I started reading tarot in 2015 when my mom gave me a deck of tarot cards that she had stored away from years earlier and had never used. It didn’t take long before I was online looking up all things tarot. I immediately purchased different decks (Rider-Waite Smith, Shadowscapes, and Wildwood) and a few books like 78 Degrees of Wisdom, The Ultimate Guide to Tarot, and Holistic Tarot to get me started.

I was neck deep in everything tarot and only kind of holding my own. I knew I wanted to learn how to read tarot cards and everything that these cards had to teach me. But I didn’t go about it anywhere near the right way. I jumped in feet first and didn’t know how to swim.

Here is what I wish that I knew when I first started in hopes that you won’t have the same struggles that I did when I first start reading tarot.

Intuition is KEY

I feel like this one is a no brainer for some of you, but I am a very fact-oriented person. I like facts and data. And trusting my intuition is something that is still hard for me to this day. It’s a relationship that I have to constantly work at.

When it comes to reading tarot though, I find myself going through the list of memorized meanings of the cards before settling on one that seems to fit the reading. Especially in the beginning this was the case.

I would sit there for 5 or 10 minutes on a single card trying to figure out which of the 15 keywords and meanings it was trying to convey. It wasn’t until I let go of some of my control that I was able to really get a grasp on what people mean when they say that you can read tarot with your intuition.

I remember that I was talking about this with my husband and I showed him a tarot card. Mind you he’d never picked up a tarot deck in his life. The card that showed up was the 2 of swords reversed. Without giving him any keywords, just that swords was decisions and struggles, he came up with something like “they’re overwhelmed and feel like they’re drowning about a decision.”

I was flabbergasted that he came up with this using just his intuition, but this scenario reminds me that the imagery on tarot cards are meant to speak to your subconscious mind, not your conscious (read: thinking) mind. It also reminds me that everyone has a different connection to their intuition (or inner self) and listening to that voice is extremely important- not only in a tarot reading, but in life as well.

Take the Time to Learn a Single Deck

As I mentioned above, when I first started I bought multiple decks. This was a BIG NO NO for me. I didn’t focus on a single deck to learn the meanings 100% or even 75%. I meandered through the meanings of multiple decks (RWS, Marseille, Shadowscapes and Wildwood) which all have different tones and different styles. I got lost, and this is something that still affects my ability to read to this day.

Because I didn’t focus on learning a single deck, my definitions still come out spotty here and there from mixing and matching the definitions that I learned. They all come together to create a single meaning, and seeing beyond that singlular definition can be a challenge.

If I were to start over, I would definitely choose a single deck and set of meanings to start with and work solely with that deck until I felt I had some level of mastery over it before moving onto a different tarot deck.

I get that this can be hard with all of the different art styles out there, but put the tarot deck shopping on hold just until you feel you have mastered a single deck.

Read All The Things- but Study Too

Reading is one of my favorite hobbies. And reading all the different books on tarot has been almost a downfall for my tarot reading practice. I spend more time with my face in a book learning about the history of the cards, how they were implemented in the early 1900’s spiritualism movement, and down the rabbit hole I go…

Reading is absolutely important and you should definitely read a tarot book or two when you first start out, but don’t neglect working with your tarot cards. Spending time flipping through the cards, doing visualizations, or writing out meanings is very important to learning how to read tarot. The more time that you spend with your tarot cards- actually working with them- the better tarot reader that you will become.

After you feel comfortable with you tarot cards, then indulge the book worm inside you and read all the things.

Keep Records

No- it’s not about taxes. It’s about the learning process. If you spend time working with your tarot cards, interpretting their meanings in different spread placements, or for different situations (love, career, etc) are you going to risk forgetting that insight?

I did.

I barely wrote anything down. I used the excuse that I preferred typing to writing. But I hated reading tarot in front of my computer. So I skipped writing down the insights that I had about the cards.

If I knew what I know now, I would definitely have kept a tarot journal. It’s why I have one that you can download for free here. I know how important it is now…

Getting Stuck on a Card is Ok

So I mentioned that I kind of mish-mashed a handful of meanings together, right? Well, it led me to have a lot of trouble remembering the meanings and it leads me to get stuck on some cards more than others. It’s not a big deal. It happens.

I learned to not be so hard on myself about it and try to think about different ways that I could relate to the meaning of the card. Was it through a symbol on the card? A color? If the meaning that you are trying to memorize isn’t being recalled, try to connect with the card in a different way.

You’re Not Going to Get Rich Quick

When looking at tarot decks, I’m sure that you’ve seen your fair share of tarot readers selling tarot readings and thought “wow, I wanna do that”. And maybe your a natural at reading tarot and you can give tarot readings with little study. For the rest of us, take the time to study and master your craft before you begin selling.

Think about it this way, if you were to buy a tarot reading, would you be confident in spending your money on someone who had only been reading tarot cards for 1 month? At what point would you be comfortable paying someone for this service?

That answer that just popped into your head is how long you should take before accepting money for your readings.

Find Your Own Style

Reading the definitions for the cards can be overwhelming when you have about 5 books that you are looking at. Some tell you that THIS is the definition of the card and others tell you to follow your intuition. Which one is right?

The honest answer is both. Tarot is a guide that helps your connect with your subconscious (intuition) through imagery. There are a lot of universal themes in the cards which come with their own meanings, but finding how the base theme of the card relates to you is important too.

This is where coming up with your own style comes in.

Once you have a basic handle on the themes of each card, you can mix-match pieces of definitions from others and yourself that fit the meaning of the card in the reading.

It hurts my data brain, but there is no black and white in tarot.

Don’t Ignore a Definition Type

Definition type? Yeah, like relationship themes or business themes.

When you ignore part of the definition, you are handicapping yourself and making things harder. Some cards relate really well to business themes, like the 2 of Wands and the 3 of Wands. Whereas the Two of Cups could also be about a business partner, not just a new romantic partner.

Just because you don’t plan to give relationship/ business/ spiritual readings doesn’t mean that the theme won’t come up in another type of reading. If you neglect to learn a part of a definition, you are hindering yourself from the start.

Don’t Try to Learn Everything At Once

Astrology. Numerology. Colors. Symbols. Tree of Life. New Age. Occult.

This is something that I could say I get from my college days of studying. I tried to learn all the correspondences to each card at the same of the meanings. It didn’t work out well. Things were muddy and unclear most of the time.

It was really information overload and I ended up having to go back and re-learn a lot of the correspondences because they didn’t stick.

Tarot is not a test to study for. It’s a journey of learning.

Key Takeaway: Take your time and learn things one by one, only moving on once you have mastered the previous step.