The Suit Of Cups Tarot Card Meanings

1 ACE OF CUPS

Meaning: Beauty and pleasure, fullness, goodness, fertility, productiveness.

Reversed: Erosion, sterility, clouded joy, false heart.
2 OF CUPS - Love

Meaning: The unity of male and female in the broadest sense: can be inner harmony, can be relationship between two people based on equality, warm friendship, partnership, love-relationship. Perfect harmony, radiating joy and ecstasy.

Reversed: Unsatisfactory love, false friendship, crossed desires, misunderstandings, divorce, separation.
3 OF CUPS - Abundance

Meaning: Plenty, overflowing, sensuality. The good things of life, enjoy them while they are there, because the won't last forever.

Reversed: Loss of prestige. Delays.
4 OF CUPS - Luxury

Meaning: Pleasure or success mixed with anxiety, because it is decaying/coming to an end.

Reversed: Injustice, weakness.
5 OF CUPS - Disappointment

Meaning: Disturbance when least expected, frustration, disappointment in relationships, misfortune, sadness.

Reversed: Learn from your disappointments.
6 OF CUPS - Pleasure

Meaning: Well-being, harmony, ease, satisfaction, sexual pleasure, happiness.

Reversed: Thanklessness, not being able to enjoy, always making conditions.
7 OF CUPS - Debauch

Meaning: Fantasy, delusion, imagination. Illusionary success. Addiction or intoxication (alcohol , drugs, food, sex, etc.).

Reversed: Back to reality.
8 OF CUPS - Indolence

Meaning: Abandoned success, discontinuance of effort, decline of interest in anything, depression, misery.

Reversed: Effort continued until full success is attained. Recovery from depression.
9 OF CUPS - Happiness

Meaning: Joy, gladness, delight, pleasure and happiness, material attainment, good health, complete success.

Reversed: Material loss, mistakes, imperfections, vanity, self-praise.
10 OF CUPS - Satiety

Meaning: Emotional contentment and satisfaction, fulfillment followed by letting go (everything comes to an end).

Reversed: Waste, stagnation, debauchery.
PRINCESS OF CUPS

Meaning: A very gracious, sweet, tender, sensitive person. Meditative. Loyalty. Paranormal advice. A very helpful person.

Reversed: Indolent, selfish, luxurious person. A flatterer.
PRINCE OF CUPS

Meaning: Expressing and controlling deep, passionate desires. Following your deepest heart. Letting your soul take you into new directions. In secrecy and silence searching for power and wisdom in your life.

Reversed: Evil, merciless person with overweening ambition.
QUEEN OF CUPS

Meaning: Reflection and reception. Poetical. Gift of vision. Medium. Intuitive inner wisdom. Devoted, soft person. Sensitive, loving intimacy.

Reversed: Diffusion, dreaminess, irrationality, confusion, deceit, delusion, fears and nightmares.
KNIGHT OF CUPS

Meaning: Sensitive, wise counselor. Openness. Innocence. Showing your feelings, following your spontaneous insights. Compassion.

Reversed: Sensual, idle, untruthful, charlatan. Tendency to melancholy.



Books You Might Enjoy:

Phil Hine - Aspects Of Tantra
Ophiel - The Art Practice Of Caballa Magic
Anonymous - The Secret Book Of Artephius

The Major Arcana And Suits In Tarot Cards

It is very easy to learn how to read tarot cards. You do not need any special psychic abilities, although using tarot cards can be a very good way to develop your intuition, if you would like to do that.

You can approach learning to read tarot cards in a logical, systematic way. The easiest way to do that is if you have a deck of tarot cards where there are clear pictures. The Rider Waite deck of tarot cards is ideal for this purpose.

Traditionally a deck of tarot cards consists of 78 cards, which are broken down into five sections. These are the Major Arcana and the Four Suits.

The Major Arcana is made up of 22 cards.

If you see a lot of Major Arcana cards in a reading or a spread, then it is likely that those issues are very important and deep-rooted and that the impact of the situations may well be there for some time.

The Major Arcana covers virtually every aspect of your life. It can also be seen as a more spiritual journey and the lessons that need to be learnt to move through various life situations.

The Major Arcana also indicate personality archetypes. These may be things that we can recognise in ourselves or see in others. Although the figures in the cards may show as male or female, the characteristics can relate to either gender.

Major Arcana cards can also represent events.

Suits

The rest of the deck is made up of four suits. These can be compared to the suits in a deck of playing cards. They consist of an Ace, cards 2 – 10 and four court cards, which are Page, Knight, Queen and King. All the cards in each suit relate to the same element, which makes learning to read tarot cards quite easy.

The first is the Suit of Cups, which usually represent matters to do with emotions and feelings.

Astrologically they represent the element of Water and the signs of Cancer, Scorpio and Pisces.

The next is the Suit of Wands, which refer to matters to do with action, work, career, business, creativity, moving forward.

Wands are represented by the element of Fire and can point to the zodiac signs of Aries, Leo and Sagittarius.

Then we have the Suit of Swords, which points towards mental activity and head stuff with thoughts, ideas, fears, logic.

Swords represent the element Air and the astrological signs of Gemini, Libra and Aquarius.

Lastly, we have the Suit of Pentacles, which represent money, material things, matters to do with the earth and the home.

Pentacles represent the element of Earth and the astrological signs of Taurus, Virgo and Capricorn.

The Major Arcana and the Suits are the cornerstones of learning to read tarot cards. Once you understand the general principals, it is much easier to break your learning down into bite-sized chunks.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Stephen William Hawking - Space And Time Warps
Frater Achad - Crystal Vision Through Crystal Gazing
Swetha Lodha - Your Love Life And The Tarot Cards
Jester Raiin - Major Arcana 2nd Update And 1st Typohunt

Tarot And Politics

Lately, I’ve been thrown off balance by the number of tarot readers who venture into politics online. Today, someone I admire greatly for her kindness and generosity promoted a Deepak Chopra essay on Sarah Palin that was so vitriolic and mean-spirited that it literally took my breath away.

