Jung and Tarot

Mind Body & Soul Ezine Book review: Jung and Tarot - An Archetypal Journey by Sallie Nichols, published by Samuel Weiser with an introduction by Laurens van de Post.

 

Carl Jung presented the Major Arcana of the tarot card deck as a means to work through the 22 archetypes, each of which demonstrates unrealised or neglected aspects of ourselves. Each card is explained separately to gain an understanding of its unconscious symbolic power and in order to bring into our consciousness awareness its archetypal energy and light. This process Jung calls 'individuation'. The world is a mirror which reflects ourselves, our tendencies, characteristics, potentials and shortcomings, which we place outside of ourselves and into all we perceive in the outside world. Our purpose is to project less so we see ourselves and the world as accurately as possible. This is presented as similar in depth to many of the initiatory card decks currently on this market and is well worth working with for insight into the self and others and to progress to maturity of thought. 

"Who looks outside dreams; who looks inside wakes" Carl Jung

This book contains black and white images to illustrate ideas within the text. There is a full colour pull out at the back of the book with each of the card images. The Marseilles Tarot, one of the earliest surviving decks, is used throughout and is chosen as the most suitable deck for the purposes of understanding the nature of projection and for the process of making the unconscious mind, conscious.

The author, Sallie Nichols studied at the Jung Institute in Zurich and you will find this an excellent book on how to work with the tarot to create greater levels of understanding of the self and the tarot. 

Review: Wendy Stokes https://wendystokes.co.uk