My main concern about the style to use for a reading is that it answer the question. If the client's question is "Will this relationship work out?" and the reader decides to answer the question "What do I need to focus on spiritually to love myself more?" then I feel there is a disconnect.
I agree. I think if you decide not to answer the original question, you should make it clear that you're doing so.
SunChariot and delinfrey, both of your posts on how you carry on with a querent who wants a predictive reading are really helpful.
Does anyone have experience where you've suggested a modification to your client's question and the client refuses? How do you work that out?
If someone is going to be a predictive reader, their biggest enemy is Ego. ...
If someone is going to be a spiritual lesson reader, their biggest enemy is Ego (you saw that coming right).
Haha, yup, totally with you.
To me, tarot doesn't tell things we don't know. It doesn't give answers. Instead, I feel it provides a framework to help us ask the right questions and illuminating the answers we already know. It provides encouragement and warnings.
There's a sort of mantra that keeps coming up for me around tarot, and that is, "Tarot only ever tells us what we already know." I'm not gonna go on and on about that one, but what you said above resonates.
So when you say "warnings", are you talking about how recognizing patterns in the present and past can help us avoid pitfalls or other problems in the future? I feel like this relates to what Grizabella was saying about how it's difficult to differentiate between advice and prediction in a reading.
Shade is totally right about the ego involved! Instead of wording readings in ways that will impress the sitter, you should just say or write what you see, exactly what you see (or feel). It might not be popular with the person but I bet they say it's more accurate about their lives!
This is the way that I try to read, too.
But do you feel comfortable predicting that the sitter's future lover would have dark hair and be tall? I consider all the cards simply motifs and metaphors, so finding actual detail like that is beyond me. But I'm very interested to see how much the placebo affect comes into play. Are they more likely to look for that type of person and find them, thus confirming? Or would they pass up on really good match bc the sitter is looking for that specific quality?
I'm really curious how much those kinds of effects come into play, as well. I see them as falling under
cognitive biases.
I think Shade's response to this is interesting. In some ways, naming specific traits of a person (indicated in the cards) had the effect of expanding, rather than narrowing, what the querent was inclined to think of as her options. (Also interesting is the third-party validation of the clairvoyant.) It affirms my feeling that we can't always be sure what kind of effect will come about from what we read in the cards.
I'm glad you could help guide her to him if it had been my reading I'd have asserted that maybe she needs to open herself up to connecting with a hopeful romantic to balance out her life of hard work. In your opinion, would the client walk away with the same benefit if it was read the two different ways? I know it just comes down to syntax: do I tell her she WILL meet someone, or do I indicate she should ready herself to the possibility of meeting someone? I'm sure you'll say that's a personal choice, I'm just trying to understand when or if to predict instead
Yeah, it's a good question. Does the syntax make a difference? To me it does. I think I'm intuitive, but I wouldn't go so far as to say I'm psychic, so I'd be more more inclined to say that the cards indicate a likelihood or not, if I thought they could be sensibly read that way.
Sometimes the syntax doesn't seem to make any difference, though. If someone has a very intense desire for a particular outcome, their wishful thinking filter can distort clear language into the message they want to hear. I've had this experience in conversations with friends, completely outside of the context of tarot readings. I've been in those shoes, too, where my wishful thinking is severely distorting my view.
I don't do readings for others because I don't want to take on that kind of responsibility and because I don't think my rhythm would work with others. I tend to mull over spreads for days, looking at individual cards, obsessively doing new spreads on particular cards and so on. I don't think it would be very practical.
I see the practicality issues, but I love the thought of working out the meaning of a spread over a longer period of time. You get to look at it from all different angles, and allow for meaning to well up, to develop. I often find that I have new thoughts about a spread's meaning after "sleeping on it".
I feel differently about where responsibility lies, though.
To answer the question though, I always value prediction over any sort of lesson. That's the point for me. Tarot can tell me what is likely to happen and what is not as likely to happen. It can tell me about obstacles I'm not aware of. If I need advice, I'll add an Advice position in the spread and I'll take the advice from the source, not the reader. I don't like giving out advice regarding the future so I'm not really hot on taking advice from people who are just as clueless as me in the grand scheme of things.
I guess I don't believe that my goal in life is to become some cheerful little Yoda, learning life lessons and becoming wise. I feel more like driving a boat through dark waters, needing some help with avoiding reefs. As long as I know or suspect where the reef is, I can take care of the sail-around. Including the decision of whether to sail around or test the hull and break into it.
But don't you ever learn anything, someone might ask. Sure, I've learned the best lessons after mistakes. But it's such a personal process that I doubt it can have the same value or impact without a mistake to shake you and without self-inspection so I'm not convinced anyone else is required directly.
I'm having trouble with the very last sentence, but I think I get the gist of what you are saying. It definitely feels like a very personal process, and there's a way that it feels very trusting, like whatever you choose to do, the way you do it, that is right, it's your path to follow. It makes sense to me.
You say you're not interested in becoming wise. Yoda aside, does that mean you don't care about wisdom at all? It seems that if you value experience, even if you feel that is all that you are after, wisdom is the inevitable by-product. Perhaps this is exactly what you're saying, actually?
Learning Lenormand made me a better predictor with Tarot - the stricter rules are better for it.
I know very little about Lenormand, but now I'm curious.
your replies are very helpful
