Yo, yadda yadda (me 'n' Thoth)

platitude

Yello,

hopes you all walked through the new years door and kicked ass x

So, got me a deck of thoth bout 3 years ago, this being my first deck of tarot cards. I am told this is not a great place to start, but hey ho, lets stretch my imagination. I was first drawn to the thoth for a number of reasons, firstly because I remember my fathers cards which had the same reverse prints as I think, though you are welcome to correct me, you find on the Golden dawn tarot. Also because I have read a number of books by Robert Anton Wilson who talks about Crowley in awe inspiring terms. As for personal knowledge on Crowley, I dont feel as of yet I need to know that much, just is what is will be.

Yo, so why am I writing this post, INFORMATION, DIRECTION, GUIDENCE plus maybe a helpful spoonfed session, baby stepping, baby walking, show me, guide me, help me, LEARN, please, did I say thank you yet? I will.

I have no problems with this kinda talk, do you?

So, more to the point then, after 3 years of my thoth deck gathering dust, 2 days ago I picked them up being the close of year (and what a year) I kissed and blessed them all individually then asked for 1 card to help me to show the way forward. Lo and behold I pick the Ace of Wands. Well if thats not an awe inspiring card then I dont know what is.

This gave me the confidence to then yesterday go for the 15 card tarot spread that it shows in the little booklet that came with the deck. The results I think were overall positive, look, Im smiling :)

If I may be so blatent to make this so about me and my thirst for knowledge on my first post, I will group my cards for your information.

7 trumps (Devil, Aeon, Death, Lust, Fool, Chariot, Priestess)
4 Disks (6, 8, 3, 7)
1 Wand/CC (Prince)
1 Cup (9)
1 Sword (5)
1 Unicursal Hexagram

What I did first was to write down what I could see in the pictures, the different hebrew symbols, the feel of the card in my head and what energy I could feel coming off the card onto my hand. Then I looked in the little booklet which I didnt find much help at all. Then I looked around the net some and found this place as well as a few others.

What, get on with some more questions or make a point?
Heh, okay then. Let me get it straight that I am not asking for a personal reading, just some LIGHT and a poke and nudge in the right direction.

1. Am I right in thinking that the way to learn tarot is by practising on yourself as I am now doing?

2. I have been reading some on the Kabbalah and tree of life this/last year, I can see how this knowledge is important with regards to the thoth, is there anything else I should be looking into/for?

3. In my lower left quadrant, I had the fool, the chariot, then the 5 swords, (ouch). This confuses me somewhat. My feeling is that I am trying to lead a fairly spritual and etheical life and in doing so others are going to bite my ankles, ya reckon? Then in the lower right quadrant I had 7 disks, ouch again, then the Unicursal hexagram ( ????? ) then the beautiful Priestess. Still more confusion. Let me make it clear I dont like the word Failure, although I try not to focus my attention on that, I see that it must happen in order to learn.

Anyway, if ya made it down this far through my waffelings, praise be with you. Any Ideas on these words and thoughts I write, if not thats cool, just dont shoot me in the foot please.

Excellent.

x





xxxx
 

Alta

Hi platitude,
Welcome to Aeclectic and the Thoth Forum.

My first comment on your throw is that 15 cards is way too many cards for a starting throw. You are very unlikely to be able to sort it out at this point in your learning. My suggestion for you is to scrap the whole thing and try a few simple three card throws, just to get started.

Past- Present- Future (on an issue, or just yourself)
Body - Mind - Spirit

And those sort of throws. They will help you get oriented to the cards. Read for others too, but use small simple spreads to start.

Reading all sorts of things will help with the Thoth: Kabballah, numerology, astrology. But the best thing to read is the original book, Crowley's Book of Thoth.

And. just work with your cards, let the ideas flow and relate them to your life, or the lives of those you convince to let you read for them.

We don't accept to have your actual readings posted for comments anywhere but the Your Readings forum. You will be able to access this Forum after a 30 day membership and 50 posts.

It seems to me that you have a will to learn, so read older threads here, related books and your cards and you will be able to accomplish a lot.

All the best
 

platitude

cheers

Thankyou Marion for your reply there, was begining to think that I smelt or something. *giggle*

Anyhow, is funny you mention a three card spread incorporating, past, present and future because that is exactly what I did as with regards to my relationship with the b/f. He's backpacking it in Egypt for a few months and I miss him much. x

So yes, I reckon that 3 card spread is a damn good idea, thank you. As for crowleys book of thoth, I have heard that this is quite complicated to get to grips with. I am not so great at taking in large amounts of complicated information. Small bite size chunks is my key but saying that I will never know unless I will myself to learn it. So yes, I'll grab that information too.

This seems like a very resorceful place to be so I will smile and hope you do too.

x
 

Alta

Hi platitude,

You are not the first person to find the Book of Thoth rather intimdating. It is online and I am sure either one of the regular Thoth Forum users may post it or you may find it in one of the many threads here (sorry, don't have it to hand as I have the actual book).

