Module 1: What Is Tarot?
This module will take you on the Fool's Journey. We'll review the real history of Tarot in brief and dispel common Tarot myths. Discover common symbols in Tarot imagry. Learn how the Tarot works and get start reading right away with one quick exercise. You can learn how read Tarot from day one.
But first, here's my story of how I came to know and love the Tarot.
A Skeptic's Introduction to Tarot
"We're going to see the witch"
It was a cold February evening a few years ago. I wasn’t sure what to expect, so I donned the cloak of the Skeptic and hopped in my sister’s beat up pick-up truck. We picked up the Witch who wished to bless my sister’s new house. My sister hasn’t been religious since we left our childhood home for college, so I was a little surprised how she embraced someone who proclaimed herself to be a witch wishing to perform a blessing. “I’m training to be a Druid Priestess” she exclaimed with bubbling excitement to my sister as they exchanged pleasantries.
Looking back, I don’t think that the Witch ever got around to the blessing. There was light conversation and glasses of wine with other visitors in the new home. Eventually, my sister knew it was time. The Witch spoke, “I believe I am here to give you a reading about your journey.” My sister indicated that she was going to take a walk to provide privacy and the others joined her. The Witch and I sat alone at the dining room table and she shuffled and pulled cards into an hourglass spread. This stranger, who knew nothing about me or the journey ahead of me, proceeded to reveal my deepest fears, my highest hopes, and my desires.
That was my introduction to tarot. A Witch came to me with a message.
The words of the Witch followed me across the world and my life hasn’t been the same since. That one reading guided many important decisions. The Tarot brought me what I had wanted and what most of us seek when we turn to the cards for guidance.
I found my soulmate, lived my dream, discovered my life’s purpose in a career that I love, and opened myself to the abundance I wanted to live life well. I was engaged to marry my soulmate 3 days after meeting him and soon after moved to The Hamptons on Long Island. I managed art galleries, became an honorary lighthouse keeper, and lived by the ocean. Two and a half years after that first reading, I bought my first tarot deck.
I would like to invite all who wish to demystify the Tarot to join me on a quest for wisdom. Still donning the cloak of The Skeptic, I ask a lot of hard questions about Tarot, divination and metaphysics. Some of these questions may have answers and some may not. I hope to provide an enlightening perspective on how Tarot and intuitive sensory perception influences decision making, emotional and creative expression, and can be a powerful tool to facilitate financial wellness.
The most difficult part about being a seeker of esoteric knowledge is asking the right question. A general curiosity can hardly be satisfied if you don’t know what to ask, what knowledge to seek, or what the goal is for learning. It can be almost impossible to ask the right question if the ultimate destination, goal or desire is unclear or unknown. I hope that this discovery of the Tarot will ultimately be one of self-discovery for you. When we engage with the Tarot, what we truly wish to know is about ourselves. And those answers are already within you, dear reader. Our goal here will be to use tools of Craft to tease out your inner secrets and to acknowledge your desires.
I have created Filloria, a website, and the Free Trader Beowulf, a vibrant Facebook community, to help satisfy those who are curious about Tarot and other tools of divination by posing common questions I have found along my personal journey and the answers I have found along the way. This free Tarot course is a comprehensive collection of lessons on what Tarot is, how it works, and how it can shape the future of those who interact with it.
Are you ready to find your soulmate? Do you wish to know why you are here? Are you ready for financial abundance? There’s no better time than now to begin dreaming and fulfilling your desires.
What is this mystical deck of playing cards? How does it work?
Tarot is a tool for divination and a deck of playing cards.
Skeptics may find the lineage of the Tarot easier to digest than the myths surrounding this simple deck of cards. Originally designed as a parlor game, Tarot has been used for divination since its inception. Many divination tools share this blended path of gambling and fortune-telling. So then, what is “divination” and how does it work with Tarot in comparison to other modalities?
Readers of the cards engage with their subconscious mind in order to deliver a message to a querant, a person seeking information. For many readers, Tarot takes time to learn. One makes association with the meanings designated to each card, then fills in information from their intuition, personal experiences, or spiritual communication. Card reading, or cartomancy, relies on a card with a printed image, word or symbol, to help develop the meaning of the message. This imagery helps to jumpstart the exploration of the subconscious mind. One can liken Tarot to an exploration in soft-psychology. The tactics used in reading Tarot, at least on its surface, are no different than tactics used to communicate messages in art, media, and marketing.
What makes Tarot special is the system that helps the reader decode the meaning. A standard Tarot deck is composed of 78 cards and is divided into parts. There is a suit of trumps called the Major Arcana and the illustrated pips, called the Minor Arcana, are divided into 4 suits. The name Arcana was arbitrarily chosen by author Arthur Waite, which means “secrets” in Latin. We uncover secrets of the subconscious mind and spiritual world when we read Tarot.
Beyond the construction of the deck and the assignment of universally accepted card meanings, there is little to distinguish Tarot from other divination cards. The answer to a querant’s question can be derived from one card or multiple cards in a spread. Some readers will enhance their readings through psychic abilities such as clairvoyance, clairaudience, mediumship, channeling, or automatic writing, as just a few examples. Most professional readers do not identify Tarot as the best tool of divination for fortune-telling. The ability to predict the future is of debate within the metaphysical community.
