Tarot 101: Tarot as a Solution
Today has not gone as planned. I woke up with thoughts of Tarot in my head and a light task list to move through, and I was prime to set my day in motion. My son, who has no school today, threw a big wrench in that mindset. And I’m sitting at the computer and trying to write about IV of Wands (today’s card) and finding absolutely no inspiration whatsoever.
So I decided to do a personal reading to see what I could learn. I put on some brown noise in my headphones; closed my eyes and spent 2 or 3 minutes of taking deep breaths. Once I felt a little more centered, I thought of my situation, my lack of inspiration, and did a quick 5-card spread. I thought I would use that as the example for today’s post to illustrate how Tarot can be used to move through problems.
The spread I built is based on writer’s block: what prevents me from finding the inspiration I need to do my daily writing. This is something I quickly put together myself; that’s the great thing about Tarot spreads — you can easily build your own. You don’t have to rely on pre-created spreads or feel limited to the traditional 3-card past-present-future/problem-solution-0utcome spreads.
So here is my spread. I just laid the cards out side by side, nothing fancy.
The Writer’s Block Spread
- The Source: What is preventing me from being able to write today?
- The Solution: The recommendation on how to overcome today’s blockage.
- Strengths as a Writer: What are my natural strengths and talents as a writer?
- Weaknesses as a Writer: Where do I struggle as a writer?
- The Outcome: What is the potential outcome of today’s writing?
The Results:
Anytime I do a personal reading, I have to make sure that I step back and think about the cards a bit. It’s important to be as unbiased as you can be, particularly when emotions are heightened. My writing this today is also my working through these cards one by one.
The Overview: Overall the story of the spread is balanced. There is no representation from the Major Arcana, which would suggest this is a little blip on the radar, nothing with a large reach. I have representation of all four suits, leaning more on swords and cups (not surprising). Most of the cards fall into the end of the numerical cycle of the suits (IX and X), which would tell me that we are nearing the end of some sort of cycle. I love that the strength and weakness cards are represented by court cards, which are more personality traits. And of course — having the Ace of Wands, even in the negative spread position, tells me that we’re at the beginning of something creative and passionate — I just need to take it and run with it because currently… I’m not. The VI of Cups (Reversed) as the Shadow Card suggests to me that the run of meh with my son isn’t finished yet and that it’s up to me to find a way to move forward from the past.
- The Source: Ace of Wands: The Ace of Wands represents the source of my writer’s block. While I do recognize that the emotional chaos of the morning is a part of my block, the Ace of Wands suggests that I haven’t leaned into today’s creativity and haven’t found the passion that I normally have. I suppose you could say that I haven’t embraced the inspiration to write today.
- The Solution: X of Pentacles (Reversed): The X of Pentacles is about family legacy — but more specifically, it’s about being together as a family. This morning, that has been chaos, and the X of Pentacles — reversed — is telling me that I need to separate myself from them for the moment so I can recenter and come back to where I need to be — not just for the purpose of writing, but so I can be there for my family when they need/want me.
- Strength as a Writer: Page of Swords: The Page of Swords was a nice card to see as a strength. As it’s a Sword, it represents communication, words, thoughts, ideas, intelligence, and knowledge. The Page is young energy, someone who is still grown but has the excitement of someone who loves what they do and is eager (maybe over-eager) to move forward.
- Weakness as a Writer: Queen of Cups: No duh on this one. The Queen of Cups as a weakness tells me that I let my emotions overcome me and that I am not grounded. While creativity and inspiration are available, emotion gets in the way and I allow my feelings to block my natural flow.
- The Outcome: IX of Swords: The IX of Swords, as the outcome, admittedly, threw me a little. I mean, it’s the card of anxiety and stress. I feel this card is the outcome for two possible reasons. 1.) I worry that a deviation from my traditional card-of-the-day type posts will bother some of my readers (but I’m hoping they will find inspiration for using Tarot for daily problems); and 2.) I worry that while I’m setting aside my anger/frustration/chaotic feelings for the moment, the situation still persists in the present, and I need to come to terms with what’s happening and find a working solution to move past the anxiety of the morning.
I also pulled a Shadow Card: the VI of Cups (Reversed). This is the underlying theme of the reading. The VI of Cups is traditionally a card of nostalgia and childhood — or less sugar-coated, a fondness for the past. As mine is reversed, it tells me the underlying theme of the reading is, potentially, the past events of the morning. That may be a little narrow in scope, but I could easily zoom out and see it as pertaining to the recent conflicts with my sons. As this is reversed, I think this could indicate that I’m having a hard time letting go or moving past the bumpy bits of the past few days and that the issues remain unresolved. That, of course, is well outside the realm of writer’s block, so I won’t go further into that (although I could/should do a reading to work through some of that as well).
I hope this post was insightful. It turned out to be a lot more “fun” than I had expected it to be. I’d love to hear your feedback:
- Is this kind of post insightful to you?
- How do you interpret the cards? Is there something that comes to you that perhaps I didn’t see?
Deck shown above:
Originally published at https://www.pixel-tarot.com on April 17, 2023.
