Arcana

Arcana literally means secrets or mysteries. Standard decks have two Arcana, two sets of cards, the Major and Minor Arcana.

The Major Arcana – also called the trump cards. Typically, 22 cards representing powerful archetypal, fateful energies.

Minor Arcana  – Typically comprises 56 cards divided into four suits (Wands, Cups, Swords, and Pentacles) and represents the varying nuances of day-to-day experiences. 

Clarifier Card

An additional card drawn during a reading to gain further clarification on a specific issue, or to provide deeper understanding of the cards already laid out in the spread. A clarifier card is optional in every spread.

Court Cards

The Page, Knight, Queen and King cards of the Minor Arcana. The court cards represent different personality types or archetypes. They typically depict people and can indicate specific individuals or aspects of the querent’s personality or external influences. Different decks can have different names for these cards.

Deck

A set of tarot cards. Decks are typically unified in a theme, artistic style, or some other element that unites the cards.

Intuitive Meaning

Every reader can bring their own interpretations of a card’s meaning. This might be based on the traditional meanings combined with the reader’s life experiences and views, or it might be solely from the reader’s intuition and move away from tradition completely. Intuitive readings are usually inspired by the reader’s response to the art and or words on the card, as well as the card’s position relative to other cards in the spread. 

Querent

The person for whom the reading is done. When reading for yourself, you are both the reader and the querent. Reading for a fictional character, your character is the querent. Reading for a friend, your friend is the querent.

Reader

The person performing the tarot spread and interpreting the cards. Also called the practitioner. 

Reversals

When a tarot card appears upside down during a reading, it is considered a reversal. Reversals can modify or add depth to the card’s traditional meanings, indicating challenges, shadow messages, or blocked energies. Some readers ignore reversals and simply flip the card the right way up.

Significator

A card chosen to represent the querent or a specific person or energy central to the reading. The significator provides additional context and serves as a focal point during the interpretation. The significator card is optional, though some spreads in this book specify its inclusion.

Spreads

Spreads are the patterns in which we lay the cards out. Just as each card has its meaning, so too can each position in a spread.

Suits

The Minor Arcana is typically divided into four suits. These are usually Wands, Cups, Swords, and Pentacles, but different decks can give suits different names. Suits are arranged like playing cards, starting from Ace, with ten numbered cards, and then court cards of Page, Knight, Queen, and King.

Each suit has its own central theme. These are: 

Wands – ideas and intuition

Cups – creativity and emotion

Swords – action and logic

Pentacles – material values.

Traditional Meaning

Each tarot card holds a traditional meaning and most modern decks represent these meanings in some way in their art.

The post Basic Tarot Glossary appeared first on Tarot Writers.

To writers I also suggest, if possible, to choose a deck that suits the feel of your writing, something that resonates with your author voice. There’s a reason I own several contemporary witch tarot decks – because I write a lot of contemporary witch fantasy.

As well as these thematically inspiring decks, you might also like to consider a deck directly inspired by a literary theme. These writerly tarot decks could be used in your readings and tarot writer’s life in a variety of ways. 

You might read with them as reminders of your idols, what you aspire to be in your own writing life. You could also use them as a tone text, matching your deck themes and story themes. For example if you write period romances, the Jane Austen deck could be well suited, or a mystery writer might inspired by the Sherlock Holmes deck. There are decks for so many special works, including the Hobbit deck, the Lord of the Rings deck, Game of Thrones tarot deck, HP Lovecraft Necronomicon deck, and so, so many more.

Here are a few other tarot decks specific to writers (plus a sneaky oracle and Lenormand deck).

You might also like to see the official list of tarot decks specifically mentioned and recommended elsewhere on this site. These are the decks I use in my own writing life.

This post contains affiliate links.

American Renaissance Tarot

The American Renaissance Tarot is a 78 card tarot deck inspired by American literature. It showcases 36 prominent writers, including Emerson, Whitman, and Thoreau, and portrays significant scenes from renowned American literary works between 1825 and 1875. The Major Arcana cards also narrate the journey towards the abolition of slavery. In the Minors, the cards depict the literary contributions of Herman Melville, Edgar Allan Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Frederick Douglass.

