Chaos Theory

Tarot bias

I'll admit that I've fallen prey to this. I did a reading for someone who had just gotten dumped and wanted to know if they'd get back together. From what she'd said about the guy of late, I was not impressed by his behavior...and interpreted the cards that way. They're engaged now.

*sigh*

"Working as a professional tarot reader on the online equivalent to a 900 line makes it easy to start making a lot of assumptions. After reading for so many who seem to all say the same thing such as, "He came on strong but he's not calling anymore, what happened?" and seeing the cards say, over and over, "He's just not that into you," it becomes way too easy to begin to give canned responses and presume this reading, this situation, is just like the twenty before. This is a surefire way to eventually make an ass of yourself. Assumptions tend to do that, don't they? I'm not saying there's no place in tarot reading for common sense and mundane wisdom. I don't think we can completely separate ourselves from our own life experience so much that we don't draw on it, nor should we. However, I've learned that I need to treat each and every reading as a new experience, a clean slate, and not to think any situation is "just like" one before.
The cards have often surprised me with their seemingly off-the-mark advice. They tell querants to do things I would never tell them to do. Though I've never seen them advise anything criminal, I have seen them advise pursuing relationships, careers, and other courses of actions that seem untenable. Still, I have to remember that with the very limited information I am given with which to do a reading, it really is quite presumptuous of me to draw conclusions about that person's life and circumstances. Sometimes it seems so ridiculous not to draw on common sense. I mean, hello! The guy is married with three kids and tells my querant he loves her, his wife "just doesn't understand him" and he plans on getting a divorce "soon" but it's just not the right time now...
Um. Please.  Take your line of bullshit elsewhere, right?
As a tarot reader, though, you have to resist the urge to slap your querant upside the head saying, "Wake up and smell the lies!" As useful as that advice might be for your friend over Manhattans during Girls Nite Out, it really gets in the way of an effective tarot reading. If you approach any reading with your mind already made up then your mind has shut tight. No other alternatives can enter in. Each card will then be read on the bias, with slanted interpretations towards your foregone conclusions. Even if what you tell them is your standard Good Advice, and it very well may be very good advice, no harm done, right? Wrong. They aren't coming to you for that, they are coming to you for a Tarot Reading. If they wanted Good Advice, they'd ask Dear Abby. If you fall back on handing out prepackaged advice, you may as well toss the cards in your bag and buy them a Manhattan.

So you read the cards. Just read the cards. And they tell her to wait, to hold on, he's on the verge of a big decision and she should wait and see. The cards say he does indeed love her deeply. He needs more time.
WHAT?!?
Great. Now you feel guilty. You feel like this is very Bad Advice and sharing this would be giving her false hope. Now you, as a reader, feel compromised between what you believe to be the right thing to do and what the cards have instructed. I sympathize. There have been quite a few times I have looked blankly at the cards in disbelief and have thought there is no way in hell I can, in good conscience, tell this querant to wait for her lying, cheating scoundrel of a lover to come around. But then I do and what unfolds is often amazing. It never comes out the same way twice. If I am fortunate enough that the querant returns for a follow up reading or writes me to tell me how things worked out, it is usually for the best. Whether she uses that time to better understand her own feelings and decides to kick him to the curb, or whether that big decision he finally makes is to reconcile with his wife, or if they do indeed begin a legitimate relationship after he initiates divorce doesn't really matter. What matters is that the time the cards advised was crucially necessary for the situation to come to its natural conclusion."

Well, that's a new take on it

"Creative visualisation is all about using your imagination in a creative manner to manifest your goals. The more lighthearted you are when using creative visualization (detachment), the more successful the outcome. A playful attitude is really helpful when manifesting your reality and taking control over your life.
And what better way to take control than by playing Sims 2? Sims 2 is a life simulation game where you have total control over the life stages, needs, personality, relationships, career and even death to some extent of the characters you create. What’s more, you can build some pretty cool houses.
My suggestion is that you create yourself and the people you want in your life (and of course those that are already in your life) and live your dream life in simulation. As you play the game, you will feel the the excitement of being in love, the satisfaction of living in your dream house and buying all the goodies you want.
In the past, I’ve actually manifested an apartment and a marriage with this technique. Of course, I should have known the marriage wouldn’t last; we were constantly at loggerheads in the game…"

This reminds me of my ex doing that with us on Sims 2. We had a baby and then it was taken away immediately. Um, YEAH. Also a hint.

Pagan naming is like Cats

No, really!

Buddhists are flippin' weirdos.

"TEN years ago, Michael Roach and Christie McNally, Buddhist teachers with a growing following in the United States and abroad, took vows never to separate, night or day. (NYT)
By “never part,” they did not mean only their hearts or spirits. They meant their bodies as well. And they gave themselves a range of about 15 feet.
If they cannot be seated near each other on a plane, they do not get on. When she uses an airport restroom, he stands outside the door. And when they are here at home in their yurt in the Arizona desert, which has neither running water nor electricity, and he is inspired by an idea in the middle of the night, she rises from their bed and follows him to their office 100 yards down the road, so he can work.
Their partnership, they say, is celibate. It is, as they describe it, a high level of Buddhist practice that involves confronting their own imperfections and thereby learning to better serve the world."

Okay, these people are weird, anyway. Adding to the fun, the guy is/was a monk.

