getting to know your tarot deck

Today on CARD TALK, I’ll cover:
-why it's useful to get to know your deck before you begin reading with it
-tarot as a language
-simple exercises to try out with a new deck
-why you don't need to always do a deck interview spread

Beth Maiden's deck interview spread can be found here.

For more on Meg, check out 3amtarot.com, and order your copy of Finding the Fool through Bookshop.org or your favorite local bookstore.

Find episode transcripts and more over on the CARD TALK website.

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Transcript

Meg: 0:15

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 getting to know your tarot deck. Now, I'm going to be mainly talking about how to get to know your deck if this is your very first deck and you're getting started with the cards. Our previous episode was about picking out your first deck, and so this is going to be a kind of natural continuation of what we were talking about in that previous episode. But there are also some tips and tricks for spending time with your deck if it's a new to you deck, but you're not new to tarot. So I'm hopeful that this will be a supportive episode for people in both camps.

Meg: 0:59

Now, as I've mentioned in previous episodes, a lot of folks who are new to the tarot want to immediately dive into readings once you get your hands on your deck and look, I get it. You have this incredible tool in your hands. You've been researching it, you've been spending all this time thinking about it and now that it's here, you want to use it for this purpose that you may have gotten it primarily for to pull cards and communicate with the deck and ask your questions. I get it. I understand. I did the exact same thing when I got my first deck, but here's the thing it really can help. I promise it really does make a huge difference to spend time getting to know that tarot deck before you dive right into the deep end. So this is really just an episode that's all about tips and tricks for meeting your deck and getting familiar with it.

Meg: 1:46

Tarot is not therapy, but think about it this way. If you've ever had a therapist, you probably didn't run into your very first session, shake their hand and then say, hey, can you like fix my life for me yourself to the therapist, telling them about yourself and your goals and your dreams and your history and your trauma, and also hearing from your therapist about their experience and their specific kind of training and the ways that you will probably be able to work together over the course of your relationship. You want to do the same thing with your tarot cards Plus if you're new to tarot. The purpose here is not just to familiarize yourself with the structure of this deck that's in your hands. It's also to be learning the structure of tarot in general and to really start to understand how tarot functions and the different ways that it can support you in your various endeavors. Just to review, for those of you who are newer to tarot, remember that tarot decks are always going to be organized the same way. You're always going to have 22 major arcana cards and 56 minor arcana cards, and these cards include archetypes as well as numbered pips those cards that are numbered 1 through 10, as well as court cards, which are generally the only cards in the deck that don't have numbers on them. But your specific deck might have alternative names for some of those major arcana archetypes, some of those court cards or for the suits in general, and even if it doesn't, you still want to be as familiar with the cards themselves as possible so that you're able to quickly recognize which card is which and understand what the deck is communicating with you when you pull a specific card.

Meg: 3:21

I talk a lot about tarot as a relationship, and I really do believe that that is a really helpful way to think about it, right? Whatever you plan to use this tool for, whether you're looking for spiritual enrichment, creative inspiration or help with personal reflection tarot is going to be able to meet you where you are. But tarot is also a language, and in beginning to build that relationship with the cards, you are also learning to speak the deck's language. And in beginning to build that relationship with the cards, you are also learning to speak the deck's language. Now, if you're new to tarot, you are going to be learning the language of tarot as a whole, like in general terms, by starting to use this deck. But I also want you to remember that, just like when you're speaking a general language to a living, breathing human being, individuals have their own accents and dialects and slang, and your tarot decks are no different. As you start to branch out and use additional extra decks or additional new decks, you will start to learn each deck's specific way of speaking, as well as their habits and preferences. The broad strokes of the language doesn't necessarily change from deck to deck, but you might find that the ways that you work with and speak to each specific deck is unique, and so, as you are getting to know your deck especially again if this is your very first tarot deck and you're learning tarot at the same time, keep in mind that as you start to eventually maybe branch out to new decks, you might start to build different relationships with different cards, or your understanding of a specific card might be challenged or shifted or evolve when you start to bring in additional decks.

Meg: 4:51

Now, when you get your first set of cards or any new to you set of cards, one thing that I like to encourage people to do is to literally introduce yourself to the deck out loud. It might feel a little silly, you might be a little self-conscious, but if you really want to build a relationship with these cards, you need to think about the fact that you are going to be talking to those cards, either out loud or in your mind, or whispered to yourself. You are going to be communicating with these cards and asking them for something in return. Questioning and answering is a conversation, and so I think it's really helpful, when starting to embark on a new relationship with the deck, to think about what it means to be in a new relationship and to begin a new relationship. Just like when you meet a new person, you're not going to immediately dive in and start telling them everything about yourself and asking really personal, intense questions or expecting that person to know you immediately and be able to speak to your life. Instead, those first moments with a new person are so often just about getting to know the basics, and so that's what I want you to remember when you start going through this deck and really getting to know it.

