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Tarot basics
Anyone who wants to understand tarot can get lost at first - and for good reason. The field is so vast - limitless, to be honest - that sometimes you can end up feeling overwhelmed. Or at best, you end up with more questions than when you started. Since it would be very complicated to go through all the subtleties of tarot in just a few words, I'll just stick to the basics here, so you can get an idea of how it works.
THE TAROT CARD DECK
Tarot decks consist of 78 cards, each with multiple meanings. The deck can be divided into sub-categories that share common characteristics. They are called Arcana (which translates to “secrets”) and can be either Major or Minor. The Major Arcana (22 cards) represent the big secrets (important life lessons, karmic events, or things that are beyond our control), while the Minor Arcana (56 cards) holds the “smaller” secrets (they can describe emotional states, situations we can prevent or control, certain people in our lives, our energy in general). Both sub-categories have their own unique qualities and play different roles in the deck, as well as in spreads.
Major Arcana Cards
The cards in the Major Arcana are numbered 0 to 21 and represent a visual story of The Fool’s Journey. The names of the cards are symbolic: The Lovers, The Devil, The Fool, The Emperor, etc. They represent major influences in our lives. You can see them as landmarks of the human experience, as they often carry deeply spiritual messages.
Minor Arcana Cards
The 56 cards of the Minor Arcana are based on playing cards – we find cards from ace to tens, as well as “court” cards – pages, knights, kings and queens. They describe people and situations in our lives, as well as our attitudes towards them.
Like the usual playing cards, the Tarot has 4 different suits:
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Wands – refer to our passions, projects, work and motivation
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Spades – refer to our way of thinking and communicating
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Cups – reflect our emotional realm
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Coins/Pentacles – reflect the material aspects of our lives
There are cards related to our intellect, our will, our feelings, and our bodies. All cards have meanings – on many levels. The elements of the cards (name, number, suit, position in the spread, visual representation) are also designed to help during the interpretation. From a broader perspective, each card is a short story that, connected with others in a spread, creates a complex puzzle regarding the client.
Also, suits can be used to estimate time, but not all tarot readers use this method. For example, spades equal days (so if you are using them to know when something will happen and 5 of spades appears, you can estimate that the thing you are asking about will happen in about 5 days), wands equal weeks, cups indicate months, and coins/pentacles equal years.
The card number also has a specific meaning:
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Aces = new beginnings
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Two = duality, balance, relationship, choices
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Three = creativity, collaboration, care
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Four = stability, structure, organization, stagnation
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Five = conflict, loss, chaos, opportunity
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Six = communication, problem solving
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Seven = reflection, evaluation
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Eight = movement, speed, power
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Nine = compromises, possible stagnation
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Ten = completion, ending a cycle
Additionally, each card has a specific meaning. So, the 5 of Wands is slightly different from the 5 of Coins, for example, even though they are broadly speaking the same theme. The 5 of Wands often refers to conflicts and inner struggles that we are going through, while the 5 of Coins can indicate a breakup, feelings of abandonment and rejection, bankruptcy, or layoffs. Each card has a general meaning as well as a specific one, depending on the area you are asking about (relationships, emotional health, money, or job).
Feel like you’re even more in the dark? I told you it wouldn't be easy.
So, in short, what does a tarot reader look at in a spread?
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The names of the cards
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The number of cards
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The suit they are in
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How many times the same number appears in a spread (this can tell you a lot about the state of a situation)
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Whether a particular suit is dominant, compared to others (this can indicate some unbalanced external or internal dynamics)
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How many Major Arcana cards are in the spread (usually, if more than 30% of the cards are Major Arcana, this indicates that there are forces beyond our control in the given situation)
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How many "court" cards are in the spread (if they appear in more than 25% of a spread, it may indicate that there are multiple people involved or influencing the situation. Another possibility is that the person asking is having identity issues)
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Their individual meaning
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Their visual representation in the selected deck (may vary)
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Their significance in the entire puzzle of the spread (where they are in the spread, how they connect to others, etc.).
And to understand how many meanings a single card can have, I leave you here two references from a very useful platform:
Enjoy practicing!