"There is a tremendous amount of opprobrium by the Tibetan monks; they think they have gone wacky,” said Robert Thurman, a professor of Indo-Tibetan Buddhism at Columbia University.
Professor Thurman, a former monk himself, describes himself as a friend and admirer of Mr. Roach, and said that after the geshe made his relationship with Ms. McNally public in 2003, he begged him to renounce his monastic vows and to stop wearing the robes that mark him as a member of a monastic order. Mr. Roach declined, and the two have not spoken since.
“He is doing this partnership thing and insisting on being a monk,” Professor Thurman said. “It is superhuman. He says he is staying celibate, but people find it hard to believe.”

 

The couple did a three-year silent retreat in this yurt from 2000 to 2003, while their relationship was a secret to all but the few people who brought them food. Soon afterward, Mr. Roach determined it should be public, even if it flew in the face of two millenniums of Tibetan Buddhist tradition.
He acted for two reasons, he said. One, he felt that it was impossible to keep secrets in this age of Google Earth. Two, he decided that if Buddhism was really going to succeed in America, it would have to be more inclusive of women.

There are very rare instances in the Indo-Buddhist tradition of an individual’s being considered holy enough for a chaste spiritual partnership, said Lama Surya Das, an American Buddhist who studied in Tibet and wrote “Awakening the Buddha Within,” published in 1997. But Mr. Roach, Lama Surya Das said, has not convinced colleagues that he has reached that level.
“He is a good guy and learned person, but the Bill Clinton question lingers over him,” he said of Mr. Roach. “He is with a much younger blond bombshell. What is a deep relationship that is not sexual? It is hard to understand.”

Inspiration board roundup

Interesting...

Astrological-ish political commentary

Thought this was interesting.

"Nearly every astrologer (at least the ones who think Pluto is a worthwhile symbol) agrees that Pluto's transit through Capricorn has something to do with a deep (and likely painful) transformation of our power structures.
One needn't look far into the cultural ethers to see this happening in a big way—or how else can we read this crazy '08 presidential campaign?
Could we find any more poignant image than a matchup between John McCain, poster-child for old rich white conservative men (an ultra-traditional face of Capricorn), and either our first serious female or Black candidate (the agents of 'transformation')?
Now, I'm not saying either Clinton or Obama have the election wrapped up, just because we're due to have our view of government forever fucked with. If anything, my preliminary astro-intuitive glance at the candidates has me favoring McCain. But this whole shebang is so much larger than any of these candidates as individuals, I hardly think there's a potential outcome that, in itself, is cathartic enough to heal the United States.
I will offer this much, though: Obama is no great hope for salvation. Clinton is no demon in a dress (or is that 'pantsuit'?). And McCain is no brave maverick. These are all potent projections, straight from the nervous gut of our national culture.
We desperately crave a reprieve from our guilty consciences, praying that electing an 'articulate Black man' (notice how often that loaded word 'articulate' is used to describe him, as if we expect all males of color to speak like Mike Tyson) will wash the generations of blood off our hands.
We want our powerful women to be the type who give great hugs (a la Oprah), not the Hillary variety—smart, sly and sneaky, like most every male politician ever elected to a high office. If she's guilty of everything we accuse her of (namely, wanting to win, and isn't that the point of running?), then so too are the rest of 'em.
We wonder whether it's even possible for a conservative free-thinker to make it all the way to the top without pandering to a small group of neo-con ideologues and family-values tyrants (you know, the ones with all the campaign dough), regardless of what said thinker once claimed to believe. We watch the slide down the slippery slope, sighing at the answer in front of us.
I'm not one for cynical summations, so please look deep into my longer-range optimism when I say: I just don't see how any of this can possibly work out well… at least if we're looking for any short-term satisfaction."

White Magic Friday

This is a sweet story.

MegaloMart Voodoo Doll Kit

"This kit is for those of us who are tired of the Huge Discount Stores and all the connotations that go with them:
How they drive out Mom and Pop businesses, dooming Main Street of the past to become a ghost town.
How the workers are paid minimum wage grudgingly, and asked to work "off the clock" to keep their jobs.
How they take out life insurance on the senior aged workers with the company being the payee, so that the business profits with the death of an employee.
How they force the companies they buy from to make so little profit that the companies must sacrifice quality to do do business.
How they strong arm their workers to keep them from unionizing for better working conditions and wages-
          the list goes on and on!

Why not "stick it to the Man" literally?"

White Magic Friday

"We combed flea markets and thrift stores for cheap plastic dinosaurs. We made sure we didn't buy any that a kid could choke on. And then, under cover of darkness, we took them to the dinosaur park and put them all around.
About a week later The Heir was out riding her bike. She went past the dino park and saw a mom with two little kids. The kids were playing happily with the dinosaurs. One of the kids asked if they could keep them, and the mother said, "No, they belong here, so that next time you come you can play with them again."
Over the years we've replenished the supply of dinosaurs when it runs low. But here's the magic part of it. Since we started dino-stocking, other people have been doing it too. We always find dinosaurs we didn't buy ourselves. And one time, when some bad demon took each and every dinosaur away, we found that we weren't the only ones re-stocking the site."

Birthday Gifts for Taurus

Take note, folks. Though I am not all that picky on gifting, I wouldn't argue this point for my mom (also a Taurus).