Meg: 5:59

There are a couple different things that I like to suggest to folks when they're getting started, because these are things that I do myself, and these are things like literally going through each card in the deck, pull them all out, take a look at them and really start to notice how the cards make you feel, both as a whole, when the deck is in your hands, but also individual, specific cards. I find it really helpful to go through the entire deck and pull out cards that feel particularly comforting, stabilizing, grounding or encouraging. In another pass or at the same time, you might also separate out cards that seem confusing to you, that you wanna spend more time with, or that you feel like might be ones that could trip you up, ones that don't immediately have a vibe that you understand. I also think it can be helpful to do a pass and pull out cards that feel uncomfortable or scary or strange, to note cards that you have a strong reaction to and, if you can, if it's comfortable or helpful, make a record of this process. Somehow those first impressions of the deck can often be really helpful to look back on and reflect as you deepen your relationship with the cards. And this can look any number of ways. If you like talking or you're comfortable videotaping yourself, it might just be easy to just set up your phone camera on record and just talk to the camera about the cards as you're seeing them. But you might also be someone who loves to journal and that's completely fine too. You could do audio notes, you could doodle, you know whatever really makes sense for you. But if you're able to make a little record of those initial impressions of the deck, you might find that they become rather prescient as you move on.

Meg: 7:31

Another thing that is really helpful, once you've gone through the deck a few times, separated out some different cards and just looked at the images, is to practice shuffling. There are a lot of different techniques for shuffling and, depending on the deck itself and your hand size and your particular ability to be flexible or the strength of your hands, you might find that the way you thought you might shuffle the cards actually doesn't super work in practice. There are some decks that I can do that kind of riffle shuffle with in my collection. But there are other decks that simply don't work that way. The cardstock is too thick or too stiff and they just don't work like that. So I have to do kind of an overhand shuffle instead. And there are other decks that the only way I can shuffle them is by like putting them in a pool, on the surface of a, like a table or something. Like you're going to play, go fish and mixing the cards up. That way you really can shuffle in any way that's going to make sense for you. But it makes sense to practice those different techniques and kind of see what's going to make sense for you when you want to mix the cards up in your own personal reading. So definitely recommend practicing that as well.

Meg: 8:34

I also recommend reading the guidebook, even if you're someone that has lots of experience reading tarot and you feel really comfortable with the cards themselves. Reading the guidebook depending on the deck, of course, but can hold a lot of really beautiful gems. A lot of times the artist or the writer who helped to create the guidebook will explain where inspiration for the deck came from, how the images were generated and how long it took to create the entire deck, and if this is a deck where there are different names or a different structure, some decks, especially indie decks, will put in like an extra major arcana card or two. This is where you can find out how those naming conventions function and make sure that you can really recognize a card when it pulls out in your reading. Another thing you can do to get to know the cards is to separate the cards out into sections so you can line up all of the majors and consider the story of the Fool's Journey and how this particular deck portrays it. You can line up all of the minor arcana suits, each one by one, and think about what each suit explores. You can also look at all of the court cards, both as a court like looking at all four of the cards from the suit of wands together or by rank, like looking at all of the pages side by side. And if you're interested in numerology, you might also want to try grouping together the number cards, like all of the aces, for example. Looking at these cards in their groupings together can also not only help you understand what the artist might have been trying to portray with these cards, but can also help you start to see similarities between the cards or the stories and cycles that are being explored within the deck. I find that paying attention to the context of each card is a really useful technique when reading, which is something we'll talk about in a future episode.

Meg: 10:42

No-transcript you, as you get to know the cards, how does it feel to have them in your hands and what are you excited to do? First, I am a big fan of journaling, so as you continue to engage with my work, or if you're someone that's super familiar with what I do already, you're going to notice that I always have a ton of journal prompts in my courses and writings, and this podcast is going to be no exception. I think that anytime you can incorporate a journal entry into your tarot practice, it's a really useful and supportive way to give yourself space to really think about what you're doing. I think there can be such a tendency to rush through tarot readings or tarot practices, but anytime I force myself to really slow down and consider what's actually happening, I always get greater depth and meaning out of my readings, as well as just my general work with the tarot. Even if I'm not doing a reading, having your journal there can be a really supportive way to engage with the cards that forces you to move a little bit more slowly.

Meg: 11:43

I always like to end these episodes with a little tip or a trick that you can use, and in this case, I want to talk about deck interview spreads. Now, if you are brand new to tarot, you might not be as familiar with what a tarot spread is and, again, I'm going to do multiple episodes on this down the line but what I want to just emphasize here is that if you are new to tarot, diving headfirst into a deck interview spread might be a little intense. It can be a lot to manage if this is your very first deck and if you're just getting started learning how to read. But you don't have to do a deck interview spread to get to know your deck. If you're just getting started and you really do want to do a reading of some kind, though, if you want to ask the cards something and have the cards respond in a way that you can listen to and process and start to interpret, I would suggest shuffling the cards very well, because if you've been going through these exercises, you've been grouping them together in different ways. Make sure you shuffle the cards really well and then ask the deck what would you like me to know about you today before pulling a single card out?

Meg: 12:42

You can do this, if you want, every single time you work with the deck over the next few weeks, but this can be a really nice way to gently start a practice and still be getting some feedback from the deck about who it is and what it might want you to know, without trying to tackle an eight card spread before you're ready. And if you are someone that's really familiar with the tarot, beth Maiden's deck interview spread is my absolute favorite. If you Google Little Red Tarot, you'll be able to find that easily, and I'm also including a link in the show notes. That's all I've got for you today. Thank you, as ever, for being here and supporting my work, and I'll see you 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.