Combining Tarot With Counselling Skills

You might want to consider a book written by Arthur Rosengarten, Ph.D, a clinical psychologist in California, who has decades of experience using tarot in his practice.

Tarot and Psychology: Spectrums of Possibility (Paragon, 2000)

I have it and find it very useful. His approach is integrative, with a Jungian influence.

Thank you Sentient - that was exactly who I was trying to remember.

(I mentioned it above.)

Here in Israel, I don't know how the legal situation is, but I have heard from friends that their therapists use all kinds of cards. There is quite a market for Hebrew-language "healing cards" or "therapeutic cards" (if interested, look here and use Google Translate), and they're designed to be used as therapeutic tools. Some are inspired by tarot, others are not, but most were developed in the aftermath of the tarot boom that swept the country some 15 years ago.

Again, I don't know what the legal status and accreditation of the therapists are. My daughter is studying to be a clinical criminologist and her mentor, a clinical criminologist, uses different card decks with her patients.

Sentient said:

You might want to consider a book written by Arthur Rosengarten, Ph.D, a clinical psychologist in California, who has decades of experience using tarot in his practice.

Tarot and Psychology: Spectrums of Possibility (Paragon, 2000)

I have it and find it very useful. His approach is integrative, with a Jungian influence.

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Interesting reading.

So from the (very little) I have read it appears as if he uses cards as visual/emotional prompts, with method of selecting (presumably, pre-selected) card and allowing the client to form their own conclusions about it.

In this sense the tarot card is one of those "here is a picture printed on cardboard you may associate with and draw meaning from" deals, with the side benefit being that a tarot deck has x number of cards and covers a reasonable range of psychosocial topics with a fairly large library of associated meanings/narratives to draw on.

I'm actually kind of okay with this, dependent on national code of conduct, the exact clinician, the client, and conditions of use, as it's not dissimilar to a picture of Little Red Riding Hood being printed on a card and presented to the client (narrative, sub-text, printed on cardboard...). I could print a picture from Google on rectangular palm-sized cardboard too. Same deal.

The biggest issue is lack of evidence-based practice (in an industry that is, historically, already highly-based on theory rather than scientific evidence). As Rosengarten points out himself, there isn't much, but there IS a whole lot of stigma and legit dodgy practices associated with tarot. Which brings me to...

gregory said:

I think that's a bit daft. As long as you ARE properly, clinically trained and qualified, I think you should be able to select the things that aid your professional practice.

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The thing about medical practice (let's loosely encompass counselling in here too) is that when we prescribe treatment, it kind of comes with a guarentee. eg your Aunt Elise comes to hospital because she's not feeling well. Do we go with:

1) Option A - Drug X, which has been shown to be effective in patients like your Aunt Elise, as proven by Grade 1 evidence (systematic review of randomised control trials)

2) Option B - Drug Y, which has been shown to be effective in patients like your Aunt Elise, as proven by some studies but not others

3) Option C - Drug Z, which has been shown to be effective in some patients, perhaps not quite like your Aunt Elise, but what the hell let's try it anyway

4) Option D - Drug XYZ, which has no supporting evidence at all.

FYI, these loosely correspond with psychology therapy options as well. As you can see, if it were my Aunt Elise, I'd want Option A, because it comes with the greatest likelihood that Aunt Elise is going to get well. The government and the related industry body happens to agree as well, so since we have Drug X, Y, Z, and XYZ, the code of conduct stipulates that we should use Drug X before Y, before Z, before XYZ etc. If a clinician jumps straight to drug XYZ, we tend to look at them funny.

And that's what people expect when they come to medical professionals/allied health professionals. That we are VERY rigorous in our choice of assessment and treatment, because this is your health we're talking about. In some cases our decision making process is the difference between whether someone lives or dies. We cannot afford to make arbitrary choices based on personal biases/interests, particularly if there are better options out there. Conservative? Yes. But for good reason? Yes.

