Intensive Deck Study (IDS) Support Lounge ~ Part IV

[yukinkoicy]

Mari, I'm like this. For me it is because of my trauma background. Certain things trigger memories of past similar experiences and my emotions about the present incident/decision is heightened. During my childhood and marriage I was conditioned/brainwashed to think certain things. My situation is extreme so things are very obvious, but even for people with "perfect" childhoods, there is conditioning and forgotten memories that shape how the adult acts, thinks, makes decisions. The brain makes connections and generalizations that the adult is unaware of, between the past and present.

I'm most insecure about things that will make me think I'm "bad". I'll make harmful decisions for myself to keep myself from feeling "bad" in the presence of a witness. I have to keep revisiting what I think is "bad" and why I think that.

Don't be afraid to go with an unconditional deck. You can change your mind. An IDS is meant to assist not trap an individual. It is not "bad" to back out of a goal if you find the goal no longer assists you. It is often by setting a goal and starting the journey that we travel to a place where we meet a new better goal, that we wouldn't have learned about if we hadn't started the first journey.

Sometimes I can take my tarot journey too seriously. I think too much about where I am going, instead of just enjoying the moment.

Enjoy the moment with your Shapeshifter for however long it lasts. Live it intensely and fully and then move on to the next moment when it arrives and live that one, then, making your decisions informed with all you learned between now and then.

A couple times in trauma groups I been given a handout that lists basic human rights. One is to make mistakes. Another is not to have to explain myself or my decisions.

Just go for it if you want. Even if it's the "wrong" choice, so what? There are no IDS police.

There isn't any IDS police, is there???? Looking around to check :-0 Not seeing any :-0

Oh, no. No perfect childhood - I've been through plenty of trauma and especially mental abuse, and not just in my childhood either. I do know and understand (as much as I can at my young age) why I am how I am. It has taken a lot of pain, tears, blood, and hard work to get where I am today and I embrace even the bad times because they made me who I am. And they eventually led me here to Tarot.

I do have problems with explaining - I always have to explain myself, LOL.

But thank you for sharing that - sometimes it feels very alone, thinking that maybe no one know show you feel and maybe everyone will look down on you; even when (or especially when) everyone is so nice and understanding!!!!

Anyways I think we have veered a bit!!!

I fully intend on enjoying every minute, even the hard times. And I know at times I will take it too seriously, and get frustrated. and then I will look back and remember to enjoy. That's what IDS is to me, even though this is my first time. Learning your deck, loving your deck, enjoying it to the very fullest, and experiencing life with it. At least, that's what I plan on doing!

 

[DaisyDragonfly]

Kat, can you change me over to the Maat?

It came yesterday, and I did as I planned. I sat down with both it and the Haindl, and I interviewed them both. Maat, though beautiful, unnerved me in some way. There's some cards that scare me a little - the creepy girl in 6 of Cups, the laughing goddess of Justice - and others that I don't understand at all and others that are just gorgeous. I could read with it, but I knew I was just scratching the surface. It would take more than just looking at the picture and reading the book to 'get' what was going on.

Then I did the Haindl interview. I've got to say, as a deck it's just suffused with immense wisdom and serenity. It was very gentle with me, but it pointed out - correctly! - that I'd end up skewered on the end of all the possible research routes. I'd be entirely confused as to what to read first and end up reading nothing. One day, but not now, was it's key message.

So Maat it is. I've downloaded the workbook and already started working with it. I appreciate having something to guide me through the study process: I won't get lost! I like that I can study it first just as pure tarot, but then - once I'm done - go back through the cards but in their astrological context.

IDS promises? Gosh, that could be a mistake. I'm pointlessly rebellious sometimes, even to the extent of breaking my own rules: 'cos I can, yeah. Still, it's worth clarifying to myself what I can do:

1) Every day, I pull a focus card. It's my morning card, it's a message for the day, it's whatever I want/need it to be. This will go into my journal.

2) On the weekends, I'll do one original reading for myself: any spread, but a chance to read the story of a group of a cards.

3) I'll participate in the 78 Weeks Study thread.

4) I"ll participate in the IDS Exchange thread.

5) I'll also work on a single card per week, purely for research and in-depth study. This will correspond to astrological card of the week, as laid out in the Maat Book Of Days. This week's card is 8 of Wands. Any research I do will go into my journal... and, possibly (if I can coalesce it into something useful) the relevant AT Maat Study Thread.

