Tarot Cards
I owned a deck of Tarot cards for 20 years. They were incredibly accurate, period, end of subject. I can easily list off several dozen readings that were spooky enough to have written down. Karen didn't like a reading, so I reluctantly reshuffled the entire deck and spread them out again. Funny how the absolute exact cards appeared again, two positions were switched. Nuff said. Sure enough, just as the cards told me, she was pregnant after all, with Katie.
When I reached the stage of having to separate 'of God' and 'not of God', after serious and lengthy deliberation, I sadly determined the cards were 'not of God.' His Word clearly states if you want to know about the future, ask me, not fortune tellers or cards. The cards were put away and never used again, which did not quench the feeling that they were still a problem, still in my life and still had to be dealt with. After a year or two I finally got the courage to actually destroy them. This was one of the hardest things I have ever done. I ceremoniously burnt them, one by one, trying to cleanse them from my system. The last card, the Queen of Cups, was placed on the flames. I watched the wisps of flame devour the edges of the card, taking the entire picture until it transformed into ash and ceased to exist. The feeling of loss was very strong and sad, so I simply tried to rationalize it as I walked away. The 'devil' does try to hold on firmly.
My daughter's abilities and awareness are blossoming. Her curiosity about the cards is overwhelming and she wants to own a deck. I debate, I toss, think, vacillate, wonder, balance. I firmly state my opinion about the cards, adding that this is MY belief, and as all else, she has to form and settle in her own set of beliefs. I have forbidden a few things, but how I can be truly fair by forbidding cards? Most things can actually be divided into black and white. Grey things must be determined. If I canna taste a grey thing, how am I to know which category it fits into? Jena has to discover her own path, her own beliefs. I told her, thinking that she has got to get this out of her system, that we would buy her a deck. BUT, gawd, everything has a but, she has to listen to this, this and this. She also has to understand this, this and this.
The next day after a night's sleep, I regret my decision. We have a big thing about promises. You never break one and saying we will do something is as good as a promise. I have preached forever to remain silent and think about a decision until you are firm in your choice, yet I failed miserably this time. I could not change my mind now, no matter how much I felt this was not the best decision. I could only thank the stars above this was not an earth shaking event that could have dire consequences. Or was it?
Yesterday we head off to Barnes and Noble. Dangerous store. I can't count the times we went in for one book and walked out almost bankrupt. Jena is clear about my reluctance and assures me she will not make this purchase if anything tells her not to. I wonder if she was not listening or choosing not to remember when we were at her doctor appointment just ten minutes ago and our long time family doctor suddenly asked her how her relationship with God was doing. I would have headed straight for home had been my decision.
In the Tarot section there are over a dozen styles on display. I point out a few decks I think are ones I prefer she not buy, the pictures are connotative of demonic witchcraft, have extra information on them (Guinevere's name on the goddess card, NOT!) etc. Which does she pick out? The Aquarian set. The set I owned. She was way too young when I burned mine to remember them. I asked to have three decks brought out but it took us a while to get it across to this poor girl we wanted three Aquarian decks, not one Aquarian, one Medieval, one Gendron. Jena looked at all three and firmly selected one set. Home.
Sigh...in short, these cards have to 'belong' to some one. Held, loved, known, cherished, cared for, adored. It's calling 'tuning' a deck, to get to know it, to hold it, understand it, play with the cards, etc. Only after a deck is tuned to it's owner can it be used accurately. You would never sell a set, give away a set, use some one else's set. I am wondering if I can tune it and turn it over to Jena to shorten the tuning time, and if this is possible, it would be because we are such a close mother and daughter.
