Title: The Big Book of Tarot
Author(s): Joan Bunning
Projection is one reason why the tarot cards are valuable. Their intriguing pictures and patterns are effective in tapping the unconscious. This is the personal aspect of the tarot, but the cards also have a collective component. As humans, we all have certain common needs and experiences. The images on the tarot cards capture these universal moments and draw them out consistently.
Meaning is a mysterious quality that arises at the juncture of inner and outer realities.
The twenty-two cards of the major arcana are the heart of the deck. Each of these cards symbolizes some universal aspect of human experience. They represent the archetypes—consistent, directing patterns of influence that are an inherent part of human nature.
A major arcana card is always given extra weight in a reading. When one of these cards appears, you know the issues at stake are not mundane or temporary. They represent your most basic concerns—your major feelings and motivations.
While the major arcana expresses universal themes, the minor arcana brings those themes down into the practical arena to show how they operate in daily events.
Each of these suits stands for a particular approach to life. Our everyday experiences are a blend of these four approaches.
Wands The Wands are the suit of creativity, action, and movement. They are associated with such qualities as enthusiasm, adventure, risk-taking, and confidence. This suit corresponds to the yang, or masculine principle, in Chinese philosophy and is associated with the element Fire. A flickering flame is the perfect symbol of the Wands’ force. This energy flows outward and generates passionate involvement. Cups The Cups are the suit of emotions and spiritual experience. They describe inner states, feelings, and relationship patterns. The energy of this suit flows inward. Cups correspond to the yin, or feminine principle, in Chinese philosophy and are associated with the element Water. The ability of water to flow and fill up spaces, to sustain and to reflect changing moods makes it the ideal symbol of the Cups suit. Swords The Swords are the suit of intellect, thought, and reason. They are concerned with justice, truth, and ethical principles. Swords are associated with the element Air. A cloudless sky, open and light-filled, is a symbol of the mental clarity that is the Swords’ ideal. This suit is also associated with states that lead to disharmony and unhappiness. Our intellect is a valuable asset, but as an agent of ego, it can lead us astray if it is not infused with the wisdom of our Inner Guide. Pentacles The Pentacles are the suit of practicality, security, and material concerns. They are associated with the element Earth and the concrete requirements of working with matter. In Pentacles, we celebrate the beauty of nature, our interactions with plants and animals, and our physical experiences in the body. Pentacles also represent prosperity and wealth of all types.
kinds. Sometimes this suit is called the Coins, an obvious symbol of the exchange of goods and services in the physical world.
An Ace announces the themes of a suit. The Ace of Cups stands for love, emotions, intuition, and intimacy—ideas that are explored in the other cards of the Cups suit. An Ace always represents positive forces. It is the standard-bearer for the best its suit has to offer.
Each of the middle, numbered cards present a different aspect of a suit. The Wands explore such themes as personal power (card 2), leadership (card 3), excitement (card 4), and competition (card 5). A card may approach an idea from several angles. The Five of Pentacles shows the many faces of want—hard times (material want), ill health (physical want), and rejection (emotional want).
A Ten takes the themes introduced by an Ace to their logical conclusion.
The court cards are people with personalities that reflect the qualities of their suit and rank. The court cards show us certain ways of being in the world so that we can use (or avoid!) those styles when appropriate.
King A King is mature and masculine. He is a doer whose focus is outward on the events of life. He demonstrates authority, control, and mastery in some area associated with his suit. A King’s style is strong, assertive, and direct. He is concerned with results and practical, how-to matters. Queen A Queen is mature and feminine. She embodies the qualities of her suit, rather than acting them out. Her focus is inward, and her style, relaxed and natural. A Queen is less concerned with results than with the enjoyment of just being in the world. She is associated with feelings, relationships, and self-expression. Knight A Knight is an immature teenager. He cannot express himself with balance. He swings wildly from one extreme to another as he tries to relate successfully to his world. A Knight is prone to excess, but he is also eager and sincere, and these qualities redeem him in our eyes. We can admire his spirit and energy. Page A Page is a playful child. He acts out the qualities of his suit with pleasure and abandon. His approach may not be deep, but it is easy, loose, and spontaneous. He is a symbol of adventure and possibility.