You can go read Chopra’s work for yourself, if you like. It’s a pretty straightforward attack on conservatives. Chopra writes that Republicans represent the shadow side of life, and he says that Republicans base their opinions on fear, rejection, hostility to change, and narrow-mindedness.

Here’s what the tarot community needs to remember, though: Half of this country is conservative. Half of this country regularly votes Republican. Half of the people you meet in everyday life lean toward the right, and half of the people who might be interested in learning or reading about tarot could very well disagree with you politically.

What’s more, no conservative would ever agree with Chopra’s assessment of their beliefs — and no conservative could ever feel comfortable confiding in a tarot reader who publicly suggests, as Chopra does, that Republicans are a demoralizing force who exhort others to obey their worst impulses.

On a practical level, I’m always shocked when tarot readers attack conservatives. As a professional tarot reader and an author, I don’t think I can afford to antagonize half of my prospective clients and readers.

I also think that political attacks cross an ethical boundary we need to recognize. Most of us would never demean a client based on religious beliefs or cultural differences. We go out of our way to be non-judgmental when it comes to other characteristics that define us as individuals, like race and sexuality.

For some reason, however, political opinions don’t fall under the same umbrella of compassion and protection. In fact, politics seem to be the only arena in which tarot readers regularly feel free to make insulting remarks about other people; you can hardly go to a tarot conference or symposium in which most of the speakers don’t make disparaging jokes about conservatives and Republicans.

I don’t think we should keep going down this road. It’s not healthy on a personal level, to feel either on the defensive or on the attack.

It doesn’t suit us professionally, either. As tarot readers, we’re already marginalized enough. A lot of us even know what it feels like to be demonized for our beliefs. We face an uphill battle when it comes to gaining respect from the general public — and we don’t need to go looking for people to hurt or offend.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Zoroaster - The Chaldean Oracles
Marcus Bottomley - Nine Proven Magical Rites
Anonymous - Wicca Beliefs And Practices
Sepharial - A Manual Of Occultism
Archmage Bob Andrews - Old Witchcraft Secrets

Tarot Numerology Eights

The tarot can be understood better if the underlying numerology is understood. Cards of the same number in different suits and in the Major Arcana have similar meanings derived from the following qualities...

Corresponding - Major Arcana - Strength

Major characteristics: Power, Success, Progression to a new phase or cycle.

Also: Regeneration, a fresh sense of direction, completion of one stage of a project before moving on, setting new priorities, new ways forward, balance, stability, control, reorganization, enterprise, executive ability, harmonizing opposing forces, death of the old to make way for the new.

Thing "twice four" for strongly stable, and "seven plus one" for spiritually stable and wise.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Tuesday Lobsang Rampa - Candlelight
Walter Scott - Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft
Thomas Muldoon - Numerology For The 21st Century

Tarot Devil Death And The Tower For Transformation

I am writing on these cards, to once again, share with others, what these Tarot cards mean, during these very new and changing times. Recently, someone that had read my article on "The Devil" shared with me what had happened in a phone reading. In this reading, they were told that they had a dark cloud over them and was surrounded by evil.

Well, to say I felt outraged by this, was putting it mildly. First, this is truly a false representation for what these cards mean, now...during 2010 and how humanity is awakening to the inner calling of their life; soul blueprinted awareness. Back in the day, when readings were done for another, Tarot cards in reversed positions, or the Devil, Death and the Tower were seen as true evil and negativity. However, based on what my journey has been and based on how I was guided to understand; truly understand, from a deeper level of perception and awareness, this is ABSOLUTELY NO LONGER TRUE.

Back in September of 1984, a friend of mine grew up in metaphysical and psychic awareness. She would be the very first person to do my first reading and soon become a guide on my own awakening journey. In this reading, she had done the Celtic Cross for me. My ending card in this layout was the Death card. Well, even tho I had no idea of the meaning of these cards...I knew deep down, that this card did not mean death in the physical sense, but Death of change to relationships or a known way of life.

In this moment, prior to my awakening journey, I knew that there was something on the horizon for me. Once my journey began, Death, Devil, Tower and reversed positions became the theme in the readings that I would do for myself. The more change I was experiencing, the more these cards would appear in my readings.

As an empath, with high intuition, shifting through a lot of changing emotional highs and lows, I knew that I needed to learn how to clear myself. I knew that I needed to go deep within for the answers to my questions and the true meaning for these cards. This became quite the journey.

It is now 27 years later, and the insight and wisdom that were gained, through deep inner awareness, became my godsend and the light through the many changes, challenges and obstacles that required and requested understanding and awareness.

When choosing a reader; be very, very clear about the purpose of your reading. Predictions take away your right to choose or be in true inner alignment with soul knowing. Ask questions or read up on the type of readings available. Readers; whether they are psychically reading or tuning in to another level, do not have the right to tamper with anyone else's personal space in this way. Whether we are tuning in psychically, energetically or consciously, being in tune, as our way of life, means that we are here to uplift the energy, not scare the crap out of another with this way of reading.

Each one of us, whether we choose to learn how to tap into our heart knowing, wisdom or soul awareness, have our own blueprint to our life journey and a good reader will guide their perspective client to tuning into their inner journey.

Be picky; be choosy about how and where to put your energy for a reading. Because these days, when a reading like this is done to another, not only are you feeling your own fear about the lack of information that was projected, but the reader just projected their own unclear energy into your personal space and if your skills are undeveloped at this level, this very energy can send you off into a tailspin.

We are living in very different times now. We are being called to clear our imprinting, by bringing understanding and awareness to our experiences, not to get rid of them or forget that they are there, but to bring them into balance, alignment and healing.

We all have a voice of wisdom. Some of us are naturally tuned to this way of life and some are just waking up to this way of life. And trust me, what I have shared here is not sugarcoated or watered down, but has been a 27 year experience to truly learn how to keep searching and digging for absolute clarity to the purpose of the experiences we are having now.

This is your journey...choose wisely...ask questions and listen to your gut.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Marcus Cordey - Magical Theory And Tradition
Tereza Burns - The Little Book Of Black Venus And The Three Fold Transformation Of Hermetic Astrology
Max Heindel - Ancient And Modern Initiation

Tarot Cards Meanings The Tower

The Tower ~ Rejuvenation, rebuilding and the break down of old ways, old forms and old patterns. The very first time I saw the Tower in a reading, I must admit, I felt tremendous fear; major change was on the horizon.

