What to Share/Not Share in an Online Reading with Thoth/Thoth-based Decks

This would be part B of my question from the other recent thread of mine about criticism. This was the part of the criticism that I owned, my style was convuluted! Here's part of what I said in that other thread:

probie said:

The biggest problem I have right now is a reading presentation style. I need to figure out how much to share and how much is for me.

I'm getting the sense this is becoming like The Antique Road Show. Some of the people who bring in their stuff really do want to hear the expert appraiser say their spiel, it's the item that's important for them. However, there's also a distinct group that you can see in their face, "C'mon, c'mon, c'mon! Enough history already, what's the cash value? I got a cruise to take!"

Online readings, for me, are tough. In my day job, I'm a human services person and I do all those active listening techniques plus obsesses about body language and paralinguistics (tone, pacing, emphasis, pauses, etc.). In this format, I got a screen and it's mine.

With phone/F2F (face-to-face) you get some of this and can just go, "These two cards don't get along" and skip the fact that they're earth and air as well as the later has Venus in Scorpio and is on the 7th point (Netzach) & far down the Tree of Life - so isn't a happy little card to begin with!

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Okay, an edit here for you smarties: no card can have "Scorpio" + "Venus" + "Netzach" and be either earth or air - whoops! This is why you don't post @ 6:30am!

So while this is a reading question, it's a Thoth one because of all the leaning on dignitaries: elemental, royal elemental, zodiac, planetary, decanate, positional, and I'm sure I'm missing a bunch! How much of that is for me & how much do you share? Examples (obscuring 3rd parties of course) would also be appreciated.

If I were an ordinary sitter - I would just want to hear what the cards told you. I would not want to be told all the elementals and so on - as someone seeking advice, I wouldn't care how you got it, just what you got. If the sitter asks - then is the time to share the "stuff".


IMHO, YMMV and so on.

i agree with greggers!
I think at the end of the day time is money, sitters often dont want to waste time getting the background when they could fit more into the reading thats helpful

I'll tell you...

My boyfriend hates people wearing scrubs in the street. He's a forensic investigator, and it drives him BONKERS that medical professionals would wear clothing that is literally designed to denote surgical cleanliness out in the real world because it's A) pointless since by wearing it outside you've negated its purpose, and B) slightly fraudulent because it often seems to be a hamhanded way of advertising "I work in a HOSPITAL" for people who get juicy about that stuff. When he grumbles, I often point out that scrubs are comfortable and fast and that often people do things out of laziness or exhaustion, because some of my family often wears scrubs as a kind of default sportswear, even though none of them work in hospitals. Neverthless, he's right: scrubs are only something created to let you "scrub in" and the minute you aren't sterile, wearing them may be comfortable, but it''s professionally pointless. It's a costume being worn offstage (now there's a peeve of mine!)

I think the same rule and its variances apply with Tarot.

98% of people don't give a rat's hindquarters about elemental dignity or qabalistic attribution or planetary symbol... and "wearing" them in public has a slightly insistent look-at-me-ma-I'm ESOTERIC quality. Likewise, all of those things are ways of helping to convey certain qualities and states and modes, but Shin is not a tooth any more than the celestial geography of Aries bleats and has horns. And while the 2% of people who are interested in the minutia may thank you for letting them read the roadsigns while you're driving, a map is not a journey.

Likewise, people seeing a doctor don't need to know every journal subscription and conference and hospital round a doctor has been in on. They don't need to know all the wherefores and whereases. Occasionally when it's relevant, a doctor will convey details specific to a medical situation by way of explanation, but more often than not it obfuscates more than it clarifies. A lot of people would argue that it's the doctors job to edit all the noise so you can hear the message. And I'd say that applies to divination as well. Like scrubsuits, there's something slightly glamorous and sneak-peeky about letting people see what surgery looks like, but for the most part, people want the diagnosis and treatment, not the disinfectant and 48 hour shifts and arguments with the head of thoracic.

This is a personal decision: what is your style of reading? What are you tryign to give your clients? Do you NEED to describe a Sephiroth to them or can you just answer the question? Do they WANT to know what the astrological signposts are or do they want direction? You're the one reading the symbols, right, else why are they sitting in front of you virtually or physically? To use another metaphor, leaving people a lot of unprepped, uncooked raw materials lying on a counter is not the same as making dinner.

So I'd say: read the cards... don't lift the hood for them to look around unless they insist. The rest is stuff for you, not them. Occasionally sprinkle some occult bits in for people who might be so inclined or likely to read alongside... but in bang-for-buck-land mystifying arcane symbols don't even need to be on your robe or pointy hat. All they want is the reading.

Scion

love it scion!

I agree with Scion, but I'll soften what he's said with a little disclaimer - we "learn" to read so much here on AT, where we all speak a certain sub-language of esoterica and whatnot . . . here, your describing to me that I've got the 10 of Wands, Saturn in Sag, in the Water pile - that all makes a sort of sense to me (thought it does tempt me to chime in on the reading! LOL). But out there, most people will look at you like you would if your mechanic started going on about catalytic converters to you . . .

I read your other thread and I think the person who gave you feedback was very high-handed and condescending - for that, I'm sorry for you, that you had to be on the receiving end of such irritating blechness. But the person does have a point.