Card orientation allows us to interpret a card in two different ways. An upright card shows an energy that is developed, available, and active. The energy is strong and clearly present in the situation. A reversed card shows an energy that is not fully developed. It exists in the situation, or it would not have appeared, but it’s weak, incomplete, unavailable or in some other way not fully expressed.
When cards are related to each other in a spread, an entirely new level of meaning is created. Combinations appear, and a story line develops with characters, plots, and themes. The weaving of a story from the cards in a spread is the most exciting and creative aspect of a tarot reading.
A reading is an earnest, even sacred agreement between you and your Inner Guide. You enter into it with the understanding that you are receiving truly meaningful guidance. The card you select is important to you.
There are five inner qualities that are beneficial when you do a tarot reading.
- Being Open: Being open means being receptive. It is an attitude of allowing—being willing to take in what is offered without immediate denial or rejection. By being open, you give yourself the chance to receive what you need to know.
- Being Calm: It is hard to hear the whispers of your Inner Guide when you are in turmoil. Tarot messages often arrive as gentle hints and realizations that can be easily overwhelmed by a restless mind. When you are calm, you are like a peaceful lake in which every ripple of insight can be perceived.
- Being Focused: Focus is very important. I have found that when I feel a question strongly, I receive a direct and powerful message. When I’m scattered and confused, the cards tend to be the same. Your most insightful readings will be those you do when the desire is very strong.
- Being Alert: When you are alert, all your faculties are alive and awake. A cat is alert when it is watching a bug. Of course, you won’t be stalking your cards, but you will find them difficult to read if you are tired or bored.
- Being Respectful: Being respectful means treating the cards as you would any valued tool. You acknowledge their role in helping you understand yourself better. You honor the choice you have made in deciding to learn the tarot and handle the cards accordingly.
Having a procedure to follow is very helpful in tarot work. When you follow the same steps over and over in a certain way, they help you center yourself in the moment. The details of the steps are not that important; in fact, you can change any of them, if you wish. The goal is to maintain a spirit of mindfulness. Doing a reading with loving concentration will make your tarot practice very powerful.
It’s best to regroup the cards in one quick motion. Don’t try to figure out which pile should go where. Just let your hand move where it will. The cut is an important finishing step that marks the end of the card-arranging stage. Once you have regrouped the cards, the pattern of the reading is fixed, and all that remains is to lay out the cards and see what they reveal.
Trust your intuition, and reserve judgment until you’ve seen all the cards. Note any stray thoughts or “irrelevant” feelings that come to mind.
When interpreting a reading, you will go back and forth between sensing all the cards as a whole and examining each one individually. The two approaches reinforce each other, but eventually, you do have to clarify the meaning of each card. You need to understand its unique energy, so you can fit it into the whole picture. There are three sources of meaning for an individual card:
- Traditional Meanings Each card has a set of traditional meanings that have built up around the card over the years. These vary with different tarot writers and teachers. My suggestions for each card are given in the Card Descriptions section.
- Personal Meanings Your personal meanings for a card are based on your tarot experience, background, personality, and intuition. This mixture changes over time and from reading to reading, and keeps the meaning of a card fresh.
- Card Image Meanings can be triggered by a card’s image. Your response to an image can often be quite telling. Details may seem to relate very directly to your subject. For example, in a reading about building a house, the document on the Three of Pentacles may strike you as a set of blueprints. The images on the Rider-Waite deck are particularly evocative. One major benefit of this deck is that there are images on every card.
At first, you will probably rely heavily on the traditional card and position meanings, but gradually your personal reactions will become primary. You may not feel any reaction to a card, or perhaps just a mild one. Try to notice any quick thought, feeling, or image that comes to mind, no matter how slight. Here are some questions you can ask yourself to help tease out the meaning of a card: What feeling do I sense in the card scene? What feeling do I sense in myself when I see this card? Am I attracted, repelled, or neutral about this card? What about the subject comes to mind when I see this card? Does this card remind me of anyone? What details seem important in this card, and why?
Aces are portals between the realms of the major and minor arcanas. They allow powerful, but impersonal forces to come into your everyday life. An Ace in a reading shows that its qualities are becoming available. An Ace is always interpreted as beneficial, positive, and life-enhancing.
An Ace can also represent a window of opportunity that is opening. The Ace tells you to pay attention, so you don’t miss it.
Kings are active and outgoing. They want to make an impact on the world through the force of their personality.
