Tarot ‘Plays’ Footie

I rarely watch sport, and can’t bear all the roaring and howling that comes out of the telly when football’s on.  Some of those commentators get really foamingly hysterical and could do with a slap. But who am I to naysay a national passion? The card below, the 6 of Pentacles, also known as Coins or Discs, is the card I have learned to associate with the ‘home crowd’.

 I wouldn’t feel comfortable using the Tarot for betting purposes.  Or safe. It would seem disrespectful, contrary to ethics, and if  it didn’t work out, there could be unwanted comeback. And if it did work out, there could be unwanted comeback.

Maybe someone would like to make a movie about a tarot reader who gets a hit man set on to them by a cartel of evil bookmakers, because the reader’s giving too many winning tips and it’s costing the bookmakers big time. Hello, Quentin T? Are you there?

But if Tarot is a divination tool, what will it co-operate in divining for and what won’t it divine for? Does the ability to divine depend upon the reader having a personal interest or sense of connection to the question? 

I live just down the road from Blackpool and Saturday was  a big sporting event. Blackpool (the Tangerines) were playing Cardiff at Wembley. At stake, so I gather, a place in the Premier League and £90 million. High stakes indeed.

I laid out my cards in a counting spread. I laid out six cards and above them another.  The six cards ‘count’ for one point each. The solitary card above them counts for two, giving a total of eight.

I laid out two of these spreads, one to represent Blackpool, the other Cardiff.

As I shuffled I asked to be shown the winning team.

Normally in a counting spread, a likelihood of something happening will be given by a result of drawing more upright cards than upside down cards, known as reversals.

I drew a count of three upright cards for Blackpool. Doesn’t look great, I thought. Then I drew a count of two uprights for Cardiff. Oh, I thought. That’s not a win either according to my usual system.

I decided that the Tarot had answered a differently phrased question. It knew what I was trying to get at and had answered me very directly, not by saying a yes or no, but by indicating the SCORE.

And a little over two hours later, we had the score: Blackpool 3: Cardiff City 2.

SEE VIDEO HIGHLIGHTS BELOW (…if you absolutely must.)

http://www.footytube.com/video/blackpool-cardiff-city-may22-47851

As a tarot reader, getting an answer that doesn’t seem to fit the question, be prepared to discover that the answer you’ll get is a correct answer to the question as the Tarot preferred to tackle it.

Tackle. Geddit?

So in answer to the original question…no. Divination does not require an emotional connection from the reader. In  fact, this could skew the results. Reading for yourself if you’re tired or anxious, or reading for loved ones where there is anxiety or hope attached to the question, may produce distortion of interpretation. 

If reading for yourself, try pulling  an extra card – a  BIAS CARD to identify any such distortion.

When receiving a reading, bear in mind tarot and similar activities work best when your reader is in an ‘alpha state,’ a condition of relaxed consciousness. Scowling at a reader with cold suspicion, arms folded, is not conducive to the alpha state for either of you…because you too,  will get most from your reading in the creative receptivity of alpha state.

If you follow football, you have pretty good hunches sometimes, and want to be even better at hedging your bets…you could do much worse than hone your intuition by learning a divination skill.  Joking aside, such skills, whether you’re using tarot cards, ordinary playing cards, runes, divining rods, mirrors or pendulums…are a tool for life, with who knows how many applications.

Questions or comments? Just click on the comment tag below. 

Double Trouble…

What a few weeks it has been for anyone using the Tarot to try and divine the Election outcome.  On May 4 I looked in the cards and saw a riot of apparent contradiction. Cross- referencing a number of question-and-answer columns, I seemed to be witnessing the following scenario post May 6:-

Gordon Brown still in situ in No. 10

BUT David Cameron the ‘winner’…just

AND a Hung Parliament was probable. (chance  3/5 or greater.)

GB! I thought. And I meant Gordon Bennett!  not Gordon Brown. It looked completely bonkers.  I tried to rationalise what I was looking at and couldn’t. I couldn’t  think of a formula or precedent, that would allow me to accept the Tarot’s preview as likely.

Now, to use the Tarot for divination on public matters or world events doesn’t feel at all the same as doing an interpersonal reading. When attempting to divine impersonal events, such as earthquakes for example, or the actions or thinking of a mass collective…such as the national consciousness, the variables are truly enormous.

Even so. Hindsight (or Back In Time, as Tarot author Janet Boyer terms it) serves here as a reminder that reading the Tarot can require NERVE.

We have come though an education system that doesn’t teach us to how to train or access our unconscious mind pro-actively.  To live peaceably in society settings, the human animal has had to compromise individual instinct…which is why the divination arts are so often regarded with mistrust and disfavour. They theoretically represent a potential threat to society.  Imagine the social consequences of all of us acting on our gut feelings about other people…we’d struggle to work productively in co-operative teams of strangers in the workplace for starters, wouldn’t we? 

