I think my original question for this thread has been answered. (So thank you very much to all who responded! Especially Grizabella for being the inspiration for its creation.
) I believe the answer to "how to use the Tarot for fortune-telling" is to do exactly what I am doing. If there is any difference at all, it is only the context or questions asked, and that is personal and thus
naturally going to be somewhat different for everyone.
Grizabella said:
I have every faith in the cards and their ability to show the future. Nobody could ever convince me otherwise.
I share your faith and I agree. I will relate an interesting story that was told to me a few weeks ago. I have introduced a few people to the Tarot since I learned it. A family member (a life-long Christian, which I mentioned in another thread) is now reading the cards for herself as well as for friends and (some) family.
She is new and still relying on the definitions in the book to some extent. A couple weeks ago I talked to her; an Aunt and her kids (a few are adults) came up for a visit, so she read the cards for them. In one spread, the entire spread "made sense" except one card. She and my cousin were trying to figure out what was "wrong". Then they realized, they were reading the wrong card definition (reading the 6 instead of the 4) to which she said, "that goes to show that the cards laid make sense, and not just any card will make sense." To that I said, "exactly!"
I almost never talk about the Tarot with her; I don't bring it up if she doesn't mention it and she rarely does, although I have told her I would certainly try to answer any questions she might have. But I generally like to “learn things for myself”, and she is similar, so I don’t initiate conversation (or try to "push"). I didn't even know she was reading for others, or even still reading for herself until she told me that story. So any "projection" of my "beliefs" onto her would be fairly minimal. (I bought her the Shadowscapes Tarot, and she uses the book that comes with that deck for the "definitions". She has a few other books as well and I have obviously sent her links to posts here.)
I do ask the Tarot yes/no questions and take the answers seriously. (However, I use my
yes/no/why spread, which provides
more than just a simple yes or no.) And I am not "scared" of being "wrong", which has been mentioned in this thread a few times, but just like stock market forecasting, any "inaccuracy" must be "hedged" to limit "risk". So the voracity of the prognostication must be evaluated and ascertained if any trust at all is to be put in the prediction. However, so far I have never seen the Tarot be wrong... *shrug* maybe it is just me... Although my interpretation isn't always "right" and it is almost never "complete". I often only fully see what the Tarot was saying later, after events unfold. This may also be due to the type of questions I ask (yet again!). When faced with a fork in the road of life, once one path is taken, the other path is closed and then it can
never truly be known what awaited down that path. So the Tarot may have been wrong and I just didn't know it. But I am quite satisfied (thus far) with the paths it has been taken me down, so I don't worry about it.
As for your post, ireneintheworld, the Tarot has given you a job you love, not many people have that, and that is enviable. That in itself is fantastic, regardless of any other proposed use of the Tarot. Although it seems my perspective is similar to yours, I basically only read for myself and have no intention or desire to ever read professionally, although I do read for others occasionally. But I don't think I use the Tarot as a "self-counseling tool" either, however, that may be how some people define what I am doing...
And that leads to my final point, I was a little puzzled by SunChariot's emphasis on whether the future was changeable or not. Then I realized, some people might automatically consider "fortune" to be synonymous with "destiny". I looked it up and destiny (and fate) are a couple of the definitions for fortune on
www.encarta.com. Destiny
is an "unchangeable future". I don't believe in destiny or fate, I believe in "free will" and choice. So of course I don't believe the Tarot can predict our destiny (or fortune), since I don't believe in it. Thus I am now even more opposed to the term "fortune-teller". I think Umbrae would certainly enjoy this, more
confusion based on the
terminology used.
Although some future is unchangeable and the Tarot may predict that, but just because the Tarot predicts it doesn’t mean it can’t be changed. Additionally, some future only contains the
illusion that it is changeable. (I will reference the conversation between Neo and the Chancellor in the 3rd and last The Matrix movie.) I think believing all future can be changed is just as… disempowering as believing none of it can be changed. One resigns us to fate; the other overwhelms us by choices. Although I am not much for prayers, I have always loved the Anonymous group’s prayer, called the Serenity Prayer:
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
I believe the Tarot helps me with the last thing, thus implicitly helps me with the first two. But also I think it is up to all of us to determine what the Tarot does for us, and being the
magical artifact that I believe it to be, that could be quite different for each one of us. So I am still very much interested in hearing about
all uses of the Tarot. But I certainly see the future unfold when I turn over Tarot cards, although that is not my
specific or stated intention. And it appears that Grizabella (and others) do as well. If we are
crazy, Grizabella, I will skip down that
yellow brick road with you!
ETA:
I think it is far more
useful to flip over Tarot cards and see what happens, than to try to
rationalize and thus
constrain the Tarot before
seeing what the Tarot can
actually do. That is really the point of my posts in the following thread, and there are great posts from others in the thread as well:
Only charlatans see the future?
