I decided to look for myself (the lady) in the deck and see what came up around me. I’ve been rather stumped lately – I don’t like not asking a question, but I don’t like to ask a question at the same time. This felt like a safe option. The above is my throw – I threw five cards until the lady appeared in the line of five. There are six cards above, and there is a reason for this…
Sometimes when I read, instead of getting very in depth with combinations I like to read the line of cards like a sentence. It may seem silly, but sometimes that is really all one needs. I often find that the message I need becomes obstructed by my delving too deeply into something that isn’t meant to be so carefully disected.
Key – Mountain – Boquet – Lady – Storks
What does this mean? Well….
The key is never much of a mystery when I read. It means “yes”. It means “success” . The key is something that “is” without any shred of uncertainty.
Next in line is the Mountain. This is an obstruction, a block, barrier or challenge. We can climb a mountain, but it’s no easy task.
So, thus far our sentence reads “Definite (key) block/obstruction (mountain)”
Next is the bouquet. For some odd reason, this card always puzzles me. The bouquet is generally something pleasant. It can represent a younger woman (and I have had this happen). It can also be a gift – think of flowers from a lover or even from a child who hasn’t access to money but can still offer a beautiful sentiment: “I am thinking about you”. It can be a surprise, or it can be a visit. It can be the astrological sign of Libra. I’m not entirely sure what meaning to chose, but I think in this case (odd as it seems) it doesn’t matter much.
“Definate (key) block/obstruction (mountain), something pleasant (bouquet)”
Next in the line is the lady, which would be me. What I find to be highly ironic is that the lady is facing the definite block of something pleasant. I have been very caught up in focusing on things that are bothering me as of late. Just that information alone is enough to stop and feel confident that I have been offered a very valuable message (and one that a friend offered me not too long ago that I foolishly disregarded). Trapping ones self in a negative message is a very dangerous game. The cards are even bringing this to my attention. What’s more, the pleasant things are right in front of me and unobstructed. Nothing is preventing me from reaching out to grab the bouquet…. except me. The lady even holds one that she seems to be oblivious to, and looks as if it could slip from her grasp.
“Definate (key) block/obstruction (mountain), something pleasant (bouquet), lady”
Next is the stork, and now I will explain why there is a sixth card. The stork is another one of those “what you see is what you get” kind of cards. The stork is about changes. As Chanah at Freaky Fortune Teller once wrote, “the stork brings”. The stork can potentially mean other things of course (context is important) but it’s not common. So if we look at the sentence again, it reads:
“Definate (key) block/obstruction (mountain), something pleasant (bouquet), lady, changes (stork)”
The change is behind me, so I don’t even see them happening – almost like the imaginary barrier to pleasant things. However, because I read these lines from left to right, the change is now and coming before me. ”What kind of change?”, I wondered. So I threw another card.
The Sun – energy, light and good fortune.
“Definate (key) block/obstruction (mountain), something pleasant (bouquet), lady, changes (stork), for the better (sun)”
The changes are coming, and they look like they’re pretty good 
I am back.
So many thinks have happened since I stopped writing – I hadn’t stopped reading, but I hadn’t been enjoying it the way that I should have. I actually started to write on more than one occasion and then decided it just wasn’t time. So yesterday I asked “Should I return to writing about cards” and received a very positive response. And then my son awoke from his nap, LOL…
I decided today to ask about myself and my emotional condition. I don’t particularly like reading for myself. I often find it difficult to be objective. Part of my hiatus involved learning on an emotional level – learning to trust myself, and learning to let go of my pre-conceived ideas about people and situations around me. I, like many people tend to drag quite a bit of emotional baggage around, and it’s time to allow myself to leave it behind so I can grow as an individual again.
I have been growing in my cartomancy practice as a direct result of this, and being able to recognize the difference between picking up on a situation, and picking up the feelings around a situation. I think this is very important when you’re reading for others – it’s very easy to become influence by the person you’re reading. You may pick up on what THEY think is going to happen (especially if they themselves are emotional at the time you’re reading for them – something I do not recommend). It is what they feel is going to happen – sometimes they may be correct, but other times their hopes and fears are just that. Discernment becomes especially valuable in these instances.
Because I suffer periodically with melancholy I decided to ask about a particular situation that has been causing me some concern. I decided I would only throw three cards. I shuffled, cut and threw the first three cards at the top of my deck.
Key - Lady - Anchor
#33 The Key – I always view the key as an affirming card – it is my “Yes!” when I read, it’s also a card of success and successful undertakings. Keys also open doors of course, and lately I have felt somewhat locked in.