Queens express their suits from the inside, setting a tone without imposing it.
Knights are extremists; they express their suit qualities to the maximum. Such excessive feelings and behavior can be either welcome or unwelcome depending on the circumstances.
In readings, you must consider both views when interpreting a Knight. Does he represent a beneficial or harmful approach? The other factors (and your own honesty!) will help you decide.
Pages also encourage you to “Go for it!” Children do not hesitate when they want something. They reach out and grab. If you want what a page is offering, don’t be afraid. Seize the day!
A court card can show a quality that is being expressed or seeking expression. It may be something that’s valued, or something neglected. It may be an approach that’s recognized, or one that’s denied.
A court card can also represent a particular person. If you look at a court card and say to yourself, “I know who that is!” then it could very well be that person. It may also represent someone of whom you are not yet aware.
A court card can also reflect the general atmosphere. Sometimes, an environment seems to take on a personality of its own—one that matches a court card type.
If you think of a tarot reading as an object to be dissected, you will have trouble grasping its full meaning. A tarot story doesn’t come from without; it arises from within. Your stories come from a part of you that is seeking expression and conscious realization.
The principles are valuable, but not because they hold the key to readings in themselves. They simply help you recognize what you already know.
Sometimes knowing comes in fragments. Stay with a reading only as long as the effort seems worthwhile. A partial understanding may be all you need.
Trust yourself and your intuition completely. Banish right now any concerns you have about reading the cards correctly. You really can’t make mistakes.
A reading does not deliver news to you as a passive victim, but as a powerful agent who can use that information creatively. It gives you a picture of the energy patterns in and around you so that you can work with them as you see fit.
The tarot helps you find out what it is you do believe, so you can acknowledge it. Your unconscious becomes conscious. You can’t interpret falsely, but you can fail to perceive all that is there. The tarot is a mirror that reflects your own consciousness back to you.
A card’s energy is not really its energy as a physical object, but the larger archetypal energy it symbolizes. A card’s energy is its meaning, but with an added sense of movement and change.
you impact the energies in and around you simply by doing a reading! You alter the flow of events by examining them. This is why working with the cards is so powerful. A reading helps you become aware of the key energies at play in your life so you can work with them creatively.
When you do a reading, each card shows an energy at a certain point in its cycle. One energy may be strong, another weak. One may be on the rise, another fading. It would be quite helpful to know the status of each card’s energy. The orientation of a card can give you this information. Orientation is the direction a card faces on the reading surface or as you hold it. A card can be upright (normal view) or reversed (upside-down).
An energy does not represent its opposite when reversed. A card’s essential nature stays the same no matter what its orientation. A reversed World does not show unhappiness—the opposite of happiness. It shows happiness itself is low—a subtle difference! True unhappiness has its own active energy
You can check if a late phase energy is repeating by asking yourself the following questions: Am I dissatisfied with what’s happened? Do I feel compelled to hold on? Is something keeping me from releasing? Am I sorry this energy is fading?
Was this energy cut off prematurely? Will I want to revisit this energy again? Knowing energy tends to repeat helps you appreciate the subtle shifts that occur at the reversed card stages. You can watch for past influences affecting new energies. You can make sure fading energies are resolved satisfactorily.
A general rule of thumb is: When a card’s orientation doesn’t match your expectation, you’re misperceiving the strength of the card’s energy.
tarot practice is based on the understanding that wisdom from some Source will come to you through the cards. At first, you may have to accept this on faith, but after a while you will receive the “proof’’ you need in the results you experience in your life. If you can approach the cards with trust, your tarot practice will take off!
A line can mean “interpret us as a group”—all the positions in the line refer to the same subject. Sometimes, a line shows direction, such as the flow of time. In this case, cards for the past are traditionally placed on the left, cards for the present in the center, and cards for the future on the right. A line can also show cause (left) moving toward effect (right). The horseshoe is a line bent into a curve suggesting the rise and fall of energies.
The Celtic Cross is divided into two sections: the cross on the left and the staff on the right. The circle/cross positions give you a snapshot of certain key aspects of a subject at the time of a reading. The staff positions comment on what is pictured in the cross.
Position 10 is a projected outcome. It represents the most likely development if all the factors in a situation continue unimpeded on their current trajectory. This outcome is not a given. You can alter or reinforce this course by changing the conditions that exist in the moment.