Cult of Tarot Forum

This is an invitation to work with one card deck for one week in a group reading.

You can pick any deck: tarot, Lenormand, Kipper, oracle or playing cards. From this deck, you'll draw one card per day - i.e., seven Daily Cards from your Deck of the Week that allow you to get to know the deck better, to hone your reading skills and get new insights about your life.

In a Planetary Week reading, we don't only draw a card per day but also give it a topic. We focus on motifs, topics, patterns in our lives, inspired by the planetary ruler of every weekday (for background information, look here).

On Saturdays, ruled by Saturn: Obstacles and Blockades,
on Sundays, ruled by the Sun: Inspiration and Goals,
on Mondays, ruled by the Moon: Dreams and Fears,
on Tuesdays, ruled by Mars: Conflicts and Challenges,
on Wednesdays, ruled by Mercury: Interactions and Change,
on Thursdays, ruled by Jupiter: Power and Influences, and
on Fridays, ruled by Venus: Love and Attraction.


The focus words I chose for each planet/day are not binding. Please don't limit yourself to the two short words if you feel other aspects of the planet are relevant to your reading.



There are different ways to perform a Planetary Week reading.

Traditional: draw a card per day and use the prism of the planetary influence to connect the card to your day and life.

Selective: select a card that suits the topic of each weekday and use it as affirmation and empowerment to improve your life.

Day-by-day: draw or pick your daily card one by one through the week.

Summarily: draw or pick all cards together before the week starts and treat them as a complete reading.


And what about those who just want to have a Deck of the Week, Card of the Day reading? They can just jump in and leave the planetary lore away.


Share pictures if you can or want to.

No matter how we do it - by reminding ourselves of the planetary regents and their influence, we re-connect to the sevenfold cycle of time that our ancestors established, with their eyes to the sky.



Participants:
Stronglove - Tarot Apokalypsis by Eric Dunne and Kim Huggens
BreathingSince72 - Jean Noblet TdM by Jean-Claude Flornoy
CharlotteK - Druid Plant Oracle
Nemia - Bharata Major Arcana Tarot by Sunish Chabba

this week i will be using the tarot apokalypsis by eric dunne and kim huggens. i borrowed the deck and book from my tarot friend to find out if we match. i am really interested in the extensive guidebook bursting with information about the different ancient civilizations that are depicted in the cards.

saturday, ruled by saturn, obstacles and blockades
the prince of cups
this card is about connection and the search for the soul

some relevant bits from the guidebook:
eros, god of new love, romance and chaos
my soul desires connection as my body needs air and water; without love i am lost
the prince of love cannot bear to see the reality of people or situations: he prefers everyone and everything to be beautiful and perfect and anything less either turns his heart away or breaks it
on a deeper level, the prince of cups searches for connection, beauty, wisdom, illumination and the soul

interesting synchronicity. yesterday i bumped into a former good friend who dumped me about a year ago. we didn’t speak (he literally banned me out of his life so i hadn’t seen him since)
this morning i was thinking about him, remembering what caused the breakup, and still wondering why he has treated me so horribly.
drawing this card made me realize he is a genuine prince of cups, and that i have probably broken his heart by not being the perfect beautiful person he created, by not fitting the mold he made for me......
seeing this so clearly enabled me to release the last bits of resentment i still carried with me. wow! i think i am finally over it.

at the same time i can also see my own tendency to put people on a pedestal and feeling hurt when they disappoint me. and how this has caused the breakup of another friendship...... interesting......!

This week I will be using the Jean Noblet TdM by Jean-Claude Flornoy. I almost went Lenormand on this but changed my mind.

Saturday-ruled by Saturn-Obstacles and Blockages.

I chose the eight of swords This card made me laugh out loud...so literal. A card about blockage on a day when we are to write about blockages. When you get blockage in response to “show me the blockages I ,at face today,” it is a bit humorous. I look at the flower trapped within these bundles of swords but I see that it shares color harmony with a part of the swords. I also see smaller or profiled versions of the flower outside of the sword bundle. Were they sliced on their way out or were they altered after they became free?

I feel that this card shows me in harmony with whatever is making me feel blocked. In other words I am stuck and if I want to get out of being stuck, I am going to have to take action. Very simply, my blockage is that I’m blocked. (And a little defensive which always happens when I’m tired). I need to take action and get into the solution.

I'm going to use two decks this week.