#29 – The Lady – represents myself. I always love when I throw a set of cards and my representative card appears in the center. To me that is a very good omen and gives me a sense that I have connected with my concern well.
#35 – The Anchor – I usually use the anchor to mean employment or work (I most often use Treppner’s interpretations) but I have found it very often to represent other things. It’s hard to explain how one makes that determination – it’s more of an instinctive feeling to me than anything else. I have had it come up in readings to mean a weight or burden, often imposed by people outside of the questioner. I have also read it to mean grounding in it’s most positive definition. It’s a secure feeling – the long hard journey is over, now is the time for both celebration and rest. You are at home once again.
I felt very pleased when I saw these three cards. The lady faces the key, so my focus will be on the positive aspect of the situation in question. I will be more focused on my success than being depressed. There may potentially be work involved (and I know for certain there will be) but I will be pleased with the fruit of my labors. I will feel more grounded and more at home. To me this throw is all about successful undertakings and positive outlooks.
What a wonderful gift for my return to blogging, eh?
I’ve been seeing some repetative themes again. I do so hate when that happens because I often misunderstand the message. I always find it quite difficult to read objectively for yourself.
We recently had a visitor who happens to be another family member (my husband’s side) and I think that is who the cards are speaking of. The first set of cards is the 2C, 10P and KnP. The 2C paired with the 10P can mean a family member, and the KnP would be that person. Since the knight is a pentacle, this would be an Earth sign (which is also accurate). Knights are generally younger men – in this instance it is a younger ACTING man.
The second set is the 7S, 7P and Justice. Oddly, I believe whatever the cards are warning me about will come to pass within a week’s time (the repetative sevens and aces make me think “7 days” or “1 Week”. This set is also central, so I believe that it’s an explaination of why we were visited.
More in a few…..
I find reading for other people to be both challenging and rewarding. Recently a dear friend asked me to read for something that I strongly dislike reading for – pregnancy. I agreed, and prefaced the reading by explaining that not only do I not read pregnancy well, but it’s not something I am comfortable reading for. It was a “take it with a grain of salt” type of situation. It turned into a wonderful learning experience.
I started the reading in my “traditional” way – a line of five cards. The question I asked was “Is Mrs. K pregnant?”. Much to my surprise, the first card out of the deck was the Key.
The Key is one of my favorite cards, because it provides the most concrete answer. When I see the key, the answer is yes. The key could also imply a successful undertaking. Both uses would apply beautifully in this case. The next few cards bothered me terribly and left a very bad taste in my mouth. So I decided to try something different.
Most die hard Lenormand enthusiasts like to use the Grand Tableu, which is a method of laying all 36 cards and reading them based on placement and in combination with other cards. Treppner teaches other methods of reading using this spread such as knighting. If you are interested in learning to read the rather daunting GT, Treppner’s methods are outstanding and I highly recommend them. The GT is something that this humble reader is incapable of muddling through. It is simply too much information for me to process because of my personality. So every six months or so, I will throw one out and look at it. One will never develop a comfort level with something that they never attempt. To this day it still overwhelms me.
There are other wonderful methods of reading – the very wise Madame Seaqueen has several, with her most popular being the “Simple Trigger” and has even created a new blog devoted to layouts here. For the novice, her spreads are more realistic than a Grand Tableau. Even if you are a more experienced reader, these layouts are also far more realistic in practice. Spreads are like guides – each card placement assigns a layer of meaning to the card placed there. And make no mistake, even a spread with few cards deserves respect – you don’t need to use the entire pack of cards to get the answer to your question. Sometimes, less it more. Many times too many cards makes for too much confusion.
When I am reading cards makes me think of a line from The Last Samaurai: “Mind the sword, mind the people watch, mind the enemy, too many mind… No mind”. This has always been the case for me. I do much better with “no mind”. As a result, I do better without traditional card spreads. This is the main reason I have always stuck with Sylvie Stienbeck’s “no layout” method. I have modified it to suit my purposes and it works quite well, especially when I do phone readings – it’s a lot easier to get the information to my client without a lot of dead air and wasted time. In this instance it wasn’t working for me at all. It’s never worked for me when trying to read for this situation. So I modified it again.
While I was shuffling, I thought to myself that I was going to throw my cards the same way I always would. I would be looking specifically for the child:
So what was different? I told myself: “I am going to recite the months of the year from February and move forward. Whatever month the child falls on will be the month Mrs. K will give birth.” The answer was “September”.
