- By John Gilbert, edited by John Michael Greer
- Aeon Books, 2023
The short book was compiled from a set of lessons given by John Gilbert, a well-known Tarot teacher who died in 2021. Its editor, John Michael Greer, an excellent author on esoteric subjects in his own right, knew Gilbert and has edited this book to provide those of us who’ve never met him the benefit of his teaching and insights.
Gilbert believed that the cards are a means through which our conscious minds can communicate with the individual and collective unconscious, and that the key to making them work for us in this way is to create alignment between our conscious and unconscious minds about what each card means. According to Gilbert, any card can mean anything we want it to mean, as long as that meaning is clearly communicated to our unconscious mind (he suggests writing it down). Once these meanings are established, our subconscious mind guides us to the cards we need to interpret to provide the answers we and our clients seek.
The first chapter presents a quick and easy way to create and internalise our own card meanings. Subsequent chapters provide more ways to develop these meanings, as well as the meanings of sequences, associations and spreads, and to use these sets of meanings to answer any question from ourselves or our clients, including ‘where did I leave my keys?’ (yes, Gilbert explains how to use the Tarot to answer this question!). Gilbert offers advice on formulating questions that the cards can answer, and on providing respectful, helpful and appropriate answers to clients (cautioning us that we can get into trouble for giving medical or financial advice without a license). He offers techniques to answer specific quantitative questions, like ‘when will x happen?’ (his excellent advice for ‘when’ questions is to look at the selected card or cards and answer that ‘x will happen when these conditions are fulfilled’). One chapter provides a useful analysis of the meanings of numbers in the Tarot, and another troubleshoots problems novice readers (and sometimes advanced readers) encounter. He also includes a helpful chapter on how to develop your intuition (or, in other words, how to learn to listen better to your intuitive mind).
I found the authorial voice at times blunt and off-putting (his constant ‘the truth is’ refrain gets repetitive), but it’s clear that John Michael Greer has succeeded in his stated goal of giving readers the experience of hearing Gilbert himself in this text. I personally now rarely use the cards to answer questions, and would probably not use these methods myself, but I have certainly taken away some valuable insights, and Gilbert makes a strong case for the effectiveness of these simple techniques to obtain useful information about the past, present and future. I enjoyed the book, learned a lot, and would recommend it to anyone who finds any of this intriguing.
0 Comments