This card looks like violence and chaos are on the way, at least that's the way that I perceived this card, when I first began my journey learning about the Tarot and then eventually teaching the Tarot. It would be many years, through many, many experiences, that I would finally come to appreciate all that the Tower, in a reading, had to offer.

In our human nature, we become complacent with having things remain the same, with little or no change, thinking that no change is a safe place to be and to live. However, this is not true. Becoming complacent to our life and hoping for no change in our lives, prevents us from growing, learning and evolving into the adults that we are meant to be from heart centered and soul blueprinted awareness.

The Tower and the changes that the Tower represent can sometimes be scary, but it is through the breakdown and breakthrough of old forms of thinking, that we see the world and our life in a new light.

When my journey began with the Tarot back in the 80s, I remember the Tower coming up a lot in the readings that I did for myself. I also remember the Tower coming up when another was doing a reading for me. And although I had no deeper understanding to what was in the process of coming into my life and altering the course of my life drastically, I knew that it was going to be big.

It has been 25 years since the Tower first made its presence known to me. Everyday that I consider and contemplate the life changes, that at first began as negatives, shifting and transforming to challenges and obstacles, it would be through the Tarot, that I would finally understand that I was being challenged to grow, to step into my life's work and my life's path. The Tower insured that I would bring much needed insight and clarity to each changing experience in my life, until I learned how to utilize the gifts and tools of my awareness to truly understand that all negatives have the ability to transform into knowledge and awareness on our life journey.

So, if in a reading you see the Tower come up, have no fear. Remember that change is on its way and that with common sense, intuition and the tools of inner knowing, each of us can transform our experiences to ones of heart centered and soul blueprinted awareness.

For in truth, the Tower offers great opportunity to step into alignment with the true voice and wisdom of our own inner knowing.

In the end, the Tower offers us opportunities to build a much stronger, inner foundation in our lives.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Carl Mccolman - The Well Read Witch
Melita Denning - The Aurum Solis
Aristotle - On The Soul
Paul Foster Case - The Life Power

Tarot Card Fool Meanings

The Fool is one of the Major Arcana cards, and the tarot deck is based on the journey of the Fool, also the Major Arcana begins with this card and ends with the World. The Major Arcana represents the circle of life in all its complicated stages such as spirituality, mortality, love, and change. When a Major Arcana card shows up in a spread it often indicates that there are major changes and lessons to be learned. The circle or cycle of life is also a circle that happens many times in one lifetime, and is not just a chronological cycle, and it seems that most everything that happens to us in our lives as a beginning, a middle, and an end.

The journey of the Fool who is the first of the 22 Arcana cards starts with our birth. We emerge from the womb into the world of the unknown, the beginning of our journey from childhood to adulthood. It is worth stating at this stage that this card is a rite of passage card just like all the other Arcana cards. With the Fool as we reach the end of a journey we begin a new cycle, however, this new cycle will be either higher or deeper than the last one.

So when this card appears in a tarot spread it puts us on notice that a new chapter of life is about to begin. There is a call for us to step out into the unknown, take a risk, and trust that we will be supported. Even though we will not know whether the outcome will make us look foolish or give us the awareness we are looking for two allow us to go on to the next cycle.

The image on most tarot decks is usually depicted by a young and carefree person who is embarking on life's journey, and can represent an irrational need for change and freedom for the individual. This card is often associated with Uranus, the unpredictably powerful planet of change.

In the upright position the card indicates a need for change and a willingness to leap into the unknown in order to achieve this goal.

In the reversed position the Fool can indicate an individual's energy is low, and because of this they are unable to move forward in their challenging cycle, thus slowing them down on the circle of life.

In this article, I have tried to give some basic practical knowledge about the Fool, however, it is my belief that we should always allow our intuition and psychic ability to guide us in a tarot reading.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Marcus Cordey - Magical Theory And Tradition
John White - Toward Homo Noeticus
Aj Drew - Wicca For Couples Making Magick Together
Tuesday Lobsang Rampa - The Cave Of The Ancients
Aristotle - Metaphysics

Reclaiming Yourself In Tarot Ancient Space

I have great respect for the Tarot and its meaning in my life as an expression of awakened consciousness. In a holographic universe, where I know that I am an unique articulation of the whole - particle and wave at one and the same time - revering my own potential - the Tarot is a reminder for the genius of whom I AM to become the more that I can become.

All meaning is context dependent. That is a given. So, while I have spent over 10 years contemplating the brilliance of the Tarot’s Major Arcana, it has only been in the last two years, that I have uncovered so much more of its relevance to my potential. WEL-Systems® is the quantum portal to my expanding Self-discovery. It is all very exciting! The Tarot, then, has become internalized and fully alive as a body experience for me, no longer captive to my intellect.

It happened, like a dragon awakened and released from her cave, untethered for elevating and unending flight, when I decided to change my mind about my expectations of mySelf, relative to cultural conditioning and family systems... and to choose to live my life for me, first. I figured that ‘selflessly’ doing for others in denial of myself, as I had been taught to ‘do’ over the course of my life, had not worked... ever... so, I simply chose to ‘be’ myself and to stop ‘doing’ what I had, until then, perceived as desired by others. I learned to say ‘no’ to what I did not want and ‘yes’ to what I did want. I chose to stop performing. I chose to stop ‘dying’ to be right, because the default to that was killing me... slowly and by degrees - the metaphor of death by a thousand cuts.

The Tarot was never meant to divine the future as an absolute; it has ‘lived’ throughout the ages to evoke intuition - what we know as our internal art and our internal science - and the awakening of potential in what we do not know that we do not know about ourselves. That evocation is the invitation to inhale our experience and to exhale our restructured reality. It happens in every complete breath.

There are 22 trump cards called the major arcana based on the 4 elements of creation - earth, fire, air and water. From these 22 trump cards descend another 56 cards that constitute the minor arcana. The 22 majors are the meta and non-linear perspectives for life’s natural creation, evolution and death; for starting, changing and stopping; for being, doing and having. The 56 minors speak to the finer distinctions of the 22 majors - as archetypal signatures for the energies of the four elements. Further, each of the 78 cards, defines numerology, as an organizing principle for living life large with intensity.

