"Ethics" of tarot

lilangel09

Since you are also into astrology. Because you already have faith in astrology, I'm going to use it as an example. What do you tell them when you see hard transit coming their way?
You are providing info based on what you see in a chart. (with transits)

When you read cards and see a negative outcome...
You are providing info based on what you see in the cards.

In both cases, you communicate the difficult information, at least as a heads up, right? And you may say, "This period of time will be tough, but doing this and this will make it easier to handle". Or you can discuss some options on how to deal with the outcome or hard transit.

Astrology and Tarot are both faith-based practices. Replace 'chart' with 'cards'. Gradually with time, reading cards will be as natural as reading with a chart, but if you're questioning your faith... read more, experience more, reinforce more. You know, same way you found your faith in astrology!

Unsolicited advice below:
As for the person you're dating. If he doesn't like Tarot/astrology, fine, but he should at least respect YOU enough to respect your interests, even if he's skeptical... given you think about him as a serious candidate for relationship. Your interests are intrinsic to you, and with Tarot and astrology, given the amount of devotion involved to each craft, the interest is often very deep. I think it's an insult to you to for him to insult your interests.
 

nisaba

The person I'm dating (has been a bit tumultuous lol) highly disapproves of my interest in astrology, tarot, etc. and basically tells me it's a "cheap trick", and those who do tarot readings are "playing God", have no right to give advice to people they know nothing about, etc...
That is their right.

I would expect them to mention it once, then never mention it again.

A question for you: Why do you choose to stay in a relationship where they maintain an ongoing disapproval of *anything* about you: spirituality, activities, friends, clothes, accent or whatever? Do you think so little of yourself that you don't think you are worth any better? (I don't need to know the answer, you probably should think on it).
 

SunChariot

The person I'm dating (has been a bit tumultuous lol) highly disapproves of my interest in astrology, tarot, etc. and basically tells me it's a "cheap trick", and those who do tarot readings are "playing God", have no right to give advice to people they know nothing about, etc...

Honestly as far as astrology goes I've become pretty confident in my knowledge, and I would not feel at all "unethical" looking at someone's chart and giving them advice based on upcoming transits. But I have to admit with tarot (still very new to learning about how tarot and astrology actually relate) sometimes if when doing readings for others the outcome is especially negative, I hesitate to explain it to the querent because I don't want to make too much of an impact on their actions and perceptions (especially if the cards are actually "wrong"??)

So I'm sorry I'm still a beginner and questioning my "faith" a bit lol but I guess I'm just wondering what other more experienced tarot reader's responses are to these types of opinions... Seems to be the general consensus and I don't have much evidence to justify my experiences or beliefs in it

Ethics are a personal thing to a large extent. Your bf may have different ones from you on Tarot...but that does mean yours are unethical or not right for you personally,

Well if you don't feel certain inside yourself that the right answers will come up in Tarot for you or that you can interpret them rightly, my thought is you may not be ready to read for others until you reach that point. Maybe unless you tell the querent first that you are just learning and are not yet sure of your accuracy level. That would be a different case of course.

Yes, the things you tell someone in a reading can affect the querent very much, Some people get more affected than others. But people generally come for readings because something is bothering them and they want help. They may be a little vulnerable at the time.

Yes, if you ask a question the cards may sometimes tell the querent what they want to hear and sometimes the news is not what they want to hear. When we start a reading we don't know what will come up. But it is our job to pass on what we are told.

But there are two things, maybe more, to remember here. If we are talking about a reading about the future, as you seem to be, even if something "negative" shows up in cards about the future that does not mean that this thing will in fact happen. I feel it is our responsibility as readers to explain this to the querent: that when we ask the cards about the future ALL that they can do is tell us where we are heading at the precise moment in time the reading was done.

That does not necessarily mean that is where things will end up. The future is not usually solid or set in stone. We can usually change it. The future we are heading towards now does not necessarily have to be the same future we are heading towards a half and hour later. Forewarned is forearmed as they say. We can change the future if we are not heading where we want to be. But we can only change the future if we know where we are heading. That is where you come in , You as a reader provide that knowledge that is necessary before change. There can be no change until YOU show the person why it is necessary.

Let's say for example that A is in a relationship with B. And let's say they are fighting,. And A is being all proud and saying that they will not apologise to B first as they were not the one who started it...etc and they are not going to make the first move. No way,. no how

And let's say they have a reading on the future of the relationship and the cards say that the relationship will end because too much time went by with no communication and B went off to find someone who can understand them and talk to them.

So A gets a reading that says the relationship will end. That does not mean it will end, if you see where I am going. it just means that where the relationship is heading NOW is towards that ending.

At that point A has a choice. They can think about if their pride really means more to them than the relationship instead and is who apoligizes first really more important than saving what they have.

And at that point they can run over and take B in their arms and apologise from their heart,. And if you did a reading 5 minutes later if you did a reading, the cards might well show a wonderful future behind then.

And that is what Tarot is. It is not telling someone that their relationship that they value will end, it is giving them the chance to save it, to prevent that which they don't want from happening to them. With the knowledge that the cards give we can change the future.

Next point, LOL, if you have to tell bad news, it's all in the delivery. Tact and caring are important skills in my opinion. The wording is very important, Some ways of hearing hard news are easier to deal with than others. And yet all can express the same basic truth.

My viewpoint is that we are hear to help and never to hurt as readers and any reading should be helpful and never leave the querent feelings worse than before it was done.
That means that if you tell them something that is coming they do not wish for you find suggestions on how to prevent it., Even if you have to pull another card to ask how they can do that. And you leave them with hope and faith in life.

Those are my rather long views on what it means to be a reader, LOL

Babs
 

ravenest

I think I am seconding this. Ethics is something quite different, and tarot does not have a special set, they are what your ethics are.

Tarot, generally, does not have a special set of ethics but some Tarot decks do... or at least one does.
 

The crowned one

Tarot, generally, does not have a special set of ethics but some Tarot decks do... or at least one does.

The Thoth? Yes right. People project, it comes without a special set of morals... Just like this stick I am holding. Save it.
 

Zephyros

Tarot, generally, does not have a special set of ethics but some Tarot decks do... or at least one does.

"I am the flame that burns in every heart of man, and in the core of every star. I am Life, and the giver of life, yet therefore is the knowledge of me the knowledge of death."

I used to have ethics, but I seem to have given them up one after the other, life being what it is. Now I have only one, try to be the best me that I can be, whatever that means. But I didn't learn that from anything related to Tarot, but I came to the Tarot field I am studying now because of my experiences that led me to that "revelation." This isn't to say I commit heinous acts and then justify them, but I accept my humanity and my many imperfections far more than I used to.

All this, of course, reflects on Tarot. Reading for and about others (without their knowledge), using it for less than virtuous ends, and all in all doings things "ethical" Tarot readers would frown on are all on my résumé. :)
 

Zephyros

The Thoth? Yes right. People project, it comes without a special set of morals... Just like this stick I am holding. Save it.

It doesn't quite work like that. The Thoth is a pictorial representation of a very specific viewpoint. I wouldn't say it has missionary tendencies, but it does espouse certain ethical values. Why would anyone have to save it for telling the truth about a deck's conception and original purpose which aren't anecdotal? Both are well documented.
 

The crowned one

It doesn't quite work like that. The Thoth is a pictorial representation of a very specific viewpoint. I wouldn't say it has missionary tendencies, but it does espouse certain ethical values. Why would anyone have to save it for telling the truth about a deck's conception and original purpose which aren't anecdotal? Both are well documented.

You miss interpreted what I was referring too, not the deck.
 

The crowned one

Art has no intrinsic moral template.