PLEASE NOTE: The following content only represents the downloadable handouts from an in-person live master class presented at the 2019 Masters of the Tarot Conference at the Omega Institute. No online equivalent to that master class is included here, and what’s accessible is just those supplemental handouts and a copy of the PowerPoint.

What are the Akashic Records? Are there special requisites before gaining access? What are its origins?

My presentation at the 2019 Masters of the Tarot Conference will be an exploration of the origins of the Akasha from an Eastern perspective.

From there, let’s consider how tarot is a microcosm symbolic of the Akashic macrocosm.

Preliminary Principles

Technique-wise, we want to approach reading a deck of tarot cards with the beginner’s mind, so to the seasoned readers, work with unfamiliar deck for these exercises, and for accessing the Akasha through the cards.

Conceptualize communication from the spirit’s perspective. Imagine that you have a finite set number of symbolic objects on a table. And now you want to communicate with someone across the table by arranging the objects you have been given on those tables. You must use arrangements from those given symbols only to communicate what it is you want to say, and you have some idea of the personality and disposition of the person (in this case the tarot reader) you are about to communicate with.

Which of the symbolic objects would you pick and how would you arrange them to make sure the person across the table gets your message?

Once you conceptualize a tarot card spread from the spirit’s perspective, you’ll have greater appreciation and sympathy for what cards are coming up in a reading to convey what message.

Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine

One of the earliest sources we can document references to the Akashic Records comes from the Yellow Emperor’s Classic of Internal Medicine 黃帝內經 (Huángdì Nèi Jīng).

While the text, in modernity, is most popularly associated with Traditional Chinese Medicine, in particular acupuncture because acupuncture is about regulating the qi, it’s a lot more that. It has also been known and well-documented to be an important treatise on Taoist Mysteries, on esoteric Taoism, inner alchemy, and spiritual cultivation.

Book I: Basic Questions, dates back to around 400 BC, while Book II: Spiritual Pivot, dates back to around 200 BC.

The text is written in a dialectical Socratic dialogue between a young Yellow Emperor and his teacher, the mythical teacher and ascended master healer Qibo.

What’s so remarkable about the Inner Canons is that well over 2,000 years later, two millennia, this text remains relevant in modern acupuncture, qi gong, Taoist healing cultivation, and medical theory.

The overarching philosophical premise of the text is that what you eat, your lifestyle, your emotions and state of mind, your environment, and your life experiences will determine your physical health.

In Traditional East Asian epidemiology, all diseases, illnesses, and physiological weaknesses can be sourced back, in some way, to the Wǔ yùn liù qì, the Five and the Six.

The Five Carriers are based directly on the Wu Xing. Carriers is to indicate vehicles or that which transports and moves, facilitates the qi.

As for the Six Qi, they are: wind, cold, heat, dampness, dryness, and fire. From the Six Qi arise pathogenic conditions. Also, the six pathogenic conditions double because of the yin and yang binary to sum up the Twelve Changes Medical Theory espoused within the Inner Canons.

What is Shen 神?

In “The Eightfold Gods 八正神明論” from Huángdì Nèi Jīng 黃帝內經, a young Yellow Emperor asks his teacher, the mythical healer Qibo 岐伯: “What is 神 (shén)?”

On its face, the dialectical exchange is about acupuncture, but implied within the subtext is another conversation altogether, as every word in the discourse holds double meaning.

Jīng Qì Shén 精氣神 signify the trinity of essences in our bodies that govern physical, mental, and spiritual health, referred to as the Three Jewels 三寶 (sān bǎo), triplicities comprised of yin and yang, like trigrams.

三部九候為之原 ， 九針之論 ， 不必存也 。

The triplicity arranged into a square of nine, says Qibo to the Yellow Emperor, represents the origins and the fundamentals. This square of nine is baesd on observations, is used for divination, represents the stations of our cosmos, our seasons and the passage of time, and all omens.

