When you go out seeking to buy your Tarot deck you will find many different designs and flavors. You can find Tarot decks that are suitable for cat lovers, or there are Tarot decks that use a certain storybook for its theme. There are also Tarot decks created to reflect a particular major motion picture or popular television series. Some decks are even created to reflect a particular sense of humor; maybe you will find a deck that in many ways looks like a parody of Tarot. Interestingly I have found, since I have developed my specific method of reading and interpreting, that all decks work for me. I was even given a deck once by a young lady who said the deck appeared on her table shortly after she had had an altercation with a particular “witch type girl” who it is believed wanted to compete for my friend’s boyfriend. This deck had two cards with burn marks on them and a third card with the corner torn off. I suspect this was meant as the component of some kind of negative magick designed to cause problems between the couple. I offered to take them off her hands as she requested and I performed a reading with them for my own interest. Even though damaged, there was nothing about these cards that made them unreadable (as my friend claimed she for some reason could not read them even though they used a similar “Rider-Waite” depiction method like her personal deck is and not the “Crowley-like pip cards” many decks I own use).
Rider-Waite style decks, as they are commonly called in the Tarot community, are decks that not only show the Major Arcana in vivid picture form, but also use every day like scenery to describe the numbered Minor Arcana cards. Crowley-based, as they are sometimes called, or “pip decks” as they are also called, are decks that only show active images on the Major Arcana and for the Minor Arcana they draw only items of the specific suit and in the specific number of the card. For instance, in a Rider-Waite style deck the two of pentacles will show a man appearing to juggle two large coins; he seems to be having difficulty keeping his feet on the ground and the scenery behind him shows a bay filled with boats floating over a very turbulent body of water. A Crowley type design will only show two coins with perhaps some stylized flourishes such as Crowley’s deck specifically uses Yin-Yang symbols in the disks and has a serpent entwining the two disks and biting its own tale. Both of these cards have the exact same meaning.
There is another variation between the two deck styles, and I have seen some that mix the two changes in different ways; so in effect, you end up with four different deck configurations possible. This issue has often led the novice to much confusion but I will tell you here and now that this confusion is not something you should let bother you. In fact, it should play no difference on your Tarot divinations once you learn your technique and as long as you are comfortable with the overall appearance of your deck of choice. This other variation you will find in decks is that the numbers associated with the Major Arcana cards of Strength and Justice get switched. Also, some decks will have foreign titles on the Trumps as they are created in different languages and some decks will change subtly the names of some of the Trumps, but these cards are still the same. Strength means Strength whether it is numbered 8 or numbered 11, and Justice means Justice numbered either way.
The main thing to seek out when buying your Tarot is that it is actually a Tarot Deck. Ask someone who has the deck if you can see it first. Make sure there are 78 cards (real simple to check that there are 22 Majors, 4 suits ace through ten and 4 Courts per suit). If you learn the meanings of the cards traditionally associated to them, that’s a good starting point for developing your own understanding of each card – it isn’t easier or harder to learn a “pip style” deck. The theme should be something you are comfortable with and not overly distracted by (I’ve known many a Tarotist to end up buying a deck that was just “too pretty” to do anything pragmatic with). As far as the (sometimes controversial) variations I’ve described above, for divination purposes they won’t have any significant impact – these differences are for when using your deck for esoteric investigation of the specific magical system aligned to the deck.
It's that time of the year again when we say "out with the old and in with the new." Personally I'm not a fan of the New Year beginning in the middle of Winter - I'm a Spring loving guy - so since my 1987/88 New Year's resolution was "to never make New Year's resolutions again," I'm going to break that resolution once and for all this year.
