What do you think of tarot readings and psychic mediums?

[T1mom]

What do you think of Tarot card readings and similar?

I went to a 'psychic medium' yesterday who was highly recommended by close people I know.

I'm not sure if they were tarot cards or another type of cards. I picked 8 cards, she talked through them. They had relevance to my life but I am skeptical and think that any card could have been twisted to fit my life. She asked a lot of leading questions and I feel like I filled a lot of gaps for her.

My DH saw her separately and thought she was brilliant and bought every word she said. Thought she knew a lot about his life and past and believes every word she said about his future.

What do you think? I'm intrigued because so many friends have totally bought into it.

Treat it as a bit of fun

I’ve been to a few. I’ve found one lady I go to when I find myself needing a bit of reassurance or I’m at a cross roads. I trust her completely just because things she’s said have either come true or she’s known things about me no one could ever know. She predicted my husband at a time when I didn’t even know he existed she described him in so much detail it was weird and at the time I was going through a separate heartbreak. She’s so frank and honest. I’ve also experienced some weird readings with another lady - I had an object from someone who had passed in my pocket and when she started talking I semi passed out and was crying without knowing I’ve been told before that I have “the gift” but I’m a firm believer that we all have that energy it’s just that we’re all so focussed on learning what we’re taught that we forget how to use it which is why so many children see spirits etc because their brains haven’t been exposed to normal stuff. I take comfort from it but I guess you have to be open minded to accept that there’s almost another dimension to what we all know as normal. I do believe in the after life because there’s been too much proof otherwise. I take comfort that we are all part of a bigger picture and it’s helped in times of real sadness. Sadly, on the flip side there’s people out there that will manipulate sadness for their own gain and not all card readers or clairvoyants are genuine.

I want to but I don’t think I do

These of the baby thing often comes up. Bear in mind that it’s a 50:50 guess and you’re more likely to remember if they’re right!

@OtterandaRock "Even random guesses will sometimes 'come true'."

things are probably different from one psychic to another

The crap ones I saw told me totally wrong things about me in the present

Yes, some random guesses might come true but equally they won't come true sometimes

Are they normally quite vague?

My friend saw one last year for guidance in a particular situation and the guy she saw really committed to what he believed would happen

It didn't!

Maybe he thought he was offering her some hope

i'm actually very curious about this but it would be a very expensive thing to research!

I find daily life plenty to manage!

Also -- remember what happened when Anakin Skywalker began to believe that his dreams had to come true.

Have a read of Beyond Black by Hilary Mantel. A great book with a LOT of detail about how “psychics” operate xx

Read it, it's great

probably need to read a memoir or something

sounds like a search for tonight!

I'm glad it gave you comfort.

It's fraudulent, but not demonic, because demons aren't real.

That is a brilliant novel. Dark, though.

Money, probably.

They are either deluded or fraudulent. You can use tarot as a form of meditation-as a way to direct your thoughts. But you could also use any other pack of cards with pictures on.

Both fraudulent AND demonic. Demons are very much real.

Where is your line between real and not real then ?

For example, if demons are real, are there multiple Gods too ?

No, they're not.

I was a very hardcore evangelical Christian for many years. I left because (a) I was abused horrendously by people who took advantage of how passionate and desperate for acceptance I was and (b) they ascribed just about everything to demonic activity. It's all an enormous pile of nonsense.

They are con artists.

Very dark but so clever. I miss Mantel and her dark humour.

Was Alison in Beyond Black actually a fraud or did she have medium talents? I could never quite work that one out. Swung back and forwards on my opinion.

now that I have seen a couple of Darren Brown shows and watched him talk about cold readings on YouTube. I am forever now an unbeliever, much though I would like it to be true.

Indeed. And the odd thing is about Christians blaming stuff on demons is that the Bible is actually evidence that they are made up. In my view anyway.

Because they are not needed in the OT. The god of the OT is vengeful, and not really nice at all. Kills as punishment and all that. But NT reinvents god as full of love and mercy. And then the Bible needs the bad entities. So they can be blamed instead of their god.

The pastors never explain where these demons come from all of a sudden.

I don't think she's a fraud -- I think Mantel doesn't tell us whether she's actually being haunted by horrifying ghosts or whether they're 'just' the ghosts of her own abusive childhood, if you see what I mean. Whether her visions and voices are hauntings by hostile spiritual entities or hallucinations and flashbacks whose origin in entirely in her own mind.

I taught it on a course about Gothic once, and some students were genuinely freaked out by it. One mature student was outraged at the appearances by the ghost of Princess Diana because Mantel's version of her is so petulant and calls her sons 'Kingy and Thingy' because she can't remember their names.

My logical brain says it’s a load of crap, however I saw one in the early 2000s (just on the off chance, a pub I was working at had a psychic night).

I told him nothing (and I mean nothing) sat there stony faced, barely moved and gave him no ‘purpose’ (so no ‘tell me if my grandmother is at peace’ sort of thing) as I thought if he’s as good as he says he is, he won’t need any help from me.

He was scarily accurate on several points.

Freaked me out a bit!

That’s true about Alison. Mantel doesn’t tell us.

It’s funny though when there’s a psychic fair, the psychics discussing their various new trades and what they use and new trends and when Mrs Etchells exposes Silvana on stage for being a “fraud”. The hen night party is hilarious too. The hen totally goes along with it, possible revenge on her cheating fiance, to make her feel better.

If you’ve read the equally good Every Day Is Mother’s Day and Vacant Possession they both go into spooky goings on, spirits and reincarnated beings (the baby) and Muriel Axon and her mother are brilliantly dark drawn characters. Weaving a web of destruction and revenge.

No one does bad and dark and spooky quite as well as Mantel did, imo. Her history novels are good too.

I believe that some people are able to 'pick up' information from other people, that is very accurate.
However, I am concerned as to who or what is supplying them with that information !