Tarot confessions part 1: The Journal

I lie prostrate before my fellow worshippers at the Despicable Temple and her mouthpii, (plural of mouthpiece), and I humbly beseech you to hear my innermost confessions.

Part one:

Oh Fellow Worshippers, I hereby confess that I do not keep a Tarot Journal, I know not what a Tarot Journal is for, nor how you use it.

I have before me a notebook, begun during the first flower of my "engouement" for the art of tarot, and it has two pages per card, and I have coloured the page-edges to function like tabs, orange for wands, purple for swords, aquamarine for cups, and earth-brown for pentacles. On these pages, I once began comparative descriptions and interpretations for each card from each deck (this was possible when I only had four decks), and notes from places like (don't shoot me!) Joan Bunning, and sometimes (don't shoot me, please!) quotes from the Little White Book. (The book to the Roots of Asia is definitely worth consulting).

I confess, I confess, I have not touched this book since oh 2003 or so. And I never used it as it was intended, that is, I think I haven't.

Please, oh my fellow worshippers, allay my feelings of shame and misery at my failure to adhere to this commandement. (Does anyone know what the other ten Tarot Commandments are?)

Please tell me anything you wish to tell me about your tarot journal. Here are some of the questions I have in case you think you have nothing to say:

Do you keep a tarot journal? why?
How often do you write in it?
What kinds of things do you write?
Do you refer to it often, or ever?
How long have you been keeping it?
In what way is useful to you?
What does it look like?
Do you have more than one volume?
Has the tarot journal ever come in handy?
What do you learn/gain etc, from keeping a tarot journal.

etc.

Speak, oh my brethren and sistren...

O Sistren of the Occasional Journal...

I, too, am guilty of your transgressions. Fifty lashes (administered by the Emperor) with a wet Justice card.

I have journaled (ha!) on and off for years...I recently started writing down (most) of my spreads...mainly the large ones (6+ cards). I do not keep track of my little 3-card, yes/no, pointed spreads. however...when I opened my (ha!) tarot journal (in which I also kept my dream interpretations), the last entry was May 2003.

Oh, and did I mention that the journal is still only half-filled?

I even tried to keep a quasi-journal via the daily card draws...I did not post today to AT because I pulled a card that I'd pulled recently...and saw no reason to repeat it online.

I do go back (once in a while) to look at old spreads, etc, and see if they ever came to pass. I read an old dream from 2003 that had me

Doest this makest me wanting by the tarot gods and goddesses?

Shall I be doomed to incomplete tarot journals forever?

Help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi (you Hierophant, you)...you're my only hope.

Yours in journalistic apathy,

T.

(((firemaiden)))

Mine is a daily planner where I record daily draws.

It's leather.

It's a place where I write down my thoughts about a card, if I have any. It's pretty informal.

I have two, one for oracles and one for tarot.

It's more of a discipline and cultivating my focus, it teaches me to listen to that quiet voice that gets drowned out so often.

Oh, and I record longterm readings in the back so I can find them later.

This is the first year for me using the planner, before that it was a spiral notebook with random pieces of paper shoved in haphazardly. Same format.

Velly intellesting .traveller. - an excersise to quiet the mind. I like it.
So do you ever refer back to it?

Y'up. Which was why I went to using a planner, I couldn't find jack in the notebook. I tend to remember things like "didn't that happen around May?" and having a book that is organised by time is good for me. It also has the phases of the moon, which I find useful too.

I...I...I am guilty of this same crime *brust into tears*.

I confess, i confess.

Do you keep a tarot journal? why?
Not really - keep a Confusion Journal. It's actualy much more about the Playing Card Oracles than Tarot, but Tarot readings go there too. Nice spreads go, too. But pages for each card yadda yada stuff...nops. Tried once, but it didn't work =/ *rocks are thrown*

How often do you write in it?
I write when i do a reading, when i need to write. I have printed and 'attached' my own numerelogy meanings (yes, i wrote them, but in the computer ) because i was too lazy to write is down pretty. *more rocks get thrown*

What kinds of things do you write?
Readings and spreads, for Tarot. For the Playing Card Oracles, i have a page for each number (which mean i cram the meaning of four cards in one page). But don't think it's all pretty, half of it for Tarot, the other for PCO. Nops, all mixed together, the way i like it.

Personally, i think that 'new possibilties' and 'feelings' for a card come more during readings than when i sti down and look at the card, without any context. So, when i write down the reading and my intepretation of it, i'll also write down if any card seems to me to have showed something different, that i hadn't thought about before.

Do you refer to it often, or ever?
I usually carry it with me - it's a small and flimsy notebook, doesn't weight much. I use it to write the readings, quotes, something really interesting i found. But the main thing is that i like going back to older readings to see what's going one now and which was my interpretation back then. To sse any patterns, what i missed and what was right on the money. That's the best part.

