Cat 'N Owl

Tarot for Your Self: Chapter 1: Getting Acquainted with the Cards, Part 1

Jen — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 13:45:45 +0000

We continue with the read through of Tarot for Your Self with chapter 1. For a book focusing on learning to read tarot for yourself, it only seems fitting that chapter 1 starts us off with creating a tarot profile.

A tarot profile helps you gain insight into your own personal life journey.

I’ll admit, I’ve never seen so many personal profile cards calculated at once and I haven’t heard of a lot of these. It’s a bit daunting, but we’ll go through them one at a time. I’m hoping we come back to them in a later chapter, but if not, maybe we can come up with some exercises to explore the meanings behind these cards more too.

Personality & Soul Cards

The Personality Card “indicates [your] life purpose, aspirations, and lessons to be learned,” while the Soul Card “indicates [your] soul purpose and qualities that will assist [you]”

These cards/numbers are calculated using your birth date. You add all the numbers together, combining them down until they reach a number smaller than 22.

For example, if your birthday is October 14, 1947 it would look like this:

10
14
+1947
=1971

Then add each digit together: 1+9+7+1 = 18

This number is your Personality number, or The Moon in this case. If you add the 1 and 8 together, you get your Soul Number: 9, or The Hermit.

My Personality and Soul Cards are both The High Priestess. What I found interesting was that those of us with the same card for both are specifically working on our soul purpose in this lifetime.

Along with the Soul Card, we have four minor arcana cards that correspond to it, representing lessons and opportunities. It matches the number, so in my case I have the High Priestess, or a 2. My four minor arcana cards would be the 2 of pentacles, cups, wands, and swords. This is a new one to me. Interesting though. I’d never though about incorporating minor cards into profile cards before.

Hidden Factor Card

The Hidden Factor Card “indicates qualities [you] fear, reject, or don’t see that can become [your] greatest strengths. Mary lists a chart for finding out what these cards are. In my case, I get two, Justice and Judgment.

I have to think more about what these cards mean in this position. This is one of the ones I’d never heard of before. And I found this section a confusing one to read. I’d love to get your take on this, what did you think?

Your Year Card

This card changes every year. It represents the “tests, lessons, and experiences you will go through this year.”

In this case you add the month and date of your birth to the current year. So for the above example, you’d just swap out 1947 for and add away 2010, ending up with 11, or The Wheel of Fortune.

My year card is an 11, Justice:

Your Zodiac Card

Each of the astrological signs is represented by a card. I’m a Scorpio so my card is Death:

Along with the Zodiac Card, Mary adds in another element called Your Zodiac Lessons and Opportunities Cards. These are minor cards that correspond to our sun signs. And each sun sign has three corresponding minor cards, which Mary lists on a chart. My cards are 5, 6, and 7 of cups:

What this means in terms of zodiac lessons and opportunities, I have no clue yet. Do any of you have any idea why it would be a zodiac lesson as opposed to a general lesson?

Your Destiny Card

Your Destiny Card is the minor arcana card that corresponds with your actual birth date. It’s pulled from one of your Zodiac Lessons and Opportunities cards. My card in this case would be the 6 of cups:

Persona Cards

Lastly, we have Persona Cards. These are calculated based on your sun, moon, and rising signs. If you don’t know yours, create a birth chart (it’s free!) to find out what they are.

My sun sign is Scorpio, so my Personal Potential Card is King of Cups.

My moon sign is Leo, so my Inner Teacher Card is King of Wands.

My rising sign is Aquarius, so my Mode of Expression in the World can be described by: King of Swords.

I’m apparently all about the kings. I have no idea what these mean at this point since this section is another new one to me.

Now that I’ve gone through the exercise, I need to spend some time with each card and think things over. If you feel overwhelmed by the number or profile cards, maybe start with the Personality and Soul Cards. If you are feeling ambitious, add in Your Year Card. Worry about the other cards another time. Spend some time with each of the few you choose and journal the first thoughts that come to your mind for each card. Don’t hold back and don’t be afraid to write any random thing down. You don’t know where that idea will lead you on your quest to read for your self.

So that’s that for this part of chapter 1. I don’t know about you guys, but I’m exhausted, and a bit overwhelmed. How did you do with selecting profile cards? If you posted them somewhere, please feel free to share in the comments by linking to them. Is there any part of this you’d like me to go over in detail? The only one I’m really confused about is the Hidden Factor/Teacher Card but I can look into that too if anyone else is curious.

Anyway, that’s that. I’m going to spend some time journaling on these myself and will be back with part 2 next week when we’ll talk about tarot rituals.

Have a happy day!

Tarot Writing Prompt: Dear Abby

Irini — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 11:53:42 +0000

Choose one card as “Abby” and another as the letter writer. What does the letter say? How does “Abby” respond?

What card did you pick as “Abby?” Is this card a good counselor? What about the querant? Do you think this card would be open to “Abby’s” suggestion?