As Great Works each, I wonder if we ever remember the very genius of whom we are as Quantum Biological Humans™. As quantum beings, our ability to create is purely the by-product of remembering whom we are and choosing what we want to see in our worlds. The ancient Tarot is as relevant, now, to the truth of human evolution, as it was when it was first imagined into existence. What presents is never, ever, about what presents. Life as Metaphor. The Tarot speaks to the idiom, ‘Because I say so!’

Tarot is the ancient and enduring template for how we naturally create our lives elementally - crystalizing what we imagine [sight] for ourSelves [light] through open, honest, clear and direct declaration [sound]. Space, as its infinite paradigm, has been the invitation for the creation of a multitude of Tarot Decks... all expressions of quantum genius in human form. So, the Tarot is not about the Tarot; It is about the ‘game’ of life and then some. And, it is all relative to the ‘cards’ we choose to ‘play’; If we do not like the cards we’ve dealt ourSelves, we can change them. We have to choose, first.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Tuesday Lobsang Rampa - The Thirteenth Candle
Tuesday Lobsang Rampa - The Cave Of The Ancients
Tuesday Lobsang Rampa - Wisdom Of The Ancients
Anonymous - Protection Of Space
Swetha Lodha - Your Love Life And The Tarot Cards

Nine Of Swords Meditation For Troubled Worries

Tarot Affirmations are positive statements using the Tarot, to center ourselves while energizing our Mojo! My goal is to help invigorate higher vibrations with creative visualization for self-awareness, while enhancing one's perspective, confidence, and productivity. Becoming part of the imagery is a necessity as it allows all senses to be encountered. Proclaiming and vocalizing your personal statement out-loud 'seals your agreement' with the Universe. Disciplined practitioners sense a significant change within seventy-two hours of repeating the oath. Inexperienced users must understand that it can take a little longer until you find your own rhythm to encounter the magic of will and assertion.

Meditation: Sit for a few minutes alone, with eyes closed and a goal to relax. Calm all thoughts and emotions until you are aware of the quietness that surrounds you. With slow and deep breaths, feel yourself float into this calm energy, feeling your body and mind also adjusting to this quietness. All the noise disappears and you feel at peace. Pay attention to the soundless spirit, as you cleanse and exist with silence.

Visualization: Today's card image can assist you in this meditative affirmation. We can start by thinking about the thoughts that have caused us doubt and confusion. What mental images do we focus on repetitively that create stress and fear in our lives? Like the nightmarish image in the card, we are the sole creator of our own inner torment. Understand that as we allow a disturbing snapshot of worry to live in our mind, another will breed from it, like bacteria. We know that this isn't good for us, but we choose to carry it along with us - throughout our day, and our night.

Think about your the bothering thoughts that cause you an uneasy feeling, the ones that you can not put to rest. Imagine each of these frightful thoughts hanging above you, dangling about like an unwanted friend. Anxiety and fear are not good companions. Visualize the negative energy floating over top of you, while paying attention to your body and the way it feels when inconvenience enters your world. Feel the pressure it causes. It doesn't feel very good, but again, you choose to carry it around with you. Continuing to visualize, reach above and grab your 'worry'. Hold it, and quickly slip it beneath your bottom. That's right, you're going to sit on it. If you have other worry's' up above you, do the same and slip them under you. You're going to force those towering thoughts of negativity to submit to you. They are not worthy, and by taking control - you give them an inferior status. Wiggle your butt, gently bounce, and flatten useless troubles of 'potential possibilities' and 'what if's'. Squash them hard, and smash those homies.

After you have shifted your body about, crushing what has been plaguing you... sit back and relax. Breathe with a long sigh of relief. Enjoy the position that you are in. You have complete control over your imagined problems. You have power over your mind again. Notice a feeling of pure emptiness that surrounds you. Your head is clear, your shoulders relax, your muscles lose tension. Breathe and release whatever ounce of worry might be left. Let it all out - and imagine it like a feather, floating from your breath. Let it fall to the floor so that you are ready to leave the room, you can step on it as you rise. The heavy weight that has been a burden is released, and only you have the power to keep it at a distance.

The Affirm: While being one with yourself, announce your trusted affirmation:
Worries are beneath me.
My mind is empty and at peace.
I see the world as it is, not as I imagine.

Now go get your mantra on!

Books You Might Enjoy:

Saint John Of The Cross - Dark Night Of The Soul
Order Of The Golden Dawn - Theoricus Initiation Of The Hermetic Order Of The Golden Dawn
Order Of The Golden Dawn - Meditation With The Archangel Auriel
Brian Swimme On Chardin - The Divinization Of The Cosmos
Anonymous - Meditation Of The Four Magickal Weapons

Learn Tarot By Listening To Tarot

The more things change, the more they are the same especially when it comes to human behavior. So many things appear to be happening...and they are...and yet there are templates that overlay the events, patterns and sequences that the events fit into. The question is: Where in the pattern, the sequence, are we? What template are we in?

The more life experience an aware person has, the more likely he is to know what is happening and what will happen because he 'has been there and done that.' He is keen to the sequence, he knows what happens when you.... Life experience allows one to intuit the sequence, see the patterns, and know what comes next. Life experience is what tells us not to do the same thing and expect a different result. (Life experience is the reason tribal people usually honor elders.)

Individual tarot cards represent points in the sequence, represent places in the pattern. When you apply the scene the card represents to the question at hand, you 'put two and two together' intuitively, you realize what the pattern is that is developing in the question at hand, and hopefully you come up with four. You usually do. As President Lincoln said, nothing is 100% !00% of the time, and I take that personally!

The more you know tarot, the less simplistic your reading of it is. Nuances and details in abundance are to be had in tarot. And the way you know tarot is to listen to it. (That is the way to learn generally, isn't it?) If you ask questions you know the answers to, to discover what the meaning of the cards is, you are listening to tarot.

