BARBARA MOORE
  • Home
  • Barbara
  • Blog
  • My Work
  • Currently Reading

Snickerdoodles

10/14/2015

2 Comments

 

Snickerdoodles: A Delicious Metaphor

Picture

At the Minnesota State Fair, there are lots and lots different categories for entering your best efforts in the arts, baking, knitting, crop art, and more. In each category, there a many different lots, or subcategories, you can enter. In the baking category, there is one that I always find interesting. Each year, they pick a different recipe--this year it was Snickerdoodles--and each entrant bakes the cookies using the exact same recipe. 
The picture above is just a few of the many cookies entered. As you can see, even though they all supposedly used the same recipe, the results are all different. I'm sure there are lots of reasons: quality or specific types of ingredients, relative humidity, technique, tools, the type of oven used, timing. Even if they controlled for all of that, I think the cookies would still come out differently because each baker adds something of him or herself to the mix, something that is uniquely themselves. 

Besides making me want to eat many cookies, looking at them reminded me a lot of tarot readings. In some groups or on Facebook, sometimes people will do a reading for themselves and ask the group for input. I always wonder about the usefulness of that, because I think that you can put the same, say, three cards in front of a dozen readers and even using the same question and positional meanings, you will get different conclusions. The reason goes deeper than tarot education and experience. Underneath all of that are our personal beliefs about what tarot is, how it works, where the answers come from, the role of the reader, etc. 

These are all questions (and there are even more) that I have my students answer before we even get into "what the cards mean." Because what the cards mean depends on your core beliefs about how the world works. Good bakers understand that baking is more than measuring ingredients and following directions. Just like a good artist doesn't simply make a painting that looks like a photograph; they make a painting that expresses a core truth that lies in their heart or mind or soul. There is an alchemy that happens in the creation, an alchemy that starts from within.
​
In fact, the alchemy starts from within and affects the reading before it even begins. It will influence what kind of sitters you read for, how you handle their questions (including type, wording, and approach to the reading), how you interpret the cards, and how you present the information (as well as how, if at all, you "edit" the information you see in the cards). These are all things that new readers want to know the "rules" for. But unless the rules come from their core, it's not really their most authentic reading. 
​
Many readers tap into that core accidentally, because they are trying to access their intuition or something "more." I think that cultivating a firm understanding of your beliefs will help a reader tap into that place of alchemical wonder more easily and more consciously, and, in the long run, it will help them become a better reader.

My wish for you, my friends, is that you are always able to access the divine core within you and add your own unique magic to whatever you create, whether it is cookies or a tarot reading.  

2 Comments
Brenda Moon
10/15/2015 08:35:46 am

I was wondering what my be a good technique for identifying your core beliefs. I wonder if it is something that happens over time and with experience. I have beliefs about Tarot but spend much time thinking, "I know there is more. Where/How can I find it?"

Reply
Barbara link
10/15/2015 08:56:59 am

Hi Brenda! It is a process. In a book of mine coming out next year, I detail the process and also my Novice Program walks the students through the process. So I can't really share it all in a comment (too long) but start with questions like: how does tarot work, where do the answers come from, what is my role as a reader. The main question of how do I think tarot "works" is usually the foundation and includes larger issues relating to spirituality (or the lack thereof) or psychology or worldview. Your tarot beliefs should reflect your actual beliefs. So that's enough to get you started!

Reply



Leave a Reply.

    RSS Feed

    Categories

    All
    10 Of Pentacles
    10 Of Swords
    2 Of Swords
    3 Of Swords
    4 Of Cups
    4 Of Pentacles
    4 Of Swords
    4 Of Wands
    4s
    5 Of Cups
    5 Of Pentacles
    5 Of Swords
    5 Of Wands
    7 Of Cups
    7 Of Wands
    8 Of Pentacles
    Ace Of Wands
    Becoming The People We Want To Be
    Blessings
    Card Meanings
    Death
    Emperor
    Empress
    Energy Clearing
    Fool
    Hierophant
    High Priestess
    Judgement
    King Of Swords
    Knight Of Cups
    Llewellyn's Classic Tarot
    Magician
    Mystical Tarot
    Podcast Appearances
    Queen Of Cups
    Queen Of Pentacles
    Queen Of Swords
    Rumi
    Soul Musings
    Tarot And Shamanism
    Tarot As Sacred Text
    Tarot Decks
    Tarot In Wonderland
    Tarot Techniques
    The Hermit Departs
    Tower
    Wheel Of Fortune
    Wizards Tarot
    Your Tarot Your Way

    Archives

    July 2019
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    January 2018
    September 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    October 2015
    March 2015
    January 2015
    July 2014
    June 2014

    RSS Feed

  • Home
  • Barbara
  • Blog
  • My Work
  • Currently Reading