The Poet Tarot

The Poet Tarot is a 70-card deck created by and for poets, writers, and artists. It features 30 well-known poets on its Major Arcana and court cards, and has themed Minor Arcana suits of Quills (Wands), Muses (Cups), Mentors (Swords), and Letterpresses (Pentacles). This deck is specifically designed to help writers, artists, or anyone engaged in artistic pursuits to explore the intricacies of their creative process and embrace a creative lifestyle. The Major arcana showcases renowned poets embodying various roles: Edgar Allan Poe as the Devil; Emily Dickinson as the Hermit; E. E. Cummings as the Fool; William Butler Yeats represents the Ending (traditionally The World).

Sherlock Holmes Tarot

The 79 card Sherlock Holmes Tarot captures the characters, era, and narratives from the celebrated books by Arthur Conan Doyle. The Major Arcana cards feature significant figures and iconic locations from the books, immersing you in the world of Holmes and his adventures. The Minor Arcana depicts scenes from specific stories.

Tarot in Wonderland

The extraordinary 78-card Tarot In Wonderland deck transports you to a fantastical realm where tarot symbolism intertwines with the whimsy of Lewis Carroll’s literary universe. Accompanying this magical deck is a meticulously crafted companion book by Barbara Moore, which not only provides comprehensive insights but also showcases stunning illustrations that perfectly complement the tarot cards. 

A Jane Austen Tarot Deck

A Jane Austen Tarot Deck is a must-have for any Austen loving tarot enthusiast. This set of 53 cards features hand-drawn characters, including Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy, and objects from Austen’s world such as bonnets and books. Created by acclaimed artist Jacqui Oakley, each card serves as a playing card and tarot card. The deck comes in an oversized, sleek cigar box with foil stamping, accompanied by a booklet providing an overview of tarot and a guide to Austen’s world. 

The Literary Witches Oracle

Experience the intersection of spirituality, feminist wisdom, and literature with The Literary Witches Oracle. This unique, 70 card deck invites you to infuse your reading with spirituality, feminist wisdom, and literature, featuring remarkable icons like Octavia Butler, Shirley Jackson, Gertrude Stein, Joy Harjo, Virginia Woolf, Toni Morrison Yumiko Kurahashi and Mirabai.

The included guidebook helps you navigate the cards based on your intentions, the writers’ characteristics, and the spiritual symbols at play.

Fairy Tale Lenormand

While this is not actually a tarot deck, the Fairy Tale Lenormand deserves special mention for its stunning art and the way the cards use familiar fairytale motifs to connect with real life parallels.

Lenormand cartomancy is the less known cousin of tarot and oracle cards, and a fun direction for readers to expand their card reading curiosities and deck collecting obsessions… err, I mean interests. Read more about Lenormand cards here.

Do you have a favorite literary themed tarot deck? Tell us about it in the comments below.

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How do you interpret reversed cards?

Do reversed tarot cards have special meanings?

Different tarot readers approach reversals in different ways. 

Ignore Reversed Cards

Some readers choose to ignore reversal and simply flip the right way up, using one meaning for each card.

Reversed Cards Have Reversed Meanings

Others believe a reversed card has an entirely different meaning, often a negative reversal of the traditional meaning of the card. In this sense, the card takes on a note of warning. For example, with a reversal of the 0 Fool card, instead of a card about the blissful naivety of new beginnings and expansive possibilities, we see this card more as idiocy than innocent foolishness, and a warning about not looking with caution where you are about to tread.

Reversed Cards Are Blocked Energies

For other readers, a reversed card indicates that there is a blockage in the querent surrounding whatever they’re asking about. Sticking with the Fool example, if you draw a reversed Fool card, this blockage philosophy might suggest that there is something holding the querent back from stepping off into a new adventure and embracing the unknowns of new beginnings. 

When I encounter a reversed card, I like to combine these ideas depending on how it best serves the reading. 

I take the reversal of the traditional meaning and consider how it’s not happening for me or for my story worlds, how it might be blocked, and what might be blocking it.

Might that blockage serve as a warning?

Reversed Cards as Shadow Selves

I also tend to imagine reversed cards as messages from our shadow sides. 