Not being satisfied, I decided a second approach. I would throw the cards the same way I always do again, only this time I would count to 13 (which is the number of the child card). The thirteenth card would tell me the month she would give birth. And lo and behold the card that fell was the Bouquet:
But wait a minute…. Doesn’t the bouquet mean “Spring”? Well, yes. And no. For timing purposes, most often it would mean Spring. The bouquet also has an Astrological reference, and the one I use (taken from Treppner) is Libra. This has always worked very well for me. My beloved German grandmother was a Libra, and loved to garden. When I looked at the bouquet I immediately thought of her gentle smiling face. I had my answer.
I shared the information presented by the cards with my friend who was overjoyed. Apparently, she would be due around that time if she were currently pregnant.
For many years I used to become stuck when reading because tradition spreads didn’t work well for me. I didn’t know any other way to use cards, so many times even though I would read for family and friends and have very good results I would stop for a while and take a break. Trying to read the spreads would exhaust me, and I never felt comfortable using them. Reading for others without confidence is a dangerous thing. As years have gone by and I have learned more about cards and methods, I became more confident. If you are an enthusiast like I am and finding yourself stuck, don’t give up! There is a method out there that will work for you too. Sometimes it just takes time to find it or for it to find you. Using non-traditional spreads and modifying them as I need to has been invaluable for me. I still love to attempt more structured spreads in the hopes of being able to develop more of a comfort level and to grow in my practice. I am just happy that I finally found something that worked well for me.
Wouldn’t you know she called me this evening to tell me she took a test and is expecting?
Being I woke up in an absolutely horrid mood, I figured what could be better than to throw some cards? Generally I am not an optimistic person, but I figured things couldn’t get much worse. But they always can…
What’s this all about? Well, the anchor is work (to me that is – many people use the fox for employment instead). The cross often pertains to grief and the child new beginnings.
And here begins our lesson. I thought this might be a good opportunity to illustraite how three different schools of thought would interpret these cards, and how important it is when reading to maintain an open mind.
When I went on my hiatus from reading for others, I invested in a membership over at waldfee.net which is a very extensive website as far as Lenormand and several other card systems are concerned. I had become familiar with it back in 2005 if I recall correctly. It’s exclusively in German so I have to use several online translators, but I feel it’s quite worth it. It was very important to me to be able to find additional resources to draw from. Part of what I’ve always had trouble with as far as English resources are concerned are the combinations. Waldfee has many that aren’t typical in any of these books.
Why is this important? Well….
When you read, you hope it’s going to be coherent. When I read the Lenormand, I think of my layout as a sentence where each card represents a word or phrase. This is why I like to read using linear type spreads. Now, I will demonstrate why this becomes challenging when using the different resources that are out there.
Reference #1: The Secrets of the Lenormand Oracle
“Anchor+Cross: Lasting sorrows, painful life experience, religious lifestyle”
“Cross + Child: Communion, baptism, birthing pains”
Now, it’s VERY important to note here that Sylvie Steinback (the author of this book) uses the Fox to represent work. I started reading using Sylvie’s method. It’s a very good one as far as I am concerned (I still use a variant of her “no layout method”) but because I had some background in what I would guess are traditional German meanings (and anyone more knowledgeable out there – please do correct me if I am mistaken) a lot of her meaning didn’t work well for me. This is one of those instances. If you’re a beginner to the Lenormand (or just looking for what I would consider to be a more “hip and updated” version of reading with these cards), this is a very good jumping off point to learn from. I know of many people who swear by Sylvie’s method and this is where they stop because it works beautifully for them.
Part of reading cards is really about connecting with your medium of choice. This way, when you lay out cards the meanings will be evident to you. Through interacting with many wonderful people over at The Art of Cartomancy forum I have seen this fact to be illustraited over and over. There are people from all over that come there and share knowledge and it’s so interesting to see how people view the same cards I use. There is no “wrong” way to read them – everyone is different. The important thing to do is find YOUR way of reading….
Had I stuck with Sylvie’s methods exclusively, the cards I threw probably would have been different. Once you and your cards agree on a language together, they will speak the one you’re familiar with. In my case, everything is “a work in progress” so the cards and I are still perfecting our conversational methods, lol…
Example #2: The Treppner Course
“Anchor+Cross: This work is destiny”
“Cross + Child: A child/young lady has a cross to bear”
Could this work for me? Well, I suppose it could but it’s not entirely clear what work it is that is destiny. I have several different “jobs” if you will. Having a cross to bear also wouldn’t fit – I am not what I would classify as a “young” lady, lol. This surprised me because usually Treppner’s method works well for me and it is what I use for meanings most of the time. But I started to run into things like this where I wasn’t too clear on the meaning. Rather than throw more cards (and further confuse myself) I decided to try looking for alternate meanings again. If you are interested in learning about the Lenormand and using the Grand Tableau in particular I would VERY highly recommend this course. It is worth the money spent in my opinion, and this course really helped me to move forward with my reading as a practice.
