CARD TALK is written, edited, and produced by Meg Jones Wall of 3am.tarot. Theme music created by PaulYudin.
Meg:
My name is Meg Jones Wall and you're listening to Card Talk, a mini-podcast for Tarot Basics and Evergreen Insights. I'm glad you're here. In today's episode, we are going to be talking about tarot beliefs, and this is exactly what it sounds like. We're really going to be digging into, starting to think about what you believe, about what tarot cards are and how they function. I've talked in previous episodes already about what tarot is, a little bit about the structure and the history all which are things that we're going to examine in more detail down the line but I really wanted to address early on in this podcast a question that comes up often with new readers or even with more established ones, which is how does tarot work, or what do my readings actually mean? These are big questions and the thing is everyone's going to have slightly different answers to those questions, or massively different answers to those questions. That's okay. You might ultimately have a different set of tarot beliefs than I do, and I think that's great. I think that's one of the things that makes tarot so cool, but part of the reason that I talk so much about not diving headfirst into a tarot is so cool, but part of the reason that I talk so much about not diving headfirst into a tarot reading without taking some time to learn the cards and build a relationship with the cards is that, if you don't take the time to do that, those early readings can be a lot, not just confusing in the way where you might not understand what you're receiving, but also you might not know what to do with it. And when a big card comes out, or a card that looks scary or freaks you out or just really activates something within you, if you haven't taken the time to think about your tarot beliefs, it can be a lot, and I don't want that to happen to you. Now, before we dive headfirst into this, I want to be really clear with you that I am not judging from some ivory tower here. I'm not telling you that I had the most perfect tarot practice and I spent all this time learning everything I could about the cards before I dove into my first reading. No, I was like a lot of people and as soon as I got my deck home, I ripped the plastic off of it, yanked the cards out of the box, spent a minute just flipping through them and going, ooh, these images are so beautiful. And then I immediately dove headfirst into a reading which didn't make a lot of sense to me, let's be real. But I think that I'm really speaking from a place of having experienced it myself and knowing how tough it can be to dive headfirst into readings that don't make sense and then getting kind of stressed about how they didn't make sense.
Meg:
Learning tarot and engaging with the tarot, learning the language of tarot and building a relationship with tarot is not just about memorizing card meanings. It's starting to understand what this modality and what this tool actually do. And what's especially cool about tarot is you get to decide what you want the cards to be for you. You get to sit and unpack how the cards are going to fit into your existing belief system, whether that's a spiritual practice, a religious practice or something completely different. I am not going to tell you all about my tarot beliefs because I don't think they're relevant for you. You get to do this on your own. What I am going to do is give you some different questions and frameworks to think about so that you can start to engage with this idea of tarot beliefs, tarot ethics, tarot philosophies, tarot theology, if you will.
Meg:
I want to say, too, that if you are someone who only ever really plans to use the card purely for creative inspiration, which is to say, for building characters or plot points or world building, for writing prompts or artistic prompts or basically for another non-spiritual purpose, something that has absolutely nothing to do with divination or reflection or conversation or relationship, then this idea of tarot beliefs might not feel quite as relevant. And look, you might not use the cards to talk to your muses. You might not use the cards to talk to Mercury, and that's completely fine. There could be a doorway in if you use the cards for creativity. But I'm not going to tell you that you absolutely have to sit with this material a lot if it doesn't feel like it's relevant for you.
Meg:
But if you think there's any chance at any point that you are going to want to use the tarot to read the cards and to gain insights or encouragement or support or advice or truth or wisdom or magic, I really do think that this step is incredibly important, not just for your long-term tarot practice but also, frankly, for your mental health. Because here's the thing when you're reading the tarot, when you are asking the cards a question and waiting to receive an answer, it's important to know not just what you might be talking to or who you might be talking to or asking for advice. But it's also important to have some kind of idea of what you think is answering you, where you think those answers are coming from, what you think is answering you where you think those answers are coming from. If you don't know that, if you don't take the time to really think about that and sit with that and consider not only what it means to have answers coming to you, but also what you might be meant to do with them, like what your responsibility is to do with those truths, it can really make those early tarot readings feel charged or intense or even scary. Think about, early on, asking a really big, tender question and pulling a card. That scares the shit out of you. It's kind of a mean thing to do to yourself. I don't want you to put yourself in a position where you're asking questions and are not really prepared to receive answers. It's really important to understand how your belief is going to fit into your use of this tool, so that you understand how to receive the information that is being offered to you. I also want to say that I do think that this is something that's important to do early in a practice, but I also think it's a really powerful thing to revisit on a regular basis.
Meg:
No matter what you're doing with the cards, chances are that, over enough time and with enough readings, your relationship with the tarot might evolve, which means that your beliefs about the tarot or your beliefs about what you're doing when you read cards might shift along with them. Even if you've been reading for a while and you're still listening to this, I would encourage you to try to answer some of the questions that I'm going to offer in a minute. See what comes up for you, see if these are things that you've thought about a lot, a little or maybe never at all, and consider how your answers to these questions, or maybe the questions that these questions bring up for you, really reflect your current spiritual, religious, creative and other kinds of beliefs. Now I'm going to read you a bunch of questions that I've written to help you dig into this idea of tarot beliefs more closely and through some different lenses and some different perspectives. But what a lot of these questions really boil down to. Are these two questions lot of these questions really boil down to? Are these two questions?
