This quote is from Theresa Michelsen's Designing your own Tarot spreads:
Discomfort with doing predictive readings relates to the question of whether we have at least some control over our future. Some people believe that we can affect almost anything about our future, that we create our own reality. This is a relatively modern idea, and is one reason that older spreads often tend to look overly definite to readers today. In earlier times, the idea that one's destiny or fate was preordained was much more prevalent, and still prevails in some religions and cultures. Many people felt truly powerless against the church, nobility, powerful landowners, disease, nature, and other forces that seemed to determine the course of their lives, apparently at a whim.
Today the concepts of empowerment and using the tarot as a tool for spiritual enlightenment and direction have gained credence. In addition, Jungian psychological concepts have made their way into tarot work and moved many readers to use the tarot as a tool for self-awareness and personal development. These approaches have given rise to a different reading style---one in which the client is not given all the answers and the reader is not an all-knowing authority. Instead, the reader uses the tarot to help provide a deeper understanding of the situation; the client's motivations, goals, and feelings; the alternatives open to the client; and possible plans of action to obtain a desired result.
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