Past Life & Karmic Tarot (Special Topics in Tarot)

Rating:
Summary: Rambling and Ambiguous
Review: I have studied the tarot for nearly 5 years and keep an open mind whenever a new book appears on the market. Edain McCoy, who has written some wonderful New Age material, strikes an off-putting note in this one. The spreads are certainly imaginative and are perhaps insightful to her own method of tarot interpretation, but convey confusing and ambiguous directions to the reader who is trying to understand her card placements. In several of her spreads she conveys that a card's placement at a certain point in the spread "may or may not" mean some karmic element at play. The whole exercise of creating a spread is to pinpoint with a degree of accuracy the situation you wish to define. Therefore, when a card "may or may not" mean something, that interpretation could significantly change on whether you "may or may not" interpret it that way, leaving the interpreter open to rationalizing a card's meaning. Tarot cards are intuitive, not rational, and their meanings can best be intuited when their placement is clearly defined without ambiguity It is difficult to have it both ways and I found working with these spreads difficult. Imagine doing a Celtic Cross reading and the first position "may or may not" be the root of the issue. These spreads speak very clearly to the author, but not so to the reader. I rate it 2 stars for depth and insight into Karma and past lives, but the explanations are too ambiguous.

Rating:
Summary: Past Karma, Future Conditions
Review: I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Traditional layouts are given a new slant; and new layouts, while not particularly cutting edge, are presented in a unique and easy to understand manner. I have used several of them -- in particular the Dark Moon Spread and the Rainbow Bridge Spread -- and found them to work very well in the circumstances of the readings. Ms. McCoy knows her subject, and presents it in an easy-to-read manner, not getting so deep that the reader needs a dictionary to understand her topic, yet being deep enough to cover the information thoroughly. The only reason I have not given this book 5 stars is because the individual meanings of the cards of the Tarot are not particularly discussed, which could be off-putting for an inexperienced card reader. However, this was not the purpose of this book; her intention was to provide a series of spreads that can be used for interpreting and balancing karma, and this is done very professionally and skillfully indeed. I highly recommend this book for those who are familiar with the Tarot and its meanings already; for absolute beginners I would say by all means invest in this book, but wait until you have a working knowledge of the traditional meanings of the cards and their symbols first.

Rating:
Summary: Answered a very important question I had
Review: There is/was someone in my life who is very dear to me and always will be. Unfortunately, circumstances have parted us. I've always had the feeling that "we were meant to be." I've also always had the feeling that I've been her mother, because I feel so very maternal towards her.

I did the Lifetime Convergence spread and found out: 1. I've been both her mother AND her father. 2. It was Divine Fate that brought us together. 3. The nature of our Karmic Bond is to help each other grow and learn. 4. Also, as I've suspected she and I have never had any romantic bond between us. It's always been a blood bond, except for this lifetime.

This is just a suggestion about a way to get the most out of this book. In my opinion, using a non-traditional Tarot deck works better with these kinds of spreads. I use my Shapeshifters deck or my Arthurian Tarot for the spreads in this book. Those two decks really seem to lend themselves to past-life and karmic explorations.

So if you want to really explore you past lives using Tarot, this is a great book for doing it!