Our Tarot will be my base deck but I'm going to do a daily draw from the Druid Plant Oracle.

Firstly my week's base:


I drew four Majors - Emperor, Hanged Woman, Judgement and The Sun - and three Minors - two 7 and 6 of Pentacles and Ace of Wands.

Saturday ruled by Saturn: Obstacles and Blockades.


My base card is The Emperor personified by Queen Victoria. And oh how I struggled asserting my authority yesterday with two five year old boys having a 'sleepover'. My personal effectiveness, power and confidence was in tatters at 1am as having refused to go to sleep they were requesting toast and milk because all the late night playing had made them hungry! They made a mockery of my leadership skills.

My daily card was Mugwort.


As a plant with properties that help with clear seeing, scrying and intuitive perception, this was definitely an obstacle yesterday. I'm drawn to the clouds scudding across the moolit sky and the way the light falls hazily on the water. Yesterday I was also trying to make a start on my Bardic studies but the two five year olds mentioned above made tuning in utterly impossible.

Sunday, ruled by the Sun: Inspiration and Goals.

My base card is the Hanged Man, also known in this deck as Hypatia.


This card suggests ideas that have yet to surface or be recognised. I'm picking up my Bardic studies again today and feel very inspired to get going with these as I feel there is something pent up inside. My lovely mundane life with my darling little family is wondeful, but there something more fundamental within me that needs releasing. Tarot helps a lot, but there is more!

My daily card is Plantain.

A phenomenally versatile healing plant, the plantain is also amazingly resilient and adaptive to its environment to evade being eaten. Like the standing stones in the card, it endures. Small boy visitor is here for another couple of hours. I will survive the onslaught. I will endure the spilled juice, Lego, lidless felt tips, toast crumbs and wailing.

I'm very impressed with the Druid Plant Oracle! Beautiful!

I took my pictures this morning in dim light, and I'm too lazy now to take new ones




Nothing to see! *Off to take new pictures*

Nemia wrote: ↑19 Aug 2018, 10:15 I'm very impressed with the Druid Plant Oracle! Beautiful!

I'm impressed too. It is lovely and the book is very good. I don't really like large cards and have trimmed my Druidcraft or borders, but as an Oracle format I wouldn't have them smaller. I am waiting for the Druid animal Oracle to arrive, also by Will Worthington, and I'll combine them into a single larger deck of plants and animals. Wish I hadn't traded my Wildwood away now

Nemia wrote: ↑19 Aug 2018, 10:15 I'm very impressed with the Druid Plant Oracle! Beautiful!

I took my pictures this morning in dim light, and I'm too lazy now to take new ones



2018 08 18 Bharata Chariot.jpg



Nothing to see! *Off to take new pictures*

Me too! I was so happy when they reprinted it. People were offering to sell it to ne for upwards of 139 when a kind woman turned me on to the reprint.

CharlotteK wrote: ↑19 Aug 2018, 10:34

Nemia wrote: ↑19 Aug 2018, 10:15 I'm very impressed with the Druid Plant Oracle! Beautiful!

I'm impressed too. It is lovely and the book is very good. I don't really like large cards and have trimmed my Druidcraft or borders, but as an Oracle format I wouldn't have them smaller. I am waiting for the Druid animal Oracle to arrive, also by Will Worthington, and I'll combine them into a single larger deck of plants and animals. Wish I hadn't traded my Wildwood away now

The Druid animal oracle is also lovely! I’m a member of OBOD and have all of those decks and had never considered trimming the Druidcraft. I would love to see that. CharlotteK, where are you located?

Sunday ruled by the Sun....Inspiration and Goals
It’s funny that I’ve gotten two minors in a row. I feel like it is a nudge from Spirit to get back to basics. My card for today is the Four of Deniers. I do not know if the coat of arms on this deck belongs to any specific house or is stylistic only. In the RWS, this card would refer to hoarding or fearfully protecting something. In the TdM, it is about being conservative, in this case, with resources. It is a goal for me to have a secure base in the material realm. Money is such a fluid thing and I have not always been the best steward of my resources. I have evaluated the psychological reasons why this is so and am working on it. .

In The Marseilles Tarot Revealed, which is the exact same book as The Open Reading, Yoav Ben-Dov defines it this way:

‘Material security, a solid base. Relations with respected and trustworthy institutions. Tradition, reputation, and honor. Reliability gained over time. Preserving the existing assets. Doing things in the old and time-tested ways.”

