Crowlove
Ugh, you are so right on!
I just want to extend my gratitude for your fearless approach to Tarot & your insight really spoke to me & sheds light on my journey thereby allowing me to have that "blank canvas", to continue your metaphor & express MYself.
Peace.
It., of course, means different things to different people and the reality of what it means to me would be the sum total of what it means to us all together.
There is NEVER any such think as the word "Should" in Tarot. NO ONE can tell you what you should do or should not do as a reader. All that we know, no matter how good we are, is what works for us. The best way for someone here may be the worst way for you. And that is normal and how Tarot works. Tarot, and especially our intuition, is a very individual thing and works differently for each of us. And that is exactly as it should be.
Intuition especially, is something you have to go inside yourself to find. The path inside each of us is different. Also intuition comes in many shapes and sizes. We may not all be gifted in the same areas. Eg some are clairvoyant (See the answer in their mind's eye), some are claircognizant (they just FEEL and KNOW the answer inside them), some are clairaudient (and hear the answers as as though someone were telling them to them).
Tarot is a tool that does and will develop intuition, but we do not all develop in the same way. Just like some of us are better at History in school and some are better in Math....we each have different aptitudes in our intuitiuon natures and some forms will be easier and come more naturally to us than others.
No one can tell you what you should do, only you can know and feel what is natural to you.
As for me, I have had intuition come to me though all my senses at different times. But I am predominantly visual and claircognizant. I do start a reading with a short versiou of my set meanings, They are not the answer per se, but they point out the direction where the answer is to be found.
Most of my answers come from looking at the card image, closing my mind and just feeling. Certain things in the image will call to me and as I look at them, I start to know the answer. The card images for me are like the catalyst that sparks the knowledge.
My opinion of tradition, and a lot of people may disagree, is basically who cares. What matters is to find what makes you the best reader you can possibly be. That may go along with Tarot tradition, it may fly against it. But whether or not something has been done for ages, does not make it the best way for you. What gives you the best answers, and feels best and most natural to you....those are the things to concern yourself with finding. Not what has been done before or why.
There are no rules of what you HAVE to do in Tarot. No that does not mean you can make things up as you go along, at least not at first. I believe you have to learn the rules to know when to break them. Like an artist, reading Tarot IS an art to me, certainly not a science. An art teach can teach you different techniques that will be useful later on, but no one could have taught Picasso to be a Picasso, when what he was to create had never been seen before.
Reading is unique. It is an expression of what is inside you, your personality and all that you are comes out in it. No one can teach you to be you and to express yourself through he cards. You have to find it, from inside you.
The thing I believe works best is reading a LOT of methods, trying the ones that call to you and seeing for yourself what works for you and what doesn't, Keep what works or modify it, and let for of what doesn't. And you can ALWAYS make up something completely new of unheard of before in Tarot if it suits your needs better than what is around now.
Your cards, your tool. Make the best of them and most of all make of them a reflection of who YOU want to be in this world and as a reader,
Babs
I just want to extend my gratitude for your fearless approach to Tarot & your insight really spoke to me & sheds light on my journey thereby allowing me to have that "blank canvas", to continue your metaphor & express MYself.
Peace.