Lon Milo DuQuette's book: Understanding Aleister Crowley's Thoth Tarot is one that I personally found the most helpful.
ISBN 1-57863-276-5

I also liked and benefitted from Banzhaf's book The Crowley Tarot.
ISBN0-88079-715-0

They could be regarded as 'starter' books, though eventually reading The Book of Thoth is a must for this deck. The deck also works well intuitively, though you should generally not just read to the keywords or at most use them as kick-off points. The art and the details in the art are the thing.
All the best.
 

Lillie

Hi

Don't listen to people who say the Thoth is not a great place to start.
It is a great place to start, if you want to start there. (if you see what I mean)

I agree with Marion. That 15 card spread is pretty big. It has a lot of cards to make sense of.
And it is a lot better to start with a small spread.
If you intend to use the 15 card spread in future, then a 3 card spread is a good way to begin. As the 15 card one is really five 3 card things.

Other wise, you seem to be going great. You are looking at the cards and seeing what they mean to you, what you see in them. And that is a very good way to learn. It means that you are already stretching yourself away from the 'book' meaning, which can be very limiting sometimes, and going with your own intuition.

The unicursal hexagram!
Well, it's a bit of a thing, here, sometimes.
Not all decks have it, not all people use it.
I have it. I use it. I wuld not use a deck that did not have it. It's my favorite card.
But, you have to make up your own meaning as I have never found one in a book.
To me it is a card of magick, a card of 'things happening', a bit of a wild card, but I am always glad to see it.
And from the threads I have read that have discussed it, most others who use it interpret it in a similar way.

If you would like my suggestion as to how you should proceed from here...
I would suggest that you use your cards a lot, doing small spreads, about things that are happening or will happen in your life soon (and the same for any friend who will let you experiment on them)
You could write down the spreads, and how you interpreted them, and then you can see where you were right and where you were wrong, and adjust future readings to take account of your new understanding of the cards.

Though, it is always good to remember that the same card can mean different things in different spreads. That's when you need your intuition!

Read everything that you can get your hands on, but always remember that no one knows everything, and that the cards can speak to you in a different way to how they speak to some author somewhere.
Or even Crowley himself. What he believed/thought/intended 60 years ago need not govern the way you use the cards. Your deck is yours, not his.

I love this deck. I really do.
I'm glad you chose to use it too.
I hope you get as much out of yours as I have out of mine.

And I am so jealous of your BF! Back packing in Egypt! He is so lucky.
Tell him to bring back a pyramid for me!
 

wizzle

You might want to get familiar with Elemental Dignities which is a way of moderating the meanings of ajacent cards since most who read the Thoth don't use reversals. You can do a search either here on AT or on google to get lots of websites that will explain the concept.

Congrats on getting the Ace of Wands. That is a very auspicious card to draw. Hope you have tons of fun with your deck.
 

Lillie

Elemental dignities!

Ooh! I ignored them for every so long!

Mostly because I couldn't remember which was friendly to which.

But then, I read something that told me the key to it all was on the cross on the backs of the cards.
The colours of the arms of the cross representing elements/suits, and their positions on the cross indicating friendship/hostility.

Opposite = hostile
Adjacent = friendly.

That made it a lot easier.
 

platitude

wow

Well the title of this reply says it all , my heads spinning from the knowledge I've learnt over the last 2 days. Like What? Well ive gone from having absoultely no idea what card is what, to actually knowing quite abit more than nothing at all. Praise be me.

Google eyed an all, have drawn plenty of charts, done elemental work, symobolic meanings, hebrew letter study, astrology and germantrics.

wow! get me huh!

Oh yeah, the rose cross on the flip side that was what I was refering to that was on my dads tarot, the one thing that stands out to me as a child, that cross. Thanks for the info relating that to the elements, excellent. Does the white bit then represent spirit and the major arcana, if not do you know what it does represent?

Anyway in the spirit of fire and this new excellent energy im experiencing, me thinks that im getting a little ahead of myself as often I do and need to take a break.

Will carry my cards around with me for a few days and just be -

happy

wiv a

huge big smile.



Thanks for all the words, education and love.



Rainbows and stars

&

loadsa chocolate if ya want.


x
 

Lillie

It's great to meet someone who is so happy!

And so interested in all this!

The white in the middle of the cross. I would guess spirit, it usually is, isn't it?

If you are into Robert Anton Wilson, have you ever read Illuminatus?
It's good.
 

platitude

eck, cheers for those words lilly. Happiness has been along time coming, so I practise this virtue from within as much as is duly possible. In answer to your question, the illumiatus triliogy has been sitting on my bookshelf unread for as long as I have had my thoth deck. Presently I am looking at a book on the Kabbalah and in there it says to take a work of fiction that you feel may hold some keys and highlight that which speaks to you, then once read, go back to it and see if they still resonate. I am going to choose the illuminatus for that excersice. However, the books I have read by R.A.Wilson presently are cosmic trigger and prometheus risisng. The later book really was my first stepping stone to turning around my mentality.

Im still as excited and enlightened about my thoth deck as I was 5 days ago. I am deciding to make this a part of my life.

yadda yadda

x