I'd recently read some statistical statement that said nearly half of everyone who makes a New Year's resolution breaks them before June. Because of my position on honesty, and how I qualify a broken promise as the equivalent of a lie and how that affects your ability to accomplish goals, that's why I decided not to make resolutions without great thought given to them and how I'm going to accomplish my goals. Being under "peer pressure" to create a resolution for New Year's Eve because tradition dictates we do so just wasn't my cup o' tea any more. So since then I've been creating my goal-plans (resolutions) on my birthday in May, using astrology as my guide. But this year, because for the past two years I haven't had all my resources together and the time to create a "Solar Return Chart" for myself by my birthday, I'm deciding to give the New Year's resolution tradition another go.
I like to keep things positive in language. I believe we're more apt to be successful in our goals when we speak of the things we want to have, the rewards we want to gain, the distances we want to go, as opposed to speaking of the things we no long wish to do or be like.
So here's the big announcement for all of you who read this: My New Year's Resolutions! I'm going to create that learning tool software for tarot I've often talked about. I've already bought the software tool for creating it and the books to learn to use it (FLASH For Dummies I hope is going to be very helpful). I'm going to write that book that everyone tells me they think I'm supposed to write (the software and the book belong together, but I may offer them separately). Since I'm the guy who always got the syllabus and jammed ahead of the rest of the class schedule, you know I'm a guy that likes to get a head start and I'm already two chapters into the book and two ...uhm... sections? into the software (I don't know what to call them... lessons?). I'm also going to finish building that temple that though currently is in workable shape (I do use it), it isn't photogenic yet. I'm going to succeed in finding a video camera that doesn't disappoint me (bought 2 this year that proved not to be what I need) and I'm going to make a new YouTube channel for fun and do more with my YouTube.com/ThelemicWaves channel. In fact, I'll be adding things to that channel very soon regarding the Rosetta of the Royal Path software I'm writing (Rota of the Royal Path was the previous working title, and I think my current working title is going to stick).
So what are your resolutions this year? I'd really like to hear them. Comment me.
My Son, in all Judgment and Decision is great Delicacy, but most in these Matters of the Will. For thou art Advocate as well as Judge, and unless thou have well organized thy Mind thou art Bondslave of Prejudice. For this Cause it is adjuvant to thy Wisdom to call Witnesses that are not of thine own Nature, and to ask Oracles whose Interpretation is bound by Fixed Rule. This is the Use of the Book TAROT, of the Divination by Earth, or by the other Elements, or by the Book "Yi-King", and many another Mode of Truth. Thou knowest by thine Experience that these Arts deceive Thee not, save insofar as thou deceivest thyself. So then to thee that art NEMO is no Siege Perilous at this Table, but to them that are yet below the Abyss is very notable Danger of Error. Yet must they train themselves constantly in these Modes, for Experience itself shall teach them how their Bias toward their Desires reacteth in the End against themselves, and hindereth them in the Execution of their Wills. Nevertheless, as thou well knowest, the best Mode is the Creation of an Intelligible Image by Virtue of the Mass of the Holy Ghost, declaring the True Will unto thee in Terms of thy Qabalah!
The above is taken from Liber Aleph: The Book of Wisdom or Folly by The Master Therion (Aleister Crowley). It is chapter 103 of the book (a book written in the form of letters or epistles from a father to his son). It is written intentionally in the archaic language reminiscent of the King James era so as to lead one to elevate their mind as they read over the thoughts. *This chapter’s Greek title translates “On Certain Methods of Seeking an Oracle.”
The first statement tells us that the Wise must act with “great Delicacy.” This, of course, is a loving kind of caution – a tenderness and succulence, suggesting that all thoughts and acts (Judgment and Decision) should be done with the least amount of haste, especially in “Matters of the Will.” (Note: the word Will is capitalized, thus elevating it above mere wish or want, and describing instead our Life Choices.) So for this reason most certainly are designed the methods of Divination (of which the Master describes several, but not all). To these tools, which are of a nature unlike ourselves (thus giving them insight beyond our own limited frames) and which too are “bound by Fixed Rule” (more on this later), we are meant to go and seek Wisdom for our actions and judgments even before we make them (not after, and not out of curiosity, and not in haste), for we know “these Arts deceive Thee not, save insofar as thou deceivest thyself.”
