Inspiration, music

Inspiration, an interesting concept and a necessity for tarot. I have learned that inspiration is vital for good tarot readings simply because you need the “spark” to start of a good session, but there’s more. When you do a reading and place the cards on the table, a story unfolds. How that story is told depends on the reader. That reader, going on intuition to a certain extend, is heavily influenced by such things as his surroundings, recently read books, music, movies and much more. Some things influence more then others and this may shift from person to person. I have found that for me anything can be such an influence, but especially music has a strong influence on me.

That influence, to some extend, I believe is what sparks “inspiration” . Having realized that some time ago I have also learned how you can “manipulate” yourself by choosing certain kinds of music. At least off course to some extend. When I have a customer that requires a somewhat more sensitive approach I tend to play calm music, maybe a ballad or something, “Where the wild roses grow” by Nick Cave and Kylie Minogue works like a charm. When I do a reading that requires more mystique I like to play Blue Oyster Cult, “Astronomy” or “Don’t fear the reaper”. Also I’ve learned that some music I love is not suitable as inspiration for reading, either classical music ( Love Russian Composers, Korsakov, Mussorsky etc.) or death metal seem to cause unsettling readings and musical songs and folk-metal, my favorite genres make me “bouncy” for lack of a better word and even though I am very cheery, reading is hard simply because I can’t seem to quiet down enough.

I tend to listen to this music before I do a reading, not during. During a reading I usually have nothing playing, would be pretty useless my constant talking would drown out any other sound….

Winner online reading and short interview by Ixani.

Here it is, today’s blog.

First, Sunday I did the draw for the free online reading. Out of three followers who requested Paula Cardoso was drawn. She will be contacted regarding the question she wants the reading on.

Just for fun I had the lady who owns the shop where I do my readings do an interview with me and here it is:

1: Who in the Magicians name is Sidney Tuttel van Dorst and why would a Celt even bother to do tarot and not runes?

Because I read and write runes and I am very interested in their history I regard runes as letters, as they were intended. Reading runes to me comes across as picking scrabble letters for divination. I do however use runes for spiritual tattoo designs and such.

2: Were you born a tarotist or did you decide to become one later?

Well I started when I was thirteen, that’s the short answer. I can safely say that the esoteric, the occult and supernatural has been an interest of mine for as long as I can remember. I have explored other forms of divination like i-tjing, runes and all kinds of oracles but tarot was the only one that made sense to me, oddly enough because it is just as valuable without the mystique and spirituality as it is with all the mojo and hocus pocus added to it.

3: What do you see in the cards and do you tell everything you see or are you being polite sometimes?

The cards have their meaning, the position they’re in have their meaning and the cards influence each others meaning. A card can mean “this” but another cards meaning may shift card A’s traditional meaning or add information to it. Other then the “standard” meaning, many cards have subtle extra information or may even have certain concepts related to them ( moon – lunacy… justice – police ). There is also a “layer” of information that enters on another level, hinting of extra information enriching the cards on the table. When I read for customers I am very careful what information I share. I rarely share the more intuitive information because I do not see myself as a fortune-teller, though I do sometimes try to gain more information in the direction my intuition takes me. The info I give is usually tailored to the person in front of me and in general I keep it related to the question of the reader. If I do “see” more I rarely just share it, mostly I try to gain insight whether the info is needed and wanted.

4: What is your favorite deck and why, and when can we expect your own handmade deck?

The Shadowscapes Tarot because it is so beautiful, Crowley Toth for myself and Rider Waite for my customers. I have many decks I love to death, but these are the ones at the top of my list. I have been busy designing my own deck since years but so far nothing useful has come of it. I will one day start over and make a serious deck.

5: Does drinking whisky make you think more clear?

More clear no, far from it. However I have noticed that when there is a limited amount of alcohol involved it becomes much easier to rely on intuition and a certain “flow” starts to form. When push comes to shove I prefer a reading after, or better yet during enjoying a good single malt Islay whiskey.

10 Obvious signs you are spending too much time on tarot.

10 Obvious signs you are spending too much time on tarot.

10 – You start referring to people around you in card names. “Yeah this 4 of coins at work had a serious argument with that 7 of swords”

9 – You start recognizing individual cards by their backs.

8 – Decks start hiding themselves to get a rest.

7 – You need to do a reading to decide what to wear.

6 – You own at least one tarot t-shirt.

5 – When you have shuffled you main deck back in original order.

4 – You have lost the finger prints on your thumb and index finger.

3 – You already know everything.

2 – Your friends already know everything.

1 – Random strangers already know everything.

