Tarot Tip Tuesdays - Try Not To Piss Off Your Tarot Reader

Whether you are new to Tarot and in the throes of building a connection with your Tarot cards or an advanced Tarot reader diligently honing your Tarot reading skills, I am putting out a Tarot tip a week to help you to consistently make Tarot a part of your everyday life.

This week, I thought to turn the tables and use this blogpost for Tarot Tip Tuesdays as a resource for advice to clients seeking a meaningful reading from a professional Tarot reader.  

Sometimes, I might meet clients who had visited me for the first time and have never obtained a Tarot reading before.  The smart ones would be upfront with me about the fact that they were "Tarot reading virgins" and would openly and honestly ask for advise on what type of questions they could ask and how should they ask these questions.  I loved such 2-way engagement with these clients and they always leave my table feeling happy, empowered and less stressed.   

Conversely, I have also met clients who turned our Tarot reading session into a complete disaster either due to their prejudice, misguided expectations or obnoxious behaviour   Tips for Tarot readers who  had been through such experiences could be found here.

Today, my Tarot Tips for this Tuesday are meant for clients intending to seek a meaningful reading from a professional Tarot reader:

1) Have an open and honest conversation with your Tarot reader about your expectations from the reading and what outcomes you hope to derive out of the reading. Be clear with the details of the background and other necessary information that could help your reader connect with your situation.

2) Always ask your questions in a clear and focused manner.  If you are not sure how to ask a focused question, your reader should help you to frame these questions in a way that will help the cards provide a clear and focused advice.

3) Be realistic about your expectations of a Tarot reading.  Tarot cards are not meant to predict the future.  They are meant to guide you and provide you advice with which you can use to make the right decisions to effect your desired outcomes.

4) Be respectful to both your Tarot reader and the Tarot cards.  Do not throw your tantrums at the reader just because you did not like what you hear.  Do not rant about your reader by calling him or her a charlatan or a quack and definitely, do not throw the cards callously on the table in frustration.

5) Do not take your husband, wife or partner to a Tarot reading, and ask awkward questions while pointing an accusatory finger at him or her about any misdemeanor, imaginary or otherwise.

6)  Ensure that you keep within the boundaries of the Tarot reader's code of ethics when you ask your questions.  If you are not sure what these codes are, do ask your reader.  Some Tarot readers will not read on subject matters related to health for example, so establish that boundary upfront and respect it.

7) I know it is nice to have moral support from a friend or friends when you arrive at your reading hoping to get advice on a relationship issue for example.  However, please respect that the space between your reader, the Tarot cards and you is sacred, so you might want to refrain from having a group of friends whooping and cheering on from behind you while you are having your reading.

8)  It is flattering when you find your Tarot reader quite super but please do not attempt to flirt with your reader or ask him or her out on a date.  Keep the relationship strictly professional.

9)  Do not arrive at your reading reeking of alcohol.  You would like your Tarot reader to provide advice with as much clarity as possible so you had better be sober enough to ask clear and focused questions.

10) A Tarot reading requires a lot of energy and effort put in by your Tarot reader. Paying him or her for the session is a rightful exchange of energy so please do not threaten not to pay for the session just because you did not like what you have heard. 

I hope these tips ensure that your Tarot reading session is a meaningful one.  So, try not to piss your reader off if you want the session to help you steer your decisions towards the right outcome.

May your Tarot cards provide you with a full deck of possibilities throughout your day.

If you like this blogpost, do follow my blog at http://sungoddesstarot.blogspot.com and LIKE my Facebook page at www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot

About The Writer:

The writer of this blog post is a marketeer by trade, and an intuitive reader by accident who deploys the combined modalities of a Tarot, Numerology and Astrology overlaid with her Clairvoyant and Clairsentient skills to deliver her readings with authenticity. She was awarded a Certified Professional Tarot Reader qualification from the Tarot Certification Board of America (TCBA) and is also a certified numerologist.  She is currently running a consultancy based in Singapore called Sun Goddess Tarot,  which provides confidential intuitive readings combining the metaphysical disciplines of Tarot, Numerology and Astrology via face to face and emails as well as readings at corporate and private events and workshops.  A member of the American Tarot Association (ATA) and the Tarot Association of the British Isles (TABI), she is also a reader for the Free Tarot Network and mentors Tarot protégés on behalf of the American Tarot Association

Website: www.sungoddesstarot.com
Email:  Joanna@sungoddesstarot.com
Facebook:  www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot
Twitter: www.twitter.com/SunGoddessTarot

Tarot Tip Tuesdays - Creating Customized Tarot Spreads

Whether you are new to Tarot and in the throes of building a connection with your Tarot cards or an advanced Tarot reader diligently honing your Tarot reading skills, I am putting out a Tarot tip a week to help you to consistently make Tarot a part of your everyday life.

So here goes your Tarot Tip for this Tuesday:

When I first started my journey with Tarot, I was taught to use basic 1-card, 2-card and 3-card spreads.  The positions were fixed, for example, a 3-card spread had cards representing past, present and future,  Then as I got more comfortable, I expanded my repertoire to classic spreads involving 6 cards or more, for example, the Horseshoe spread and the Celtic cross spread.

I think that is well and good when you are still at the beginning of your tarot journey because it lends structure to your reading.  However, as you grow more confident as a tarot reader and indeed if or when you turn professional, do bear in mind that  unlike the fixed positions you see in a tarot spread, life generally is not experienced in a highly rigid, fixed and structured manner.  

So why use a "cookie-cutter" tarot spread?  What is stopping you from customizing a spread to your querant's needs?  