The next part of the chapter might get a little confusing for those not familiar enough with the teachings of The Master Therion, but I will clarify. “NEMO” is the adopted name of whom the letter was in place written for – not a specific person, but a position or rank of adepthood and it specifically means “NO MAN.” This is in the mystical tradition of the Order of the Silver Star to whom all these writings are intended. “NO MAN” is as one who is above the influence of the baser instincts, one who has no need for what you might call a Personality or Ego identification to things, one who is neither angered nor hurt by being right or wrong – but instead moves to the Truth. Below this are described the errors of those who must attach themselves to their desires and results as if these things were greater than themselves. The Master warns of these dangers. The final statement is a secret of Initiation which is beyond this writing to describe (not because any need for secrecy, but to write about it in mere words more than what above is stated will only profane it). Of it I will only give you this useful hint, the “Intelligible Image” is like a God to thyself and the “Virtue of the Mass of the Holy Ghost” is the total Union of Opposites described in all the Programs of the Order.
As I promised, I will go further in discussion on this phrase; “Oracles whose Interpretation is bound by Fixed Rule.” Herein is controversy. These methods of divination (and others not exactly named) have fixed rules of interpretation, not several and not many, but one fixed rule. As “the Book TAROT” is the main object of my work with you, it will be the only one I bother to discuss here. Every card is in itself an entire cosmos to itself (just as a human being is an entire cosmos to itself), but one of many to the diviner (unique and not understood in a vacuum without relations). And the methods of communicating with them, through them, and by them are much like any method of communication in any world or system – subject to the rules of grammar, syntax, and definition. Contrary to a very popular belief, the TAROT does not mean “whatever one feels it to mean at the time.” In fact, due to the proliferation of inarticulate (and non-initiate) designers of TAROT decks, the cards don’t even always match up to mean “what their pretty pictures look like.” In some cases, as in the design of the Rider-Waite Tarot, the designer has claimed to “intentionally have gotten it wrong” so as to protect “oath bound secrets” of their meanings (personally I believe this is a silly excuse as this was not the intent of Waite’s oaths to the Golden Dawn).
What these “Fixed Rules” of the Tarot are is a writing of book length itself and easily found among many libraries and by several different authors. You will find that these authors have in common several things besides offering you the same or very similar methods and knowledge: not one of them claims to have been naturally born to reading the TAROT, nor do they claim a parental bloodline giving them privilege to know the TAROT; they will have come from the same and most ancient of traditions regarding not only the TAROT but all the forms of divination and occult study, Great Orders and Societies that have held together for centuries the ancient and collected Wisdom.
So remember, in all matters of Will, savor Judgment and Decision for until that time when you are no longer swayed by your baser instincts, you are prone to misconception and prejudice and should seek the advice of those that are not attached to your preferences but are instead attached to the Greater Good of all of Humanity. Listen attentively to when the TAROT speaks to you, for the TAROT cares not about the color of your clothing or your taste in music, your preference for old habits or novel adventures, but instead for the Wisdom that will lead you to things you obviously haven’t discovered with your own eyes. Don’t come to a reading seeking to prove yourself right, for surely this will only lead to your pain – instead, come with an open mind and open heart, and open ear to things you haven’t understood, and then you will be right beyond a doubt.
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The above excerpt from The Book of Wisdom or Folly, written in 1918 and republished by several book producers, has itself fallen into public domain. This is not to be confused with the various books that are now published under the main title, as they are copyright as “collections” specifically involving the cover designs, additions of “Prologues” and “Introductions” by various modern authors and an Index or more at the end, but the works of Aleister Crowley himself have expired their copyrights. No copyright infringement is enacted nor are any rights claimed by the current author regarding the above used excerpt having been installed for fair use purposes of commentary and education. I hope you have enjoyed the included work as it is a masterpiece that should not go forgotten. You can find copies of The Book of Wisdom or Folly at the usual booksellers but I suspect the price will be much as I am not certain at this time if the work is still in print (The Ordo Templi Orientis often retreats on its efforts to publish the works of the Master Therion for various economic reasons).