Tarot for Your Self: Introduction and Roses

Jen — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 01:25:05 +0000

Okay, so it’s time for the first post of working my way through Mary K. Greer’s Tarot for Your Self. Yay!

The book begins with an introduction section and I thought it would be a good idea that we take a moment to touch upon that. I’ll start with chapter 1 tomorrow.

The major point of this book is to help you establish your own personal relationship with the tarot, as well as to work on developing an awareness of your intuition.

Mary goes on to explain how to use this book, i.e. it’s a workbook. There are exercises in it and you should do them all, in order. It doesn’t seem to be designed for flipping around, although I’m sure on re-reads you could do just that. So, as suggested, I’m going to work through this in chapter order, one exercise at a time.

And she doesn’t even wait for the first chapter to start up with the first exercise: Write down everything that enters your head about roses for a few minutes. Eh. I have to admit, I was on a bus commuting to the city when I read this. I didn’t have paper or a pen with me. Whoops. So the first thing I’ll point out with reading this, have something to write with! Whether you write in the book or on separate paper is up to you. But you need something to write with…and a tarot deck, of course! And like I mentioned in my initial post on Tarot Basics, I’ll be sticking with my Universal Waite Tarot Deck for these exercises.

Anyway, back to the rose exercise. I rambled a few things about it, first running through the various colors of roses and what they mean: red = passion, pink = love, yellow = friendship, white = purity. Then I shifted to random thoughts: petals, delicate, soft, thorns, pain, green, blossom, lush, pungent, inspiration, bud, and growth.

She also adds that you should look through your cards to see the way roses have been used in your deck. Then questions, do the thoughts you jotted down give you insights into why roses were used in certain cards? What do you think? See any of those roses differently now?

Weekly web roundup

Jen — Sun, 28 Feb 2010 14:51:17 +0000

Here’s this week’s list of all the posts from around the web that we’ve shared over the past week on Twitter, Google Reader, FriendFeed, and both Facebook pages (Cat ‘N Owl and Reiki).

Tarot

…………………………………

Reiki

…………………………………

Astrology

…………………………………

Misc

If you have a tarot, reiki, astrology, crystals, or herbs blog and would like to share it with us, please add it in the comments or let us know on Twitter. Thanks!

Tarot Writing Prompt: Name Those Books

Irini — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 12:11:29 +0000

What books do you think they are reading? Are they reading the same book? Does what they are reading influence how you think of card?

Weekly web roundup

Jen — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 16:00:25 +0000

Here’s this week’s list of all the posts from around the web that we’ve shared over the past week on Twitter, Google Reader, FriendFeed, and both Facebook pages (Cat ‘N Owl and Reiki).

Tarot

…………………………………

Reiki

…………………………………

Astrology

…………………………………

Misc

Finding Silence in a Busy Mind

If you have a tarot, reiki, astrology, crystals, or herbs blog and would like to share it with us, please add it in the comments or let us know on Twitter. Thanks!

Working my way through Mary K. Greer’s Tarot for Your Self

Jen — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 12:15:25 +0000

This book just might be the most recommended book for those starting out in tarot. Can you believe I haven’t read it yet? A friend of mine just recommended it to me and it reminded me that I hadn’t read it yet. And since I posted about wanting to go back to the basics, I felt that working my way through this book might be a good place to start.

I’ll be posting about it as I go through it. I don’t know how often that will be since I have work and other stuff going on too. You know, life. But I will post my way through all of it and I’ll aim to post on a regular schedule…which I’ll figure out by my first post.

If you’d like to join in the discussions, posts will start up March 1. If you have a copy of the book and haven’t yet read it, maybe now is a good time to start! And if you already have read it, maybe now is a good time for a reread!

Hope to see you there.

Have a happy day all!

Tarot-Inspired FlashForward Ads

Jen — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 12:17:53 +0000

These tarot-themed FlashForward ads were made by the Brazilian advertising firm, Publicis. I love the technicolor tones and that the cards are life-sized. If you are unfamiliar with the TV show its advertising, FlashForward is about what happens when the entire world blacks out and during that time they get a glimpse of the future.

Larger images can be seen on the Ads of the Word site.

(via io9)

Tarot Writing Prompt: Temp Job as the Hermit

Irini — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 12:21:15 +0000

You are filling in for the Hermit (he called out sick). You need to supply your own source of light. What do you use? Do you already own something? Do you need to buy or make it? Is it real or imaginary?

(pictured here: Flashlight, Moroccan Lantern, Ice Bulb)

Weekly web roundup

Jen — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 15:49:33 +0000

Here’s this week’s list of all the posts from around the web that we’ve shared over the past week on Twitter, Google Reader, FriendFeed, and both Facebook pages (Cat ‘N Owl and Reiki).

Tarot

…………………………………

Reiki

…………………………………

Astrology

Free Will Astrology: Horoscopes for week of February 11, 2010

…………………………………

Misc

If you have a tarot, reiki, astrology, crystals, or herbs blog and would like to share it with us, please add it in the comments or let us know on Twitter. Thanks!