How do you turn to your Tarot when mentally disturbed??

[hunter]

Hmm. Interesting.

I've found that just doing a Tarot reading (and writing out my interpretations on pen and paper, it doesn't work if I type them up on the computer) will relieve my anxiety. It doesn't do much for depression, though. As often as not, I find my depressed state of mind reflected back at me, with little or no advice on how to deal with it.

I would say try reading with the lightest deck you've got (Mine's the Gilded), where even the worst cards can be read with an optimistic interpretation.

I was wondering why there were so many comments about NOT reading while upset. I am so often in deep distress, but not depressed. I can see now how depression would affect a reading in a totally different way than anxiety and confusion.

I often use the books "Tarot Affirmations", "Tarot for Every Day" and "Tarot for All Seasons" when upset as well as "The Instant Tarot Reader" that I mentioned above.

I often play solitaire with a deck and pay attention to which cards are in key positions of the game.

I'll often just carry the Rabbit Tarot around with me when I'm in trouble like a security blanket. Following the advice in "Tarot for Every Day" sometimes I just spread a deck out on top of me.

I've used my deck as a journaling prompt, in art therapy sessions. "Tarot for Writers" is a good book.

If I had to wait till I felt better to read, I'd never be able to read.

I like to trim decks when I am upset.

I like reading for DVD characters.

 

[Mellifluous]

To be honest, when I'm upset, it tends to reflect every horrible thing I'm thinking right back at me, as though it's all true. Once you know a range of meanings for all the cards you can interpret anything as negative, lol, as someone else mentioned. If you keep asking, to 'make sure' or 'confirm', then you start getting completely opposite answers from one time to the next, and you get upset with tarot, too, (and yourself for not reading well) which is not fun. lol

Also, I find (in hindsight, if not sooner) I get a lot of messages to stop reading, but it's too easy to see those cards as doom and gloom and relationships ending and calamities, etc. Even the waiting cards become a bit sinister in bad times. So, I don't recommend reading while you're upset at all. lol

Sometimes you can get better/more realistic/comforting messages out of non-tarot oracles, but sometimes not even from them.

If I'm determined to do it, I just do it anyway though. Later, you can redo the readings (if you even feel it's necessary anymore) and get more accurate answers. Then just forget about whatever ones you did while you were upset.

I do, sometimes, eventually ask the deck to just tell me something (anything!) to make me feel better (once I can get off the originally upsetting topic). In my case - and I doubt I'm alone - I'm often told by the deck, at that point, to just go to bed and get some sleep.

 

[Miss Divine]

To be honest, when I'm upset, it tends to reflect every horrible thing I'm thinking right back at me, as though it's all true.

Yes that is exactly what happens to me! I usually don't even try to read tarot when I'm in distress for that reason.

 

[hunter]

I'm finding this to be so interesting. My cards don't tell me darker things when I am sadder, and lighter things when I am happier.

When I am down, the bunnies do tell me enabling things though :-0 I remembering asking them once what to expect if I were get drunk on vodka and they responded with a 4 of Wands

I do tend to gravitate towards books that give meanings that are affirmations and self-help type, rather than fortune telling. So even getting a death card is not predicting a bad thing. It is just telling me what I already know and suggesting some healing messages about how to move forward.

My life is full of scary, scary, scary events. It doesn't scare me to get the "bad" cards. I already know bad stuff has happened, is happening and will happen. I look to them to tell me how to respond to the bad stuff, and they do that.

They tell me when to stand my ground, and when to submit while I plot and plan and stay alive long enough to live another day. They tell me when I need to hunker down and when I need expand my horizons. They tell me when I need to isolate and when I need to reach out more. They tell me when I need to forgive and when I need to push people away.

 

[Kosjitov]

I don't read when I'm upset. Period. I need a clear focused mind for reading and mental health days are times where you need to rest and recover.

 

[SunChariot]

For me, if I try to read in that mindsef, I get a bunch of nonsense cards that make no sense. It's happened to me often enough that I know better than to read in that state. It just doesn't work for me.

IF I am in that state and seiously want answers I have a bunch of reader friends (whom are all from AT) And we read for each other when we are having that problem. I trust them all as readers and we're there for each other as needed for that. Works well with online readings...That is my solution that worked for me. Reading for yourself when calm is fine and even wonderful. When in a low place, call on your friends.

Babs

 

[hunter]

When I read when I am upset, I am often looking to self-soothe, rather than looking for answers.

My cards are my friends; I don't necessarily need friends to interpret my friends. When I'm upset I like to directly intereact with all my friends, including my cards.

I stay away from certain oracle decks when I'm upset. Many oracle decks have books with meanings that fall under "secondary wounding". I don't find it helpful at all to have cards or people minimize or deny what I am going through or tell me things are my fault that are not.

Sometimes if I am using multiple decks, I do find it funny to use ONE card from a shame/blame/minimize/deny oracle deck. Then I laugh at what it says and pull a card from the Vanessa or some other woman's deck and let the cards start battling each other. I could always count on The Vanessa or Mother Peace to tell off the Sonia Chockrek (sp?) or Dorian Virtue deck.

Medicine Cards, The Way of the Horse and The Joy of Relationship Cards are oracle decks that I have found to be safe to use when upset.

 

[MareSaturni]

I'm finding this to be so interesting. My cards don't tell me darker things when I am sadder, and lighter things when I am happier.

I don't think the cards do that. Readers do that. The cards are the same - it's our ability to interpret them under a more balanced light that gets disturbed by our mental state. The cards are just the cards...

 

[hunter]

I don't think the cards do that. Readers do that. The cards are the same - it's our ability to interpret them under a more balanced light that gets disturbed by our mental state. The cards are just the cards...

Life is more fun to live, believing that the bunnies talk to me I'm sorry you don't have talking bunnies :-(

Oh...and there is too a Santa Claus!

 

[Glass Owl]

When I am upset or in the throes of anxiety, which I have a lot of struggles with, I do something I call Comfort Me Tarot. I pull a card or three with the intention that these cards have comforting words for me. I then read them in the absolute most positive light possible.

I also do a spread I call Worst Fear/Best Hope, a two carder which usually lays my fears out and gives me a way to address them.

I might ask for the source of my anxiety, and for practical advice to deal with it.

What I do not do is lay out large spreads or cards with no positional meanings because in that state of mind I will read the cards in the worst possible way every time. I have even managed to convince myself the Lovers/Ten of Cups as how The Man feels about me is that he regrets marrying me and plans to get out as soon as he can. Anxiety is a liar and is self protective, in that it wants only to protect itself and stay around by any means necessary.

Sometimes I like to just shuffle, pull cards and make a story as a distraction. Or read for whatever may be on television or what I am reading. Just not for myself unless I have forced myself to only pull helpful cards, with good advice. Even if you get a "problem" card in those positions you can find good things to read in them.

When I am stressed I like shuffling while watching tv or movies. I don't go with complex spreads either. When a terrible "Tower moment" took place over a month ago I leaned on positive oracles and decks that were recommended as healing decks. I used the decks for small spreads, usually for guidance and support.

I don't know how I would have made it this far with the support of my decks and I am incredibly grateful to Tarot and this community. During a crucial time when I asked for answers, Tarot told me what I needed to know.