Having to RE-learn tarot?

I have been reading on and off 13 years or so. While I have been studying very hard and reading a great deal for the last couple of years. I haven't been using the tarot as much as I had in the last six months or so.

While I do retain all of the information and keywords/phrase, I have been thinking that it would do me a great deal of good to start over with the basics. Mostly like a refresher course? I was wondering if any of you felt or feel like you need to do this on occassion or if I'm simply crazy...which is always an option.

Tabi

This is my 3rd time around with Tarot, and yes, I decided to do the beginner thing to the best of my ability. There had been quite a few years between the last go-around and this one, and I had forgotten that I knew a lot already. I felt like I didn't know anything.

As I've been working with the cards a lot has just come back and pretty quickly.

This time around I decided to do a daily draw kind of thing, and I'm doing the 21 Ways study here at Aeclectic. I fully expect to do some study of all of the cards before I'm done.

You haven't been away from the cards as long as I was, but you might enjoy going back to basics anyway. It certainly can't hurt.

Most likely, truly it just feels as if I'm not as strong as I was at one given point. I'm not sure what it is or if it is simply a lack of confidence or just needing that basic refresher course.

I read my handbooks on my lunch break, mostly to pick up on the symbols for the SSG that I do. I happened to grab the Gilded and actually really like some of the beginner exercises that they have through out the book. I think I'm going to do about half of them in my course.

I did the same this year after a long break from reading. It does help

I don't think you are crazy at all tabi. I think it's really healthy to get 'back to basics' from time to time. Often when you start to get more in-depth with the meanings you can forget some of the more basic interpretations and I find that this makes it difficult when I do readings (which isn't that often). I feel like I have a really deep knowledge of the card meanings but I seem to lose the ability to articulate it. I think by reviewing the basics you can then see them with new eyes because you have so much more knowledge than when you first looked at the basics as a true beginner.

I hope all that makes sense. I guess what I'm really trying to say is that I think it's a great idea to go back to the basics and I think it's just what I need right now as well!

No you're certainly not crazy Tabi! I've been in love with Tarot 21 years now, but life takes you on many journeys so there have been many periods of waxing and waning interest/involvement. I've done the back to basics refresher course quite a few times! I think it's a great thing to do and each new time you do it, its like your learning something completely new as you're a different person with new life experiences.

I recently re-did all those exercises in Bunning's book "Learning the Tarot" and it was a lot of fun and very enlightening!

tabi said:

I have been reading on and off 13 years or so. While I have been studying very hard and reading a great deal for the last couple of years. I haven't been using the tarot as much as I had in the last six months or so.

While I do retain all of the information and keywords/phrase, I have been thinking that it would do me a great deal of good to start over with the basics. Mostly like a refresher course? I was wondering if any of you felt or feel like you need to do this on occassion or if I'm simply crazy...which is always an option.

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Tabi, I would highly recommend the workbook 21 Ways to Read a Tarot Card. It is perfect for what you are describing. I went through the same sort of feelings you are having, and that book has opened up a whole new world to me. It really helps you learn the deck you are using, trust and build your intuitive reading skills, and identify symbolism and other things inherent in the cards. It has been very refreshing as well as enlightening.

We also have a great study group on the book here on AT, and have completed the Apprentice Level and are now working on the Adept level. New members join the group relatively regularly, and those of us that have completed the earlier steps go back and assist/comment for new members to the study group. It has really helped me grow as a tarot reader and become more confident in my skills and abilities as a reader.

As I said in a previous post, I'm doing the 21 Ways Study now, and boy have I learned a lot. I think it is a great way for someone to return to the basics mainly because it covers all of the ways you can get into a card, including some that you probably have never done before. If you've done the book thing, there are intuitive things to learn. If you learned to read intuitively before, you are going to get a bunch of book learning. Etc.

Starling said:

As I said in a previous post, I'm doing the 21 Ways Study now, and boy have I learned a lot. I think it is a great way for someone to return to the basics mainly because it covers all of the ways you can get into a card, including some that you probably have never done before. If you've done the book thing, there are intuitive things to learn. If you learned to read intuitively before, you are going to get a bunch of book learning. Etc.

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Exactly. I tell you, after completing the apprentice level, one day I picked up my Baroque Bohemian Cats deck, and I swear it looked as if the cards were animated! I saw so many things I had not noticed before, and the cards were just alive ... hard to describe. 21 Ways really has taught me how to look at and interpret an image with a combination of intuition and tarot knowledge. Just amazing.

Starling glad you joined the study group

That has happened to me many times. And surprisingly, everytime i decide to start again, now with books, but with the cards...using them, sleeping with them, carrying them around, playing with them when i'm bored....everytime i re-start the journey, i'm able to go a little deeper.

I am too 're-starting' a journey, and i believe i'll also make a new journal for it. My past ones were too messy, and mixed too many things in one. =/

Good luck to...us, all re-learners