When you do a reading, go ahead and engage your querant.  The spread should always be structured out of a 2-way dialogue with your querant. With this dialogue, you will find that the spread can be layered on with more cards focused on a specific question about the issue to get closer to the root of it and hence provide a more focused advice later.  

You might want to consider 2 basic rules when customizing a tarot spread:

1) When you keep the question focused, the cards will provide a focused advice.  

It all starts with some basic line of questions and I encourage you to approach your querant's issue with as much curiosity as you can muster.  As you approach a friend when he or she shares a problem with you, you should approach the cards in the same way.  Start with finding out where your querant is at now with the situation? How did he or she respond to it? What would he or she like to see coming out of it? What is blocking him or her from achieving this outcome? How can he or she turn the situation around? What tools or resources does he or she need to effect the outcome that he or she wants? How would the situation pan out in the end?  

2) Layer the questions to provide greater depth to the reading.

An example of this is when you ask the question about what is blocking him or her from achieving this outcome, you may layer it after that with additional cards to find out what are the internal and external influences contributing to this blockage.   When you ask the question about what the outcome would be, you may layer it with more cards addressing the additional advice he or she needs to make a good outcome sustainable or the advice he or she needs to to move forward from an outcome that appears to be not in the querant's favourite.

I do not use a fixed spread for my clients.  I usually rely on my intuition to design one specific to their questions. A spread could use anywhere from 5 cards through to all 78 cards in the deck depending on how I layer the questions.  They also do not have to have a "shape" unless I intend to create a theme around it like during Christmas when I use a Christmas tree spread perhaps. I normally do not care whether it looks like a cross, a horseshoe, a star or the zodiac wheel even.  Usually, I would just pull the cards and put it on the table in a linear fashion, just so I can clearly see a story building around the situation.

However you design your spread, remember that it is your responsibility as a reader to provide as much "bandwidth" as possible to your querants to open their minds to the multitude of options available to them.  So go ahead and pile on the layers to the questions and keep the questions focused.  Most of all, have fun with your cards.

May your Tarot cards provide you with a full deck of possibilities throughout your day.

If you like this blogpost, do follow my blog at http://sungoddesstarot.blogspot.com and LIKE my Facebook page at www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot

About The Writer:

The writer of this blog post is a marketeer by trade, and a tarot card reader by accident. She was awarded a Certified Professional Tarot Reader qualification from the Tarot Certification Board of America (TCBA) and is also a certified numerologist.  She is currently running a Tarot consultancy based in Singapore called Sun Goddess Tarot,  which provides confidential intuitive readings combining the metaphysical disciplines of Tarot, Numerology and Astrology via face to face and emails as well as readings at corporate and private events and workshops.  A member of the American Tarot Association (ATA) and the Tarot Association of the British Isles (TABI), she is also a reader for the Free Tarot Network and mentors Tarot protégés on behalf of the American Tarot Association

Website: www.sungoddesstarot.com
Email:  Joanna@sungoddesstarot.com
Facebook:  www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot
Twitter: www.twitter.com/SunGoddessTarot

Tarot Tip Tuesdays - Keep Questions Focused

Whether you are new to Tarot and in the throes of building a connection with your Tarot cards or an advanced Tarot reader diligently honing your Tarot reading skills, I am putting out a Tarot tip a week to help you to consistently make Tarot a part of your everyday life.

So here goes your Tarot Tip for this Tuesday:

When you do a reading for friends or clients, you might get a request and not a question, that goes like this, " Tell me what I need to know about my career."  Another one I get sometimes is, "What do I need to know about this year?"  

I find these generic questions rather meaningless and not helpful at all especially when the intent and purpose of Tarot cards are meant to be used for providing options that one could use to make decisions to influence his or her own desired outcomes.

Tarot is a powerful tool, but it must be used properly and with respect, not only for the knowledge it contains but for its ability to connect with the deepest recesses of our inner wisdom.  Although Tarot cards can be successfully used to answer mundane or practical questions, its highest value is as a guide to genuinely help people who are going through real adversities in their lives.  That is why I always ask clients to provide a specific question focused on an aspect of their lives or on a pressing issue that they may have, so that the Tarot cards can provide a focused answer to help support their journeys as they manage trying situations.

So when you come across questions like these, please be proactive about helping your clients  rephrase them.  And do explain to them why you are doing so.  Remember, a generic question illicits a generic advice for the client.  He or she would not want that I suspect.

Ask the client as many questions as possible to get him or her to focus on a pressing issue.  For example, instead of a generic question like "What should I know about my career?"  Perhaps, the question could be rephrased as " What are the key obstacles within this job and how can I manage them?" or "What advice can Tarot provide to help me deal with my difficult boss?" 

A Tarot reading session should be a two-way dialogue.  So make sure that that dialogue supports your client's quest to get the most out of a reading with you, and obtain better insights and advice that he or she needs most.  

May your Tarot cards provide you with a full deck of possibilities throughout your day.

About The Writer:

The writer of this blog post is a marketeer by trade, and a tarot card reader by accident. She was awarded a Certified Professional Tarot Reader qualification from the Tarot Certification Board of America (TCBA) and is also a certified numerologist.  She is currently running a Tarot consultancy based in Singapore called Sun Goddess Tarot,  which provides confidential intuitive readings combining the metaphysical disciplines of Tarot, Numerology and Astrology via face to face and emails as well as readings at corporate and private events and workshops.  A member of the American Tarot Association (ATA) and the Tarot Association of the British Isles (TABI), she is also a reader for the Free Tarot Network and mentors Tarot protégés on behalf of the American Tarot Association

Website: www.sungoddesstarot.com
Email:  Joanna@sungoddesstarot.como
Facebook:  www.facebook.com/SunGoddessTarot
Twitter: www.twitter.com/SunGoddessTarot