Your Meanings

What are your meanings?

Are you an encyclopedia of your meanings plus memorized meanings you agreed with?

Are your meanings spin-offs of what other people have said?

I guess my point is:

When do meanings truly become your meanings and not what someone else has told you or something you memorized from somewhere else? When do you know?

Note: If this isn't it the right forum, feel free to move it. Sorry for any trouble if you do have to.

Personally, the only meanings I have that are set in my head are the very basic meanings for the Major Arcana and those of the suits. That is all I use that is standard to every reading.

It gives me the starting point of the answer. Just a word or two to start me in the right direction. The rest of what I see in the cards are from looking at image and feeling what it is trying to tell me. Which basically means that the same card in different decks does not have the same meaning, as the images are different and I try to ensure each of my decks is very different. It also means that I don't see the same thing in the very same card in the very same deck each time either. As it's about feeling what it is saying to you on each separate occasion. And although it can sometimes be similar it is never the same.

I tend to start by breaking the image into it's parts, what's the first thing that pops into my head when I see this colour or this shape, how does this thing pertain to the question...pretty soon I'm trying away quickly with my memories and associations and what those bring to mind on that particular occasion. I think it becomes almost like an automatic writing exercise. Starting off with a few basic thoughts and it just builds from there.

I don't know if I explained it well, but I have always read that way. Even when I tried to do it differently, this is the only way that really works for me. I just don't really have set meanings. The asnwers each time just come to me from the card images. And are never the same.

I also have over 50 decks, all of which I use regularly. So that helps ensure that when a particular card comes up in a particular deck, that I have no real memory of what it said to me last time I saw it. So that keeps me fresh.

Babs

In agreeance with sun charoit...........take the word FUN,funny ha ha,,,,,FUN yeah sure (negitive).....FUN nooot,(sarcastic) there's plenty more like that........
and just to compound things ,it depends also on the moods.....

Well there's a tendency for me to go with what I think are the traditional meanings... sometimes they're apt, sometimes they're not, but I can't tell if I continuously get the traditional meaning. Sometimes these meanings translate into various decks, then when a picture doesn't fit the traditional meanings, it's like a wake up call. I think of it as lacking flexibility, yet I do not think that my meanings are my own. I think they are someone else's meanings (although I have my personal skew on it) that have been "proven" to work or fit.

I have trouble seeing a card as fresh each time. There are many memories. I suppose reading 3 cards as a daily can carry too much baggage. Lately, I've been interpreting 6 of Pents as balance/exchange when the reading is for others, yet for myself, I know my situation and I think the 6 of Pents is telling me to give back and read live.

My meanings are in no way static or constant. Some are based on what might be standard meanings, and others are strictly intuitive or based on the imagery itself. Really, it depends on what deck I'm using at the time. Since I'm doing the IDS with the Tarot of Prague, I find that I'm using a blend of it all. Yes, the deck is back on the RWS system, but the images just scream at me sometimes and I just follow wherever they drag me.

For the most part, my memory sucks something fierce, so I don't have much of a problem keeping my readings fresh.

I think it doesn't really matter where your meanings come from as long as you understand them and are able to work with them effectively. As long as you are able to take the cards into something meaningful and comprehensive for your sitters, then I think that's what matters.

lilangel09 said:

What are your
I guess my point is:

When do meanings truly become your meanings and not what someone else has told you or something you memorized from somewhere else? When do you know?

Click to expand...

Being a beginner with Tarot, I have been working a system out for myself. Everyone says to just let it come, to look at a card and meditate on its meaning, and not read about meanings. Well, I can't just look at a card (minus the major arcana) and take guesses about the ENDLESS possibilities of meanings. Just looking at for instance my Universal Fantasy deck, looking at the 10 of Wands card, I would think it meant something peaceful - not negative like being burdened! I would say it looks calm. That won't quite work, will it? At least not for me.

