the bully. Depends which person in the card you gravitate to most.

The Eight of Pentacles + The Four of Pentacles = Someone being a tightarse with the budget.

The Eight of Pentacles + The Eight of Swords = Being unable to come to a decision.

The Eight of Pentacles + The Ten of Swords = A meeting where you've lost the will to live. That's pretty much my experience every time. He he!

What about you? Which card combination would encapsulate the way you experience meetings? Please share.

The Emperor: Hey Dad!

We had a look at The Empress recently so it seems only fair to check out her counterpart, The Emperor. He's one of the Life Lessons (Major Arcana) cards so he carries a bit of weight in a reading but as he's found early on in Life Lesson Tarot he's not too complicated. What does he represent?

He's your dad.

He's you as a dad.

He's a hard worker, or, the need to work hard.

He's the one meeting out discipline or the need to be disciplined.

He's successful. Gets things done. (Cause he works hard and is disciplined. The knee bones connected to the thigh bone.)

He's where you experience limitations.

He's good at saying no. (Whereas The Empress is the yay-sayer.) Note: He's not a hard arse. That's more the King of Swords. The Emperor has expectations but he's not cut-throat or mean about it. Just firm.

He's rules and regulations.

He's every authority figure. Authority in general. Policemen in particular.

He's the rock you can lean on. But also the immoveable object in your path.

He's your inner critic. (Whereas The Empress is more like your inner encourager.) That voice in your head that reminds you what a loser you are.

He's the screws turned tight. The control freak. Obsessive compulsive behaviour. When I was a teenager I had to have 16 teaspoons in my Milo (an Australian chocolate drink). Had to. 16 exactly. That sort of thing.

He's in charge. The patriarch. Your boss. The dominator in S & M situations.

He rules. Sometimes with a fair hand. Sometimes with an iron fist.

He makes you feel safe and secure. Will defend his loved ones to the death.

He loves routine.

He's self-controlled. You can't rattle him no matter how much you try.

And he makes no apologies for all of the above.

You need to exert a little Emperor energy if you want to achieve your goals. Forcing myself to write on this blog every day no matter how #$&% I feel is tres` Emperor. (Actually #$&% represents tiredness more than anything else. Not a very exciting emotion huh? But day-to-day life exhaustion is my mortal enemy when it comes to writing. You can't write if you can't think and you can't think if you're tired. I've been off work for the last two months caring for an ill family member and go back to my day job tomorrow. So it'll be interesting to see if the quality of my posts are affected. I'll be drawing on all The Emperor reserves I have to write them I can tell you. Teaching children is like pouring your energy down a black hole every single day. Lucky I enjoy it.)

How you feel about The Emperor card will tell you a lot about how good you are at setting boundaries in your life and/or about your relationship with your father. So how do you feel about The Emperor? Please share.

Your Tarot Year Card

As I said in a previous post there's a numerological formula you can use to work out which Tarot card represents the type of experiences you can expect to have during each year. I've been using it for so long I can't remember anymore where I learnt this trick but as I said I find it quite reliable.

The formula will give you a number that correlates with one of the Life Lesson (Major Arcana) cards. Because of the way it works each following year you will shift into the subsequent Life Lesson card e.g. If your Tarot Year Card in 2012 is The Empress, in 2013 it will be The Emperor. But the turn of each decade signals a re-set button. Thus in 2009 my Tarot Year Card was Judgement but in 2010 it flipped back to The Hanged Man.

I find it quite interesting that through this formula Tarot insists that each decade has its own particular flavour. Because the western media also classifies time in this way i.e. Each decade is seen as a distinct social period. The 90s was the grunge epoch whereas the 00's was all about de bling where people got into debt to fund their dream lifestyles. I don't think anyone's worked out what the '10s are yet but I'm wondering if it'll have something to do with the rise of the internet, with the spread of information through blogs like this. With the end of the gatekeepers such as media owners and merchandise importers. I quite like that idea.

The formula is this: You add up your birth day + your birth month + the current calendar year. Then you work out which Life Lesson card matches the number you got. If the number is greater than 21, you add the digits together.

The Life Lessons cards are numbered as follows:

1 The Magician

2 The High Priestess

3 The Empress

4 The Emperor

5 The Hierophant

6 The Lovers

7 The Chariot

8 Strength

9 The Hermit

10 The Wheel of Fortune

11 Justice

12 The Hanged Man

13 Death

14 Temperance

15 The Devil

16 The Tower

17 The Star

18 The Moon

19 The Sun

20 Judgement

21 The World

My birthday is the 22nd May. The formula for me this year is: 2+2+5+2+0+1+2 = 14 which is the number of Temperance, the card of finding a new balance. Thus as a writer I expected to be doing a lot of editing and so I have been. But there has also been a shift in my relationship with my teenage children which I wasn't expecting. A re-balancing. As is appropriate when your children become adults. (Not that it isn't still shocking and scary as a mum.)

It's important to point out once again that you should use this formula with a grain of salt (I throw a lot of salt over my shoulder while using Tarot, lol). You should never let the cards chain you to a particular outcome. That would be using Tarot Devil style. I use my Tarot Year Card mostly to teach myself about the cards. I note the experiences I have and see how that could fit into the meaning of the Tarot Year Card.

Have a go and let me know what you think. And if your Tarot Year Card is one I haven't focused on yet and you'd like to know more about it let me know in the comments section below. Cheers!

Ways To Be Successful According To The Good Book Tarot (Part 2)

As I said yesterday, you can achieve success in various ways according to the good book Tarot. Here are the ones that stand out for me from the Life Lessons part of the deck.

The Emperor: Success achieved through hard work and discipline. For some reason potty training comes to mind. After a lot of practice and concentration every kid eventually manages to swap nappies (or diapers as they're called O.S.) for undies (as we call pants here in Australia).

Wheel of Fortune: Success as part of the natural ups and downs of life. Sometimes things go your way for no particular reason. More of it I say.

The Sun: Living the life of your dreams e.g. You love being a mother more than anything else and you get to be a stay-at-home mum.

The World: The ultimate success. Where you're at peace with your life in every way. Not only are you living the life of your dreams but in doing so you're contributing to the broader community.

Because these are Life Lesson cards we all get to experience them at some stage in our lives (hopefully.) And let's not forget the Court cards when it comes to success. Getting a king or queen can signify mastery of a particular area of your life.

So there you have it. Any other suggestions?

Ways Of Being Successful According To The Good Book Tarot (Part 1)

You can achieve success in various ways according to the good book Tarot. Here are the ones that stand out for me from the Everyday Tarot part of the deck.

Four of Wands: Success at bagging yourself a partner or getting people to generally wish you well using your social skills.

Six of Wands: Success achieved through natural talents or skills developed over the years. You experience this type of success after being in a job for awhile. It's when you've learnt how to work the ropes to get what you want in the workplace.

Six of Pentacles: Success thanks to another party. Maybe you win Tattslotto or get an inheritance.

Seven of Swords: Success by being a master tactician or sneaky bastard. And if you're both the world is your chupa chup (my daughter insists I say this, she doesn't like oysters). A shout out here to our friend Lance (see previous post)!

Eight of Wands: Success at achieving something you've been working towards. Such as getting funding for a business idea. It's the kind of success that comes out of the blue after a hard slog.

Nine of Pentacles: Success achieved all by yourself.

Nine of Cups: Just generally feeling successful.

As a teacher I employ many of these scenarios. I use my experience (6 Wands) and strategy (7 Swords) to maximise learning in the classroom and have benefitted from being well looked after by my bosses (6 Pentacles).

Are you experiencing any of these types of Tarot success right now in your life? You know the drill, please share.