3 OLD Decks given to me by a friend

Maybe it has something to do with intimacy; my cards are in my hands so often that the thought of others touching them gives me the creeps, to the point that they feel almost like my underwear. And I'm really weird about lending and borrowing clothes in general, to the point were my limits are a jumper or a pair of socks between my mother and I. If someone stays over and accidently leaves an item of clothing behind when they leave- urgh! I don't mind a second hand deck of cards providing they're lightly used, but an old deck that's been used continuously for decades... Yeh, not going to sit comfortably with me. Yes, I know I'm weird. :sly:

beginagain said:

Maybe it has something to do with intimacy; my cards are in my hands so often that the thought of others touching them gives me the creeps, to the point that they feel almost like my underwear. And I'm really weird about lending and borrowing clothes in general, to the point were my limits are a jumper or a pair of socks between my mother and I. If someone stays over and accidently leaves an item of clothing behind when they leave- urgh! I don't mind a second hand deck of cards providing they're lightly used, but an old deck that's been used continuously for decades... Yeh, not going to sit comfortably with me. Yes, I know I'm weird. :sly:

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Beginagain you're not weird at all, I feel exactly the same way! I won't read with used decks and I don't let people touch my cards. But, I am very empathic and I FEEL things!

gregory said:

That is for her to know and not for us to speculate. Maybe she wanted to be sure she would manage to stay retired - no temptations. But I don't see how anyone can call it "off".

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I said I didn't understand it...in other words I can't relate to it so therefore it feels off to me. I was no more speculating than you were about 'vibes'. I definitely understand her picking up uncomfortable vibes with these cards and sympathize. I would hate to see a lifetime of energy in these cards destroyed by a cleansing.

I wouldn't look at it as destroyed, just 'moved on'. The cards are fully capable of replacing that energy with the new owner's. There won't be a vacuum. It's not like they can only fill up once and then they're done.

HudsonGray said:

I wouldn't look at it as destroyed, just 'moved on'. The cards are fully capable of replacing that energy with the new owner's. There won't be a vacuum. It's not like they can only fill up once and then they're done.

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I guess I just don't feel that way. I feel that these cards are full of this woman's beautiful soul and energy.

When I did a crystal healing course I was told that crystals used for healing could get 'burnt' out, even if routinely cleansed. After a period of intense work they might actually break or just be in need of being retired, maybe it's the same for a deck??

An appropriate way to retire a crystal was to give it back to the earth and the Gnomes. That's why I thought of burying the cards to retire them, giving them back to the earth.

I currently live in India, next to the Sacred River Ganges. Indian people place significant objects (e.g. a photo of a deceased loved one) in the river to let go of them in a ritualistic and respectful way. Here this is not seen as 'pollution'. That's why I thought of letting them go in a river, with some kind of a ritual goodbye, of course.

I'm thinking tarot cards, essentially cardboard, are bio-degradeable, no? certainly a lot more bio-degradable than many things that routinely go in the trash methinks...

Sorry to all those who find these suggestions distasteful or inappropriate in one way or another, but everyone's allowed their two penn'orth I guess, and that's mine.

Jill

PS I think the idea of showing this thread to the original owner of the cards so she can browse through the suggestions is a great idea, and if she is open to the cards having a new home with one or more of you, great!

jillkite said:

Sorry to all those who find these suggestions distasteful or inappropriate in one way or another, but everyone's allowed their two penn'orth I guess, and that's mine.

Jill

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hi jill, no apologies necessary - i didn't mean to say that your suggestion was distasteful. i realize that didn't get into all the reasons why i disagree with you, but i can here.

i get it - the river ganges has been used for that purpose for an untold amount of time. i live near the mouth of the mississippi river, and i know a lot of people (not quite in the same way) also ritually (and otherwise) let things go into its murky waters... the dead zone in the gulf of mexico tells that tale. and while i shudder to think about the state of the ganges from an ecological standpoint, i also fully realize that most people in india have a *lot* more pressing concerns than the environment, so no judgment here.

i think returning energized objects to the elements is a noble idea - if they came from the elements, as a crystal has. i agree that tarot cards do refer to the elements, but that's not what they're made of. they're made of bleached cardboard, printed with (i'm guessing) chemical inks, and bonded or laminated with plastic. in some cases, i think they're entirely plastic?
please, someone correct me if i'm wrong, but i've never seen a deck promoted as being eco-friendly or sustainable?

anyway, i totally see where your well-intentioned suggestion comes from, but it created an image in my mind of someone hiking in the pacific northwest, watching the salmon leap upstream, and finding a eddy of dirty, waterlogged cards snagged in the creekbed. i realize that one person doing this once is, as you say, a drop in the bucket - but if everyone thought that way, we'd be in a lot more trouble than we're in even now.

plus, it just seems to me that if someone would treasure these cards -creepy energy and all!- it would be a waste to dispose of them in any way.

so - this was just to explain myself a little more, i didn't want you to think i was dismissing your suggestion.

