Hey honey, hope you're fine. I would like to ask you a question, do you have any tips or advice for a beginner in tarot? Cause I bought my first tarot deck :) (finally ahah) You did me 2 readings and you were very accurate! Have a nice day ❤️
Hey there, dear, I’m doing well, thank you 🌸, hope you’re well, too.
I feel extremely humbled that you ask me so I went ahead and wrote down what worked for me and what I would want to have been told when I began learning. Below, I covered some things that came to my mind instantly but it might not be a very sound beginner post.
Take what works, dear, and leave what feels off or “wrong” ❤︎
Get a deck that has art that touches you, that has art you feel connected to, and which you do not feel “forced” to look at.
Try to pick a deck that shows illustrated scenes. There are many great decks out there which have a pip style (4 sticks or wands for 4 of wands), but for a beginner, seeing a scene on the card (for the 4 of wands it’s two people waving, looking happy, as if celebrating something) makes learning much easier.
The Rider-Waite-Smith Tarot Deck is very popular and while it’s not the prettiest to look at, I recommend it for study purposes.
If you do get a pip-style deck, try to get your hands on a cheap copy of a Rider-Waite-Smith deck. When you draw your card or lay out a spread with your pip-style deck, lay the same spread with your cheap copy of the RWS so you can look at the images there for help with interpretation.
You do not need an expensive silk cloth or an artistically crafted wooden box to store it. You can, but a shawl, an old T-Shirt, leftover material of a blanket or pillow cover, or scarf is enough to protect your deck from rough surfaces, dust, and too much light.
If you want to take your deck with you, make sure you don’t put it into your bag unprotected. Especially not if there are things in your bag that can scratch the card or get them wet or sticky. I recommend buying a small bag to put it in. My own bag was 7 Euro, it’s a durable material that won’t immediately let water pass through, and it is big enough for the cards not to get bend or angled in any way.
If you chose not to take it with you, make sure to place it somewhere where not too much sunlight can reach it. Not because it will negatively affect its energy, but because depending on the style (most of mine are rather dark), the color can fade quicker than it would usually.
I like to put a clear quartz crystal or amethyst crystal with my decks in their bags or at least on their bags but that is just personal preference.
Make sure to not use your deck on dirty surfaces, too rough surfaces, or dusty surfaces. I would recommend making sure that if cards fall to the floor, the patch of floor is clean enough for them not to get soiled.
Put it near you or under your pillow when you sleep.
Keep it with you throughout your day if possible.
Shuffle it throughout the day, talk to it, take time out of your day to just look at the imagery. Don’t bother about keywords yet or about “doing it right or wrong” - there is no right or wrong.
Take it to a favorite place of yours and sit with it there.
Sit with it on your balcony, at the window, hold it and just spend some time together.
Use it, either draw a card daily with the intention to learn about the drawn card that day or ask it questions and try to interpret them with your intuition through what you get from the imagery on the cards you drew.
There are spreads all over Tumblr to “get to know your deck”, but honestly, you can ask it any question. I love talking to my decks when I get to know them. I ask them what they want me to respect about them, what they don’t like, I tell them I will take good care of them, that I will include them in my day either with using them or just carrying them around, I promise mine to spend time with them after each reading as I feel uncomfortable just putting them away after receiving advice and guidance from them. I wouldn’t turn around and leave a friend in such a situation, so I wouldn’t do so with my deck either. However, that is my personal practice and by no means something you need to do, dear.
openlibrary.org has many books available on Tarot. There are biddytarot and other websites offering keywords for interpretations, there is a whole lot of books written just with keywords - pick one thing, perhaps the guidebook your deck came with and go with that for getting down the basics. If the keywords of your guidebook don’t resonate at all, find a different source and study with that.
Do yourself a favor and don’t overwhelm yourself, dear. Pick one resource, then go through it top to bottom. Pick one to three keywords for each card max. Decide beforehand if you want to read with reversals or without. Take it slow, honey.
Once you picked a source of information you feel comfortable studying from, get yourself a notebook and a pen - doesn’t need to be fancy either. Write down the card, your own thoughts, what you see, and then take a look at your resource. Pick one to three keywords from the resource of your choice.
I recommend doing one or two cards max a day, with reversals or not. You may want to pull a card each evening in terms of “What energy was most dominating in my day today” and see if you can somehow relate this card to your day. Use your own thoughts first, dear. Your intuition always weighs more than a generic keyword from a book.
Again, trust your intuition. Keep in mind how a card makes you feel, do you tense when you see it? Do you smile? Is there a pressure in your chest or stomach when you look at it? Do you feel light? Even if you don’t really have any thoughts for a card, there almost always is a feeling you have when you draw it.
Start with small spreads - two cards to three cards max. Go slow, write down the positions of your spread, the question asked, and then just dive in. Write down a description of what you see if you have to, sometimes it takes a while to get your intuition flowing.
Watch where people or objects point at, for example where do the court cards look? Where does the Hermits lantern point at? Where is the hand of the Queen Of Swords reaching out to?
Look for dominating suits, do cards “jump out” while you shuffle? On this aspect, note these cards. If a lot fall out, you just need a bit more practice when it comes to shuffling but if only one jumps out, or perhaps two or three at max. in one shuffle, then they usually carry a message they want you to know.
An entry in your tarot journal might look like this:
Question and dateThe card(s)your own thoughtsthings that caught your attentionkeywords according to your chosen sourceyour thoughts on how the keywords relate (or why they don’t)a reflection a few days or weeks later, depending on the question
You do not need a ritual to “awaken” your cards, the moment you touch them, open the package, handle them, talk to them, they are yours, dear.
Be respectful to them as you would be with a dear friend
Before your first use, hold them into the sunlight, knock on the back three times and imagine white light flowing into them - this is you cleansing them off any lingering energies.
You DO NOT need to cleanse them regularly. If they feel off or whacky in their answers, they most likely are just “tired” and need a rest. I like laying mine into the sun or moonlight once in a while. Personally, cleansing them regularly would feel like resetting their “memories” of our readings, my energy, the things I’ve told them and what we did together by that point.
You do not need a teacher to be a tarotist. You do not need a family that practices tarot for generations to be a tarotist. It does not matter what religion you have - you can practice tarot regardless, do not let anyone tell you otherwise. Tarot is not evil and it can not invite evil spirits in your home.
keep a tarot journal oh dear please do, it will help you so so so much in the long run
if you feel like wanting to have a more ritualistic approach to reading, go ahead, dear. Make your own ritual, perhaps follow someone else’s ritual - whatever makes you comfortable.
meditate regularly with your cards on your lap as if inviting them to join you, it helps with bonding and helps you with keeping your mind “open” for the card’s answers. Try to feel their energy, try to picture them in your mind.
Lastly, Tarot differs greatly from one reader to another, find what makes you happy and enthusiastic about it and keep to that, no matter what the opinion of any other reader is. This is yours through and through, darling, no one has a say in your practice.
Reach out to others who already read Tarot when you have a specific question. Most will gladly answer your questions, dear.
Did I already mention to always trust your gut? Because always trust your gut.