How long have you been keeping it?
This one? Since July - that's when i got the Playing Card Oracles book, and started studying it. But then Tarot said it wanted be in that messy and ugly little notebook too, so now both are there. Which is better than having to carry a little pretty journal for each.

In what way is useful to you?
It's useful because...it's where i keep my readings and my crazy notes. Just that.

What does it look like?
Mwahahahahahaha . If you thought leather cover, gilded edges and stuff like that, forget it. It's a thin, flimsy notebook i bought in Argentina - i needed something to write, to vent, i was feeling very bad there, and this notebook was cheap. Poor little thing, it's cover is not looking the best right now...look's like it's been repeatedly beaten with the flugly stick. But you know what? I love it. It's a WORN thing, just like my favorite decks, not a holy little personal bible to be kept in a sacred wooden box and touched only after i have washed and perfumed my hands with lavender anoiting oil. It's a thing i carry around, where i write down readings, insights, whatever. I gave up trying to make a pretty journal, and decided to stick to the 'usable' journal instead.

Do you have more than one volume?
No. I've got plenty of past failed tries however.

Has the tarot journal ever come in handy?
I don't know...it's just a little random notebook...it always comes in handy when i do a reading. AND...i've had some sitters wanting to remember certain readings they haden't writen down, and i had them all in my notebook

What do you learn/gain etc, from keeping a tarot journal.
The one thing i learnt, was that there's no right/wrong way of keeping a Tarot journal. As i said, my notebook isn't really a tarot journal. It doesn't contain lots of studies or methodical examinations...it's not pretty or anything. But it's useful for what i need in this moment.
I guess the day i sti down and realize a nice journal, with two pages for each card and in depth descriptions is necessary, i'll go and start one. But you can't force yourself to own/do something you don't feel you need right now. I've tried it in the past, and failed.

My poor notebook, one day it'll have no more room for me to write...then i'll have to move on to another. I can try to make something prettier, but to be sincere, i believe it will be just another Chaos & Confusion Journal...i wouldn't have it any other way.

~Marina

*wails and self-flagellates*

O Brave Sistren and Brethren! I have . . . four? journals . . . five? begun, forgotten, incomplete and dead-ended.

I'm a systematic person, and I simply cannot settle to a system for my tarot journalling. Also, I'm incredibly undisciplined and just don't keep to a regimen.

I can't write much here - no time - but right now, I've got two big lever arch files - one for deck studies, one for readings. I'm writing all that stuff on looseleaf A4 paper and inserting it in the most organised way you can imagine (the readings are separated into "Me" and "Others" and arranged by date and within date, kind of reading as I do certain readings for myself often, like Pollack's Soul Spread and the Moontime spread from the Index).

The Deck Study one is planned so that I can spread into other folders, eventually with one Lever Arch per deck, or so.

It's all handwritten. I am lucky enough to have nice handwriting, and looking at it makes me proud - that, and also others find it hard to read in large chunks, so it'll remain a bit more abstruse to the casual page-turner.

\m/ Kat

I've just bought a diary with the intention of writing down all my readings on the date that I do them. It's a small page a day diary... and it shows the moon cycles, which I like to know.

I do have an old journal in which I made notes about readings, but sometimes (in fact most times) I didn't make notes. And sometimes I flip through it and get the benefit of hindight, sometimes I wonder what the heck I was on that particular day...

So - my new year's resolution is to journal my readings properly and make proper notes. I sometimes think of AT as my on-line journal, but it's not quite the same as making your own personal notes for your eyes only.

I want to be good... and start journelling...

Out of curiosity, Shy Priestess, what do you learn from moon cycles?

firemaiden said:

Out of curiosity, Shy Priestess, what do you learn from moon cycles?

Click to expand...

Well... sometimes it helps me to notice the cycles of the moon and how that fits in with my emotions and my readings. Like if I get the moon in a reading and the moon happens to be full or near full also, I might figure that I'm being influenced by the moon (literally). Also, new moon is good for starting projects, full moon can be a time of results coming to fruition... (or tempers/passions flaring).

What stage the moon is at doesn't always matter to me, but I like to notice in passing and sometimes take it into account in the context of tarot but also more generally as to how it might be a good time to do this or that.

E.g. there is a moon eclipse in Virgo in Feb... something I'll be keeping an eye on for how it might affect me (or not) and I'll be looking at my readings too, to see how they might tie up with the possible effects.... like the moon eclipse blots out the past and it can be a time of endings, putting things behind you...

For some reason I like the moon... and it's cycles! It just fascinates me.