By Gary Meister
A person can spend a lifetime studying the Tarot, and still never know all there is to know. But – you don’t have to spend a lifetime before you can start doing meaningful Tarot card readings for yourself and your friends and relatives. You don’t even have to memorize all the meanings in the Little White Book (LWB) that comes with each new deck of Tarot cards. All you really need to know to get started is one meaning for each card and know it well. This series of articles will show you an easy way to do that, with Numerology.
But, this series isn’t only for beginners. I didn’t learn this system until I had received two Tarot Master Certificates from two different sources, and after nearly 30 years of Tarot study. And, along with some other systems, I use it to this day. So – if you are a newcomer to Tarot, this might make your learning curve a little faster. If you’re a veteran reader, this could be a new technique to add to your arsenal.
Okay—a quick review of where we are right now:
Secrets of Tarot Numerology Tables
Table of Elements:
Major Arcana = Spirit = spiritual growth
Pentacles = Earth = finances, money, material things
Swords = Air = thoughts, ideas, attitudes
Wands = Fire = imagination, creativity, intuition
Water = Cups = love, relationships, the emotions
Primary Number Tables
0. Infinite potential
1. Action, Beginnings
2. Cooperation, Coming together
3. Creativity, Expansion
4. Reason, Practicality
5. Changes, sometimes crises
6. Peace, Harmony
7. Success, Learning from one’s mistakes
8. Success through hard work
9. End of a cycle of life
10. Completion, Perfection, Endings leading to new beginnings.
11. Extreme creative action on important new beginnings
12. Creative, cooperative beginnings
13. Beginnings, Creativity, Expansion, with reason and practicality
14. Beginnings + Practicality + Big changes
15. Action or Beginning + Big changes + Peace and Harmony
16. Action or Beginning + Peace and Harmony + Learning from mistakes
17. Action or Expansion + Learning from mistakes + Success
A quick reminder: the adding I’ve been doing, and continue to do, is Numerology’s way of rendering a compound number into a single number value. This is called the Fadic System.
Okay... Number 18, The Moon: Action + Success + The end of a cycle
A crayfish crawls from the water onto a long path that passes between two far-away stone towers and into the distant mountains. Close to the shore, two canine animals, a dog and a wolf, stand on both sides of the trail, baying at the Moon above. The Moon itself is shown to shine above the earth below in three of her phases—full, half, and crescent.
Here we are taking another affirmative action step on our path to enlightenment (remember: the Major Arcana cards are of the Element, Spirit—having to do with spiritual growth), and we become successful at this level of growth. (I say success at this level because, if we had reached total success in our spiritual growth, we wouldn’t live here anymore—we’d have learned all our Earth-lessons and moved on to a higher plane.)
1 + 8 = 9—The end of a cycle
So, we are successful in what we are learning at this time. And that brings us to the end of this cycle of learning. We have finished the Ninth Grade, so to speak, and are getting ready to move into the Tenth Grade—more difficult, but greater rewards as well.
In a reading, depending upon the question and the spread, I might use this card in a more general way—not necessarily sticking to the Element of the card. I might say: Your active job-search appears to be paying off. One of your interviews has left a good impression and you may get a call very soon with a new job-offer. This will bring a new cycle of learning for you—learning how to do this new job to the very best of your ability. (Obviously, this reading has, as its question, something about finding a new job.) Okay—that’s how I might read it—how about you? Think about it. Make up a new question and use The Moon for your answer. Practice it. Do the reading aloud so your mind can hear your words as well as just thinking them. Expand upon it. Now—you guessed it—write it down in your Tarot journal, speaking the words as you write them.
Earlier, I mentioned Tarot Spreads... I’m not going to get into spreads at this time (this course deals with meanings), but here are a couple of website links where you can find some good spreads.
http://www.tarotpassages.com/spreads-readings.htm, http://www.newagestore.com/divination/tarot.aspx, http://www.aeclectic.net/tarot/learn/spreads/.
These sites can give you all sorts of ideas for spreads to use in your readings. However—I would suggest sticking to one-, two-, or three-card spreads for a while.
A one-card spread can tell you a great deal in a reading once you get used to expanding upon your simple meanings and letting your intuition fly free.
One good two-card spread is: Card 1 = You (or the situation), here and now. Card Two = Influences surrounding card one, or Challenges to overcome. To make this a three-card spread, you can add a Most Probable Outcome card (but be sure to let the client know that he or she can change that outcome by changing his/her thinking and/or decisions).
More and more, try to think of yourself as a Tarot Reader as well as a student. You already know the meanings—or know how to figure them out—of all but three cards. That’s 75 cards! You are completely able to do good meaningful readings with these 75 cards, by just leaving out the others (The Sun, Judgement, and The World). When you learn the meanings of those, it just adds to the readings. And, believe it or not, you already have the knowledge, from what I have given you up to now, to figure out the meanings of those!
All you need now is the confidence to do them—by, as I said, thinking of yourself as a Tarot card Reader! You are! If you’ve been following along with the lessons, you know everything you need to know to do accurate readings on your own. Practice, practice, practice! Your subconscious mind and your intuition will lead you. And—don’t be afraid to make mistakes. You’ll be amazed at how accurate people will say you are!
See ya next time with The Sun. And, maybe, space and time allowing, we’ll finish the deck. After that I’ll have a few more pointers for you.
Bright Blessings ~ Gary Meister, CTM