Spiffo
I'll play the dissenting voice ...
Seriously I think the preoccupation with the RWS is a by product of ubiquity and clever marketing, not to mention timing, by Stu Kaplan. Justin Beiber is both popular and ubiquitous, but I wouldn't recommend using him as the basis for a study of 'popular' music. The Picture Post is a good selling magazine; is it good journalism. Fox News broadcasts to millions of households and look how that's working out.
Yes indeed many contemporary Tarot books are written based on a single deck, and surprise surprise, most of those books say the same things, however much they dress it up. Since Eden Gray's book was originally published little has changed, but goodness it's been sold, resold, repackaged, and redressed for each new cohort. There are very few Tarot authors with anything original to say and to suggest that to work with Tarot you have to start with the RWS and suffer through some of the dreariest teaching methods is farcical.
A LWB, even if it is gussied up and wearing lipstick, is still a LWB and alas, nearly all Tarot books are little better.
But, there are exceptions.
A good Tarot book will enhance your understanding of Tarot, not just the RWS deck. A good author will develop, highlight, explore all manner of issues that will be transferable across a variety of decks, not just one.
A good deck will speak to your intuitive mind and your analytical mind. It will spark your conscious and unconscious ... you can see where this is going.
Find a deck that sings to you. Find a couple of good authors, but better than that, read about myth, archetypes, symbology, religion, fairy tales, art, and dare I suggest some psychology. Live a life, and get some, as they say, life-experience. And use your cards, whether for self development and growth, or for divinatory readings. Using your tools makes your use better and You, proficient.
Develop your own relationship with Tarot; don't just regurgitate one author's ideas, becoming a pale imitation of them. Find the aspects of Tarot that appeal to you, or work for you, and study in those areas. I'll bet the most interesting reading you'll do won't be a sad old Tarot book that has 78 pages devoted to the RWS.
Or you could just get a RWS, buy one of the many many mediocre Tarot books and, be, um, yeah, be something other than what you are.
X
Seriously I think the preoccupation with the RWS is a by product of ubiquity and clever marketing, not to mention timing, by Stu Kaplan. Justin Beiber is both popular and ubiquitous, but I wouldn't recommend using him as the basis for a study of 'popular' music. The Picture Post is a good selling magazine; is it good journalism. Fox News broadcasts to millions of households and look how that's working out.
Yes indeed many contemporary Tarot books are written based on a single deck, and surprise surprise, most of those books say the same things, however much they dress it up. Since Eden Gray's book was originally published little has changed, but goodness it's been sold, resold, repackaged, and redressed for each new cohort. There are very few Tarot authors with anything original to say and to suggest that to work with Tarot you have to start with the RWS and suffer through some of the dreariest teaching methods is farcical.
A LWB, even if it is gussied up and wearing lipstick, is still a LWB and alas, nearly all Tarot books are little better.
But, there are exceptions.
A good Tarot book will enhance your understanding of Tarot, not just the RWS deck. A good author will develop, highlight, explore all manner of issues that will be transferable across a variety of decks, not just one.
A good deck will speak to your intuitive mind and your analytical mind. It will spark your conscious and unconscious ... you can see where this is going.
Find a deck that sings to you. Find a couple of good authors, but better than that, read about myth, archetypes, symbology, religion, fairy tales, art, and dare I suggest some psychology. Live a life, and get some, as they say, life-experience. And use your cards, whether for self development and growth, or for divinatory readings. Using your tools makes your use better and You, proficient.
Develop your own relationship with Tarot; don't just regurgitate one author's ideas, becoming a pale imitation of them. Find the aspects of Tarot that appeal to you, or work for you, and study in those areas. I'll bet the most interesting reading you'll do won't be a sad old Tarot book that has 78 pages devoted to the RWS.
Or you could just get a RWS, buy one of the many many mediocre Tarot books and, be, um, yeah, be something other than what you are.
X