If you want to be sure you are receiving an authentic reading and not just paying good money for fantasy stories that have no basis in reality, or are possibly being read the same script applied to everyone, or are being manipulated, lied too and fleeced, start by looking for the various red flags.
1) The psychic has flawless feedback. You examine page after page and there isn't one piece of feedback lower than four stars - or there is one in all of three years that left a one star, everyone else leaves glowing reviews about how detailed and positive it was. Now there are a lot of ways to manipulate the feedback this, the most likely is a form of hypnotism. By spending five minutes on the phone with the so-called psychic reader, the client has listened to exactly the story they wanted to hear, has heard it in such a way that it leaves them feeling perfectly happy they called, and a suggestion was given at the end of the call to leave positive feedback.
2) The reader guarantees 100% accuracy and "results." Results? Do you sell spells too? That's another red flag we'll get to next, but no one can make "predictions" with 100% accuracy because the future hasn't happened yet (no matter what some believe, most people should agree with that statement). Life is a series of choices being made one after the other, and every choice we make changes the path that life is going to take. If this weren't so, I would not expect you to want to call a psychic or spiritual adviser because there would be no point - if it is going to happen anyway, it is going to happen and who needs to know in advance? That wouldn't change a thing - and if I can change my future, it's going to be me and not some magician selling me the idea of a spell.
3) To practice magick effectively takes years of developmental practice and special work. You have to have experience at developing what is known as the Body of Light (or astral body), you have to have an understanding of the "map of the territories" so you know when you are in the right place for your work and not somewhere else, you have to know the "language of the locals" if you want to call on spirits that aid you, you have have "outgrown yourself" (so to speak) so that you can reach beyond the petty egoism of everyday lives and desires. The nature of this work is itself transforming, and to those who follow it to the ends it makes equally a monk as well as a magician. One wouldn't dare imagine something as petty as a love spell or greed accumulation of someone else's feild of dreams - only the petty minded spew curses and rip new holes in the fabric of love. The petty minded have no power. Only you and you alone can change your path and work magick. We can sell you the ingredients, we can sell you the methods, we can sell you or give you the keys to finding your magical current yourself - but no one can do it for you.
4) And to curse someone is above all one of the hardest acts of magick to actually maintain. A true diver in the ways of the magical arts knows beyond any shadow of doubt that there is not really a line that separates the two of us. To cause any harm or benefit to you is to do the very same to myself. So in itself the random cursing is a possibility, there's no doubt that someone can and may indeed throw a tantrum in your direction - but to continue it indefinitely or to make it so ancient as to be upon your entire family tree for generations is just poppy cock. It's the oldest scam in the book to tell you that you have a curse or negative energy field blocking your success. This scam works marvelously because it immediately does the one thing that is completely opposite any spiritual teaching that exists - it removes you, the victim, from having to do any real work on yourself to fix things - it puts the blame away from anything that might really be causing the problems in your life. An instant answer to why things that go wrong go wrong! Ha! Thank you! Tell me more!
And for a fee, a fee that will over time need to grow, you can have this curse or negative block removed. In fact, I've heard of a very clever method of this scam that even works harder to disguise itself and has apparently worked on people who have already known of this type of scam - the money itself isn't initially requested - it's simply described and the "victim" is told to take this specific amount of money and put in a container and hide it in a specific place. As this container becomes the main component of the "spell," over time the money is added to this container as the "reader" discusses "the aetheryic fields are lessening around this powerful curse" etc etc until eventually after months of adding seemingly small amounts of money to the box, the "reader" proclaims a need to be the one to take this box and "burn it" or "drown it" or whatever to cleans the victim from the curse.