The nuances and the details appear when you reach the point in learning tarot that you perceive meaning in combinations of cards, not just in single cards. The more cards you combine in your perception, the more details you get. Eventually in your learning of tarot, you will be able to look at a 13-card spread or layout and immediately understand the gist of the answer, then you look at the cards that surround those theme cards and get the details. Not the other way around, at least part of the time, at least on a good day.

Seeing themes, seeing 'theme cards' is what allows you this quick overview. Life experience with tarot is the way to arrive there. (Someone who already knows and teaches you is of course a shortcut.) What you do when the overview, the gist, comes immediately (or quickly) to mind is notice that in the different areas of the spread appear cards that mean a similar or the same thing—let's say leaving, or delay, or taking action. Okay, now you know the answer is about that particular thing. Now you know the other cards are modifying the main theme.

If you are one of those now rare people who instinctively understands what the subject, verb and object of a sentence are: A similar process lies in the dominant and modifying cards!

That is the way to expertise in tarot.

A demonstration can be had by contacting the writer below for a reading of tarot.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Will Herberg - The Writings Of Martin Buber
Hermes Trismegistus - Book Xi Of The Common Mind To Tat
Benjamin Rowe - The Book Of The Seniors
Melita Denning - The Aurum Solis

Intro To Tarot

Modern Tarot decks are comprised of 22 Major Arcana cards and 56 Minor Arcana cards in four suits, much like the standard playing cards we use for regular card games today. This 78-card deck is the widely-accepted standard. There are also many other decks that have varied styles and numbers of cards. These are generally called Oracle decks.

The origin of Tarot cards is no longer known. One strong held belief is that Tarot originated in ancient Egypt, spreading thence to the Greeks, and moved through the world by the Gypsies. There are still links to Egyptian, Greek, Roman and other early religions in modern Tarot. It is also generally believe that what we know now as modern Tarot came about in the 13th century, and while it shows obvious differences from that time, it still follows the same basic principals.

Tarot cards have had an arduous journey through history, at times only being allowed to nobles, occasionally sanctioned by the Catholic Church, and sometimes seen as something evil. Some, even now, believe Tarot cards to be something dark and evil. While this is not the case, Hollywood has taken hold of this idea and frequently presents it as such.

The cards of the deck are used to represent the different stages in the journey through life. The cards give their meaning in the different positions and corresponding cards in the spread. Each position in the spread has a meaning, and each card has a meaning as well.

The Major Arcana are generally seen as an important significator. If a Major Arcana card shows up in a reading, it means that is something you want to pay closer attention to in your life. Major Arcana cards represent the journey through life; the major points one may go through while traveling the path of existence.

The four suits that make up the Minor Arcana each have an overall meaning, and each individual card has a more specific meaning.

Cups, which coincides with the element of water, is associated with relationships and emotions and the development of feelings.

Wands, coinciding with fire, is the development of creative imagination and the challenges one meets through their life.

Swords which represents air, is the realm of the mind, looking at intellect and thoughts.

Pentacles, representing earth, is the material world and its reality, the resources the one will have or need on the journey.

Each of the suits contains 14 cards; ten numbered cards and four court cards. Day to day events are generally depicted in the numbered cards, whereas the court cards tend to indicate personal characteristics or stages of development. Tarot cards can be a wonderful tool to help you see into your life.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Aleister Crowley - To Man
Aleister Crowley - Chart
Aleister Crowley - The World Of Tarot
Aleister Crowley - Thoth Tarot Deck

How To Develop Your Intuition Using Tarot

The Tarot can be a fantastic way to develop your intuition or give you the confidence to trust your intuition. Ideally, you want to get to a place where your intuition automatically kicks in whenever you need it and you do not have to think about it.

You just know that something is right or wrong and you trust it completely.

Tarot can also help you safely explore potential options before you commit yourself to making a decision and can give you guidance in any area of your life.

Our minds think in pictures and the Tarot consists of images, which makes it one of the most visually powerful ways of connecting directly with your unconscious mind.

A picture literally says a 1000 words and you can get an immediate feeling reaction when you look at a picture.

Pictures are the oldest form of teaching and learning. Pictures tell stories and that is the first way our early learning took place.

Pictures tap straight into the right side of your brain, which is all about creativity, imagination, inspiration, ideas and insights.

The pictures, colours and symbols speak directly to your subconscious mind to give you the answers that are right for you. This is why different people can look at the same cards and give a different interpretation because the cards speak to everyone individually.

The more you can trigger the can trigger the right hand side of your brain, the more you can tap into your intuition or gut feeling.

It is like any muscle. The more you use it, the more it will work for you and the more it will be there for you when you need it.

Our intuition or gut feeling is there to help us all of the time. Sometimes we have so much chatter going on in our heads and so many feelings in our bodies that we cannot hear or feel or see our quiet, all knowing truth.

The Tarot is one of the quickest ways to develop your Intuition or gut feeling and have it on tap 24/7 for whenever you need to make an important decision.

Find a quiet place where you won’t be disturbed and sit comfortably.

Take a few deep breaths. As you breathe out, breathe out any tension and stress from your day. As you breathe in, breathe in confidence, intuition and trust.
Continue breathing gently until you feel your mind and body relax.

A useful breathing exercise is to breathe in to a count of 7, hold the breath for 7, and then slowly release to a count of 7 and then hold for 7 before taking another breath.

When you feel calm and relaxed, pick up your deck of cards and give them a quick shuffle. Pick out a card at random and notice the first impressions that come to mind.

What thoughts are in your head? Do you hear any instant words? What is the tone of the voice?

What feelings do you get from the card?
Where in your body are the feelings? – heart, head, legs, tummy area, back, other?

Where are the pictures? - inside your head, in front of you? Are they colour or black and white, still or moving?

It is important to notice those very first words, impressions and feelings because if you look at the card for too long, your logical mind will start to analyse the card and you may miss the valuable insights.

Once you learn to recognise the signals that your intuition is using to communicate with you, you can identify them more quickly in another situation.

With a bit of practice you can soon distinguish between the answers from your intuition and the logic of your analytical mind.

Both are important and the analytical mind can be very useful once you have gathered all your creative insights.