These are the darker sides of personality that each of us has. This might not be a “bad” personality trait, as it might simply indicate that it’s a hidden part of ourselves, something we avoid facing and cast to our deepest internal world. Shadows are the parts of us that we keep from others, even those closest to us, and sometimes even from ourselves.

Inner Vs Outer Meanings

You might also think of a reversed card as the internalization of the card’s meaning, as opposed to an externally projected energy or experience. For a reversed Fool this might indicate a new project or undertaking you’re keeping secret from others, or an internal psychological journey you’re undertaking in complete privacy from others.

Using Reversed Tarot Cards For Writing Fiction

When you’re reading for your characters or a particular plot point, playing with reversed cards can be a lot of fun, and provide a great depth to your thinking and work.

A reversed card for a plot point might indicate a negative consequence for a character’s action or reaction, or a bad choice.

A reversed card might show you a shadow side of your character’s internal world that you hadn’t before considered that will influence how they react to a situation.

A reversed card for a character might indicate the character’s wound or ghost, that troubling aspect of their past they are trying to run, grow from, or change.

A reversed card might simply show you two ways of looking at a plot advancement. Will the character achieve or fail in this scene? You can also play with reversals as simple Yes/No answers.

How do you consider reversals in your tarot reading?

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 I stand by this as my preferred way of reading for myself and have been reading like this for almost thirty years.

 But I still enjoy using my intuition to interpret cards and certain spreads. This is called intuitive reading.

Intuitive reading means leaning into what the cards in their imagery and their positions in your spreads mean to you, either outside of or alongside of the traditional meanings.

Some readers swear this is the best (and for some, the only) way to read tarot. You can make that judgement for yourself.

How to Read Tarot Intuitively

Take up your preferred deck.

The deck’s theme will impact how you interpret the cards, so work with a deck with imagery that appeals to you either personally or for the story you’re working on.

Lay your spread. 

You can use a traditional spread or an intuitive spread. An intuitive spread sees you placing the cards however you decide in the moment. Do whatever feels right.

Look closely at the drawn cards.

How do the images make you feel?

What do they make you think?

Are there symbols on the cards, either classic symbols like pentagrams, moons, mountains, water, or other more interpretive symbols? For example, what might a cat symbolize in the context of your spread? What about a person’s clothes? Their body position or facial expression?

Is the coloring light or dark? 

Is the picture playful or heavy?

What stories do the scenes evoke?

How do these elements combine to relate to your question or reading?

Most often, I will do an intuitive reading of a card and then consult the books and other resources to add further nuance to my interpretations of the cards if needs be. 

I find it useful in intuitive readings to not think about expressing or explaining the meanings, like the kinds of explanations you’d read in a book, just feeling through the keywords, emotions and senses. This works better when reading for alone for yourself.

Like everything in tarot culture (and writing), how you choose to approach the practice is up to you. Choose one way, try another, combine multiple ways of reading tarot, and walk your own path through the arcanas. 

The post Intuitive Tarot – How To Read Cards Without The Books appeared first on Tarot Writers.

Whether you’re drawing a spread for your story or for your writerly self, there will come times where card meanings just don’t apply.

When we draw a card, we think of all how card might fit our situation. We look for relevance.

Here’s a hypothetical: 

Imagine you’re drawing for yourself. You’re unsure whether to write story A or Story B next. 

You draw the Ace of Cups. This is a concentrated creative energy card, speaks to deep intuition, emotion and flow. So it prompts you to think which of your story options feeds your creative soul the strongest. Alternatively, if you draw the Ace of Pentacles card, a card all about new beginnings in the material world. You might then make your decision based on which project has a better potential market viability.

What happens if you just can’t draw a connection to the meaning, or if what the card is downright wrong for you and your situation?

Say you draw that Ace of Pentacles.

You think about money and markets and material gains and it’s just not appropriate for how you feel about your writing or either of these stories. The card is wrong! The draw failed.

But it didn’t.

Instead, think of it as a reverse prompt.

The card prompted you to think about your decision in one way… To write for money over emotional creativity. And your reaction to that being so wrong has just taught you that no, you need to write for something other than material gain.

So, if you intuitively react negatively to a card and can’t see how it applies, consider why it doesn’t apply and find your answers in the opposite of what the card is suggesting.