Don't fall for this curse. It will ruin you.
5) Stating the ability to give timelines is a red flag. I won't advertise timelines because they rarely if ever actually come up. Timelines return us to point number 2 above, the future is not written yet. There are some cases when a caller will ask me about a situation that, yes, all the resolving concerns have already been manifest or are heading in a certain direction because of what has already manifest, and pretty clearly this will resolve itself in a specific manner. Some times a timeline frame will come into a reading but before I would even imagine such a thing I need several verifying indicators that I'm seeing something as a time frame and not another form of meaning. Telling you time frames takes all the meaning out of a spiritual advisory service - it makes it mere entertainment or a soothing narcotic to please you. (That's why the frauds have been called "soothsayers" because their business is to say soothing things to you).
My business is to advise you and guide you to your intended path. Generally speaking I could tell you "I can answer any question you have" using my abilities with the tarot (and beyond) - but that would not be a completely accurate statement. I cannot answer questions the likes of which have no bearing on your path (such as how John Ex-Lover of 20 years ago is doing with his business) but I can find where you are on your path related to your desires and how to be help you decide which way to go and means to use. I can show you how someone's feelings about you may help or hurt your hopes for a future together. I can show you the truth, often times something you've already seen but just didn't know what to do with, and help you manifest for yourself what is your best interest. Or I could make it my business to tell you that all you have to do is sit on your ass and swallow what I sell you and everything is going to be just golden - but my oath-bound life would never allow me to do such a thing.
It's not uncommon of me to read many different things in the same period. I mean, there are periodicals that arrive in my mail box and I'm not going to ignore them just because I also have two books on my desk that I'm exploring. Right now I'm reading "About Time" by Adam Frank which is a nonfiction examination of the human understanding of science, space, and time and its influence on the evolution of culture throughout history. I'm also reading a fiction called Ishmael which is a story about a man who becomes the student of a guru type guerrilla teaching him about how society has enslaved mankind and is destroying itself and the planet. And then there's Discover magazine, which I just started subscribing to again and they sent me two issues (November and December) to make up for lost time (coincidentally these two issues seem to be about science and space and time and our understanding of it and its impact on culture and how we are destroying ourselves and our planet - I'd say that, but I don't believe in coincidences).
Why is it so many people want to get all up on Mercury during one of his retrograde periods. "Be ware! Mercury is in retrograde. Expect miscommunications, things to go wonky on the electrical side, travel plans to go all snafu, until Mercury goes direct again on December 13." Oh really? All of us, 7 billion snafus?
Retrogrades are the solar system's cosmic practical joke. Before the discovery of telescopic viewing and Galileo's observations that the planets revolve around the Sun and not the Earth, the apparent motion of the planets against the backdrop of the constellations would frequently give one the impression that planets could stop and loop in the opposite direction.
But the truth of the matter is, the planets aren't going backwards; we're playing a game of pass and catch. As the planets all travel at different speeds and each with a wider or small orbit, when we pass a planet in our orbit it appears as if the planet is going backwards compared to the backdrop of the so-called "fixed stars" in the night sky. When our orbit turns us around the ellipse and we appear again to be approaching (or the planet in question appears to be catching up), it appears to go direct and speed up.
You see? It's all a trick of the eye. The planets never actually go backwards! But, as I pointed out earlier, these definitions and ideas have been passed down to us since the dawn of man's ability to record events and this is why we call this apparent motion a retrograde (backward moving) motion and why so many astrologers still cling to the notion that "backwards" means "bad." In the olden times it was believed that the planet was actually making a change in direction. Imagine how frightening that must have seemed! And so this type of behavior has ever since been regarded as a bad omen.
