dolphingirl said:
Can you tell me alittle about the Flower Speaks decks and why you find it special? (I have seen the box for this deck but haven't seen the deck its self)
Thanks!
You'll be sorry you asked. I managed to get a couple of people to buy this deck because of my relentless enthusiasm for it.
I traded it on a whim with someone on the Forum here and was just knocked out by the thing. The book is packed with information and she has some poetry for most of the cards, which I always like. I like her writing too and her insights into people and life. She does case studies of people she has helped with readings that are fascinating.
The Bach Flower Essences she references are only available from her. I did a great reading for myself and went to get the recommended essences and they don't exist in the regular roster of essences. Unfortunately, her kit for all the essences costs $199 US or something. So, that's one thing I discovered.
The reading I did was fabulous--spot on, really accurate particularly about human conditions and emotions and relating to other people, underlying problems or emotions and that sort of thing. I call decks like this "touchy-feely" decks--the Osho Zen tarot is like this for me, but sometimes that's what you need, right?
I like the art and colours, there are some male figures but it seems predominantly feminine to me, probably because of the flowers and plants. I have all these plants and flowers in my garden which was a kick. Things like Bleeding Heart, Trillium, Morning Glory, Cosmos and Tiger Lily etc.
I love the extra cards she has like Root and Stem. The artwork on those is a little more illustrative rather than painterly, and really good. She has a little system I like for reading. I tend to like decks with their own systems (like the Navigators Tarot of the Mystic Sea) and of course there is personal taste involved in liking decks, but if you like gardening and flowers I think you'd like this.
I did a great exercise where I randomly picked a word from the dictionary ("inshore"), picked a card from the deck (Bleeding Heart) and then did a spontaneous collage in watercolour and paper using the word and the meaning of the card together. I made the leaves from the Hanged Man in the Shakespearian Tarot and the gold back of the Shakespearian Tarot, and I also glued in the last Cosmos flowers from my garden and some of their foliage. Then I scanned it into Photoshop and wrote a poem and did it up below the graphic in a nice font. It took me 4 hours but it was a great way of bonding with a deck and I've been fond of it ever since.
There's a touchy-feely term for you : "bonding." ;-0))
There are some good scans of the cards on the Internet in the usual review spots. I love the Black Iris card. I just can't say enough about how pretty it is and yet with some depth of thought and writing in the book.
Can you tell me alittle about the Flower Speaks decks and why you find it special? (I have seen the box for this deck but haven't seen the deck its self)