If you would like to learn to read tarot cards, but have no idea who to ask to teach you or how to go about it, the following tips should help you get started on your path to telling fortunes just like a pro!

Your first challenge is to choose a deck from the 8,000 or so published brands of fortune telling cards on the market. What works for one person often doesn't for another. Some people are comfortable reading several decks and others only identify psychically from a single brand. Your local bookstore will probably carry several choices of decks and the online store at Llewellyn Publishing also has a selection of introductory Tarot. However, I highly recommend going to a store, picking up a deck and seeing if you like the feel of the cards. The feel, weight or look of the cards often "speaks" to you. If you a feel a connection with the images on the cards or even how they feel in your hands, then that is probably the deck that you will relate to best.

I also recommend a deck that comes with a small book inside the package or box so you will have something to quickly reference if you should get lost in the meaning of the cards. When I first read the Tarot, I typed myself up a one sheet that a resembled a chart on a computer so that all the meanings of each card right side up and upside down were apparent to me at a glance.

Your next step would be to get acquainted with your cards. The best way to learn is to study the image on each card, one at a time, while memorizing it’s meaning. Be patient. There are usually 78 meanings to learn so this is not always a fast process. Some tarot teachers recommend that you put the deck of cards under your pillow at night so you can get better acquainted with them. The idea is that your subconscious will absorb the meaning. You can also meditate or dream upon the individual cards in the same way by placing them under your pillow.

Some people like to charge their cards after they first get them, either by praying or meditating over them, passing them through the smoke of incense or placing them in the light of the full or new moon for a night. Finicky readers believe the power of the cards is enhanced if they are placed inside a special box, pouch or wrapped in a silk pouch. I personally don't think this makes much of a difference but pomp and circumstance is supposed to add to the power of all ritual and magic, so if storing your cards in a special way or in a special place helps you read them better than by all means do so.

Also many readers protect their cards by not letting anyone touch them. There is a belief that others can "infect" the cards with their beliefs, fears or anxieties. The cards do act as a portal through to the other side, so keeping them away from other people may be a good way of preventing people from accidentally "touching" you through the cards and passing along possibly toxic energy.

This however brings up issues when it is time to decide who is actually going to shuffle the cards. Some readers hand the cards over to the questioner and others prefer to always do the shuffling and never let the cards be tainted by another's hands. My personal take on this is that if you don't like the person's energy, shuffle them yourself, or even -- don't do the reading at all!

Most Tarot decks consist of 78 cards: 22 Major Arcana, and 56 Minor Arcana cards. The Minor Arcana consist of four "suits”, just like a deck of regular playing cards...

The four suits are:

Pentacles (or Disks or Coins), which deal with work/money/success issues.

Wands (or Staffs), which deal with more spiritual issues

Cups, which deal with emotional issues,

Swords, which some see as representing negative experiences and loss.

When starting out, I highly recommend making your life easy, and getting the person to ask you a question out loud. Both parties should focus on the question while you shuffle the cards. As you get more experienced or confident with the cards, you won't care if they ask a question, but repeating the questioner's question out loud yourself does seem to assist the divination process. Shuffle the cards until the person you are reading for feels it is "right" to stop or until you feel it is right to "stop”. After you are done cutting, you need to cut the deck. Most readers divide the deck into three piles. At this point you can either have the person you are reading for pick which pile to pick up as the top of the deck, or you can pick them up in an order that feels right to you. Another option, is to fan the cards out face down, and have the person you are reading for pick out the cards they want you to read

Two Simple Spreads:

The Three-Card Spread:

This spread is good for yes or no questions. After you are done cutting the deck lay the cards out from left to right.

1 represents the past/issues affecting the problem.
2 represents the present/problem.
3 represents the future/outcome.

You may also choose to use the three-card spread as a "Mind, Body, Spirit" spread to get a general reading on how a person is doing in those areas of their life.

The Celtic-Cross Spread

Lay out the cards on the table in the following order:

1 is placed face up it represents the person asking the question and the foundation of the matter.

2 is placed across sideways the first card and represents obstacles or issues dealt with the person in the present.

3 is placed beneath the first two represents what is on the subconscious mind of the questioner and everything he or she has been through with regards to the matter.