As you guys know, my passion for TdM is a new thing. I downloaded the CBD images for study just prior to buying my first deck on July 6,2018. I really get to flesh this system out from the beginning. My collection of historic decks has grown to a whooping six! . I mention this because I still get to be intrigued by definitions and representations on these cards. Yoav’s Reference to trustworthy institutions is intriguing because I have recently joined a credit union. In reference to preserving existing assets, part of my membership in that credit union includes a savings account, in which I am depositing 25 a month. Small starts matter. The reference to reliability “over time” is amusing because it is very literal right now. I am permitted unlimited over time at work right now so long as it is productive. This is because we are impacted. Also, I have developed a certain reputation at my job. I am able to de-escalate situations that could potentially become very ugly...mostly because I am nice but also because I really try to understand where people are coming from.

In short, I feel like this is telling me to keep doing what I do at work and also to continue to pursue my goal of having greater financial stability by being a better steward of resources.

sunday - inspiration and goals
the five of wands
omg, i will definitely not buy this deck....
the image depicts a hippopotamus being hunted and killed by five men....
ugh! definitely not my cup of tea, and not an image that i can connect with
the guidebook is even worse...
“you, warrior, know the joys of battle and the hunt, you revel in the testing and the challenge. you would welcome the forces of destruction and chaos, pushing aside peace and its sickly stability.”
“when there is nothing to fight against, no reason to battle and be tested, purpose and drive give way to laziness and empty ritual”
ahem. not a vision a buddhist can relate to....i think i will pass on this one.....
actually, i find it pretty ridiculous..... how on earth can i extract any sensible meaning from this card?
the only words that make sense to me are
“ a return to instability after a period of peace”
yes, i get that. and it fits with the five, it breaks the organized and solid four, upends the fundament and re-introduces chaos.
however, at the moment i am experiencing a time of relative peace and quiet, introspection and balance, a feeling of accomplishment. does this card tell me not to surrender to sloth and contentment? but why on earth shouldn’t i spend my days in slow motion, journaling, meditating, reading and studying..... ?
maybe i shouldn’t think too much about it. it probably only means that tomorrow my peace and quiet will be over, because it is monday and the new week will bring the usual chaos and i will be forced to improvise a lot because nothing ever goes as planned.
maybe the challenge, or my goal, will be to keep feeling balanced and peaceful throughout everything that will be thrown at me during the next days.

My Bharata majors!

On Saturday, I started with the Chariot.


If we talk about obstacles... first of all, I don't drive and that has been a difficult choice. It's one of my self-imposed obstacles in life. Then there is the self discipline thing. Some Big Projects in my life have failed because I chickened out, I didn't have the grit to finish them.

The question is, do I want to change it?

AnnaK told me the whole last week that I need Fire to get my stuff done, more energy, attack and extrovert orientation. Bharata tells me here: there is an emotional blockage that's not less important than my lack of energy. And I had on Saturday a long discussion with a good friend about this topic.


On Sunday - the Emperor.


Again my dear Emperor. And what did I do yesterday? I made order in some confusing tax and salary issues, and without my husband's injections of assertiveness, his good advice and his help, I guess I wouldn't have managed it. Today I'll have to do some phone calls. I hope the power of the Emperor is still with me. It's important for my personal aspirations. Nice synergy of the Sun and the Emperor on a sunny Sunday.



Today, my dear Monday, Moon day. And the Hermit. Today, I'm all alone most of the day, with a long list of things to do, but also some creative ideas, dreams and memory work to do. Seems like a Hermit day.

And this deck seems to tune in to the basic energy of the day very well. Every card until now relates to a concrete event on the day and also to the underlying planetary patterns and questions. I have a good feeling about this deck, I love the style, and I love the way it came into my life.

Monday-Dreams and Fears

Sorry I’m late. The morning getting ready was “off” and had a massive headache after work.
The way Yoav Ben DOv describes this card is blowing my mind right now. The key word he offers is coordination and he describes general harmony, happiness and “every person or part is on its proper place.” He describes a life where happiness is the norm. This card could also speak of having difficulty finding ones pace in the group.

Yep that about sums me up. While I would very much like to experience the coordination, cooperation and happiness of being a part of something that works, family, work or otherwise, I do have fears about finding a place where I fit. Juvenile right? I’m 46 years old and I still struggle with this. Can happiness really be the norm? Can cooperation and belonging be the norm? I suppose I will have to wait and see.