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The reasons tarot attracts writers are infinite, but I think for many writers, and definitely for me, the primary allure of tarot as a writing tool comes in three areas:

1. Human Archetypes
2. Creative Freedom
3. Pause and Reflection

1. Human Story Archetypes and Endless Stories

Tarot decks tell stories.  

From unknowing to knowing, from trauma to recovery, death to rebirth. The two arcanas have their story arcs, the suits cards have their arcs, and the cards themselves have their own visual story. 

Tarot cards represent most (every?) archetype of human experience. Add in your own intuitive readings based on your experiences of those archetypes and I believe there isn’t a single thing in life that can’t turn up in a potential reading.

The deck is a universe of stories you can hold in one hand. Shuffle it once, that story changes. Shuffle it again, the story changes. Look at a card upside down, the story changes again. In just a simple three card spread drawn from a standard 78 card deck, there are more than a half a million distinct possibilities – and that’s not even considering reversed readings.

2. Creative Freedom

With effectively infinite stories in one deck, the creative opportunities tarot allows are just as expansive. 

But it’s not just drawing a card and finding a story that I love. It’s drawing a card and finding connections in stories is that is such an allure for me. 

The cards guide us through our own creativity, prompting ideas and angles. If creativity is joining the dots between ideas in new ways, tarot offers infinite dots and the patterns to join them in.

Tarot is also a creative act in the spreads you choose. You might lay cards in a traditional spread like the Celtic Cross and creatively apply that to your story world, or you might make up a new spread specific for your specific literary problem you’re attempting to nut out.

3. Pause for Reflection

Our modern world is ceaseless, more and more confined to light and glass, bits, bytes, and likes and follows and production, and faster, and now. 

Tarot is an ancient tool, made of paper and ink. It takes time to learn and time to read, and the more time you use for both, the richer your tarot experience will be. Tarot is not a part of the modern world.

When I sit down to draw a spread, I’m always alone. It’s quiet. Screens are off (the only exception to this is that I sometimes consult the Biddy Tarot site for readings as Brigit’s interpretations of the cards align nicely with my own world views).

I draw the cards, a tactile experience, and note the spreads in my journals, pen to paper. I have different journals for different things – my general life, my fiction writing life, and then my story specific notebooks.

I write about the cards’ meanings, traditional meanings, the meanings derived from the books of whichever deck I’m reading from, and my own interpretations. I then journal about how the spread applies, what I’m thinking, what I’m learning, what I’m rejecting. 

It’s a slow and quiet process, and one I always step away from with a clear mind and a light heart. How many times can I say I’ve had that same experience stepping away from an hour scrolling Twitter (there’s a good reason I quit most social media).

The way tarot serves you and your writing life might be different to my experiences. I’d love to read your thoughts on why you’re drawn to tarot, so please share below. 

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This is not an exhaustive How To about everything there is to know about tarot (No single tarot resource could provide that!), but it will get you started with reading your cards and bringing the expanse of creative possibilities of tarot into your writing world. 

Learn The Language

Familiarize yourself with the basic terms used in tarot culture. This tarot glossary is a good place to start.

Get A Deck

Choose whichever deck you like the look of. I typically advise new practitioners to choose a deck with some thematic relevance to their writing. This will usually mean the deck resonates with your personality as well. This article about choosing a deck goes into more details on how that process has worked for the decks I use for my writing.

This article explores some decks with specific literary themes, but any deck with art you enjoy will work for you whether it’s specifically created with writers in mind or not.

Read the Little White Book

Many, if not most, tarot decks come with their own guidebook, aka the Little White Book (LWB). At the very least, this guide is usually a small white pamphlet (hence LWB) with a brief description of each card’s meaning.

These little guides are typically superficial, so you won’t find your whole tarot life in its pages, but it’s the best place to start learning meanings because it is specific to that deck you’re holding.

I use the LWB as shorthand for any guidebook that accompanies a specific deck, whether it’s little or white at all. I own numerous decks with huge tomes to guide through the deck. In addition to card meanings, some of these also contain poetry, stories, and details about how the cards were created.

Look Through The Cards

As you’re reading the LWB, explore the cards themselves, getting to know the art and getting curious about the symbology.

