I’m very surprised with the way my Tarot collection has changed over the past couple of years. Back when I first started reading Tarot, nearly fourteen years ago, I had only one deck. I bought another deck, but quickly sold it off to a used bookstore. After using my single deck for about two years, I moved on to my next deck. It kept me happy for many years, all through high school in fact. I eventually tried branching out and bought a couple of other decks, after losing interest in my old decks and their symbolism and (in one…

I’ve recently started to re-read Lon Milo Duquette The Chicken Qabalah. It is an excellent introduction to all the things a dilettante needs to know about the mystical Qabalah, and it has really got me thinking. I’m starting to wonder how the path that a cards sits on on the Tree of Life affects its meaning, and what happens to that card’s meaning if one uses a different arrangement of paths (as there are more then one). And what about the card’s meaning in each of the four Qabalistic worlds? How does it change, or does it change at all?…

Lately I have been reading A History of the Occult Tarot 1870 – 1970 by R. Decker and M. Dummett. It is an excellent book that is, unfortunately, more of a survey of magical orders then a history of the Tarot. I am stilling finding it to be a worthwhile read, though. And I highly recommened it to anyone interested in the history of the Tarot. Perhaps the most important thing that has come from reading this book is a confirmation of my feelings about Aleister Crowley. I recognize his genius for magic, but I have long felt he was…

I’ve talked quanta into buying me yet another Tarot deck, the Pagan Tarot by Gina M. Pace. Honestly, I think the search for the perfect deck is never ending. Each time I get a deck that I expect to be “The One” I always find something wrong with it. So, I’ve stopped searching for “The One” and started seeing each deck as good for a certain type of reading. Of course, the problem now is that I don’t do reading as often as I’d like. I’m thinking about offering some more free readings on

I found out yesterday that my Dad often stops by and reads my blog. (Hi Dad!) This won’t change the way I write or what I write about, but it might give me pause for a minute or two once in a while. Anyway, on to other things. I am trying really hard to read Jung’s Man and His Symbols, but it isn’t really making a lot of sense. Oh, I am picking up a very profound nugget here and there, but I don’t understand most of it. You see, there are a few things I just can’t get my…

My Tarot studies are in a bit of a slump right now. I think it is partly due to some of those shoulds that I wrote about yesterday. I feel that I should use Tarot for something more then “simple fortunetelling”, like say for meditation or self-discovery or something. And I feel that I should study both the Marseilles Tarot (which I can’t stand!) and the Thoth Tarot (which just doesn’t do anything for me) to get a fuller understanding of all the Tarot traditions. When I first got started with Tarot, I was passionate about it. I read for…

Today I made a deal to trade away the last of my Tarot decks that I don’t get along with–The Osho Zen Tarot. I really wanted to like this deck. I bought it after reading a great deal about it on Aeclectic Tarot Forum. Many of the members there seemed to really love this deck, saying it was excellent for personal, spiritual readings. And, when I first got it, I did find the readings to be quite good. But… the more I worked with it the less I liked it. The messages just didn’t seem right; they didn’t fit with…

I finished reading A Wicked Pack of Cards: The Origins of the Occult Tarot last night. It is an interesting book about the development of Tarot from a trump-taking card game (which is actually very fun) to an occult tool. I was a little confused about the authors’ opinion on Tarot though. Which I suppose is understandable since the book was written by three people and they are bound to have different ideas. It felt a little like in part of the book they were saying that Tarot reading is rubbish, since it starting as nothing more then a card…

Yesterday I mentioned that I am part of a few groups that I really enjoy. One of them is the Stat-Tarot group at Yahoo. It’s purpose is to have many people do a one card reading for a specific issue and then do an analysis of those readings to see if there is any correlation. It is an extremely low traffic list, and a really interesting project. The time commitment is very small, just long enough to do a one card Tarot reading and send in a report (in a specific format) detailing your reading. If you are interested, keep…

Off and on, I’ve had an interest in various types of personality tests. I know my Myers-Briggs type and my enneagram type, ISFJ and 1 wing 9 respectively. I’ve also explored by Western and Eastern Zodiac signs in an attempt to learn more about myself. Sometimes I discover truths that I knew about all the time, and other times I discover hidden pieces of myself that I am forced to acknowledge. I am always pleasantly surprised when two systems neatly intersect. Take, for example, Tarot and Myers-Briggs. Based on physical characteristics and my Zodiac sign, the Queen of Pentacles is…