One thing I need some help with is pathworking and journeying into the card... I've read what Mary K. Greer has to say, but I just fall asleep when I try. Any advice?

 

[thorhammer]

I gots nothin' one journeying with the card - I'm so not into that But I'm sure there are others (Mi-Shell!) who will have more wisdom to offer I'll change you over now. Any idea of how long you'll be aiming to stay with the MAAT?

Oh, and that laughing goddess? Maat, of course . . . and I LOVELOVELOVE that card (I have the Blue Moon TArot and some of the images are the same).

\m/ Kat

 

[DaisyDragonfly]

I originally put a date of February 15th in my post... that's the end of this school term. But then I instantly felt the cold chill of commitment wash over me. It instantaneously felt both too far away and far too soon. So I'll say it, but in a tiny, small voice, so that I don't hear myself.

Incidentally, that's not the 'full stop' end. That's the 'assess current progress' date. And more than that I won't say, 'cos I'm freaking myself out

I know the laughing goddess is Maat... and it scares the bejesus out of me. I don't know why. I've never felt strongly about that goddess before. But there's something about the image which just strikes me cold. Which is, of course, all the more reason to study it

Right, I appear to be embroiled in a strange debate/argument on another thread. Not comfortable, at all... and also feeling entirely belittled, as if my observations on tarot are irrelevant because they're not historically accurate Feeling very unmotivated. Help!

 

[thorhammer]

What thread? Where? If it's in the Historical forum . . . bleh. Just let 'em go, fight amonst 'emselves D That's what I used to say about the Thothites ROFL).

I'm off to hunt this thread down . . .

\m/ Kat

 

[DaisyDragonfly]

No, it's right here, the 'issues with tarot' thread. But it is a historical vs contemporary interpretation argument. Pentacles vs Coins. It's gone off-topic enough, as is, so I've made my retreat... but it's left a nasty taste in my mouth. It's really become about whether it's okay to veer away from the traditional meanings or not (though, in the argument I'm having, the only traditional is the pre-RWS one), with the belief that any RWS meanings and onwards are nice accidents, but not really important to the meaning of Tarot.

Which I don't get. I thought it was All One Tarot?

It did threaten to tip over into the whole Justice,8 or 11? mess... ... but I stepped away from that. I'm barely intact as it is.

And to think I meant to do some research on scary Maat tonight. Instead, pointless - and draining - arguments. Bah.

Thank goodness for the IDS thread! *sighs with relief*

 

[emmsma]

((Daisy)) Don't let 'em get ya down.

This is why I don't do political convo's. I'm not trying to change how anyone thinks about anything, so I mostly keep it to myself.

 

[thorhammer]

Which I don't get. I thought it was All One Tarot?

Oh . . . it's so not! *shakes head*

There are Three. And never the twain shall meet SRSLY, don't even get the historical types started. I have, on occasion, ventured in there in a bid to learn about reading pips . . . and yes, barely come out intact. It's just . . . another world. And I thought I was brave, facing down the Thoth forum!

(Nicky, you out there? )

\m/ Kat

 

[DaisyDragonfly]

((Daisy)) Don't let 'em get ya down.

This is why I don't do political convo's. I'm not trying to change how anyone thinks about anything, so I mostly keep it to myself.

*Nods* Wise words, and noted.

Why is it that, the minute I decide to 'study', I do nothing? Yesterday, I did more. I started a conversation with a character on one of the cards - as per Mary K. Greer - and got some cool stuff out of it. I *think* my deck even might have a name... or just that card. I'll keep you updated. This afternoon, I filled in a page of the activity book, coloured in the nice little blank b&w card that was there, wrote down some things to research, then came on here to ask for the IDS change, prior to going back to my notebook. That was 4 hours ago. I'm still really keen on the research -- Fool as Shaman? - but, bleurgh. I'm out of practice. That's what it is.

But, really? Fool and Shaman? I've been watching all the Shamanic conversations with interest, but from a distance. Looks like I'm going to have inch a little closer...

 

[DaisyDragonfly]

And I thought I was brave, facing down the Thoth forum!
\m/ Kat

Thoth Forum?

I've heard tales... is it as gruesome as I've heard? Are the stories all true?

Mind you, I once had a very good evening at the pub on The Strand where Crowley and his cronies used to chill. That's about as close to Thoth as I've gotten (or, for the moment, intend to get!)