Trust those first answers as they will most likely be the right ones for you.

When you feel ready, relax, calm your mind and pick another card.
You start to develop a relationship with your cards and trust them as a tool to access your intuition whenever you want and need it.

Lay a couple of cards of cards side by side and notice the impressions that you get. Observe how the story changes when one card is next to another.

It is helpful to have a Tarot journal, so that you can keep track of any insights that come from your cards.

Over time certain cards will come to have particular meanings for you. These may be very different from any definitions you find in a book. That is brilliant. Go with what you feel is right for you for each card.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Robert Ellwood - The Encyclopedia Of World Religions
Solomonic Grimoires - Lemegeton Iii The Pauline Art
Robert Wang - The Qabalistic Tarot
Paul Foster Case - An Introduction To The Study Of The Tarot
Swetha Lodha - Your Love Life And The Tarot Cards

How Long Does It Take To Learn To Read Tarot Cards

I am often asked this question and the answer is “how long is a piece of string?” It can be as long or as short as you want it to.

I have seen claims that you can learn to read the Tarot in a couple of hours from a book or a DVD. Yes, you can get a very basic grasp of the meanings of each individual card from doing this.

Often, though, what is lacking is an understanding of how the cards interact with each other or how their meanings alter depending on their position in different spreads.

The rapid learning works best if you are just looking at the cards and using them as a trigger for your psychic abilities.

Some people can do this quite easily and don't need to do anything further with Learning the card meanings. Other people can lack the confidence to trust their intuition to this level.

For anyone who has seen the film “The Golden Compass” or read the book it was based on, “Northern Lights” may remember Lyra with the alethiometer.

In the beginning she cleared her mind, focused on her question, spun the needle and as soon as it landed on a symbol, she got an immediate picture in her mind and often a strong feeling as to what it meant.

Everyone else who worked with the device had to learn and study the symbols to get an understanding of it.

I know that was the case for me. I needed to learn to read the cards and over time I came to trust the intuitive prompts.

For me it took many hours of practising with the cards, looking at the pictures, noticing any intuitive prompts I received and making a note of those in my Tarot Journal.

I had fun "playing" with them, until I built up a relationship with my cards and they spoke to me individually.

The time it takes to learn the tarot also depends on your reasons for wanting to learn and how much time you have available.

For many people it is such a passion that it becomes a life-long study. I have been reading tarot cards for 16 years and I still see new things in my cards. I might suddenly notice a detail that I have not been aware of before and this adds an extra subtlety of meaning to my cards.

Tarot has multiple layers to it. You can probably have enough knowledge to do a very simple reading in about an hour, just from reading the booklet that comes with the cards. However, for most people that does not give enough detailed information.

I have taught courses which were 2 hours a week over 6 weeks, and we found that was not really enough time to cover the cards and spreads in detail.

If you can spare a couple of hours a week to understand a new card and to see how that card interacts with previous cards, your knowledge and skills will build up very quickly.
The more you can look at your cards and practise with them, the quicker you become familiar with them and start to build your own personal relationship with them.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Solomonic Grimoires - The Book Of Secrets
John Dee - The Rosie Crucian Secrets
Christine Payne Towler - The Continental Tarots

Free Tarot Cards And The Truth About Them

Free tarot readings are readily available online, and are a popular method of fortune telling nowadays. However, are free tarot readings really worthwhile?

Most free tarot readings are computer generated – that is, a computer program randomly chooses which images to display on your screen. Usually, a neutral interpretation of the card that can be applied to any situation accompanies the display. To a skeptic this might appear just as good as a real tarot reading, but to those that actually believe in the abilities of tarot to give love readings, success readings, money readings and so on, this won't do at all. The powers of gravity, the skill of a human reader is required to give a true and accurate reading.

Think of it this way – how well do computers "read" things like text that's entered into them and meant to be parroted back over the speakers? How well do computers translate text between foreign languages? Consider this example of computer-translated text from French: –

"To be or n' to be not, here is the question.... Qu' there of nobler for l' is; heart? to support the blows of sling and the arrows of outrageuse fortune? or s' to arm in war against an ocean with miseries and, of brave fight, to cross there short?"

You can maybe recognize the rudiments of Hamlet's famous speech there ("To be or not to be, that is the question" &c. &c.) but as this demonstrates – no computer can do a job only meant to be done by a human. Computers do not understand things, they only perform tasks they have been coded to perform, and don't have a way to "know" if what they deliver makes sense or not. Is this really what you want to trust your fate to?

Alternately, some online tarot readings are what are known as "canned readings." In these cases, a single reading is created that can apply to most situations, and this same reading is delivered to every client who orders a free tarot reading.

Rarely, one might find a genuine tarot reader offering free tarot card readings. Sometimes this might be a promotional effort, in which case you're in luck as they'll be at the top of their game, trying to cultivate repeat clients. However, in many cases, people offering free tarot readings have something more sinister in mind.

There's a famous con, dubbed by Cat Yronwode "The Gypsy Fortune Telling Scam." In this, a fortune teller (often offering free or low cost readings) informs the client that their problems are due to some kind of magical interference or curse, and then pushes the client to buy from them any number of expensive magical or spiritual services that they claim will remove the supposed curse (which probably never existed in the first place.)

The fact is, most cases I've seen of "free tarot readings online" performed by a real person who wasn't an amateur trying to practice, have been cases of this.

There's an old saying – "You get what you pay for." In the online world, where everything costs money (bandwidth, domains and so on) anything that claims to be free is particularly suspect, free online tarot card reading included.
For those who seek actual spiritual guidance, be warned – don't waste your time on free tarot card readings. Find yourself a genuine tarot reader. Use the following guidelines:

*Look for tarot readers who are knowledgable about the cards.
*Avoid tarot readers who charge hundreds of dollars for one tarot reading. At best, it's going to pay for advertising.
*Avoid tarot readers who use multiple aliases or who own several different fortune telling companies which they try to make appear as unrelated.