Tarot Fatigue

The last few days I’ve been having what can only be described as Tarot-Fatigue. Though I have some serious work still to do, a review for Aeclectic Tarot and the rest of my Tarot training, I simply do not feel like picking it up. Tomorrow I have an appointment with a client, oddly enough I am looking forward to that. Maybe it’s not the tarot itself but the extra work that’s bugging me lately. Doing a reading, the human interaction always gives me enormous amounts of energy.

I have had similar episodes with drawing, painting and designing. I am actually still in the middle of that as well, four tattoo designs at least are still waiting to be created, to flow from my mind to the paper, but I simply do not “feel like it”.

I am hoping my client tomorrow will re-energies my “tarot-battery” so I can get to work on other projects, though coming week might already be too fully planned to even have the time to get to work.

BTW, this Sunday I will choose followers for a free online reading… if you still want one, let me know…

Death, Tower, the Devil…. That’s not good….

Bad cards, a delicious subject when it comes to tarot. When you look at a card like death you immediately get that ominous feeling, the grim reaper looks up at you from the table. The same goes for many other “bad” cards. Most bad cards can be explained in a light and positive matter. For instance death, yes death is the end… but every end is also a new beginning, one chapter ends a new one begins. Also the end is not something bad by definition; end of a financial crisis, end of a long sickbed, end of a nightmare. When a bad thing ends it can be a joyous thing.

It is my experience that many tarot readers grasp for the positive meanings of cards when they appear on table, maybe to please their customers, or perhaps even to prevent them from being scared away. They do however often seem to evade them and as such they negatively influence or “pollute” their readings. “Bad things” are a part of life and even though the negative tarot cards can be interpreted as positive regarding place, question and other cards on the table, you should always consider the negative meaning as well.

Life isn’t just rainbows, unicorns and carebears, so neither should the readings be. Tarot is a representation of life, good and bad. Off course it takes skill to include a negative explanation in your reading without upsetting your client too much… and perhaps for someone who lacks the communicative skills sticking to rainbows and carebears is the best strategy. But I personally view it as a disservice when I keep out perhaps important warnings or a harsh message.

Walking the thin line…

“In your future I see, a tall handsome man… three beautiful children, but also tears for a lost love… that will be 35$” Yes, this is still daily practice for some tarot readers. Now don’t get me wrong, I do, to a certain degree, believe that the tarot system has the properties to stimulate a certain amount of premonition or precognition, but I don’t believe it is something to rely on and most certainly not something you can deliver on the spot for a fee.

I use tarot as a mirror, as a different perspective, like a friend saying “Have you tried looking at it from this angle?” Information regarding the future I regard mostly in a sense of action reaction… “If you continue on this path, this might happen” or “If you do that, you should be mindful of such and such… “ I do not believe in fate and I do not feel the future is written in stone. If anything, I think we may be given hints or warnings from time to time…maybe by our combined consciousness calculating possible outcomes of happenings, maybe by some divine spirit or just from same nameless energy.

Tarot carries a certain mystique and many people come to a Tarot reader to have their fortune read. I use the tarot professionally as a coaching tool and the said “mirror”, though at times I cannot deny weird things turning up. It is never the goal of my readings, but when my intuition “rings” I do pass on the information I find with the added “it is just a hunch, but consider this…” I don’t want to come across as the clichéd gypsy, but since I do have customers who come to me with that cliché in mind, I cannot deny them their expectations altogether.

It is a thin line and I am careful not to drop to either side, I am neither a complete skeptic not a die hard believer….

May the moon light your path,

Sidney

Free Online Reading, blog promotion...

How to draw people to your blog, simple... give something for free!!!....

To promote my new blog I am giving away free online tarot readings, if this turns out successful I will later ad giveaways possibly in the form of tarot decks, bags or books.

What do you have to do...

• Well become a follower and promote my blog.


• Let me know that you are interested in a reading.

Every two weeks I will randomly pick someone. I'll inform on any questions you may have and do a reading including a picture of said reading with my personal interpretation and advice.


May the moon light your path,

Sidney

Tarot a girl thing?

Friday, almost weekend and it couldn’t have come quick enough for me. Tropical temperatures and soccer are not my “thing” so this week has been quite the challenge for me. Just have to wrestle through a few more hours of work today.

This weekend I will spend some time getting to know my Shadowscapes Tarot (http://www.shadowscapes.com/Tarot/index.html )a bit better. It is by far the most beautiful tarot deck I have seen. Up till now I haven’t had time to actually do a reading with them, but this weekend I am planning on doing just that. Funny thing came to me though, the deck, especially compared to some other decks I own is a bit feminine. Looking at tarot as a whole it all feels a bit aimed towards the female species. I never thought of it before, but right now I feel Tarot is a bit of a female “thing”. Most of my clients are also women, off course I would love to say that it is because of my raw masculine charm, but I’m afraid that might not be the case…hahaha.