Retrograde simply means "returning to" or "going back over" old ground. Personally I see these events as opportunities to go over old material, lessons, or even locations and rediscover or sharpen up on them. This is not a bad thing, this is an opportunity to improve. Mercury retrograde is not a time when travel plans are going to go awry any more so than any other time of the year (Merc retrogrades do happen like clockwork and roughly twice a year, so it would be silly to assume that always and only at these times will these "bad things" occur). Venus retrograde is not a time special for the pulling away of relationships and affections, but a time when old relationships and old desires will be more available (do the math, if this happens to your partner too, he or she will seem distant from you, while you are off exploring old haunts, to him or her you will seem more distant). And all the other planets - it has become popular to use the doom and gloom phrasing of what a retrograde means but I'm begging you to reconsider this. Go over your astrological opinions again and reframe the experiences so you see what is actually taking place.
There have been added a couple of changes to the Thelemic Waves website and service offerings. I've been having a lot of fun learning more techniques for developing websites and I'm taking advantage of what I've so far learned and am able to offer more value added content for you.
Recorded readings are back again. Remember back when you would call me, have your reading performed and you could then later download your mp3 recording of it? That's right! It's back again. So also is your personal and private Thelemic Waves Account Page with all your readings and invoice records stored there for your own benefit.
Why I stopped offering the service in the first place has to do with time and space restraints that I've since overcome. Before this month I did not have any actual means to offer you a password protected page without actually manually creating it and updating it for you. I had to invent a password for you and give it to you. I had to shrink the mp3 file somehow to conserve space and limit you to ten such files available at a time. I had to edit your page and provide you the link via an html editing technique. I had to upload the updated page and the file through what was then a relatively slow upload speed (which took up bandwidth and meant I wasn't wise to be taking phone calls at that time as I use a sophisticated VOIP telephone service). All in all, on the average, providing that feature actually doubled the amount of work time per reading. Oh, and then I had a hard drive crash on my computer and all my copies of your files vanished - followed by accidently "synching" with the web server so that those files there also deleted (I do hope you all saved your copies yourselves). So that means that we are starting anew with your file collections.
I knew eventually I was going to bring that benefit back to you, just not exactly sure when and how to accomplish what I would require before it would happen. What I require is that the site would be able to offer you the ability to update your user account password as you so choose and to be sent an email in the event you forgot your password (yes, I'd received a few calls/emails from some who had forgotten their password and I would have to keep a list locally myself to help you). I would have to find a way for the website to automatically handle the file database for you so that I wouldn't have to spend time manually updating and configuring your pages for you. It would have to be so user friendly that I could discover I've gained a new client ready for her or his first reading without me even knowing it happened until the call for the reading came. It would have to be so simple that even a cave man could figure it out.
If you haven't done so already, go to www.thelemicwaves.com and click the account login button and create your account. You can choose any account name and password you wish but in the Full Name field use your real first and last name as it would appear on your PayPal billing (this is going to be used to uniquely name your secret file folder where I upload your sessions). You can always change your password and country and phone number, but all your other details will not be allowed to be changed after you accept them. Once your account is created, you will have access to your invoice records and uploaded mp3 readings.
I've also added a blog to the site. Prior to this I have been blogging randomly all over the Internet where ever I then felt most interested and comfortable. I've never been fully comfortable using another domain for my blogging so now I'm blogging directly on the ThelemicWaves.com domain and if you wish to leave comments (please do), you don't even have to login or even tell us your real identity! So please do leave comments. (Oh yeah, one more thing about that - articles from Currents will also be posted to that blog, so you can leave comments about this too there).
How did this all come about? On Thanksgiving weekend after about a month of struggling with different ways to learn how to code the way I want things to be, I crammed myself into learning the PHP language. I'm not terribly fluent with it but I'm getting there and recently acquired PHP 5 for Dummies - so I'm bound to be proficient soon and will be inventing even newer and more interesting site content for you. :-)
Anyway, check it out. Register you account and if I already have stored invoices for you, you will instantly see your reading history with me. And as for those recorded readings - just to be on the safe side, remember to remind me to push record because there have been times when I've forgotten (but I'm getting better at it).