Start Playing With Spreads

There’s no right or wrong way to perform a tarot spread, so cast off any fears you’re “doing it wrong” and just start spreading cards. Follow a formally guided spread if you want (like the traditional Celtic Cross spread, for example), or just lay out some cards however you like while you’re thinking of a specific premise or problem and see what happens.

If you are keen to follow formal guided spreads, my book Tarot Spreads for Writers has plenty to choose from, as well as guidance on how to create your own formal spreads.

You may like to record your spreads and your interpretations in your journal.

Apply Tarot To Your Writing

You might also be learning tarot to apply to your non-writing, wider life (as I do too), but you’re here as a writer looking to expand your creativity.

Again, there’s no right or wrong way to do this. Look into the cards and see what they make you think of. You can use them to prompt story ideas, or expand and deepen your existing ideas. Use them to guide characters into new directions. Writers have used tarot to outline entire stories (the tarot itself contains a narrative, so it’s quite handy for that). You might find characters in the archetypes, or character traits (is your protagonist a classic Queen of Cups, for example?)

The Journal Arcana tarot journal for writers has many ideas on how to apply tarot to your writing and your life as a writer.

Expand Your Knowledge of The Traditional Meanings

As you’re getting familiar with the cards, and the whole tarot world feels more comfortable and less like some esoteric occult society from which outsiders are forbidden, start to expand your understanding of the cards’ traditional meanings.

Read lots of tarot books and websites and see how these writers have interpreted the card meanings. Biddy Tarot is my favorite online resource for card meanings, as the author, Brigit Esselmont, always finds a rounded yet ultimately optimistic interpretation of each card, even the super dark cards.

Some tarot practitioners will learn the traditional meanings by rote and stop consulting the guidebooks when they’re done. I’m not one of these readers, and you don’t have to be either.

Keep consulting the books and other guides as often as you like. The card meanings will stick in your head eventually, or they won’t. It doesn’t matter. Your tarot, your way.

7. Start Leaning into Intuitive Readings

You’re getting to know what other people have said the cards mean, so now it’s time to think about what the cards mean to you. This is called intuitive reading, and I’ve written more about it in this article – Intuitive Tarot – How To Read Cards Without The Books.

I like to combine traditional meanings with my intuitive interpretations. 

8. Keep Playing, Keep Learning

Even the most renowned tarot expert will never learn everything there is to know about tarot. Just like we will never learn all there is to know about writing and reach some final summit. There are always more trails on the journey. Keep following them.

The post How To Start Reading Tarot – A Quick Guide For Writers appeared first on Tarot Writers.

What next?

If you’re looking to add a specific writing deck to your collection, look for two things:

1. A complementary theme

2. Art you like

The first deck I got specially for my writing was the Thoth deck. It’s deeply symbolic heavy with esoteric symbols, and his has a rather dark and serious vibe to it which comes, for me, from its creator, the infamous occultist, Alistaire Crowley. At the time I wrote darker fantasy, and it was a great match.

Now I write lighter fantasy blending romantic and some mystery elements over a variety of fantasy subgenres including contemporary fantasy, high cozy fantasy, and paranormal romance. There’s a lot of witches, a lot of goddess power. I rarely use the Thoth deck any more.

For most of my contemporary work, I use the Witches Tarot by Ellen Dugan and the Gilded Tarot by Ciro Marchetti, both modern decks, with vibrant colors and rich contemporary art styles. The Witches tarot suits particularly well for obvious reasons.

When my imagination ventures into the more mystical or mythical stories, I dabble with the Llewelyn deck, ancient welsh myths from Anna-Marie Ferguson, the same artist who created my beloved Legend deck. For medieval flavored inspiration, I use The Golden Tarot: The Visconti-Sforza Deck by Mary Packard.

At the time of writing, I’m dabbling with a Davide Corsi’s Ghost Tarot because there’s a ghost draft in the works.

I was recently gifted the Motherpeace deck by Karen Vogel and Vicki Noble. This unusual and highly stylized deck (the cards are round!) is drenched in feminine energy and goddess archetypes. I use it for finding deeper layers in my complicated women characters, and have also found it a beautiful addition to my personal readings (as a complicated woman character myself!)

These decks are thematic matches to the vibes I’m intentionally creating in my work.