When you do a reading, you first have to assign a card to the person who is being read. Four suits, swords, cups, rods, pentacles and each suit has a King, Queen, Knight, Page, ten through two and an Ace. There are twenty-two Major arcanas (not suits) , Moon, Sun, Empress, Devil, World, Fool, Hanged Man, and so on. A blonde person with blue eyes would be assigned to the rods, medium hair and light eyes to Cups, dark hair and eyes to the Swords, darkest to the Pentacles, etc. King for a man, Queen if female, Knight if young man, Page if very young boy or girl. Jena is the Queen of Rods. Period. I am the Queen of Cups. Period. I am showing Jena how to shuffle them. You place them face down in, say, ten piles, like dealing a card game for ten people but not in any particular order. Then, in turn, each of those piles get dealt out to the other piles until you have two piles and you put them together. I am shuffling, thinking these cards may NOT be used to predict the future, who do they belong to, can we both use you, talk to me. The last card yells at me, and I turn it over on the table, face up. It's the Queen of Cups.
Ok, I am listening.
We start working Jena with them, reading each meaning, she holds and studies each one. Then she want to do a reading. I warn her these are NOT tuned yet. I do a reading on her, it comes out PERFECT. A-1 perfect, reflecting her current stance of the huge task of planning her future, school, career, child care, home but not home (home but stepfather, not our house) and Drew shows up in her hopes and fears spot. The end result (outcome) is the Aracana, the Chariot, basically meaning perseverance (become a warrior and GO FOR IT) conquers all. Old, experienced hands? Who knows.
Now that kind of reading I can live with. Vague question, accurate answer. Guidance is good. Overall situation clarity can help someone get back on the path with balance. Confronting someone with what they are resisting, very typical of the cards, I see this as beneficial. She wanted to read me, I refused. I will not be read. She didn't like that. She played with them the rest of the night and got horrible, confusing readings. Drew came over for dinner, was very skeptical at first, then got into it. I came into the room when she was doing a reading for him, his question being, "Are we going to stay together?" Exactly what I didn't want them to try. She got cards that didn't make sense and some that said nooo, they would not. I could see the quiet upset on Drew's face a mile away. Should I tell her I asked the cards to never ever tell the future specifically?
I talked to her this morning. Again, the cards are not tuned. I don't know how long it takes, but you will know when they are tuned because readings will change. They will become A-1 perfect and you will sense what they mean more than reading out what they mean. You will be able to lay the cards out and scan the entire field and get a real feel for what is going on. You will be able to have the person ask a question silently and know what they asked from the cards. Don't do the future, ok? Please? Ok? What if Drew asks the question again and you get a bad reading? 24 hours before the reading you really were happy, felt you two might end up married, happy, kids. These cards put doubt in your head and that WILL change what would have happened had you never read the cards.
I am FIRM beyond belief that our lives have many, many, many paths and endings, all determined by the choices we make along the way. One end of mine would be to die of cancer, horribly. One end would be to die of cancer peacefully in my sleep, one is to die in a car wreck, one to die of old age. On and on. One path for Jena is Drew, others are not, one of Drew's path is Jena, others are not. These cards are showing A path. ONE. Did you want this path? Then choose it.
If I were to start reading cards again, every reading would be predicated by this belief, I just have to figure out how to sum it up just a tad faster.
Jena has a whole lot of work to do here. Not only with learning her abilities (which may not reside in the cards at all) but to balance her abilities with goals, to say nothing of discipline which she is lacking terribly, just like her mum. Ha ha, funny how you can see it in others and not fix it in yourself as easily as you feel they might be able to overcome the same bad attribute? Oh, is that a laugh. True, but funnie....
2008 note: Jena now lives in Germany, so far away. I miss her more than words can say, we both acknowledge we are each our best friend. We talk constantly, and I mourn her phone bill. When she is in a major dilemma, she will call me and ask me to bring out the cards. The cards stayed at home, I just did not want her using them without guidance. I would tell her exactly where I was sitting, what I was doing, verbalizing the entire set up. She would cut the cards on the phone. The cards, which never seemed to read for her but responded to my touch like they were my old cards reincarnated, read perfectly, each time, despite the distance. Just last month, she called. Instead of asking for the cards, she asked that I open her old pink Bible to a random page. I could not have been happier. I promptly shipped it to Germany.
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