Shén 神 is spirit, your spiritual center, psyche, and consciousness. It is your higher self, that which inspires you toward wisdom, compassion, and beneficence. It is the divinity within.

Shén 神 also means gods and ancestors, deities, and that which is magical, mystical, or considered supernatural. Magic. Miracle working. Shén qí. 神奇. Mystical. Shén mì. 神祕.

It is the word that shamans of East Asia use in self-reference—the shén hàn 神漢, shén pó 神婆, and shén tóng 神僮 shamans of China in place of the term wupo 巫婆, and the mansin 萬神 of Korean shamanism, in place of mudang 巫堂.

In inner alchemy, shen is also the exalted aspect of your soul or mind. Shen, the third aspect of the triple essential natures of human life, is your inner divine.

Jing 精 is your reproductive and creative essence. This is how you feed and sustain yourself.

Qi 氣 is breath, vitality, spirit. Breath.

Thus, Shen 神 is soul, the spiritual part of your nature; inner divinity; the inner god.

In modern day terminology, the word shen is borrowed by the field of psychology — Psyche. Jīngshén. 精神. That term also relates to your essence, your vitality. State of mind. Xīnshén. 心神. Consciousness. Shénzhì. 神志.

To the young Yellow Emperor’s question “What is shen (spirit)”, the healer and master teacher Qibo responds:

Invoke the name of Spirit,
for here is what Spirit is:
that which ears cannot hear,
the Eye that sees All,
a heart-mind aligned with its Purpose,
a solitary wisdom, awakened and self-aware,
the voice that speaks all words [that speaks from all perspectives],
the eyes that see what cannot be seen,
realized at the dusk and twilight of your senses,
that which only you can know,
a wind that moves the clouds
the dead, afflictions, catastrophe are called Spirit.

岐伯曰： 請言神 ， 神乎神 ， 耳不聞 ， 目明 ， 心開而志先 ， 慧然獨悟 ， 口弗能言 ， 俱視獨見 ， 適若昏 ， 昭然獨明 ， 若風吹云 ， 故曰神 。

In today’s master class, line by line we will explore the meaning and interpretation of Qibo’s response.

The Akasha garbha bodhisattva

Another early text with references to the Akasha, and thus perhaps the source inspiration for the Western Theosophical concept of the Akashic Records, come from the sutras of the Akashagarbha bodhisattva 虛空藏菩薩 (xū kōng zàng pú sà).

In case you want to download a copy of the PowerPoint slides presented in class:

Download PowerPoint

PowerPoint Slides

PPTX, File Size: 9 MBs

Due to the layering of images to create animation effects, you’ll need to view the slides in Slide Show.

INSTRUCTIONS FOR VIEWING: Along the upper row of tabs, click on “Slide Show.” Then click on the icon “From Beginning” to start the animation.

How to Access the Akashic Records: Review

1. By speaking the Word (i.e., connect to Divinity or higher consciousness through Invocation)
2. By your psychic senses, not physical (i.e., clairvoyance, clairaudience, clairsentience, claircognizance, and an exercise of channeling)
3. By being the impartial observer
4. By being compassionate (i.e., need an empathic connection)
5. By being rational (i.e., relying on a system of correspondences)
6. The more you awaken to a higher consciousness, the greater your access to the Akashic Records

Digital images of the handout you received during class:

Q: Can you cut and paste or modify parts of the PowerPoint file to create educational content for your own business or coaching/consulting services?

A: Yes! Of course!

Q: Can you integrate parts of this presentation or reinterpret the ideas presented here into your own teaching materials or coaching/consulting services?

A: Yes! Of course! That was the intention!

Q: After completing this master class, are you now a certified Akashic Records reader?

A: No, but (1) you don’t need certification to access the Records and (2) I’ve given you all the tools and instructions for study and practice that you need to master access and reading of the Records, so through dedicated independent work, you will become a powerful reader of the Records. When you truly feel ready in your gut to do this line of work for others, that’s when you can hold yourself out to be an Akashic Records tarot reader.