For each reader there can be a different method for reading the cards. As divination relies on intuition, the card meanings will only go so far to answer a question. The “divine” source, then, in a Tarot reading, is not the cards, but the space between the cards and the readers.
Your intuition is your greatest personal power.
Is your "Gut Feeling" your Super Power?
What is Intuition?
Your Secret Superpower
Intuition is knowing without knowing. Understanding without reason. Intuition is that gut feeling…when you know something is going to happen before it happens, or having a feeling about someone when you meet them for the first time. Have you ever decided to take a different path home on a whim only to run into someone you hadn’t seen in a long time? Or has someone come to your mind before they call you or send an email as if they knew you were thinking about them? That’s your intuition at work.
Your intuition can be more than a “funny feeling” about something. Your natural psychic communication system can guide you to make some of the best decisions of your life that will help you find your dream job, soulmate, and purpose. Your intuition is like an inner compass pointing you where your heart and soul want to go.
How does intuition work? It’s a complicated question for which we are still collectively developing an answer for on a scientific and spiritual level. In the end, it’s up to you to identify the inner workings of your intuitive, subconscious communication system and develop your personal philosophy.
You *Are* Psychic
We all have psychic abilities to some degree or another. If you are choosing to use your intuitive skills, you can strengthen them, a bit like a muscle. Or think of it as a language. When we are infants, we learn to listen before we learn to speak. Our vocabulary as small humans grows from single words, to simple phrases, and into novels of knowledge.
Intuition can grow in much the same way. If you are seeking to communicate intuitively, it may come on as simple symbols, words, feelings, or images. The more you focus on communicating intuitively, the larger your psychic language grows.
How do we learn the psychic language? We engage with "the Clairs" of psychic abilities.
Meet your "Clairs"
Clear sight is what we seek with Clairvoyance
Each person has different abilities to some degree or another. Many books have been psychic abilities, but let’s keep it simple and focus on the most commonly experienced skills often referred to as “the Clairs.”
You may already be familiar with the term Clairvoyance, a term synonymous with the modern day stereotype of a psychic….someone who sees. The root word “clair” means “clear” in French. The second part of the word tells you what type of “clarity” the person is experiencing.
Clairvoyance – clear seeing. This psychic ability enables the psychic to see visions with the third eye, or mind’s eye. Some may see flashes like photographs, others may see moving images as if watching a movie. Others may see through the eyes of another person as if to be there. The intuitive information is read visually.
Clairaudience – clear hearing. This is more than a voice in your head. Clairaudience includes songs, tones and all manner of sounds that are heard without a source nearby.
Claircognizance – clear knowing. Rather than getting a vision or words, someone with claircognizance simply knows something without understanding the source of that knowledge.
Clairempathy (or Empath) – clear emotions. Empaths tend to pick up on the emotional energy of others easily. When you meet someone for the first time, can you tell if they have pain behind a smile?
Clairtangency (or psychometry) – clear touching. This is slightly rarer than the other clairs mentioned here. Clairtangency is knowing something about an object by touching it.
And there are many more.
Access Your Psychic Abilities In 4 Easy Steps
Easy, Free Intuition Training
How to Engage with your Clairs
Strengthening your intuitive abilities will help you to provide more actuate Tarot readings.
1. Clear the mind. For many of us, a meditation practice brings a quietness to the mind. If your mind is busy, your intuition may be clouded or blocked. Your intuitive messages will likely come through stronger if your mind is quiet. Meditation and breathing techniques may help you get there faster. The important thing is to r e l a x.
2. Honor that inner voice. Let’s say you are on your way home but you get this feeling that you need to stop at the store to buy a gallon of milk. Perhaps you already have milk at home, and your conscious mind is aware of this. Go ahead and stop to buy the milk. Just try listening to your inner voice and show it you mean business by taking action. Perhaps you’ll run into someone you haven’t seen in a while. Maybe in the checkout line you’ll have a synchronicities conversation. And perhaps in the end you’ll go home and simply be stuck with two gallons of milk.
The important thing is that you’re allowing yourself to feel confident to listen to your inner-voice and take action on that voice. This builds confidence and self-compassion. No one is 100% right. You won’t be either and that’s completely natural.
3. Set an intention. When you wake up, during your morning routine, set an intention to listen to your intuition. You can state a positive affirmation or mantra out loud or to yourself. Then throughout the day, try to take note of any feelings, flashes of insight or words that come to mind that seem to answer a situation you’re in.
4. Override your fear. If your heart is telling you to go to that birthday party you were going to skip, go with your heart, not with your fear. The greatest opportunities for positive change in life will come on the edge of discomfort. Your magic will manifest if you conquer your fears.
And that's it! Really, truly. You don't have to meditate for hours and hours. You don't have to "be born with it". Your connection to your psychic powers is really about trusting your instincts and insights.
Again, psychic abilities strengthen like muscles. The more you use them and the more you exercise them deliberately, the stronger they become. And just like muscle training, your psychic abilities benefit from good health or diminish in bad health. Eating good, nutritious food, cutting back on bad foods and habits *will* strengthen your intuition.