I'm willing to believe there is a possibility tarot could be a powerful tool if used appropriately by an appropriately accredited professional. But how will it be introduced? Trained? Mandated? Assessed for quality control? Could it be mis-used with significantly detrimental effects? Hell yes. Misinformation with lack of high-quality supporting evidence has already had terrible effects around the world, eg anti-vaxx campaigners and spinal manipulations on babies.

Clinically you always have to be prepared for the worst case scenario. I don't want to be THAT clinician where something bad happens to their patient, and asked to justify their clinical reasoning for treatment leading up to the event, says "because my intuition/my cards told me so".

Very Important Clarification:

All this being said, I think there's a small but extremely significant difference between using a singular (pre-selected) tarot card as a visual prompt as opposed to whipping out tarot cards and doing a tarot reading as part of the clinical assessment or treatment, which involves very unscientific variables such as chance and co-incidence into one's clinical reasoning.

I can actually see some benefit in the former, when used appropriately AND in line with your country's laws, but the latter should definitely never be used clinically.

I think I'm going off on a tangent here

I've trained as a counsellor and it's been invaluable in my practice as a Tarot reader - but I always stress that I am a tarot reader and not a therapist!

Tarot reading (in my opinion) can absolutely be a wonderful tool for delving into the dark, but I think that before such a process begins, both parties need to be prepared. Sometimes, I really (in my opinion) don't think a tarot reading is helpful and something more "conventional" is needed -

I keep note of contact details of agencies and so forth that I can refer folk too, and have learnt invaluable strategies for helping distraught people. Many of my customers/clients are in difficult situations and I want to offer whatever help I can, however some poor souls are simply too vulnerable and so I recommend other routes of support they might take.

The sad truth is, in this country at least, the mental health services are stretched - a desperately unhappy person might wait months before they see a therapist or counsellor on the NHS, and a tarot reader might seem like a source of solace and guidance, often more affordable than a private counsellor.

I'd like more professional tarot readers to do more training in counselling skills. I know that this isn't answering the original question, but I do feel that care and caution should be taken by readers when dealing with vulnerable individuals. There have been far too many times I've had to "pick up the pieces" left by the reckless, thoughtless words of so-called "psychics".

velvetina said:

I've trained as a counsellor and it's been invaluable in my practice as a Tarot reader - but I always stress that I am a tarot reader and not a therapist!

Tarot reading (in my opinion) can absolutely be a wonderful tool for delving into the dark, but I think that before such a process begins, both parties need to be prepared. Sometimes, I really (in my opinion) don't think a tarot reading is helpful and something more "conventional" is needed -

I keep note of contact details of agencies and so forth that I can refer folk too, and have learnt invaluable strategies for helping distraught people. Many of my customers/clients are in difficult situations and I want to offer whatever help I can, however some poor souls are simply too vulnerable and so I recommend other routes of support they might take.

The sad truth is, in this country at least, the mental health services are stretched - a desperately unhappy person might wait months before they see a therapist or counsellor on the NHS, and a tarot reader might seem like a source of solace and guidance, often more affordable than a private counsellor.

I'd like more professional tarot readers to do more training in counselling skills. I know that this isn't answering the original question, but I do feel that care and caution should be taken by readers when dealing with vulnerable individuals. There have been far too many times I've had to "pick up the pieces" left by the reckless, thoughtless words of so-called "psychics".

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Hey, thanks for this post! I really like your perspective and a lot of the points you brought up. If they had a rep function, I would rep you

One of my tarot teachers did counselling as a side gig (I think he still does); and you can tell his counselling skills cross over into his tarot reading as well. I think it's a great thing because - as I've said elsewhere on AT - I feel what we're doing is life coaching and facilitated decision-making using the cards as prompts. A LOT of tarot readers have an interest in psychology and the human psyche, which makes perfect sense considering how many decks and how much of the classical tarot narratives involve personal development and psychological issues (eg anxiety, low self-confidence etc).

tealily said:

I'm willing to believe there is a possibility tarot could be a powerful tool if used appropriately by an appropriately accredited professional. But how will it be introduced? Trained? Mandated? Assessed for quality control? Could it be mis-used with significantly detrimental effects? Hell yes. Misinformation with lack of high-quality supporting evidence has already had terrible effects around the world, eg anti-vaxx campaigners and spinal manipulations on babies.

