When Cathy was a little girl: the healing praxis of Tarot images

Abstract

This paper is a sequel to an earlier article that presented an argument for Tarot symbolic system functioning as a techne that can serve as a valuable educational aid. The present paper shifts the focus from techne to praxis as a practical art of interpreting images and creating imaginative narratives in the context of counselling and therapy. This praxis can heal human psyche and lift human spirit. The paper presents a documented empirical case study as an example of an unfolding narrative for ‘Cathy’ who consented to making her reading public for educational purposes. The process of reading and interpretation as grounded in the ‘art of memory’ can empower us with an ability to understand the meaning of some traumatic events that may have occurred in our lives but remain dormant at the level of the unconscious. We become able to resolve problematic situations and to grow spiritually from these experiences.

Keywords:

• care
• confirmation
• counselling
• Dewey
• experience
• Jung and Tarot
• memory
• consciousness and the unconscious

Notes

1. Cathy’s case was discussed in my presentation ‘Education as human development: putting theory into practice’ at the Chaos and Complexity SIG at the American Educational Research Association 2009 Annual Meeting ‘Disciplined Inquiry: Education Research in the Circle of Knowledge’, San Diego, CA, 13–17 April 2009. Together with other 14 cases, it will appear in the book Resymbolization of the self: Human development and tarot hermeneutic (working title), which is currently a work‐in‐progress to be published with Sense Publishers, The Netherlands, in their book series ‘Transgressions: Cultural studies and education’.

2. Cathy is not a child but her emotional maturity, as will be seen below, has been delayed due to specific childhood experiences. It may appear that adult spiritual development and exploration (as the reviewers indeed pointed out) has little to do with children’s spirituality as the focus of this journal. Yet Cathy, at the time I met her, was in college, enrolled in a teacher preparation/human development programme studying to become an early childhood educator. Never mind when in her life she has had her own first encounter with the spiritual domain, this experience would have proved significant in her working with young children later.

3. As I indicated in Semetsky (2009), imaginative narrative belongs to the methodologies of the cutting edge interdisciplinary scientific programme of Futures Studies. Among other methods of Futures Studies are scenario planning, anticipatory decision making, forecasting, backcasting, and strategic foresight for shaping alternative futures; and an analysis of signs and symbols ‘articulating’ transformations and changes. Incidentally, Futures Studies employ a term ‘wild card’ for an event of apparently low probability but very high impact. Please refer to Cathy’s story.

4. This layout comprises more positions as compared to the standard 10 only positions in the Celtic Cross spread in Figure 1; thus it potentially provides some additional information.

5. All illustrations are from Rider‐Waite Tarot Deck, known also as the Rider Tarot and the Waite Tarot. Reproduced by permission of US Games Systems Inc., Stamford, CT 06902, USA. Copyright 1971 by US Games Systems, Inc. Further reproduction prohibited.

6. Wild cards? See note 3 above.