For the wise among us,

Between Leaping Lizard’s Tarot Reading Secrets or Stuart Cumberland’s Tarot: Every Picture Tells A Story, which of the two would you recommend for the budding tarot card reader?


Walter

You may want to post this topic in the spooky section. Mentalist do use tarot, but the folks in the bizarre area use them more.

I think.

Coz

Cozmo D wrote:
Speak for yourself. This is incorrect in my experience.

Walter - I have not seen Stuart's DVD, but I have watched and thoroughly enjoyed Dean's Leaping Lizard DVD. In my opinion, the more information and technique you study, the better you will become at developing and adapting to your OWN style and interpretation technique. I have posted elsewhere that I was particularly fond of Dean's very thorough and informative discussion of the Court Cards and audience/sitter management. In the end, of course, I don't think there's any substitute for you first sitting down and really LOOKING at the images on your deck's cards and finding out what they are saying to YOU. I trust you will enjoy the adventure of learning more about the Tarot - they have served me and continue to serve me well! All my best. - Scott

No doubt this is just another case of pedantry...

do all mentalists use tarot? no
do some mentalists use tarot? yes
should YOU use tarot in mentalism? depends

What the cards tell you? LOL

Stuart Cumberland is good but like someone told you, as much information you can get...

I second that...never saw a mentalist used Tarot cards

I am a mentalist and I use Tarot cards all the time. Dean Montalbano's set would be my recommendation. Stuart's DVD is good, but not very comprehensive. If you actually want to learn to read the Tarot, assuming the video's are as good as Dean's book, then the leaping lizard dvd's would be the way to go.

Ummm... Quick, somebody get in touch with Stephen Minch and tell him not to write that book he was thinking about writing concerning effects with tarot cards.

Oops, it's too late. He wrote The Book of Thoth 36 years ago and it's still in print. It's not a great book but it apparently has staying power.

While it's true that Tarot isn't used often in stage work (although Ty Kralin created an excellent stage presentation for mentalists using the cards and numerous tarot effects for mentalists are in the literature), I often use Tarot in my close-up work. As do many other mentalists I know.

I even wrote my own work on the subject, "The Psychic Tarot."

Good thoughts,

Bob Cassidy

Dr. Bob,

You give readings, right? I think that's where the difference of opinion comes in. Most mentalists don't do readings so doing effects with tarot cards, runes or other oracles holds little interest for them. They form their own sphere

The other sphere is made up of your common fortune tellers who never do shows of any kind.

Where the two spheres intersect (think Venn diagram) is where you'll find mentalists who also give readings. This is the area I find most interesting. For mentalist/readers in this middle area, doing effects with tarot cards can lead to interesting cross-promotional opportunities, among other things.

It isn't the medium that's important. It's the message.

No pun intended.

Cheers.

And lets not forget where we stole all of this from in the first place, eh!

Max Maven has a nice tarot card effect in his color series/Prism. But that wasn't really the question. If you want to learn to "read the cards" the best resource might be the public library.

There are many books written from the perspective of this being real. If you want to do "real" readings... those books would be your best source. That and a little cold/warm/hot reading and you will be off an running.

Learn the positive an negative spin for the major arcane. I don't do readings, but I am told if you clients are into this they will have read these sorts of books. Most are written from the perspective of how to do readings on yourself.

The Leaping Lizards DVD is really really good. It really got me started being able to use the tarot very quickly.

That being said, if your good at getting things from books, Eden Gray's book "Mastering the Tarot" is actually great and can be had for a couple bucks at a used book store. For some reason I have pretty consistently needed video or audio (or live instruction) to get started on most of my divination. The books have so much information that it's overwhelming and it's hard to know what the important points are to remember first. With a video it's more focused, you get the main points and your ready to go and your also ready to use books to supplement your knowledge.

The ONLY thing I'll say is that most people that I know, and most books that I've read consider wands to equal fire, this comes from ceremonial magick and (I think) is historically a little more accurate. But it's easy enough to adapt to either one.

Natural Mystic, I would not suggest using a DVD at all to learn tarot.
The best sources for the interpretation of tarot cards is in the shut eye's publications, and those are the same books that the lay public are reading. You can find a plethora of books on tarot readings in bookstores, new age bookstores and libraries, but my point is that it really requires memorization, so video instruction is not as usable as printed instruction.
For a tip that worked for me in the beginning: I put stickers on the backs of a cheap deck of Rider Waite tarot cards and wrote the key meanings on the stickers so I could use them as flash cards. This really helped lock in the interpretations to my memory.
Keep in mind though that your audience may include people that actually read tarot cards and your interpretation may differ from theirs. It's best to be well versed in as many different "schools of thought" on the means of the cards. You can only get this from a life-long study of the material that is out there.
When you want to get tricky with the cards - see the material that magicians have created for the cards, but you need a legitimate background in order to be taken seriously.
When you want to get serious about giving readings, see the material that professional readers have written about finding work and profiting from it. Richard Webster's publications come to mind, but... I'm dating myself. There may be more up to date material out there on the business of psychic readings.
Hope this helps and good luck with your endeavor.
Donnie

For the record, Leaping Lizards tarot DVD (and their other DVDs) actually do teach legitimate tarot reading method (a legitimate "shut eye" method if you must) and has no tricks or mentalism involved.

Stuart's DVD is an a wonderful "quick start" product. He provides a simple way to learn meanings for the cards and conduct readings as well as some marketing advice.

Dean's DVD set provides an in-depth course on tarot in an easy-to-learn way. He also goes into the structure of readings and the business side, as well as ethics. Also included is his commercial book on tarot.


Stuart's stands as within a day or two you can have a working definition for each of the cards, and if this is what is required, it is ideal.

Dean's product will give you an understanding of the cards, their meanings and associations, but will take more than one or two days.


I like them both, but honestly consider Dean's to be the best and most complete video product on tarot reading in either the mentalism or new age markets.

Tony

Do any of you who do readings--"cold" or "real"--use the Tarot de Marseilles rather than the Rider-Waite or one of its variants?

I don't use either.