And I say this as one who does all of the above and "owns" that tendency as well

\m/ Kat

Ah - HERE is different. I guess I might say "if you want, I will tell you where I get this stuff..." - but if they say no please don't - you have to respect that.

I am very glad this is never an issue for me

Replies to Gregory, 214red, & Scion

Thank you *ALL*! That's wonderful stuff. I just didn't know what to do with the remote approach (online versus F2F & phone).

I mean when I'm at home sort of muttering the stuff or when I learn from experienced readers that have good reputations and we're sitting in the reading room, I'm part of the process. For me (maybe it's my work?) a good process is worth more than the result as the journey is what makes it gold. For me, who gives a rip that Frodo throws the Ring of Power in Mount Doom if you don't have that big quest with all those struggles? Or as Crowley (1944) states it in The Book of Thoth when he writes, "How Splendid is the Adventure!" in response to the horrors of 18/Moon (p. 113). I want to share the process so people can get that. But...that's me and this isn't about me, is it?

I suppose I like recognition as much as the next person (to-do list item: "destroy bad parts of ego"), but I've never found anyone [yet] who won't - in their own ethnic/culture way - tell a human services worker (from therapists to welfare workers) to go to hell & not do what they say. The myth of therapist mystique where human services workers are these wise people & clients hang on to their every word evaporated a long time ago for me in my first internship. So yeah, I don't have to be a big shot & am for the thrust of the Abbey of Thelema in my own way.

Okay, okay I'm starting to get this. It's like...well...my day job!

I don't say, "At your age you're probably struggling with ego integrity versus despair according to Erik Erikson (1950) because you're an older-middle aged person going into the young old-age bracket and this has been complicated by your sudden loss of income & housing resulting in you becoming doubled-up."

Instead I say, "This must be so incredibly painful for you [validation of emotions]! You've worked your whole life and now because you got downsized and the factory went to China you've been evicted [loss of income & eviction]. So now you've had to crash on your son's couch [doubled-up/couch homeless] as you've got no where to live [ego integrity versus despair]. That sounds like that's even more painful than losing your job and your apartment [validation of emotions & book ends opening statement]."

I'll try this out. Thanks so much all of you! Online reading has been so hard for me because I never realized how much I depend on hearing people talk or seeing their expressions. Thank you! Thank you!

P.S. to Scion: Yes, tell your BF that he does have a point to an extent. In the Marine Corps, we were only allowed "brief, essential stops" while in camoflauge utilities like getting gas for the car or I suppose picking up children from day care (not my experience). Army can go everywhere, but we couldn't unless it was a dress or formal uniform. Part of it was to make a clear demarcation between work & off-work life, which I think is healthy and preserves a professional image.

However, I could see how scrubs would be the ultimate sportswear now you say it. It's like wearing pajamas, but without the looks of "you couldn't put on day clothes?!?!"

Thank You too!

thorhammer said:

I agree with Scion, but I'll soften what he's said with a little disclaimer - we "learn" to read so much here on AT, where we all speak a certain sub-language of esoterica and whatnot . . . here, your describing to me that I've got the 10 of Wands, Saturn in Sag, in the Water pile - that all makes a sort of sense to me (thought it does tempt me to chime in on the reading! LOL). But out there, most people will look at you like you would if your mechanic started going on about catalytic converters to you . . .

I read your other thread and I think the person who gave you feedback was very high-handed and condescending - for that, I'm sorry for you, that you had to be on the receiving end of such irritating blechness. But the person does have a point.

And I say this as one who does all of the above and "owns" that tendency as well

\m/ Kat

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I took such a long time editing & constructing a post, I didn't check to see if others chimed in - sorry! That does make me feel better, though I didn't feel Scion was being too rough [maybe because I'm too rough with me? Still self-castigate too much]. It's also validating to hear I'm not alone in this tendency, I can get real excited about this stuff. So it's more about eager/excited than ego per se (though it always lurks).

It also helps to hear that comment was off, it felt so wrong and sometimes I can't language my feelings well. I get all overwhelmed and such, which is why I only work with people I don't know and am careful about getting readings from people. I still have to work on using the solvent on the bad parts of ego and coagulating the good/healthy parts together.

That's what I love about this deck, it's alchemical and the sex metaphors are so appropriate. Just love it, but I guess not everyone wants to hear all of it. Continuing my studies in earth school!

Probie said:

I took such a long time editing & constructing a post, I didn't check to see if others chimed in - sorry! That does make me feel better

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LOL Me too - I saw your responses to the others and thought you must have me on yygnore, and wondered what the hell I'd done to you!

I still have to work on using the solvent on the bad parts of ego and coagulating the good/healthy parts together.

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It's about assimilating that lesson all the time in such a way that an outsider (i.e. someone who's not you) wouldn't pick up on your having gone through the process. It's kind of like stealth mode - the changes go on underneath but to the casual observer you could just be a thoughtful person. Then the challenge is to translate the same message for someone who's not versed in the same occult terminology you and I are.

Continuing my studies in earth school!

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The Princess of Disks might be a worthe companion for you just now . . .

\m/ Kat