{"id":10785,"date":"2015-02-01T01:10:22","date_gmt":"2015-02-01T06:10:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/paganpages.org\/content\/?p=11180"},"modified":"2015-02-06T17:51:48","modified_gmt":"2015-02-06T22:51:48","slug":"seeing-the-signs-10","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/2015\/02\/01\/seeing-the-signs-10\/","title":{"rendered":"Seeing the Signs"},"content":{"rendered":"

Divining by Playing Cards<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Custom<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

As the sun gains strength moving toward Imbolc, the increased light shows all the dust and dirt that hid within the shadows of Yule\u2019s darkness and it is time to clean.\u00a0 Mercury\u2019s retrograde provides perfect opportunity to reorganize our closets and our drawers, getting rid of what no longer services us and finding ways to recycle old things into new.\u00a0 After a day of cleaning, quiet time with a cup of herbal tea and a fragrant candle can be productive while re-reading one\u2019s Book of Shadows.\u00a0 Mine started as a small notebook and is now divided into three giant loose-leaf notebooks.\u00a0 Last night, I was looking through the largest one, my Tarot and Numerology notebook.\u00a0 I have always had an interest in numbers and cards.\u00a0 I received my first Tarot deck in 1988, but I read playing cards as a child.\u00a0 To be honest, I didn\u2019t know anything about it but I \u201cknew\u201d that the Queen of Hearts meant love and the Ace of Spades was death.\u00a0 The rest of it I made up as I went along, partly based on the card games I played with my grandparents \u2013 deuces were wild, whatever that meant \u2013 red threes were lucky, that came from Canasta \u2013 and so on.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

After I got the Waite-Rider deck, I was totally fascinated with the Tarot and I forgot all about using playing cards for anything other than playing card games.\u00a0 I read every book I could find on the subject and took page after page of notes, filling numerous notebooks.\u00a0 I collected hundreds of spreads and tried every single one.\u00a0 I visited every Tarot website I could find and printed out whatever information I could find, which was added to my ever-growing Tarot notebook.\u00a0 Some of the information I found was contradictory but that made it all no less valuable.\u00a0 In almost 30 years of reading the cards \u2013 I own six decks and an oracle deck \u2013 I have found that the most important thing to know is to simply let the cards speak to you.\u00a0 Still, I value all my notes and all the time it took to collect them.\u00a0 I enjoy reading them.\u00a0 I always find some notation or something I printed out from the internet that I\u2019ve forgotten and it\u2019s a revelation.<\/p>\n

Last night as I was looking through my Tarot notebook, I came across an email I received two years ago from a Yahoo group I was in about \u201cGypsy Witch Cards\u201d which used playing cards for divination, pairing Clubs with Wands, Hearts with Cups, Spades with Swords and Diamonds with Pentacles.\u00a0 There was also a listing of what each card \u201cmeant\u201d.\u00a0 \u00a0(This posting about \u201cGypsy Witch Cards\u201d had nothing to do with \u201cGypsy Witch Fortune Telling Playing Cards\u201d which are a type of Lenormand Oracle Deck sold by US Games and other venders).\u00a0 I looked in The Fortune-Teller\u2019s Workbook: A Practical Introduction to the World of divination<\/span>, by Sasha Fenton and she has a chapter on playing cards, as does Gillian Kemp in The Fortune-Telling Book: Reading Crystal Balls, Teal Leaves, Playing Cards, and Everyday Omens of Love and Luck<\/span>.\u00a0 Naturally, the meaning of the cards in each book overlapped and diverged.\u00a0 None of the meanings really spoke to me and I felt like whoever wrote them was working off a Tarot template.<\/p>\n

I think using Numerology works better when using playing cards for divination.\u00a0 If you can remember the characteristics of each number and the meaning of each suit, you should be able to read the combination of both.\u00a0 It\u2019s rather like psychic math!\u00a0 Of course the court cards have faces and they do refer to people.\u00a0 And deuces can still be wild!\u00a0 Look for pairing of cards \u2013 a Jack of any suit with a 2 of Diamonds, for instance, might mean a business partnership with a young man. The 9 of Hearts paired with a King or a Queen means you wish for a new lover.\u00a0 The more cards you put together, the more you can see.<\/p>\n

I usually do a simple 3-card spread with playing cards or a 5- or 7-card spread, each card laid out in a straight line, left to right.\u00a0 If I am reading three cards, I use a \u201cPast\u201d, \u201cPresent\u201d, \u201cFuture\u201d format.\u00a0 The 5-card spread asks me my five best options for the situation I\u2019m in.\u00a0 If I lay out seven cards, I\u2019m really confused about what\u2019s going on and I am looking to see what kind of pairs show up.<\/p>\n

As someone who has been reading Tarot cards for almost thirty years, reading with playing cards is really refreshing.\u00a0 It is certainly a challenge to read a situation with cards that don\u2019t have pictures.\u00a0 It requires a different kind of brain work, and I like that.\u00a0 Perhaps you will, too.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