4 is placed above of the first two represents the potential and the best that can be accomplished given the choices the questioner has made so far in his life regarding that matter.

5 is placed to the left of the center card represents what has transpired in the past.

6 is placed to the right of the first two, represents what will take place in the immediate future.

7, 8, 9, 10 are laid out from bottom to top to the right of these cards.

7 represents the fears of the person. Generally, this card will show you what is inside of them that is blocking him or her from reaching the desired outcome. It can also represent the atmosphere or influences that strongly affect the questioner.

8 represents how others see the person or the situation.

9 represents the hopes and fears that the questioner might have for the future.

10 represents the predicted outcome of the situation or the actual answer to the question.

Some individuals like to keep pulling an additional six to ten cards after this cross is laid down to determine what will happen in the future.

It is important to remember, that no matter what maps or directions you are given, Tarot reading is an intuitive art and after you do it enough you will begin to develop an intuitive sense of what the cards mean when they are placed in relationship to each other. Happy Reads! 

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The Fool

Divinatory Meanings

Folly, mania, extravagance, intoxication, delirium, frenzy, bewrayment.

Divinatory Meanings - Reversed

Negligence, absence, distribution, carelessness, apathy, nullity, vanity.

 

 

Inner Symbolism

With light step, as if earth and its trammels had little power to restrain him, a young man in gorgeous vestments pauses at the brink of a precipice among the great heights of the world; he surveys the blue distance before him-its expanse of sky rather than the prospect below. His act of eager walking is still indicated, though he is stationary at the given moment; his dog is still bounding. The edge which opens on the depth has no terror; it is as if angels were waiting to uphold him, if it came about that he leaped from the height. His countenance is full of intelligence and expectant dream. He has a rose in one hand and in the other a costly wand, from which depends over his right shoulder a wallet curiously embroidered. He is a prince of the other world on his travels through this one-all amidst the morning glory, in the keen air. The sun, which shines behind him, knows whence he came, whither he is going, and how he will return by another path after many days. He is the spirit in search of experience. Many symbols of the Instituted Mysteries are summarized in this card, which reverses, under high warrants, all the confusions that have preceded it.
In his Manual of Cartomancy, Grand Orient has a curious suggestion of the office of Mystic Fool, as apart of his process in higher divination; but it might call for more than ordinary gifts to put it into operation. We shall see how the card fares according to the common arts of fortune-telling, and it will be an example, to those who can discern, of the fact, otherwise so evident, that the Trumps Major had no place originally in the arts of psychic gambling, when cards are used as the counters and pretexts. Of the circumstances under which this art arose we know, however, very little. The conventional explanations say that the Fool signifies the flesh, the sensitive life, and by a peculiar satire its subsidiary name was at one time the alchemist, as depicting folly at the most insensate stage.

Description

21.--which, however, in most of the arrangements is the cipher card, number nothing--The Fool, Mate, or Unwise Man. Court de Gebelin places it at the head of the whole series as the zero or negative which is presupposed by numeration, and as this is a simpler so also it is a better arrangement. It has been abandoned because in later times the cards have been attributed to the letters of the Hebrew alphabet, and there has been apparently some difficulty about allocating the zero symbol satisfactorily in a sequence of letters all of which signify numbers. In the present reference of the card to the letter Shin, which corresponds to 200, the difficulty or the unreason remains. The truth is that the real arrangement of the cards has never transpired. The Fool carries a wallet; he is looking over his shoulder and does not know that he is on the brink of a precipice; but a dog or other animal--some call it a tiger--is attacking him from behind, and he is hurried to his destruction unawares. Etteilla has given a justifiable variation of this card--as generally understood--in the form of a court jester, with cap, bells and motley garb. The other descriptions say that the wallet contains the bearer's follies and vices, which seems bourgeois and arbitrary.

 

The Magician

Divinatory Meanings

Skill, diplomacy, address, subtlety; sickness, pain, loss, disaster, snares of enemies; self-confidence, will; the Querent, if male.

Divinatory Meanings - Reversed

Physician, Magus, mental disease, disgrace, disquiet.