With these tips you should be able to find the spiritual service you need.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Tarostar - The Witchs Spellcraft Revised
George Robert Stowe Mead - The Corpus Hermeticum
Rw Rogers - Adapa And The Food Of Life

Death Tarot Card Meanings In Love Tarot Readings

Death is not an ending, but rather is a part of a larger cycle. Although Death is often associated with something that is destructive, it really is an opportunity for something much greater. Death plants the seeds for the growth of tomorrow. Death is an act of generosity as it cleanses and purges the remnants of our old lives.

Traditionally, Death is the card of transformation. It signifies the commencement of profound change. In a Tarot reading, the Death card indicates that another life cycle has ended and a new cycle has begun. It can refer to the completion of important life stages or relationships. However, it often symbolizes metamorphosis. It is the rebirth of one’s psyche. Old beliefs and ideas are discarded for new ones. In essence, it is a metaphorical death, not a literal one. In a tarot reading, Death refers to a transformation that occurs at one’s deepest core.

One common association to the Death Tarot card is the dissipation of a romantic relationship. This is particularly true for relationships that have come to a standstill. This is not always the case. Death is a wake up call. It is reminding us to open our eyes and embrace the world around us. In this regard, it may refer to our own lack of perspective. The Death card encourages you to take a good look at your relationship. It’s quite likely that your old methods of communicating have become outdated. It’s important to acknowledge the areas that you are feeling stuck. The goal is to find a new perspective, a new way of seeing, that will enable the relationship to merge into something new.

In some aspects, the Death card signifies a need to let go. Relationships that resist change tend to get lost and lose momentum. It is at this point that a relationship must be willing to let go of its old identity to form a new one. Major change is inevitable. It’s time to broaden your perspectives and explore new areas and interest that bring you together on an entirely new level.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Thomas Moore - Candle Magick For Love
John Dee - The Hieroglyphic Monad English Version
Israel Regardie - The Art And Meaning Of Magic

Choosing A First Tarot Deck

When you first decide to learn Tarot, beginners ask what kind of deck should they choose?There are hundreds and hundreds of tarot decks available for purchase. There are people whose only interest in Tarot is collect and study the decks from history and from current artists.

There are two different perspectives as to how to go about acquiring your first tarot deck (pronounced tar'?oh or ta?row'). The first idea is that you are best served by selecting a deck that appeals to you or speaks to you in some way. This way of selecting a deck underlines the theory that every reader will respond to various styles and symbols in a different way and that it is important to respect this aspect of reading the tarot. It also is beneficial because it suggests that obtaining a deck that you respond to and like will encourage you to learn the deck.

The second theory is to obtain a widely used deck like the Waite, and Waite derivatives, or the Crowley/Thoth, or derivatives. These deck types represent the vast majority of decks that are purchased and used. The Waite deck is the most popular deck ever sold and is the one most often reconized.

I have come to the opinion that the second method, selecting a Waite-based or Crowley-based deck, is the best one for beginners. I have noticed that beginners who have acquired an offbeat deck struggle when they go to read a beginning tarot book or take a class.

So, your first assignment to find a deck to learn on. Choose a Waite based deck (including the Universal Waite, Robin Wood, Morgan Greer, Tarot of the Old Path, and some more whose names escape me right now!) or a Crowley/Thoth based deck (the smaller deck will have more lively coloration ? so notice which size you are selecting). If you will stick to these, it will be a bit easier to learn Tarot at first. Then, later, you can branch off and pick a Marseilles style, or Motherpiece, or Wheel of Change, or Osho Zen, or another offbeat tarot deck. This is all, however, just my observation. I have plenty of students simply pick the deck they like and they do fine (some however do not and break down and purchase a Waite deck so they can more readily compare what the instructor or book is saying to the deck images).

Books You Might Enjoy:

Tuesday Lobsang Rampa - The Saffron Robe
Swetha Lodha - Your Love Life And The Tarot Cards
Marian Green - A Witch Alone
Robert Wang - The Qabalistic Tarot
Aleister Crowley - Thoth Tarot Deck

A Tarot Journey

There is plenty of very good information about the Tarot, its symbolism and its origin. What I would like to do is share about the journey of the Tarot and all that it could and can teach.

As a kid and well into my 20s and 30s, I could always feel when something was going to change, sometimes it appeared not for the good, at least on the surface.

I could feel my mood swings and everyone else's mood swings around me. Pretty much not knowing where my personal space began or ended and where another's space began or ended. There were times, many times, where communication was almost impossible. It was bizarre to feel my words organized in my thoughts, but to speak them out loud, somehow the translation was lost.

It would be the Tarot that would assist, guide and teach me how to connect all the pieces for clear communication. Prior to my journey, learning about each card, I did read a bit on its origin and its symbolism. It was at this point, that I had not yet discovered that I was an empath, with high intuition. So, as I took a journey through each card, I found myself becoming clearer and more connected in my communication.

The Tarot is an excellent source of teaching, when wanting to have a deeper understanding about life changes. The Tarot teaches us how to open our minds and approach these changes from another angle, another perspective. Because we are living in very new and different times, consulting the Tarot, is no longer about predictions and outcomes, but a means to resolution, from another level of thinking.

On our journey with the Tarot, take your time and work with each card individually. Be patient with your learning experience. When working with the Tarot, this is the part of our life, where we slow down a bit and allow our intuition to develop and guide us on this journey.

And yes, our intuition does open and in the process of opening, we learn how to blend logic and intuition, to troubleshoot and guide us to our life changes. As human beings, when life changes come to us, they at first will appear as negatives happening in our lives. When we begin working with the Tarot, we begin to discover that the so called negatives of our lives, are actually new opportunities to better align with our life, at a deeper intuitive level.

We are all entering a time in our life, where common sense and intuition can act as a guide to our life changes.

So, for all who feel drawn to the Tarot, yes, by all means, read about its history and then consider how you feel drawn to the Tarot and allow your intuition, your inner knowing to guide you on your journey. The more that we learn how to be grounded in the now and present moment; in our bodies, our breath and our knowing, the better our experiences of change, that we can master with our intuition.

