Tarot — What’s in your cards?
I have friends who tell me they want a tarot reading, but they’re afraid of getting a scary card or bad news – always a version of “It might all be real, but I don’t want to know!”
Let’s get the fear out of the way – let’s read one of the scariest cards together, right now. Brace yourself – we’re going in.
So in our pretend reading, you just asked a great open-ended question. “What’s getting in the way of meeting this long-term goal I have?” We asked Spirit to provide the cards you need to see, and then I did a three card spread to represent your goal, the obstacle, and the way forward.
And to your great dismay, there’s the DEVIL CARD in the obstacle position – right there in the middle of the table. EEEEK!
I’ll admit – it’s creepy looking. The Devil card in my deck is a picture of a goat-man with horns. He has wings and a halo of diamonds, and he’s framed by a deep red background. Bad news all around, right? Not really.
You’ll try to stifle a gasp when you see the card, and I’ll smile. You’ll think I’m evil for a second, but then we’ll laugh and agree to keep going.
I’ll say “What a freaky dude! What do you see in that image?”
You’ll describe his giant twisty horns, and his bare chest and shoulders. You’ll notice the diamonds behind him.
Me: “This card is traditionally read as a warning about hoarding something – money, power, attention, fear. Could there be something that you’re clutching tightly? Something that you don’t really need – that might not be serving you, but you’re just in the habit of holding it tightly?”
Of course there is – you’re a human being. You’ll mention something you’ve been unreasonably worried about, or something you can’t stop craving and mention that it’s making you a little crazy.
Then I’ll point out those tiny (tiny!) wings, and I’ll ask you to notice how one wing is positioned on the goat-man’s back, but the one on the other side is on the front of his shoulder, not the back. If he tries to fly anywhere, not only will his wings be too teeny to lift him off the ground, but he’d be going in small, mopping the floor, circles. His badass devil wings are TOTALLY INEFFECTIVE. He’ll look like an idiot the moment he tries to exit dramatically.
And we’ll laugh at him for a second. I’ll ask “Could there be a question in there about something you’re hanging onto really intensely that you don’t need? Could your armor, or cool tricks, be getting in your way at all?”
Well, again, YES. That’s how we humans roll. We think our glamorous props are what matters about us, but the people who know and love us are clear that those extras are just our security blankets. We don’t really need them at all.
We’ll keep chatting about the devil card, but by then the fear has dissipated – now you’re into the questions. That card is just an invitation to ask:
Where am I putting my attention? Do I really care about the thing I’m spending so much energy on?
Am I hoarding things that don’t serve me? Do I want to keep doing that?
Do I crave more power or money (or ____) than I have? Have I been honest with myself about that? What do I really want?
OF COURSE we all have obstacles, and of course we create some of them ourselves. That’s just how it goes. This card is an invitation to look at all that in a new way, without panic or blame, and to wonder if there are more nourishing ways to navigate these questions.
That’s how a “scary” card in a tarot reading could go. There’s no such thing as a terrible card. And you won’t leave our session with a magic potion or a love charm, but you’ll have more insight and encouragement about something that matters to you.
The mystical part of tarot is the way the cards show up. It’s wild. In a deck of 78 well-shuffled, cut, and reshuffled cards, I routinely pull a few specific cards when I am reading for myself. When I read for other people, those cards don’t show up. Spirit brings us what we need, and then lets us decide how to use the info and the questions. It would be my privilege to read the cards with you.
