Do Tarot Cards Still Have a Place in Our World?
by: mothproof
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In a world increasingly jaded by technology and progress, it’s easy to
scoff at people who blindly entrust their lives to a deck of cards. We
tell ourselves, we are rational, clear-headed people, so how can
randomly shuffled cards spread on the table possibly answer all our
life’s questions.
Tarot cards have had a crucial and
inseparable influence in mysticism and the occult. They first arrived
sometime in fifteenth century Italy, but it was not until late 17th or
18th century that tarot cards began to be used in divination. The tarot
cards that we know today have gone through a long and evolution, from
the pictures, symbolisms, procedures, purposes, and meanings. It is
interesting to note that tarot cards were originally used in a game,
with 21 trump cards, four queens, and a fool added to a normal deck,
which totals to 78 cards in all. But it is unclear exactly how tarot
branched out from a simple mind-diverting game into the fragile
business of looking back into past lives, foretelling the future, and
answering questions.
Tarot Archetypes
The highly-respected psychologist Carl Jung
has always considered tarot as an alternative psychotherapy. For him,
the rich imagery inherent in every tarot card represents archetypes of
human personality and situations. Archetypes are basic models or
prototypes of people that embody a defined set of characteristics. The
Emperor card, for instance, can be thought of as representing the
patriarch or the father figure.
Over the years, we piece
together various archetypes according to our needs. These archetypes
are embedded in our unconscious and thus they can affect our actions
and thoughts without our knowing. Consequently, our choices of tarot
cards when we pick them out from that “innocent” deck reveal our
feelings, attitudes, and even fears towards such figures in our lives.
For instance, we may not know it, but we have always shied from
responsibilities and commitment in lives whenever there is a father
figure looming in the background, etc.
Tarot cards offer an
alternative language system through which we can access our
Unconscious. Therefore, we do not just randomly pick tarot cards, or
blindly entrust our lives to them. Every moment of our lives, we lay
ourselves bare with the choices we make, even for something as papery
as tarot cards.
The Missing Tarot in The Skeptic’s World
Tarot
readings then should not be dismissed as just some pretend psychic
business exploiting a person’s gullibility. The art of tarot cards is
subtle, delicate, yet powerful. It is energised by centuries of
symbolism and meaning created, expounded, and developed by people who
dared to see beyond. For them, the Arcane that lies on the fringes of
human experience holds the secrets we need to survive.
Before
we question the legitimacy of tarot cards, we should first look into
the person who wants to inquire about himself/herself. Will they see to
believe, or believe to see?
About the Author
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This article was written by Neoli Marcos for PsychicGuild: online provider of free numerology reports, tarot reading and tarot meaning on MySpace.
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