At first I was just reading the meanings on a well known site and swearing by them...but...that didn't work quite well either. If it was so cut and dry, where it the real "magic" so to speak? Where is the talent? Where does meditation come in?

So finally I felt THAT approach was just skin deep...so I decided to find a happy medium. I get the gist of a card's meaning, but then I add my own twist, just my own thoughts concerning the surrounding cards. Sites and LWBs may tell you what a single card means, but it doesn't necessarily show how every combination of cards will come together, and that I think is where the talent and the "magic" or whatever comes in. That's when you pull the story together and READ the cards.

Know your basics well enough to have a solid foundation, and then just build on them how you feel you should.

So WHEN do meanings truly become your own? Whenever you decide to make them your own. Find your own system, sometimes it just takes a bit of searching and experimenting.

I think it's all in how we personally experience each card, at least that's how I've come to know my cards.
Honestly, I think that's the only way to really get to know them, the meanings truly become your own, they might be way different than traditional meanings or they might be the same, it doesn't matter, but once you've experienced each card you KNOW what it means when you see it, although each reading will alter it a little bit, and so will different decks.
We're all different, our lives are different, our experiences are different so the way we see a card or interperate a reading will be different from one another, although the end result might be the same. 2 people could do the same reading, pull different cards and still come up with the same answer and details. I don't think there is anything wrong with adopting meanings as long as it works, but to really know the cards you have to experience them

When I look at a card that is unfamiliar I usually make up my own meanings, and keep the "traditional" meanings in mind if they seem apt. But when I have such a basic RWS, without detail, thats where it gets difficult not to use those very basic meanings. For some reason, the I've been interpreting the cards in a very static manner. How do you weave something out of a deck that is so basic and sparse in imagery? (International Icon)

I guess I have to make "my" meanings my own.

SMV said:

I think it's all in how we personally experience each card, at least that's how I've come to know my cards.
Honestly, I think that's the only way to really get to know them, the meanings truly become your own, they might be way different than traditional meanings or they might be the same, it doesn't matter, but once you've experienced each card you KNOW what it means when you see it, although each reading will alter it a little bit, and so will different decks.
We're all different, our lives are different, our experiences are different so the way we see a card or interperate a reading will be different from one another, although the end result might be the same. 2 people could do the same reading, pull different cards and still come up with the same answer and details. I don't think there is anything wrong with adopting meanings as long as it works, but to really know the cards you have to experience them

Click to expand...

That's what I feel SMV. After you personally experience each card, the meanings become your own. It's just difficult trying to make my own meanings if the ones that match the books keep getting proven to me. I remember as a very skeptical beginner drawing the 6 of Cups. I got the "a visit from the past" meaning from it. It was originally from Thirteen's meanings but that one came through the most. I was like "yea, like that's gonna happen," but it kept rolling in my mind. Whad'yaknow, I was at an art competition and someone I met in the previous summer was there. She said hi. I honestly NEVER thought I'd ever see her again. So that meaning will always stick with me, although I've never interpreted it as "someone from the past will return" for other people.

But then what happens to your meanings that don't work?

I guess these questions arised because the basic meanings for the these cards keep proving themselves to me in various ways. I try to change the basic meanings, but it doesn't work unless the picture is different and expresses a different concept. However, I don't hope to be limited by the deck.

I've had cards change meanings on me in different readings, sometimes my meanings just won't fit and I'll look in a couple different books to find something that clicks and makes sense to me, then I keep it tucked into the back of my mind for when that card shows up again. That's where all those companion books come in handy! I still have cards that I'm not entirely clear on only because they rarely show up in my readings, when that happens I just read what the picture is doing and scrap worded meanings and sometimes what I'm seeing in the picture is completely opposite of what I know the card to mean so I just go by what I see and not what I think.

I think if the basic meanings work for you then keep them for your own, and scrap what doesn't. I don't think there is anything wrong with that at all. They're still yours even if the inspiration comes from a book