Using tarot readings for direct yes or no questions can be tricky, and is usually recommended against. So of course, I have made it a point to learn how to do this at least somewhat reliably. There are a couple of different techniques to get a simple “yes or no” from a tarot deck in most situations.

I’ve created this spread for my birthday! But anyone can use it! I feel like it’s a great spread to do when reviewing a year that has gone by! Enjoy it! Have an awesome day! <3

I've been reading for over ten years, but I still don't remember all of the meanings of the cards off the top of my head. I don't actually remember any of them (save for death, but that's because I used to spend hours and hours defending the card as neither good nor bad). 

I feel ashamed when I do readings in person because of this. I want to be a part of the community, but I've seen so many people sneer when I pull out my journal with my basic meanings jotted down. It makes me feel less than, even though I have more experience than some of these people.

I make up for it for my reader by meditating on the combined meaning with them there, making small talk about them to gain more insight, asking related questions, trying to get to know them so I know why these cards are drawn to them.

Once that's done, I spend 10-30 minutes looking at the physical cards and divining meaning from the aesthetics. I look at the colours and think about what they mean to me and what they might mean to others. I look for patterns in the cards, I look at the names. I look at the way they ended up on the table, the way the light shines on them (how many times have my readings changed because one card had more sheen than another?)

I use my terrible memory to work on getting them feeling comfortable and for them to think about more than a meaning of the name of the card - all of my decks are different, each of them speaks to someone for a different reason and there is more than enough information on each card to do a reading without the name of the card.

So what is an archetype? Google search reveals: “A very typical example of a person or thing.” Or, “an original that has been imitated.” While I don’t think that these are entirely inaccurate, to me they do fall a little short. While I can’t say what an archetype “is,” I will say that it feels a little more like a pattern than anything else. It’s like a “core pattern” that expresses itself across…

In the last article, “Each of Us, A Haunted House” I was playing with the idea of invocation & the presence of various intelligences. I briefly touched on some qualities of symbol, which I’d like to elaborate on. There’s a lot to explore here, so this is more of an investigation into the practical side of what I might term, “symbolic consciousness.”

Symbols have always been a quintessential part…

Each of Us, a Haunted House

Okay, now we’re getting into some seriously strange country. Dear readers, the concepts presented herein are written for entertaining consideration. In no way am I prescribing the exploration of these topics, as things in these regards tend to get rather… Strange! Despite these cautionary disclaimers, I want to say up front that this article is rather important to me, so a preemptive thank you is…

Re-Defining Your Relationship to the Tarot

So in this previous article, I wrote about the relationship to the Tarot using computer analogy.I won’t bother with re-explaining the original topic, as this article is intended for the reader to consider further use of that analogy.

To begin, however, I will take a minute to re-establish the cornerstone of this idea. I believe that any oracle works because we “program meaning” into it. When one…

So I began an experiment today, and I’m feeling pretty good about it. I plan to continue on this train for awhile – in some ways it’s the practical synthesis of how I have seen the Tarot for some time but hadn’t fully integrated it into my practice.

This morning I got out of bed without sleeping at all, because of some environmental noise factors that kept me up all evening (the details behind…