As a tarot reader it doesn’t necessarily come easy, trusting what you see in your cards when it doesn’t square with your rational analysis of the question.  Learning to ‘just go with it’ is the simplest and yet the hardest thing of all.

And so, returning to the reading on the Election, we drew the Emperor Rev as an Emperor  (PM, Government, authority figure, paterfamilias) departed  – with gravitas and dignity in my personal view, just as he had conducted himself in the T.V debates – with gravitas and dignity.

And now we have two younger, smaller Emperors…

Let’s hope it’s a harmonious workable team, as in the Tarot’s Chariot card, able to forge smoothly ahead, and not the Chariot Reversed which would signify Double Trouble…

Below is the Chariot Card from the popular pre 1900’s IJJ Swiss Tarot Deck.

I would say to tarot students, ‘nerve’ develops with experience.  Cutting your ‘tarot teeth’ reading for a forgiving audience -family, friends, friends of friends, doing lots and lots of them, will help you find your key strengths and affinities in working with the Tarot.

This develops confidence in your divination…the Tarot’s power is the power of self-trust.

Tarot’s Helicopter View…The Elemental Spread.

Simple Tarot Spread, getting a snapshot reading by using the major points of the compass.

Wheel of Fortune
Wheel of Fortune (Photo credit: vpickering)

Tarot ‘s Helicopter Hover

 

I often use a 5 card spread to get a quick sense of how someone is doing in general. It’s useful when I haven’t been given any question, in which case I use it to help to identify the question.

To go up in my tarot helicopter I shuffle blind and draw 5 cards.

Card 1  EARTH/ the North stands the Suit of Coins (also called Pentacles or Discs.) I Look here to see how my querent is faring in terms of home, job, money, health, stability and security.

Card 2 WATER / West stands the Suit of Cups: I look here for insights into matters of the heart, what’s going on in their personal relationships. How’s their mood? I look out here also for issues to do with health, healing and recovery, and for creative and spiritual preoccupations or questions.

Card 3 FIRE/ South stands for the Suit of Wands: here I’m asking myself via the Tarot, what’s driving them? What’s the dream right now? Travel and relocation plans may also show up here, and social aspects, and levels of inspiration and energy.

Card 4 AIR/ East stands for the Suit of Swords: here I’m looking for a sense of, what’s going on in their head right now? (apart from the reading, obviously) I look here for their plans, pending decisions, exercising choice and power, and any legal, medical or intellectual matters.

A fifth card is drawn for the centre of the cross, and here I am explicitly asking, what is the priority to be addressed in this reading session? What is THE Question?

A recent client drew

  • Card 1 (N) Coins Four of Wands Reversed (dissatisfaction at work and at home. A home feeling incomplete 
  • Card 2 (W) Cups The Emperor Reversed (Bureaucracy, overbearing or absent male figure) 
  • Card 3 (S) Wands The Three of Cups (Friendships, celebrations)
  •  Card 4 (E) Swords The Wheel of Fortune (Thinking of making major changes, this being indicated as a good idea)
  • Question Card: Judgement

The Four of Wands Reversed

Client Response: This Card correctly indicated dissatisfaction connected to a home/property and/or a professional matter. The client had a flat on the market, no offers as yet, and had just bought a new house, but didn’t feel settled and was feeling anxious that she had made a false step. She liked her work but had been unsettled there recently, having difficulty with a new manager’s communication style. She was thinking of retirement (and this card when reversed means a LACK or ENDING or a NON-STARTING of a professional activity or satisfaction.)

The Emperor Reversed

Client Response: This card rang true.  She confirmed both as concerns that were preoccupying her at this time.

The 3 of Cups

Client response. She wanted, not a husband necessarily, but a proper companion. The man in her life would not entertain the thought of marriage, nor would he court her, nor even come to visit her in her new home. She was beginning to feel, not only sad but angry about this (the growing anger shown again to me later by the 5 of Swords) Her new house did not feel like home…she felt she hadn’t had a  ‘house warming’…

The Wheel of Fortune

Client Response:  She was ready for change, beginning to think very hard about what she wanted and needed after retirement. She felt she wanted life to continue opening up…she didn’t want it to narrow, she dreaded the idea of a dead-end.

The Question Card  Judgement: Retirement was approaching, the end of a major life chapter.  A kind of Judgement Day. Her essential question was, What would her life be like after it?

There were strong signs of happiness in retirement, indicated as being about eighteen months down the line.  The relationship problem wasn’t going to be an obstacle to this. If the man chose not to opt in more actively, I sensed she was going on to sail on regardless, and if he didn’t respond, he was likely to be left behind.

Until next time 🙂

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