References<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Fenton, Sasha.\u00a0 The Fortune-Teller\u2019s Workbook: A Practical Introduction to the World of divination<\/span>.\u00a0 Wellingborough:\u00a0 The Aquarian Press, 1988.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Kemp, Gillian. The Fortune-Telling Book: Reading Crystal Balls, Tea Leaves, Playing Cards and Everyday Omens of Love and Luck<\/span>. Boston:\u00a0 Little, Brown and Company, 2000<\/em><\/p>\n

http:\/\/aeclectic.net\/tarot\/card.gypsy-witch\/<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

www.playingcardsandmore.com\/gypsywitch.aspx<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Divining by Playing Cards       As the sun gains strength moving toward Imbolc, the increased light shows all the dust and dirt that hid within the shadows of Yule\u2019s darkness and it is time to clean.\u00a0 Mercury\u2019s retrograde provides perfect opportunity to reorganize our closets and our drawers, getting rid of what no longer services us and finding ways to recycle old things into new.\u00a0 After a day of cleaning, quiet time with a cup of herbal tea and a fragrant candle can be productive while re-reading one\u2019s Book of Shadows.\u00a0 Mine started as a small notebook and is now divided into three giant loose-leaf notebooks.\u00a0 Last night, I was looking through the largest one, my Tarot and Numerology notebook.\u00a0 I have always had an interest in numbers and cards.\u00a0 I received my first Tarot deck in 1988, but I read playing cards as a child.\u00a0 To be honest, I didn\u2019t know anything about it but I \u201cknew\u201d that the Queen of Hearts meant love and the Ace of Spades was death.\u00a0 The rest of it I made up as I went along, partly based on the card games I played with my grandparents \u2013 deuces were wild, whatever that meant \u2013 red threes were lucky, that came from Canasta \u2013 and so on.   After I got the Waite-Rider deck, I was totally fascinated with the Tarot and I forgot all about using playing cards for anything other than playing card games.\u00a0 I read every book I could find on the subject and took page after page of notes, filling numerous notebooks.\u00a0 I collected hundreds of spreads and tried every single one.\u00a0 I visited every Tarot website I could find and printed out whatever information I could find, which was added to my ever-growing Tarot notebook.\u00a0 Some of the information I found was contradictory but that made it all no less valuable.\u00a0 In almost 30 years of reading the cards \u2013 I own six decks and an oracle deck \u2013 I have found that the most important thing to know is to simply let the cards speak to you.\u00a0 Still, I value all my notes and all the time it took to collect them.\u00a0 I enjoy reading them.\u00a0 I always find some notation or something I printed out from the internet that I\u2019ve forgotten and it\u2019s a revelation. Last night as I was looking through my Tarot notebook, I came across an email I received two years ago from a Yahoo group I was in about \u201cGypsy Witch Cards\u201d which used playing cards for divination, pairing Clubs with Wands, Hearts with Cups, Spades with Swords and Diamonds with Pentacles.\u00a0 There was also a listing of what each card \u201cmeant\u201d.\u00a0 \u00a0(This posting about \u201cGypsy Witch Cards\u201d had nothing to do with \u201cGypsy Witch Fortune Telling Playing Cards\u201d which are a type of Lenormand Oracle Deck sold by US Games and other venders).\u00a0 I looked in The Fortune-Teller\u2019s Workbook: A Practical Introduction to the World of divination, by Sasha Fenton and she has a chapter on playing cards, as does Gillian Kemp in The Fortune-Telling Book: Reading Crystal Balls, Teal Leaves, Playing Cards, and Everyday Omens of Love and Luck.\u00a0 Naturally, the meaning of the cards in each book overlapped and diverged.\u00a0 None of the meanings really spoke to me and I felt like whoever wrote them was working off a Tarot template. I think using Numerology works better when using playing cards for divination.\u00a0 If you can remember the characteristics of each number and the meaning of each suit, you should be able to read the combination of both.\u00a0 It\u2019s rather like psychic math!\u00a0 Of course the court cards have faces and they do refer to people.\u00a0 And deuces can still be wild!\u00a0 Look for pairing of cards \u2013 a Jack of any suit with a 2 of Diamonds, for instance, might mean a business partnership with a young man. The 9 of Hearts paired with a King or a Queen means you wish for a new lover.\u00a0 The more cards you put together, the more you can see. I usually do a simple 3-card spread with playing cards or a 5- or 7-card spread, each card laid out in a straight line, left to right.\u00a0 If I am reading three cards, I use a \u201cPast\u201d, \u201cPresent\u201d, \u201cFuture\u201d format.\u00a0 The 5-card spread asks me my five best options for the situation I\u2019m in.\u00a0 If I lay out seven cards, I\u2019m really confused about what\u2019s going on and I am looking to see what kind of pairs show up. As someone who has been reading Tarot cards for almost thirty years, reading with playing cards is really refreshing.\u00a0 It is certainly a challenge to read a situation with cards that don\u2019t have pictures.\u00a0 It requires a different kind of brain work, and I like that.\u00a0 Perhaps you will, too.   References Fenton, Sasha.\u00a0 The Fortune-Teller\u2019s Workbook: A Practical Introduction to the World of divination.\u00a0 Wellingborough:\u00a0 The Aquarian Press, 1988.\u00a0 Kemp, Gillian. The Fortune-Telling Book: Reading Crystal Balls, Tea Leaves, Playing Cards and Everyday Omens of Love and Luck. Boston:\u00a0 Little, Brown and Company, 2000 http:\/\/aeclectic.net\/tarot\/card.gypsy-witch\/ www.playingcardsandmore.com\/gypsywitch.aspx<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":197,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":1,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10785","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10785","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/197"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10785"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10785\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10785"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10785"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paganpages.org\/emagazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10785"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}