The Tarot is a wonderful teacher and guide, to the journey of your own inner discoveries.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Michael Prescott - Darklore
Lyall Watson - Supernature
Nick Farrell - Notes On Geomancy
Aristotle - On Dreams

3 Secrets To Reading Tarot Cards

Reading Tarot cards is not really as complicated as it is made out to be – at the same time, it is not that simplistic either. Here we have 78 different cards with a variety of images on them which convey so many things. How can one remember these meanings? How is it even possible to keep a track of all the different interpretations? And in the end, how does one know which meaning to go for during an actual reading?

I am going to tell you a few simple methods of being able to do so. However, it is equally important that one does not remain too rigid in these methods – the lessons in the cards talk about and teach flexibility – they essentially tell us to remain open and aware to what our inner voice or instinct or gut or intuition tells us.

So, are you ready to begin? Here we go:

1. Visual Cues: This is the first step towards deciphering the meanings of the Tarot cards – look at the picture on the card. What is happening in the picture? What feelings does it evoke within you? Pay attention to what are the first impulses in your mind when you see the images. These visual cues will tell you what is going on in your client’s life on the different planes of his existence. For example, look at the image of the 3 of Cups card. We see 3 finely dressed ladies holding their cups high in the air. Around them are fruits and flowers. Straight off, one can guess that they are having a party or a celebration of some sort. So, this may reveal to you that there is a celebration going on in the client’s life.

2. Elemental Cues: Each of the Tarot cards corresponds to a certain element: Wands with Fire, Cups with Water, Swords with Air, and Pentacles with Earth. Each of these elements talks of a different aspect of life: Fire is burning energy and passion, Water is flowing emotions and feelings, Air is the windy thoughts and logical mind, and Earth is solid practicality and money. And of course, let’s not forget the Major Arcana which corresponds to the element of Spirit / Ether, which is the representation of the higher spiritual planes of existence. So, in a reading, when you see a card from a particular suit, you know which aspect of life you are dealing with. And add to it the imagery of the card and its visual cues, and you have your interpretation right there! So taking our previous example of the 3 of Cups, we can see that cups are emotions and feelings.

Plus the visual cues talk of celebrations. So now, we can say that these 3 ladies in the card are also emotionally bonded with each other – they could be friends. This interpretation thus reveals that the celebration in your client’s life is a party with his close friends with whom he can easily share his feelings.

3. How the Card Falls: This is another aspect of the reading – whether the card is upright or whether it is reversed. There are many ways of looking at card reversals – either you can see it as a total opposite of the upright meaning, or you can say that there is a blockage in the situation depicted in the upright meaning. So, continuing with our 3 of Cups card, we can say that in the reversed position this card will mean that either the celebration has gone bust, or that there are problems within the group of friends which does not allow them to bond completely with each other.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Yacki Raizizun - The Secret Of Dreams
Richard Spence - Secret Agent 666 Introduction
Samuel Liddell Macgregor Mathers - The Tarot
Swetha Lodha - Your Love Life And The Tarot Cards
Will Herberg - The Writings Of Martin Buber

Astrology And Marriage

Book: Astrology And Marriage by Sepharial

This handbook deals with the subject of marriage from the point of view of the ancient science of the Chaldeans, and shows the secret of happiness or unhappiness in the marital state to be revealed in the reactions caused by planetary influence. The author deals with the broad question of marriage, harmonising factors, signs of happiness, signs of discord, the misogynist, the domestic circle, multiple marriages, existing evils and the remedy, and gives Illustrated cases of assorted marriages showing the close agreement of Experience With horoscopical indications. Needless to say the subject is one of perennial and Universal interest, but is here approached from an angle that is entirely new to all who have not an extensive knowledge of the science of the stars and the influence of planetary action in human life.

Download Sepharial's eBook: Astrology And Marriage

Books in PDF format to read:

Reformed Druids - Anthology 10 Oral Histories
Reeves Hall - Asatru In Brief
Sepharial - Astrology And Marriage

3 Easy Tarot Card Spreads

Spreads are the way in which Tarot cards are organized in a formal manner for conducting a reading. Ideally, in a spread, there are a fixed number of cards which are drawn and are placed in a pattern, where each position stands for something. So, depending on the card drawn and the position where it stood at, the reader can interpret the meaning of the Tarot card.

Here, I am going to tell you some easy Tarot card spreads which you can use for simple readings. In each of these spreads, you just lay out the cards in a straight line. But before we go ahead, a little discussion about the methods of drawing the cards: some people prefer to shuffle the deck and make a fan of the cards and draw any random card from anywhere, while some prefer to shuffle the deck and draw the cards from the top of the deck. It doesn’t matter which method you follow – both these methods work, and different readers follow either of these methods.

Without any further ado, these simple spreads are:

1. 3-Card Spread: This is the most basic and straightforward spread of all times. For this spread, draw three cards from a well shuffled deck and lay them out in a straight line. This spread has many different applications. These 3 positions can either stand for ‘Past, Present and Future’ or ‘Situation, Advice and Outcome’ or ‘Option one, Option two, Outcome’ and so on. You can be totally creative with this spread. Also observe the flow of the reading and read in the direction which seems natural to you.

2. 5-Card Spread: This is a step-up on the basic 3-Card Spread. For this draw 5 cards from a well shuffled deck and lay them out in a straight line. Like the previous spread, this too has several applications. For example, the five positions could be ‘Past, Present, Hurdles, Advice, and Outcome’. Here is my favorite position definition for this spread: ‘Fire, Water, Air, Earth and Spirit’ where each element and its practical associations are explored with the card drawn in that position.

3.7-Card Spread: Again a very good and simple spread. Draw 7 cards from a well shuffled deck and lay them in either a straight line or in a horse-shoe pattern. The positions would be: ‘Past, Present, Situation, Hurdles, Advice, Outcome One and Outcome Two’.

Spreads can always be designed and the different positions can be defined based on the question being asked. So go ahead and be creative with your spreads. With these basic spreads, you can very easily do simple readings for yourself or for your friends. Once you have mastered these spreads, you can move on to those spreads which call for more cards and have more different positions.

Books You Might Enjoy:

Tarostar - The Witchs Spellcraft Revised
John Sebastian Marlowe Ward - The Master Masons Handbook
Aristotle - On Dreams
John Dee - The Rosie Crucian Secrets