Tarot and education level

G6

I think I may have suppressed a giggle back there :p

I mean really, how many people are highly educated, intuitive and brimming with common sense? Who has all three? I considered it, but there is a case to be made that I'm lacking common sense in some regards.
 

EmpyreanKnight

I mean really, how many people are highly educated, intuitive and brimming with common sense? Who has all three? I considered it, but there is a case to be made that I'm lacking common sense in some regards.

I think we may have to start a support group, G6. I keep misplacing my common sense in the weirdest places, and sometimes I'd go without it for days before noticing that it's missing. :(

Welp, at least I never leave home without my sense of humor, tho it has this deplorable habit of sucking especially when I'm conversing with someone I find thoroughly delightful.
 

G6

I think we may have to start a support group, G6. I keep misplacing my common sense in the weirdest places, and sometimes I'd go without it for days before noticing that it's missing. :(

Welp, at least I never leave home without my sense of humor, tho it has this deplorable habit of sucking especially when I'm conversing with someone I find thoroughly delightful.

Exactly, lacking common sense isn't such a bad thing all the time. Certainly makes life more interesting, ha! šŸ˜Š
 

Migdal93

Oh dear that is just so full of bullshit. So any young person such as myself, who is in the process of studying her ass off to get INSIDE a uni needs to wait until she gets her so desired Phd in about what, 6 years from now, to then be able to start learning the tarot?

Just imagine all that lost time. 6 years from know I'll probably a advanced beginner anyway!

I think this comes from the need some people have to be special all the time, at all costs. Other than that, it makes zero sense.

The best tarot reader I've ever known has no college degree. But she is AMAZING. She is just so good at it, it's insane. She is highly spiritual and cultured - if she hadn't told me about her not having a degree I'd not have believed it.

So yes, tell her to stop being so snobbish! It's not going to take her anywhere nice. Assuming things never opens doors... It does the exact opposite.
 

Astraea

The best reader I know left high school after two years. She has a lively and curious mind, she is a student of life with a grounded spiritual practice, and she genuinely likes people. No amount of education can take the place of those qualities.
 

Nemia

I think it's nonsense. And I have a number of academic degrees. You need a lot of things to be a good tarot reader (intelligence, intuition, integrity...) but certainly not a formal education. Many people I know are creative, intuitive, original thinkers and full of wisdom - but never felt interest in acquiring academic titles.

My bullshitometer goes crazy when I hear stuff like that.
 

Barleywine

The short answer is that this sounds like an academic's "blind spot" (a more polite form of "bs"); while the synthesizing skills and philosophical depth ideally acquired through advanced study of a wide range of subjects will most likely prove useful, they are hardly mandatory for something as fluid and spontaneous as reading tarot cards.

To the extent that having an advanced degree attests (or at least used to attest) to one's sheer dedication, single-minded intent, absolute focus and well-honed memory, those attributes certainly have a place in the long-term study of any subject, regardless of credentials received. This debate sets up an artificial dichotomy between the more analytical, "scientific" approach to tarot and the more intuitive, "folkloric" pursuit. I don't have an advanced degree (it took me almost 10 years to get a degree at all, going to school nights), but I have the intellectual tools to make the most of almost any knowledge I turn my mind to. With tarot, my method is a matter of successfully bringing the abstract to bear on the anecdotal purpose of story-telling, in a way that's universally digestible. While I try to come down decisively on the side of precision and clarity rather than fuzzy generalities, having the versatility to mix-and-match the hard and soft focus in reading styles is an invaluable asset. Being well-read and tirelessly curious, having a large and nuanced vocabulary and a good memory, caring enough about the subject to want to animate the dry bones of "book learning" in inspired, imaginative and ingenious ways, and cultivating an innate grasp of "just the right expression" for any interpretive occasion don't require an intensive course of prescribed study, just a nimble mind, a love of applied knowledge and a strong desire to excel.

Putting it in astrological terms, I have a Scorpio's forensic sensibilities, a Cancer's sensitivity and retentiveness and a Capricorn's unswerving sense of purpose. That seems to be enough to take me where I want to go, without an academic "stamp of approval."
 

nisaba

I have met a person who studies the Tarot for a long time. She had a strong opinion about Tarot, what I do not share. She said that Tarot only can be understood, studied and practised by people, with a higher education background. In her opinion you cannot start studying the cards, if you do not have a high degree, because it will be useless.

Um .. which degree does she prefer? Engineering? Journalism? Architecture?

I know some pretty stupid people with degrees. I know some pretty intelligent people without degrees. Tarot requires a person to have at least some intelligence, and considerable human-skills. No degree guarantees that. Not having a degree does not exclude that.