Oh well, I hate soccer ( or any sport on TV ), I have no interest in cars, I have long curls and now I count tarot as another of my feminine traits… I am so in touch with my feminine side it might be considered harassment.

This weekend I will be writing a review for Aeclectic Tarot (http://www.aeclectic.net/ ) on the HR Giger Baphomet Tarot… not a feminine deck by the way, keep an eye out for that.

And while we’re spamming check out http://www.ixani.nl/ (Dutch) and the Ixani forum on ixani.forum2go.nl (Also Dutch). This is the shop where I do my readings and the accompanying discussion forum on anything spiritual and mystical.

Diversity

One of the things I like about tarot is the diversity in decks. There’s not a single subject you can think of or someone has created a tarot deck around it, from Lord of the Rings to Hello Kitty. Not every deck design is created with reading in mind it seems. The Lego Tarot or the 8-BT tarot for instance are, despite their traditional symbolism, hardly useable for serious readings.

Off course many deck are created with reading in mind, some try to re-invent the wheel renaming or re-arranging cards. Some pick up the traditional system and build on that, adding new depth to the cards. Not every creator succeeds in this but some decks do strike the right cord and become very successful. Though the biggest split in “recent” Tarot history is the difference between the Crowley Toth and the more traditional Rider Waite and it will take a revolutionary design to branch out the tarot family like that ever again.

Random thought….

It’s weird, I read for complete strangers, I read for family and friends and I read for myself. But somehow reading for my beloved wife doesn’t seem to work. We have tried maybe two or three times and it never seems to go anywhere but explain the single cards. Maybe our fates are to much intertwined to give an objective reading who knows, but it is weird. She is the love of my life and I am happily married, she supports my “addiction” to tarot and has cards of her own….

Babe, you’re awesome…

Tattoo, Tarot Design

I made this drawing for a colleague of mine. This Friday he will have it tattooed on his arm. I got paid a good bottle of single malt cask strength Islay whisky.... a good deal in my opinion. I think I will use this as a concept drawing for the deck I am designing myself as well.


Because the design is for a tattoo I kept it a bit "cartoony" nearly old school tattoo in style, for my deck I will make it more detailed and include a background.

How to start...

As I was writing a new training course in tarot I was amazed once again by the system in the cards. The amazement came from frustration about having a difficult time finding a good way to start my training. The system has become so complete that there is no easy way to find a beginning when you are trying to explain tarot to people who are new to it. It is like finding the starting point of a circle. I have found a method, though perhaps a bit cliché. I start zooming out describing factually what tarot is, zooming in slowly to influences and purpose… in short, I am starting out like probably every other tarot training out there. My defining or divining (haha) qualities would have to be proven in another way, probably in feedback and interaction during the course. But a nagging feeling of not having found “the introduction” to my otherwise obviously brilliant training didn’t leave me until we went to visit my parents for family diner last week.







So there I was, at my parents’… laptop on my lap, typing the first outlines of my new course while my baby nephew is crying, people around me are caught in discussion and the television is making it’s own brand of special noise (probably CSI or Law and Order) and I am in my own personal tarot bubble…. My wife resting her head on my shoulder, which actually makes typing rather painful after a few minutes. It’s a special kind of comfort… but comfort nonetheless. Tarot is life or at least a representation or map of it and I love being in the middle of it. Tarot is life… it was like finding the start on a roll of sticky tape while after what felt like minutes of scratching your fingernail over the roll.

So tarot mirrors life… I will start my training with a short and hopefully entertaining story after which I will highlight aspects and how the cards relate to them….

Here's my first post

Well here it is, my first blog. Let's start of with an introduction. My name is Sidney I am married and I have a son from a previous relationship. I work for the largest cable company/ internet provider here in the Netherlands as a dayshift manager. I also read tarot professionally at a new-age shop called Ixani ( Dutch Ixani forum: http://ixani.forum2go.nl/ ).

Other then that I draw/ design tattoos, play a bit of music, write poetry, short stories and song lyrics and consider myself a die hard gamer.

Regarding tarot I am, in comparison, a reasonably down to earth guy. I use tarot as a method to gain other perspectives on things and to help my client gain new insights in a situation. I do not claim to predict the future or contact higher powers, though I must admit I have had some weird experiences. I am convinced that there is more between heaven and earth then most are ready to admit, I just don't claim to know what it is.