Victoria, I'm 47 and I still don't feel like I fit. I don't know the answer to those questions either, I guess that's why I've been seeking a connection to something bigger than myself all my life!

For yesterday- Monday - Dreams and Fears


I had Judgement and Borage. In a nutshell these cards represent both a profound new awakening and beginning and having the courage to make that new step and to 'forget'.

Yesterday evening I wrote to the head of my Zen dojo and let him know that I would stay in touch but definitely won't be coming back as a regular and committed practitioner. I also told him about starting druid training. I think he has probably known for some time that I'm not coming back. I've been very infrequently since I had my son 5 years ago and retreat in February was difficult. I felt a bit lost and he could see that. It felt like a momentous thing to do. Zen has been my 'thing for the last 13 years and yesterday I admitted to myself and others that it's not my thing any more and I've started on a new path that I've literally been dreaming about for some time. The door that I've had my foot wedged in to keep it open I have now let close. That was a very hard thing to do and I was filled with some regrets and also guilt last night. I really hope I didn't burn the bridge in case I do want to walk back over it again and I started to panic a bit wondering if I've done the right thing. But taking inspiration from the Borage, I realised I had to let that go and stand by what feels right to me.

And I'm 54 and still feel the total misfit everywhere. Even when I tried to fake it and be nice and popular and happy and well-adjusted, nobody bought it I'm afraid. I stopped trying some time ago. Sometimes I think it has something to do with being introvert and hyper-self critical. I have to pick everything apart for myself, can never just enjoy without having an inner voice criticize me for doing so.



Again Death. So many things in my life have to be changed radically... can i do it? do I want to do it? This Death looks like a Devil and quite aggressive. The AnnaK Death I had some days ago was so tempting and beautiful... and this one looks as though he was mocking me. And of course on Tuesday, Mars' day, the one day with whose energies I always, always feel uncomfortable...

omg this is getting hilarious.....
i am 63 (heh heh) and have only recently started to claim/own my ‘always being the odd one out.....’
so instead of going about assuming that i belong and then getting ostracized (story of my life, and it always seems to come out of nowhere) i have decided to walk this earth embracing my weirdness, my unpredictability and my impulsiveness.....yay!

over to my planetary week
monday - dreams and fears
the fool..... how appropriate! it is a whirling dervish, representing the soul in ascent towards unity with the divine
what a beautiful card! and the text in the guidebook is fascinating!
“ for I am not I: I is the trap that will hold you in this grave-world, knowing yourself is only knowing your tomb”
“ only when you cannot think of I without thinking of God, will the door be opened to Not-You.”
“this unity with the godhead is also a form of self annihilation, in which the boundaries between I and Not-I are destroyed.”

i spend most of monday in hospital with my sister in law, totally forgetting about the fool
then i watch a documentary by sandrine bonnaire: the balad of marianne faithfull, and it hits me: she is the ultimate fool: innocent, outcast, looking at the world and her life in amazement, endlessly taking the leap from that rock, spinning around like that dervish, falling down and getting up again.....
and i can see part of myself in her. yes, the misfit part. the part that keeps wanting to tell people things they do not want to hear(look! the emperor has no clothes!), the naive and trusting part, that never sees the blow coming..... the part that needs to continue to dance and spin.....

tuesday - conflicts and challenges
the five of coins
two old man huddled in a boat, trying to find shelter from the rain beneath the branches and giant leaves of a tree.
they are obviously being cast out, shunned. is it because they are like yesterday’s fool? no, these two are different. the fool doesn’t even notice he is a misfit, he goes about his merry way totally oblivious to his surroundings. these two guys look like they are suffering, they are well aware of their situation. even so, they don’t seem inclined to do much about it, they stay put and keep suffering. they might stay there until eternity......

the guidebook provides an interesting question:
what will it take to make you listen to the downtrodden, to extend your hand to those reaching out to you

this morning two of my friends dropped by and asked me to help them with some bureaucratic mess they couldn’t see their way out of. i spent 3 hours calling, arranging, calculating and searching, then paid some of their bills to help them out and asked them to come back tomorrow to do some more calling, searching and calculating...... so there’s the answer: it doesn’t take much to reach out to people who are stuck. and sometimes it only takes a little nudge to get them moving again.

Tuesday-Conflicts and Challenges

Pulled my first major this week...the Fool, go figure. My deck is such a smart slec. I’ll come back and update this post after work.