You aren’t limited to tarot for this, remember. You might also consider oracle cards.

I really want to get a dragon deck, and there are many around, but I haven’t found one with art I really love yet. So for my dragon stories, I use an oracle deck – the Dragonfae Oracle by Lucy Cavendish.

If you’re writing fantasy, you might stick to a deck with these themes. There’s dark fantasy, plenty of Goth vibes, vampire tarot, and the list goes on.

For the lighter vibes of fantasy, you might look to one of the many fairy decks, or fairy tales. 

Do you write contemporary stories set in the real world?

You can get all kinds of decks to suit just about any theme of life. Knitting decks, parenting decks, housework, vehicles, alcohol, ferrets, cats, computer programing… And it goes on.

You might consider directly matching different elements from your stories to multiple decks, especially if you’re writing in a hybrid niche genre like vampire knitting, or paranormal pets for example. 

If you use multiple decks for the same stories, stick with using one deck per spread.

Like so much of tarot reading, the deck you choose for your writing all comes down to what feels good and right to you. 

Shop around for a deck that matches your art taste and your story themes.

Then spend some time examining the cards, thinking about your stories, but not asking anything of the deck yet, just enjoying the art and exploring the symbolisms at play.

This process in itself can be an excellent brainstorming session, so get ready to make notes.

When you’re ready to set the cards to work, start using some specific tarot spreads for writers and let the real creative explorations begin.

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Do you need to memorize the card meanings?

Can you consult the books and other explanatory resources during a reading?

There’s something mystical about a tarot reader who picks up a deck, lays out an elaborate spread and interprets the meanings of the cards guided only by their memory and intuition.

I certainly enjoy doing these intuitive readings, but for over twenty-five years of reading tarot, I still consult the deck books and traditional meanings for the cards at almost every read.

And you can too, if that’s how you want to do it.

Reading the Cards by Memory and Intuition

Developing your own meanings and significances based on your intuition and interpretations of the art work of the cards is a beautiful way to let the cards lead your ideas. This is the foundation of intuitive reading. 

Often, readers who operate with this method are also using the traditional meanings of the cards (these days mostly derived from the RWS deck) they have committed to memory.

Reading With A Guide Book or Other Resource

Despite what many a tarot resource will tell you, there is absolutely nothing wrong with consulting the deck companion books, or a website like the wonderful Biddy Tarot by Brigit Esselmont, as you’re reading any spread.

By the way, I totally recommend Brigit’s book The Ultimate Guide to Tarot Card Meanings. Her interpretations of the cards blend traditional meanings with a contemporary, usually optimistic worldview that supports both the light and the dark sides of life.

While intuitive, off the cuff reading brings a beautiful personal meaning to a spread, using the traditional meanings gives your reading a grounding in the ancient lore of tarot, layering on significances you might never have otherwise thought of.

Plus, many decks give new meanings to cards by working with all kinds of different visual symbolism, so different decks will give differently nuanced readings. For example, a reading from the Thoth deck will take on an entirely different significance than a reading from the super cute Catittude deck, even if equivalent cards are drawn.

The Right Way to Read Tarot?

There is no right or wrong way to read tarot.

If you’re just starting out with tarot, I recommend reading from the traditional meanings of your deck guide and the classic RWS interpretations first. If that’s how you feel like working.

Many readers insist on memorizing the cards and their reversals. That’s 156 meanings. You don’t need to memorize anything, but if this is the way you want to read, then go for it. If you decide to learn the meanings off by heart, the manner in which you embark on that study is up to you. I know of one reader who spent a whole week focusing on each card, and swears by her practice. Others do a card a day. Some start with 0 The Fool and move numerically through the deck, others go for the images they’re drawn to first. If you’re inclined to these kinds of methodical commitments, enjoy your journey.

There is absolutely nothing stopping you from enjoying a lifelong practice of tarot, working with intuitive readings and still consult the books as you read.

 As you go along and familiarize yourself with the decks, certain cards will take on their personal relevances to you, and those meanings will stick in your head first. Especially if the same cards keep on cropping up spread after spread. It happens – it’s one of those things that makes tarot really seems like magic.

Just start.