Meg:
The first is what do you believe about the cards. In other words, what do you believe the cards are? What do you believe tarot is? What do you believe the cards can do? And the second question is what is it you think you're doing when you read tarot? What do you think you're tapping into? What do you think you're asking? What do you think you're doing? All right, I'm going to rattle off a number of questions here, and I want to just stress that it's okay to not know the answer to every one of these questions. The point here is not to make you feel bad about everything you haven't figured out yet, about your practice, especially if you're just getting started. I don't know, I've been reading for like eight years. I don't know if I have the answers to all of these questions either, but I do think.
Meg:
Think that you're communicating with something or someone. Do you think that the question that you're asking is being answered by something outside of yourself? Do you want to use the cards, or are you already using the cards as a method of channeling or prayer or communication? Do you think that you're speaking to a spirit or a god, a deity, a planet, a fixed star, an ancestor or some other kind of magical or spiritual entity that exists outside of yourself? Do you think that the tarot can predict the future, can tell you what is going to happen? Do you think the tarot can show you a possible future or something that might happen? It Do you think the tarot can show you a possible future or something that might happen? Do you think the cards are magical? Do you think the cards are mundane? Or do you think the cards exist in some liminal space or in combination of these two ideas? What do you believe about free will? What do you believe about fate? Do you believe that the future is something that we can change or that the future is something that is set in stone? If the cards know what the future is, how, where does that information come from? Who provides it?
Meg:
How do you think tarot connects with your own personal, existing spiritual or religious beliefs? Where do those beliefs come from and how does tarot fit into those existing beliefs or practices? How do you want the tarot to fit into those beliefs? What do you think the tarot can offer in terms of expanding or experiencing certain aspects of your existing beliefs? What kinds of rituals, routines or practices might fit really neatly into the routines that you already have for spiritual or religious practice or devotion. Where do you believe the power of the cards comes from, if not from something outside of yourself? Do you think that the wisdom presented and offered by the cards in your readings is actually coming from you? Do you want to use the cards to commune with something more, or do you want to go back and forth between asking for something from someone else, using the cards as a communication tool, and using the cards as a mirror to help you understand aspects of self more clearly?
Meg:
What kind of relationship do you want to have with your cards? How do you see that relationship evolving or growing over time? How do you intend to build routines and rituals and practices and habits that will support the kind of relationship that you want to have with your cards? Do you have relationships with any other objects or practices or modalities that might feel similar to the kind of relationship you want with the tarot, or is the relationship you want to have with the tarot singular and unique? Within your life and your existing practices? What obligations do you think you have to the tarot? How do you think that your relationship reflects what you might need to do with information that's provided to you? In other words, if the cards offer you information as part of your reading, are you responsible for utilizing it? Are you responsible for acting on it or communicating it?
Meg:
What would it mean if you ask the cards for help in like formulating a decision, or if you ask the cards straight up for advice? What would it mean to go against what the tarot recommends or suggests? How might that impact your relationship with the cards? How might that impact the belief that you have in your cards if you feel like the cards are wrong? Do you believe the cards can be wrong or do you think they are always true? Do you think it's possible that the cards will not have all of the information at a specific time?
Meg:
Now, these are big questions. Again, I've got to say that these are big questions, and I don't really think that you have to have all of the answers to all of these questions mapped out in order to do tarot readings. That's truly not what I'm trying to say here, but what I am trying to say is that spending the time thinking about, or starting to think about, some of these questions is really going to help you understand what to do with the information that the cards give you. And look, some of these questions might not resonate. Some of these might not be questions you want to answer, and that's totally fine. I really want to encourage you to take the time to at least try to engage with some of these ideas before you start doing dozens of dozens of readings and find yourself spinning out every time the tower shows up because you don't know what to do with it.
Meg:
I always like to try to end these episodes with a tip or a trick or a technique, but I've already thrown a lot of questions at you and I've realized that that might feel kind of overwhelming, that this whole concept of unpacking your beliefs around tarot might feel completely overwhelming and not like something you really want to do. So if you take one thing from this episode, let it be this I would really encourage you to take a few minutes to journal or talk to a friend about what brought you to the cards. What appeals to you about tarot? What is it about the cards themselves that made you want to work with them and engage with them specifically again, specifically over other modalities or practices or divination tools. What do you hope to gain from your readings or practices? How do you want tarot to impact you.
Meg:
You can also just answer the question how could the cards best support you?
Meg:
What would your ideal relationship with the cards look like? What would they be providing for you? Just journaling about this small handful of questions can help you start to really recognize and consider where your existing beliefs are already influencing your choice to work with the tarot. And in giving yourself the gift of time and reflection and awareness, you are really going to strengthen your practice and start your new relationship with the cards from a place of much more steadiness rather than fear or anxiety or uncertainty.
Meg:
I want you to be able to move into your tarot practice with a really solid foundation, and that doesn't mean that you have to have all the cards memorized before you start reading the deck, but it does mean that you should understand what you think you're doing when you pull cards and ask questions. Who is answering, what is answering, where are those answers coming from and what does that mean for you? That's all I have for you today, but I want to thank you so much for listening to Card Talk and I will be back with more soon. Card Talk is committed to staying ad-free for everyone, which is only possible thanks to the generous support of listeners like you. To pledge your monthly support or to make a one-time donation, click the link in the show notes. You can also find episode transcripts, more about me and additional Tarot resources through my website, 3amtarotcom. See you next time.