 

Inner Symbolism

A youthful figure in the robe of a magician, having the countenance of divine Apollo, with smile of confidence and shining eyes. Above his head is the mysterious sign of the Holy Spirit, the sign of life, like an endless cord, forming the figure 8 in a horizontal position . About his waist is a serpent-cincture, the serpent appearing to devour its own tail. This is familiar to most as a conventional symbol of eternity, but here it indicates more especially the eternity of attainment in the spirit. In the Magician's right hand is a wand raised towards heaven, while the left hand is pointing to the earth. This dual sign is known in very high grades of the Instituted Mysteries; it shews the descent of grace, virtue and light, drawn from things above and derived to things below. The suggestion throughout is therefore the possession and communication of the Powers and Gifts of the Spirit. On the table in front of the Magician are the symbols of the four Tarot suits, signifying the elements of natural life, which lie like counters before the adept, and he adapts them as he wills. Beneath are roses and lilies, the flos campi and lilium convallium, changed into garden flowers, to shew the culture of aspiration. This card signifies the divine motive in man, reflecting God, the will in the liberation of its union with that which is above. It is also the unity of individual being on all planes, and in a very high sense it is thought, in the fixation thereof. With further reference to what I have called the sign of life and its connexion with the number 8, it may be remembered that Christian Gnosticism speaks of rebirth in Christ as a change "unto the Ogdoad." The mystic number is termed Jerusalem above, the Land flowing with Milk and Honey, the Holy Spirit and the Land of the Lord. According to Martinism, 8 is the number of Christ.

Description

1. The Magus, Magician, or juggler, the caster of the dice and mountebank, in the world of vulgar trickery. This is the colportage interpretation, and it has the same correspondence with the real symbolical meaning that the use of the Tarot in fortune-telling has with its mystic construction according to the secret science of symbolism. I should add that many independent students of the subject, following their own lights, have produced individual sequences of meaning in respect of the Trumps Major, and their lights are sometimes suggestive, but they are not the true lights. For example, Éliphas Lévi says that the Magus signifies that unity which is the mother of numbers; others say that it is the Divine Unity; and one of the latest French commentators considers that in its general sense it is the will.

The High Priestess

Divinatory Meanings

Secrets, mystery, the future as yet unrevealed; the woman who interests the Querent, if male; the Querent herself, if female; silence, tenacity; mystery, wisdom, science.

Divinatory Meanings - Reversed

Passion, moral or physical ardour, conceit, surface knowledge.

 

Inner Symbolism

She has the lunar crescent at her feet, a horned diadem on her head, with a globe in the middle place, and a large solar cross on her breast. The scroll in her hands is inscribed with the word Tora, signifying the Greater Law, the Secret Law and the second sense of the Word. It is partly covered by her mantle, to shew that some things are implied and some spoken. She is seated between the white and black pillars--J. and B.--of the mystic Temple, and the veil of the Temple is behind her: it is embroidered with palms and pomegranates. The vestments are flowing and gauzy, and the mantle suggests light--a shimmering radiance. She has been called occult Science on the threshold of the Sanctuary of Isis, but she is really the Secret Church, the House which is of God and man. She represents also the Second Marriage of the Prince who is no longer of this world; she is the spiritual Bride and Mother, the daughter of the stars and the Higher Garden of Eden. She is, in fine, the Queen of the borrowed light, but this is the light of all. She is the Moon nourished by the milk of the Supernal Mother.
In a manner, she is also the Supernal Mother herself--that is to say, she is the bright reflection. It is in this sense of reflection that her truest and highest name in bolism is Shekinah--the co-habiting glory. According to Kabalism, there is a Shekinah both above and below. In the superior world it is called Binah, the Supernal Understanding which reflects to the emanations that are beneath. In the lower world it is MaIkuth--that world being, for this purpose, understood as a blessed Kingdom that with which it is made blessed being the Indwelling Glory. Mystically speaking, the Shekinah is the Spiritual Bride of the just man, and when he reads the Law she gives the Divine meaning. There are some respects in which this card is the highest and holiest of the Greater Arcana.

Description

2. The High Priestess, the Pope Joan, or Female Pontiff; early expositors have sought to term this card the Mother, or Pope's Wife, which is opposed to the symbolism. It is sometimes held to represent the Divine Law and the Gnosis, in which case the Priestess corresponds to the idea of the Shekinah. She is the Secret Tradition and the higher sense of the instituted Mysteries.