Conducting hour long tarot speak... HELP!

Hey all,

I've been asked to read at an event based on Woman's Day. It's not paid, and I'm not supposed to charge, it's mainly for 'self promotion purposes' (media shall be there too, and it's at a big 5 star hotel, with few 'power players' too). Hence it's not a complete 'charity'.

However, I've been asked to also conduct an hour long talk/workshop regarding the Tarot. Trouble is, I don't know what exactly to talk about, or do if I make it a workshop. I'd just have an hour to do it all, and they said it has to be entertaining, yet at the same time, the people should leave it, feeling like that hour was well spent, and they learned something new.

And this is the first time I'd be doing anything like this, so hence I need all the help I can get.

Thank You

Love and Blessings

OH how exciting for you, Sweet!!

Well I think I would talk of the fool's journey thru the major arcana and tell it like a story. Then afterward you can briefly touch on each of the suits and what they correspond to but without going through every card.... You know wands is creation and inspiration, cups feelings and love and emotions....etc...

I've read a few books which make the journey of the fool very entertaining.... but you are so creative Sweet you can do this on your own... throw in anecdotes and such.... make it fun!


If you have time in the end which I doubt you will you can pull a couple of cards and go thru a few combos to illustrate your discussion... Pass out cards so that people can contact you for readings... maybe make up a tarot card for each of them or something. I was at a club so many years ago (like 20 or more) in the city and had a reading by some reader and he gave me a tarot card. It was LARGE but I thought that was so cool!!

I hope that helps a bit. love and light to you!
fran

When I ran an hour long workshop for around 15 MBA students, I did it as a 'divination for problem solving' workshop (it was self selecting, but since they were all there on problem solving course the subject matter was appropriate to the audience).

I made the session mainly practical: gave an example reading, then spent a while on how to ask a question (based on Joan Bunnng's wonderful site, which I referenced on an A4 handout) and then people picked from a selection of oracles/ tarot decks/ runes and worked in 3s on their questions using a mix of intuitive and book referenced readings. I then went around to support people. (I chickened out of what I had thought of doing to start instead of a 1-1: asking everyone to hold a question in their heads, picking one card and then going through the meaning to see how many people could link it to their question. I wish I'd done that now!)

It worked really well, especially for the sceptics because I made it clear to them that I wasn't going to try and 'convert' anyone: this was an opportunity to see if they got anything useful out of this approach.

My handout had some deck, book and internet references for people who wanted to know more and investigate things for themselves.

People who focused on their business question vs people who looked at personal questions were c. 50/50 I think.

Whatever you decide, I hope it goes well!

Aerin

Sweet, Frannee touched on a very good idea about the fools journey.
Don't know if you can lay your hands on very large cards, if you can then you could do an interactive journey.
I attended a workshop once where volunteers where asked to pick a card, we all then stood in a line in front of the audience and starting from the beginning we had to give a short interpretation of our card as a continuation of the previous card, so it read as a story.
It was the funniest thing ever. Some people where readers but others weren't and their interpretation were hilarious to say the least.
It gave everyone a flavor of how to read the pictures on the card. I think she picked roughly 10 or 15 people, but this would depend on the number there.
She explained that the story was about a fool starting out on his journey, then she asked the first person to describe their card as if it was the fools first step and then we all continued from the end of the last interpretation
Everyone erupted with laughter.

Well some people dispute the Fool's journey , but that aside I think its important to get them to 'do' something themselves, and to interpret some cards. I would forget the Minors and concentrate on the Majors.

Depending on how many people attend, and how many decks you will need, I would give them say three cards and get them to write down words and phrases that they get from the cards. You could show them an example by doing one yourself first.

If you had a group of three people with, for example, The Wheel, The Tower and Emperor, they would write down what feelings came to them for each card. Then another group of three people may have The Hanged Man, Judgement and Justice and they, likewise, would write down their impressions.

Then as a group effort you could put all six cards together and either give an example interpretation yourself or ask if someone would like to try to do it for you.

There are permeations of this because if you still have time to spare you could do the same with different cards.

I used to do this at my Tea & Tarot sessions, and after a few weeks they were reading all for each other.

Getting your audience involved is the best idea. Having people come up and read the Majors sounds like an excellent ice breaker and a way to help them have a whole lot of fun while they're at it, plus learning something. That will take up about half of your hour right there, if you can get 22 people to read the cards.

That only leaves 30 minutes and you could fill that with a little Tarot history and showing some of the styles of decks you have in your own collection and such. You could also pass out flyers telling where to get decks locally.

These are really great ideas, thanks you guys.

I'm gonna meet the woman organizing the event on saturday and get more details about it. Lets see how it goes!

Love and Blessings

sweet_intuition said:

These are really great ideas, thanks you guys.

I'm gonna meet the woman organizing the event on saturday and get more details about it. Lets see how it goes!

Love and Blessings

Click to expand...

When is the event? If you have enough lead time, and it is, as you say, a big media event, perhaps Llewellen or some other cardmaker will be interested in sponsoring it, and you can give each attendee a deck to take home???

T

sweet_intuition, how exciting for you! I love the suggestions so far, and especially Franniee's idea of giving everyone one tarot card to take home with them.

You could purchase the mailing labels from Staples or some such store, and have your name and information printed on that--attach that label to the back of the tarot card and use this as your business card.

I also like the idea of telling a story with the tarot, beginning with the fool and ending up with the last card--the World. Also, getting your audience involved by telling a story or reading their fortune from the card.

Maybe, you can have each person pick out the card themselves from a box, (the one that will have your information on the back of it) and have them tell a story from that card. Or answer a question that they would've thought of before picking out the card.

Good luck to you! Let us know how it all turns out!

My advice (for what it’s worth)

Don’t forget or ignore Power Point. Remember when building a slide show, don’t do the stuff that you find annoying. Like slides filled with words, that the presenter then reads…boring stuff.

But Power Point can be really cool with used correctly.

Think about what the noob’s always ask when they first come here (and everybody here hates those questions and makes snide comments). Those questions are huge. Everybody wants to know the answers!

Does your first deck have to be a gift?

Is Tarot evil?

A game? What do you mean it was invented for a game? Tell me more!

Remember – you’re the expert.