The Art of Tarot
For hundreds of years the Tarot has been a source of mystery and
fascination, intriguing us with its compelling and enigmatic pictures
and symbols.
No one really knows where the Tarot originated or how and why
it works but if we can "tune in" to the images we can
gain a deeper understanding of ourselves and the people and events
involved in our lives. Although there are general guidelines to
the meaning of the cards the ultimate aim is to develop your intuitive
skills and arrive at your own conclusions.
In the end each reader and there interpretation is as unique as
a set of fingerprints.
The Tarot still has the potential to be original, fresh and perhaps
that is why it is as popular today as it was centuries ago.
Tarot readers have been consulted and used by many health practitioners,
spiritualists, feminist historians, novelists, artists, film producers
and aristocracy for centuries. It is the great philosophical machine,
a "map to the psyche", and an ancient sacred text in
the form of cards. Many are skeptical until they experience the
power of a reading, and discover its profound spiritual teachings.
The Tarot is a set of seventy-eight images, which taken together,
depict all the forces that affect human life, along with all the
characters, events, emotions, and ideas that provide the material
of which human life is composed.
Though we will never know their true history, that needn't prevent
us from using their wisdom, for the Tarot cards do indeed tell
a powerful story: the story of the development of human life.
It is an adventure story, like the hero's journey, filled with
challenges, obstacles to be overcome, lessons to be learned, reconciliations
to be achieved, honor to be protected, goals to be formulated
and reached. In this universal story, each of us undertakes his
or her own Way, following whatever symbolism speaks to us at the
moment of a reading.
It is this amazing flexibility that has allowed the Tarot and
its marvelous symbols to endure through long and tumultuous centuries
in order to come down to us today. Tarot cards are wonderful for
meditation, as well as for divination, or the answering of questions.
They act to stimulate the intuition, which is the key to the gateway
of the unconscious. They act to illuminate the hidden factors
in a person's life that bear on the situation at hand. Often,
the person him- or herself may be unaware of these inner issues
that are secretly shaping the course of his or her life.
The Tarot, by contacting what is inside the person, reveals them.