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How mandated and assessed ? No-one but me knows what is said in my GP's office when I go there. But so long as there are no terrible happenings; so long as people are happy with what he does, so long as no-one dies of it and the rest - it doesn't need to be as long as he gets results. He will probably prescribe me something useful (whether lifestyle or medication) but if he also does me a quick reading that I find helpful of him (no he doesn't...) who will ever know ? As for when I spent a great deal of time visiting a psychiatrist - I could not begin to tell you some of the things we discussed - I think it helped him as much as it did me. But it sure as hell wasn't conventional therapy....

gregory said:

but if he also does me a quick reading that I find helpful of him (no he doesn't...) who will ever know ?

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We're kind of getting off tangent here, but it's an interesting one to discuss

All clinicians are required by law to keep clinical notes of everything we do (and sometimes it's a HUGE pain, writing down every assessment and treatment technique I use...but needs to be done). These are typically viewed (even if informally) by fellow clinicians and even administrative staff during filing etc. If there are any red flags (even if raised by members of the public), the industry body is usually notified and all sorts of interesting things can come to light. As a matter of course my boss/the principal clinician usually flips through patient notes about once every month or so, and tends to have regular chats with everyone (usually one-on-one) to keep appraised of how everyone's going, if there are any interesting cases, if anyone has anything unique/particularly educational to share etc. Some of the best clinical principals (private practice) I know go through every. single. patient. with each of their clinicians once a month. This kind of transparency** between colleagues/superiors is generally a very good thing as it keeps us on our toes and contributes greatly to our ongoing education. **varies a bit between disciplines. Generally the more 'medical'/acute you are, the more transparent.

SO - confidential? Generally yes, but perhaps not as 'locked bag' as people may think. Eg your daughter - the nurse - probably knows a whole heap about patients she doesn't even have contact with. She may not discuss this with anyone outside her profession, however. May depend on the actual client and doctor + their team, although in my experience things usually come out one way or another.

This is especially true in the case of malpractice suits, eg let's say hypothetical doctor did readings for both you and 5 other clients - one of those clients did not respond well, puts in a complaint, and suddenly that doctor's entire set of clinical records can get recalled. I think it's slightly different for psychologists, there are clinical notes and then the kind of uber-confidential patient notes (which may require patient consent to be opened to third parties). As we go through clinical school we're constantly being taught to notate and treat as if we had a lawyer standing over our shoulder at all times, especially in hospitals

Either way, medicine and tarot? Nah... don't see it happening

If it happens anywhere, it'll be within the realms of psych.

Tealily's discription is similar to the system in the UK.

The content of a session will remain confidential between patient/client in the main but this can extend to the team and possibly other services on a need to know principle when risk issues arise.

We do discuss the process aspects of therapy in supervision though, so interventions and treatment plans, goals.. that sort of thing.

A supervisor, though not full responsible for your practice, has a professional duty to help you manage your cases, so they would need to agree. Also to practice in the NHS you need to be accredited or working to accreditation, and insurance is given on the basis that you practice in accordance with that body's values. And we have the NICE guidelines to adhere too also in the NHS. So it would be impossible to bring tarot into treatment.

Private practice is another issue. You don't need to be accredited to practice, and currently the profession is not regulated as such that unaccredited practitioners can practice but it is of course not permitted to say you are accredited if you aren't. No accrediting body in this country includes tarot, and you wouldn't get insurance because of the need to say you are working to the ethics and values of one of the bodies. One complaint and the insurance wouldn't pay out.

But in principle as long as they don't say they are accredited or insured if they're not, and they work from home (if you rent a room they would want proof of insurance), yet they are a qualified counsellor then I don't see the issue. Because you can be qualified but unaccredited currently to practice, and they could advertise as being an eclectic practitioner....many are, just not with tarot. As long as people understand what they are paying for then seems fair enough to me.

When the sky is cloudy you come along with your pretty little song