Tarot as a Counseling Language

MissNine

Hi Bradford. Thank you again for this book. It's great to be able to access it so easily. Since you had opened it up to comments/suggestions....
How about including some aspects of modern clinical psychology (what most thing of when they hear "counseling") into the book?

I know there's references to Jungian psychology and common personalities, but would it be possible to match certain cards with personality disorders and coping processes that manifest as unhealthy and/or atypical behaviors (PTSD, etc)?
Just wanted to throw that out there. :)
 

bradford

That’s a really good question. I haven’t had any luck at all associating the cards to any diagnostic categories of psychology. Like many others, I worked hard to start with what looked like the most promising set of correspondences - the Court Cards to the MBTI. But nothing I did could satisfy this cranky old INTJ.
I have a pretty low opinion of psychology calling itself a science to begin with - it’s database is largely made up of disappointing human behavior and experiments with damaged brains. Plus it’s a big business that loses income to the extent that it works. I like neuroscience a lot, but that’s partly because it still doesn’t know enough to be as pretentious as psych.
Further, any one of 78 cards has something to offer in response to a question involving any of our psychological challenges. It was in that spirit, perhaps in the sense of life coach or positive psychology, that I used the term counseling in the title instead of psychology. Diviners were reading signs and Bushi were casting Hexagrams and both were doing counseling long before there were Freuds or Jungs.
PS - most of my comments about Jung here are protests of the New Age manglings of Jung’s generally good ideas.
 

russell

Hey Bradford, fancy meeting you here. I enjoyed the Tarot page as I did all your other stuff. (For those of you who are into the I Ching, check out Bradford’s Matrix Translation; there is nothing like it.)

I finally got my Tarot mojo together; my focus is a little different from yours, the ideals totally divorced from the pictures. The part I put the most effort into was illustrating WHY number interpretation is the way it is.

—Russell
http://www.russellcottrell.com/TarotOfIdeals/
 

Sunflower8

That’s a really good question. I haven’t had any luck at all associating the cards to any diagnostic categories of psychology.

...

Further, any one of 78 cards has something to offer in response to a question involving any of our psychological challenges. It was in that spirit, perhaps in the sense of life coach or positive psychology, that I used the term counseling in the title instead of psychology.

I really like all of this. I'm a huge fan of using tarot as some form of life coach, and the idea that all of the cards have something to offer in numerous scenarios is so helpful/useful/inspiring/comforting/provoking/creativity-inducing/action-initiating..etc. :) The term counseling sits pretty well with me. or guidance. and I agree that psychology is on rocky ground as far as "sciences" go..I mean, I get that even the most quantifiable of sciences are somewhat subjective considering the human experience, but sooo many immeasurable factors influence every person that it's hard to hold psychology to a similar standard, or 'believe' in it in the same way as like physical laws. Though of course, I do think it's a subject worth studying and taking seriously to the degree that it will benefit you.

Psychological challenges seem to be very individual in nature so it doesn't surprise me that you haven't found clear card correlations with specific "disorders"...but I would be curious about the cards/spreads that come up in those sorts of readings. Will inquire further myself, and continue reading all of this ;)

Thank you for sharing! I'm printing the whole thing later today so I can more thoroughly read/comment :)