Professional Psychics...why use tarot?

Hi, all...

I'm doing a tarot presentation this weekend, and my audience will be psychics ranging from curious beginners to paid professionals who have considered adding tarot to their repetoire.

I've tweeked my past presentations (with 'regular' folk until now) to accommodate this particular audience, so the bulk of it is pretty much set. However, the coordinator also included a particular question that I think deserves some serious thought: she asks "why would psychics choose to use them (tarot cards)?"

I want to give more than just my own thoughts on this (which is currently pretty brief and uninspiring, IMO), so any response to this question from you all is wholeheartedly welcome.

Thank you very much!

Yup! One can use toothpicks, shell casings on the shooting range floor, stones, trees, watch how cheese curdles, tea leaves...

But Tarot makes it easier to express the message.

Umbrae said:

We were dining in that Greek place in the U-District when Laurel said, “Tarot is divination with training wheels. The Rider-Waite adds the helmet and body pads.”

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For me the colors and the symbols spark the flow of information...tarot cards serve as a focusing tool and as a pathway that points to the most important information to convey.

Umbrae said:

Yup! One can ...(snipped) watch how cheese curdles

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I really, really want to know how this is done. I feel I could get seriously into this. Perhaps.

Umbrae said:

Yup! One can use toothpicks, shell casings on the shooting range floor, stones, trees, watch how cheese curdles, tea leaves...

But Tarot makes it easier to express the message.

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Yeah, and it smells better than cheese curdling, too.

I call myself a psychic reader, though technically all I do is interpret the stuff that pops in my head.

And under extreme circumstances, I have discovered that I can read with anything. Stones, bones from dinner, autumn leaves, random stuff from peoples pockets, Floam...I haven't tried cheese yet!

But tarot is the one I constantly return too.
Maybe I am lazy...but tarot does a lot of the work for me.

I suppose it comes from being a visual person...it's the art, and the symbols, and the colors and the already concrete expression that comes from the little pieces of cardboard.
Even a marseilles type deck, or one that is considered to be an unillustrated pip deck can still stir up a lot of feelings, or thoughts in its limited symbols.

But it's the beautiful, busy decks I love best.

Because it makes the job of interpreting what pops into my head... a multi layered event.

First, I read what I see. just what it is...right there on the card in front of me. It can be different things each time...because some pictures will stand out more than others.
The best part about this...is that the sitter can see it too. It's right there...I can point it out to them! (unlike say the pattern in a lithomancy throw, or the images in a crystal scrying session)

And that's just the first layer.

The second layer is the store of meanings I have filed away in my head. After decades of reading experience, and a multitude of other's thoughts and books, and symbolism dictionaries...I can pull out some ideas of what they mean beyond the picture...the metaphor behind it.

third layer...I suppose this would be the "psychic" layer...things start popping into my head.
Sometimes it's a smell, or a sound. or a phrase of song lyrics.

Often it's a sentence, that I don't even realize I am saying til I say it.

Or it's a memory. Of something that happened to me , in my past experience that reminds me of what I am seeing. Or a memory of a past reading...or simply an image in my head, that I try to explain without interpretation, and hope the sitter understands.

When I use other methods for readings I don't always get these many layers to choose from.
Lithomancy stones have color and shapes that suggest things, and the patterns they fall in can be symbolic... but it's not easy to see the direct symbolic meaning like that of a person starting at fallen cups, while ignoring the ones that stand behind them.

Tarot uses metaphor, but also direct images that capture your imagination, and also the imagination of the person asking the question.

Tarot (and I will mention many oracle cards as well...)just makes reading easy, prompts deeper connections with my own intuition, and is really just more of a pleasure than any other method.

Umbrae said:

Yup! One can use toothpicks, shell casings on the shooting range floor, stones, trees, watch how cheese curdles, tea leaves...

But Tarot makes it easier to express the message.

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Well, I met a Thai masseuse who could tell a person's mental and health conditions just by looking at their bellybutton. She taught me a lil about it.

Tarot cards are easier to carry around than bellybuttons, though.

Solitaire* said:

Tarot cards are easier to carry around than bellybuttons, though.

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And there's no risk of getting icky navel lint stuck on the cards

Chronata said:

I call myself a psychic reader, though technically all I do is interpret the stuff that pops in my head.

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Dearest Chronata;
Please please please, this is being said with the utmost friendship and love, it is not meant to be taken as rude or snide, but but but...
Interpreting stuff that pops into your head? Isn't that what MAKES you a psychic reader?
If you're taking things you know, and arriving at conclusions unconsciously using that information - then you'd be intuitive.
But the stuff that pops in with no logical inference - that's psychic.
There's a difference between Psychic and Intuitive. Some of us are, some of us aren't.