Wednesday - Mercury - communication, rationality, movement, verbal relationships.... and on a deeper level, the connection to death and fears (Hermes Psychopompos) because I had Death twice in the last days.




So today is my Wheel of Fortune day. Change things, turn them around, make them work for me, catch a little wave of fortune. There are so many things running through my head right now. What do I want, what can I do, where do I turn to? The wheel is moving, it reminds me of a steering wheel. Which direction am I going?

Chariot and Emperor are such anchoring and empowering cards. Death blows everything away. And the wheel tells me it's time to come to decisions, to make my fortune, to listen what my destiny is. I don't really know, some things have changed and my head didn't catch up to the changes yet.

It's a great sequence of cards until now, like a riddle I can't solve yet. Lovely deck, succinct images. It's good to make a reading with majors only, I'm surprised it works so well.

Thursday - Thunder's Day - Thor's Day - Jupiter's Day. I like some aspects of Jupiter - the beautiful planet, and the god of rain (Iupiter Pluvius) and thunder and lightning (Iupiter Tonans). I don't like the philanderer and patriarch Zeus from the Greek myth - my heart is with Hera and I think she's been portrayed unfairly. But where myth connects Jupiter with nature, like the Romans did, I like it.

Power, fortune, influences, the gentle rain or the striking lightning - Thursdays can bring so much.

(Listening to Summer and Lightning now - Electric Light Orchestra - how I remember the summer of 1978!)


And it's the High Priestess. Wisdom, intuition, self confidence, mystery. I asked myself yesterday, where should my journey lead me to? It's the way of the High Priestess, of my femininity not as weakness but as source of power, my alien-ness not as weakness but as source of power... the journey goes inward.

How great to make these readings only with majors. It wouldn't fit every week but from time to time... when there are deep questions.... it's just what I needed now.

I had my High Priestess moment today - or better hours. My daughter and I sat down for a long, open conversation about her childhood (she'll be 25 tomorrow!) (and she's leaving for a long time abroad next week!) and the dynamics in our family. We discovered many interesting things - I see today so many things I couldn't see when I lived through the times - see my own role as woman, as mother, and my daughter is such an independent, critical spirit that it's a JOY to talk to her. We really turned stones that we had walked over so many times. Just wonderful. There are always new insights, secrets, things that intuition will bring to the fore, even when you know each other intimately. So I had my Jupiter aspect - relations between parents and children, power relations and love relations, influences and rejection and this whole human net we pull and push - and it all worked out so well. I'm coming to peace a bit with myself. And the Bharata really served me well this week.

Today is Friday - my day, Venus' day, Freya's day, the day of the love goddess riding through the skies on a chariot pulled by cats... Monday and Friday are without a doubt my kind of days.

We continued our discussion of yesterday with more family members involved. We actually achieved a wonderful exchange of memories and opinions, each of us came out of it strengthened and feeling more loved. I have no doubt that my daughter is the Page of Wands - so often, the pages are my daughters and the knights my sons. She was born in this decan of Sun in Virgo and Prudence, and she's an amazing personality. She is taking on a new project and encouraged me to do the same. She really enlightened us all.


So after a week that my innermost feelings were cooking and bubbling, now I have answers to many questions, and it's all thanks to her. I was ready to count much of my past as failure and put myself down and that was wrong. Usually we think about what parents give to their children - but we got back so much.



I had a wonderful week with the Bharata. I made some decisions concerning my future. And concerning my past. This was an important week, and it ended on a high note. I have no idea how next week can measure up to this!

wednesday - interactions and change - the world
this card shows sophia, as a representation of the descent of the soul into matter (sophia’s fall) and its conscutive ascent and reunion with the divine. the world soul nourishing all facets of creation.....

how to translate all of this to my ordinary daily life.....?
among the guidebook’s keywords i find this:
synthesis of all that has been learned; breaking through to a new stage of one’s journey; realising one’s place in the universe
somehow those words ‘click’. yes, it feels like i have crossed a threshold

later that day i try riding a recumbent trike for the first time in my life, after 20 years of not being able to ride a bike.
a whole new world unfolds in front of the two front wheels of the trike i’m riding..... yes, i think, this too is what that world card is all about.....

Ì drew all my cards but didn't get chance to photo and post them. Both Our Tarot and the a druid Plant Oracle were good to work with. Our Tarot needs a bit more time and work. It's stunning and I love the concept so looking forward to it.