Not to derail the thread, but marine debris is a huge environmental problem. The negative impact on ocean life is immense. If you want to give back to the earth, adding to the trash in oceans and rivers is the last thing you should do.

jillkite said:

I'm thinking tarot cards, essentially cardboard, are bio-degradeable, no? certainly a lot more bio-degradable than many things that routinely go in the trash methinks...

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The misperception that something is "more bio-degradable" than something else, or that it's "just" (insert whatever here: "paper," "tiny," "one time," etc) is why there is a pollution problem and the environment and its inhabitants are poisoned.

VioletEye said:

i agree that tarot cards do refer to the elements, but that's not what they're made of. they're made of bleached cardboard, printed with (i'm guessing) chemical inks, and bonded or laminated with plastic. in some cases, i think they're entirely plastic? please, someone correct me if i'm wrong, but i've never seen a deck promoted as being eco-friendly or sustainable?

i realize that one person doing this once is, as you say, a drop in the bucket - but if everyone thought that way, we'd be in a lot more trouble than we're in even now.

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I'm not trying to be harsh to (((jillkite))) but simply educate as it's important to know. As (((VioletEye))) pointed out, cards are bleached and printed with components that are potentially poisonous and deadly to wildlife when they eventually breakdown into tiny particles and are then dispersed into the river and ocean, affecting everything that eats whatever consumes those particles thereafter.

Most cards are coated with some type of plastic or varnishing (otherwise they wouldn't last 35 years!) and would *you* want to eat poisonous inks and plastic? Animals can't tell the difference between man-made items and natural food -- just google the many sad instances of large marine mammals found dead from clogged digestive tracks from a lifetime of eating man-made trash -- and the smaller the creature, the faster it's poisoned.

Anyway, again I'm only trying to help educate "one drop in the ocean" as it *does* make a difference and spread - the good and the bad.

Even if just ONE PERCENT of the world believed it was ok to give something "back" to nature that is actually man-made, that would still be nearly 71 MILLION people. Thus, our current pollution problem and the Great Pacific Garbage Patch (which is mostly small particles of plastic) -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Pacific_garbage_patch

Sorry for the possible derailing of the thread, but I think it's too important not to elaborate on...

Laura Borealis said:

Not to derail the thread, but marine debris is a huge environmental problem. The negative impact on ocean life is immense. If you want to give back to the earth, adding to the trash in oceans and rivers is the last thing you should do.

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Hey Laura Borealis, My husband and I pick up trash all the time. I know where you are coming from!!

Hi cheshrkat, Since your friend passed them on, then they want to be used, or cherished, right?
Since they don't "feel" right in your world, then passing them on could be the perfect answer. And it looks like you have 3 VERY enthusiastic, big time readers here who would love to "adopt" them & continue reading with these OLD decks.... I do believe posting here at AT is to lead you to these 3 new homes... (just my take ).

cheshrkat said:

,... but. The decks don't "feel right" and I've started getting a seriously bad vibe from them. I keep them wrapped in their silk cloths and away from my other decks. I've tried several de-consecration rituals, but I still get a weird feeling from them.
My friend just laughed it off, promised me she she meant me no harm, but explained that sometimes decks can absorb a lot of energy and that it takes awhile for this energy to finally dissipate.
Any suggestions as to what I should do with these decks? I'm grateful that she trusted me with them, but enough is enough

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Oh, we could do a reading... I shuffled and these 4 cards came out when I asked:
"What do the cards want if they could talk?" The scan is attached.

We do seem to have a water cleansing! Each of these decks seem to say, we did "absorb a lot of energy". Then take a look at that last card with nurturing! So, I get, "After the cleansing, we want to help people!" The 3 decks seem to be shown as the cup shaped flowers in these cards! The first 3 cards in the spread may even be for each for one of the 3 decks? For example, the 2nd deck wants to be put in the star light to cleanse, and sprinkled with little droplets of water...

Hope you come back and post again here soon cheshrkat...

ETA: Dee Ell, I see you posted while I was typing, and scanning. Since you live on an island, you see so much pollution coming in from the seas. I know we were SHOCKED at how much trash can be found on islands in the Caribbean that have very few inhabitants. These islands were completely "trashed". Same with Tahiti when we did a horse ride on the beach back in '99!!!