Three Ways Tarot Helps Us
Tarot is about so much more than simple fortune-telling.
Read MoreTarot Grandmaster
3559 Southwest Corporate Parkway Palm City, FL, 34990 United States
866-99TAROT 866-998-2768 (Toll Free) 561-655-1160 (Text or Call) 772-207-1852 (Palm City)
Tarot is a book of spiritual wisdom in picture form that tells the story of all human experience.
With tarot, we connect with Spirit to discern wise guidance for the present, develop understanding of the past, and learn ways to work to manifest our goals and possibilities for the future.
If you are interested in the tarot and other tools of divination please begin with my tarot news page!
Please leave this site if the practice of traditional methods of divination are not of interest to you.
Tarot is about so much more than simple fortune-telling.
Read MoreDivination is part of our natural behavior, and so much more, and more helpful, than simple prognostication.
Read MoreThis is a cross-post from my Tarot Trends Personal Blog.
Who are you, at your core?
This is a topic I often speak about, and write about, because it comes up so often in readings.
One of the reason that divination is so helpful is that divination is a way to help us discover our true identity – our core.
Sometimes we get stuck trying to be the person other people want us to be.
Sometimes we get stuck trying to become the person we think we should be.
Sometimes our self-perception is marred by low self-esteem or over-inflated ego.
Tarot, astrology and numerology are ways for us to look into a cosmic mirror, and discover things that are true about the self.
The more we are able to understand the core self, the more at peace we will be.
There are some people who misuse tools of divination, like tarot. They use the tool only to make predictions in an effort to assuage anxiety about the future. They never use the cards, nor any psychic tool, to actually question their own behaviors and discover more about the self.
The irony is, this very practice works to dispel anxiety, because once we feel solid in who we are, it is very hard to feel anxious about anything. Anxiety is most often born of a misunderstanding of self.
The significator card in a tarot spread is helpful in discerning “Who am I at the present moment?” Significator cards that we chose to represent ourselves help us discern “Who am I at core?”
If you want to learn about yourself, learn about your birth number, your sun, moon and rising sun, and the tarot cards associated with them.
This information should paint a clear picture of your motivations, your path and your sense of self.
There are those who say that we should not read tarot, or use other tools, for ourselves. They people may think we will come from the perspective of the anxious person using tarot to relieve her fear of the future.
But when we use our tools to understand who we are, we become strong, self-aware and healed.
I will be teaching a webinar on self-reading on July 24. Join us!
Decks of cards have become the usual tool for random token divination in our modern world. Even oracles that are traditionally stones, sticks or coins have card-based alternatives.
With so many card decks available I hear a wide variety of questions. Here is an attempt to answer some of them.
What is divination?
Divination is the practice of seeking wisdom and information by supernatural or spiritual means.
What is random token divination?
Random token divination is the term I’ve coined to describe any form of divination that involves the use of a group of objects (cards, stones, coins or other tokens). A small number of tokens are chosen at random to provide the reading.
How does card divination work?
Cards are drawn at random to reveal information or to provide a meditative focus. This process is called a “reading.” A reading may consist of a single card, several cards or a prescribed number of cards laid out in a particular pattern where each position has a meaning. This is called a “spread.”
What is your theory behind random token divination?
Random is by its own nature a spiritual force. When we use the power of random in divination we are allowing the Universe to communicate with us. Random works in conjunction with our higher selves, our spirit guides and our own intuition to help us see the tokens that we most need to see.
What is an oracle?
Originally the word “oracle” referred to people who were able to give psychic advice or channel information by spiritual means. The place where these people could be found might also be called an “oracle.” Now the word “oracle” can also refer to a tool such as a card deck that is used for divination.
What is tarot?
Tarot is a card oracle used for random token divination, amongst other things. There are many traditions of tarot, but all tarot has a similar structure. Tarot structure includes two sections, a Major Arcana of (usually) twenty-two cards and a Minor Arcana of four suits similar to a playing deck. Each suit has a court, generally of four characters.
What is Lenormand?
Lenormand is the name given to a specific type of oracle cards. Lenormand cards are named after Marie Anne Lenormand (1772-1843) who was a great card-reading psychic in France. Lenormand card decks consist of between 31-36 cards generally. They are numbered, and each has a very simple designation, such as Anchor, Fish, Key, Man and Woman.
Currently, Lenormand decks are experiencing a renaissance in interest and popularity.
Can one use a regular playing deck for divination?
Yes, there are numerous traditions of divination using playing cards.
What about angel cards, fairy cards and medicine cards? Are these cards tarot cards?
Unless you are talking about an “Angel Tarot,” probably not. Unless a deck has the general structure of tarot, it’s not tarot.
Why are there so many different tarot decks available?
There are many tarot traditions. These traditions include Marseilles, Waite, Crowley and modern traditions, such as feminist and archetypal. There are many decks within each tradition, and some that borrow from more than one tradition.
There are many themes that lend themselves to tarot. There are dragon tarots, baseball tarots, cat tarots and Goddess tarots, for instance. Tarot is based on archetypes. There are many ways to depicts archetypes, and many associations from art and culture for each archetype.
Tarot is a personal thing. Although there are images and traditions that are considered standard, everyone who studies tarot develops their own understanding of tarot. Artists and tarot designers enjoy having an opportunity to present tarot the way they see it. Many artists enjoy the challenge of creating a seventy-eight card body of work that follows a designated structure.
Do different tarot decks mean the same thing and give the same information?
That is a matter of debate amongst tarotists. Many tarotists would say that the card means the same thing no matter how it is depicted. Others would say that the energy of the card may be slightly or wholly changed depending on the artwork.
What is the difference between a tarot deck and an oracle deck?
All tarot decks are oracles, not all oracles are tarot. Tarot follows a specific structure. Oracles follow the structure designated by their designer. Oracles do not conform to any particular structure or tradition.
Are card oracles based on traditional non-card oracles such as runes and I Ching as effective as using the traditional tokens (stones, sticks, coins, etc)?
There is power in tradition. In the case of I Ching, the thousands-year-old tradition of tossing the yarrow sticks holds its own power that would not be present in simply pulling a card to get your hexagram.
However, symbols are symbols, and divination is divination. If you are comfortable with the cards you will certainly find divination with them effective.
Does one have to be psychic to work with divination?
Perhaps we are all psychic. Intuition helps a great deal in interpreting oracles. Oracles themselves help us develop our own psychic ability. But where or not you consider yourself “psychic” you can enjoy and benefit from divination.
What is the difference between divination and fortune-telling?
Fortune-telling suggests that we have very little power to affect our own lives or create our own destiny. Divination gives us options, ideas and power in manifesting our own goals and desires.
I read two books on tarot that said two entirely different things about the meanings of the cards. Which is correct?
Just as there are many different tarot traditions, there are many different tarot readers. Each person develops their own relationship with the cards. The interpretations in a book will reflect the traditions favored by the author as well as the author’s personal relationship with the cards.
The job of the tarot student is to use books, classes, experimentation and exploration to decide what makes sense to him or her.
Use the books to help you figure out what the cards mean to you, and to help you develop your own relationship with the cards.
These are the answers of one tarot reader. Other card diviners and oracle users may have different and equally valid answers.
What do you think about these questions and answers? Do you have a different answer? Do you have a question I didn’t answer?
Leave a comment and let me know!