Lay your cards out in traditional spreads, consult with books or websites to find these, or make up your own. And then perform your reading by consulting the books. If your memory and intuition take over, great! You’ve found your method. 

Just like writing processes, the paths to a rewarding tarot reading are innumerable and will change from person to person. They’re all allowed, correct, and valuable. And just like writing processes, your tarot methods might change as you change, evolve as you evolve.

Just remember, there is no right way and you’ll never do it wrong.

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So, is tarot actually magical tool?

I preface this discussion by saying that I am not here to step on anyone’s beliefs, faiths, spiritual practices, or any other kinds of ways of living. The views expressed in this article are my opinions based on my experiences. Like all people, I carry contradictory labels. I am an optimistic, intuitive, skeptic and scientific rationalist, open to practically any idea, even magic, if it feels right. This article is my subjective viewpoint and I’m not trying to change anyone’s mind or anything else.

I believe…

Tarot is what you make it. Tarot is what you want it to be.

A tarot deck comprises 78 pieces of card decorated with pretty pictures. Most decks we use have been mass produced in industrial printing facilities. 

Doesn’t sound magical or mystical, does it?

Over the centuries, the cards have been ascribed meanings, and those meanings have become fixed, with different readers and deck designers adding their own nuances.

Those 78 meanings and their combinations encapsulate human experience in a general sense. Most of us have gone through or will go through something that any arrangements of cards will speak to. Sometimes that can require some interpretive thinking.

“The benefits of the Tarot as an analytical system may outweigh its oracular use, as it allows the querent to distance him or herself from a situation, make a direct evaluation, and take charge of his or her own destiny.”

Anna-Marie Ferguson A Keeper Of Words: Legend, The Arthurian Tarot.

Tarot cards have no magic powers in themselves.

It’s the meanings we ascribe to them, and how we use those meanings to prompt our thinking and explore our emotions that gives tarot cards their power.

That said, in my many years reading the tarot I’ve had countless moments when I look at the cards I’ve drawn and marvel how appropriate each card is in a read.

Sometimes I keep on pulling the same cards no matter how thoroughly I shuffled that deck. And that happens across different decks too, so it’s not like a well used deck might bring up the same cards thanks to some physical thing like a bit of sticky grime that might have accumulated in the decades of use, or a slightly creased card that might make itself more prominent.

There are some cards I rarely, if ever draw.

These coincidences just happen.

That’s when the cards feel like magic.

For example, when I was considering starting Tarot Writers, I was already had a full plate of writing and family commitments and the rest of life stuff. Another project was the last thing I needed. But I felt drawn to put my work with tarot into some kind of discussion and learning resource for others. 

I started dabbling in a few ideas and pondering how it might look. Then wondered, I love tarot and love working with tarot, but do I really want to dedicate a huge chunk of my life and work to teaching tarot for writers? I was meant to be focussing my efforts on more profitable writing niches. I’d done the data crunching on tarot – it will not make me rich! Do I want to add tarot to my brand? So I want to “come out” as a tarot reader so publicly? Note, I don’t actually keep tarot life a secret, I just don’t discuss it with the general people in my life. If it comes up as a topic – however that might be, I never run from it, but I like to keep it personal (or I did before I wrote books and blogs about it, I guess!)

So I drew three cards and called them past, present, the answer.

Past was the reversed Queen of Shields (the name for pentacles in the Legend deck I used). A card about mistrust and an unhealthy preoccupation with money, and inner conflicts about work and home balance.

Future was Queen of Spears (wands), a card that speaks of spiritual and intellectual strength, pursuing aspirations and guiding others.

And the answer was the Knight of Cups, a romantic card that speaks of courage and idealism, action towards passions, and permission to be lead by imagination, emotion, and intuition. 

This was from a fully shuffled deck and here was my life spelled out in three cards.

So you can thank that Knight of Cups for making Tarot Writers a reality. 

Maybe it’s a case of positive reinforcement. I really wanted to do this project against advice to the contrary. But why those cards? Why not an answer card that suggested focus or more pragmatic action?

Maybe because of magic?

Overall, while I keep firm to my belief that the cards are tools we use to prompt our thinking, sometimes it seems like there is an unseen hand guiding those specific cards to our spreads.

It’s up to you to decide whether that’s magic.

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