Example #3 Waldfee
Anchor+Cross: (this is roughly translated in both cases): An end to one’s occupation, layoffs due to work reduction.
Cross+Child (this is what struck me): A fresh start in 3 weeks. An important new beginning.
Both of these examples really hit home for me, which is somewhat unfortunate. Both my husband and I have seen enormous slow downs at our respective jobs due to the gargantuan mess that the US ecomony has become. It’s probably not helpful that we work in different divisions of the same very hard hit sector. My husband’s job has already seen multiple layoffs. Mine has not yet and my employers are working dilligently to avoid them.
The Child/Cross combination is reassuring – at least there will be a fresh start in three weeks though I am not entirely certian how this will impact us. Because (of course) this was very unsettling I looked at the bottom of the deck. What did I find?
Everything for a reason, I suppose
It’s been a while. I have sat down on multiple occasions thinking I was going to write and it just wasn’t working for me. I hate when I get blocked but it happens. But I digress….
Today when I was shuffling the Book fell out of my deck. I though that was amusing (I still contend that my cards have a sense of humor). So I asked my cards to tell me a secret. Here’s what I got:
What is nice here is that everything is coming to me, and it’s all plesant. Very much so.
The storks herald change, and the bouquet a surprise or a gift. This will mean a lot to me as indicated by the heart, or I will love whatever the change surprises me with. What confuses me to some degree is the ship. Depending on who you look to for a meaning, it could be “a long time” or three years. Or 3 days/weeks/months. Or, possibly my ship has come in.
The other possibility here is that this is about my mother’s impending visit to see me for my birthday (the storks could be the timing card which would indicate February). While this is reasonable, it wouldn’t be a secret by any means. Unless my mother plans to surprise me somehow (as indicated by the bouquet again).
The final thing I noticed while thinking about this was that the Lady is holding a bouquet of flowers. So again this could be indicating that changes are coming, and this is something that has been my heart’s desire for a long time. The ship can also indicate longing for something. Of course (not ironically) the next card on the deck was – The book.
I guess I’ll wait and see
My first deck of divination cards (for lack of a better way to say it) was a Rider Waite tarot. I studied the tarot on and off starting when I was 13. It was a great curiousity of mine but I didn’t enjoy it as much as I’d hoped I would. When I turned 30 I discovered the Lenormand and re-discovered the Zigeuner (a woman had read for me with the deck when I was in my late 20’s). I was frustrated by the lack of literature and often felt like I was struggling to read with them. Couple this with my decision to attempt to learn three or four card systems at once while planning a wedding (the cards were supposed to be my sanity) and I wound up walking away for a few years.
When I returned I was thrilled to learn that several books and courses had become available in English, and I began my studies in earnest. Eventually I made the decision to read for people which lasted for a short while before I decided a break was in order.
One of the things that I noticed was that I began to miss the tarot, specifically my Rider Waite deck. For some reason just holding it brought me great comfort. So I figure I might take it out ever so often and use it. I have once thrown Tarot cards in conjunction with Lenormand (a method that Sylvie Steinbeck suggests) which has proven helpful – particularly when I am very stumped. But I digress.
This is the Transparent Tarot. I became aware of it while reading one the forums over at Aeclectic tarot. I had pre-ordered it in July and was planning to put off the purchase, but it shipped before I canceled it. It’s a beautiful deck and a very innovative idea which was why it interested me. I threw 9 cards – 3 for past, 3 for present and 3 for future in a layer:
8 Sw, XIV, 2Pn/Kn Sw, Pg Pn, 3 Wn/II, Pg Sw, XII
Past: 8 Swords, Temperance, 2 Pentacles:
The 8 of swords is reflective of how I was feeling – confused and overwhelmed. Both Temperence and the 2 pentacles show my desire for balance and harmony.
Present: Knight of Swords, Page of Pentacles, 3 of wands:
It seems part of mastery for me will be to reign in the more tactless aspects of my personality. This is also something that I’ve been struggling with recently and have battled the better portion of my adult life. The truth can indeed set us free, but it can get ugly before we are released. How do you deliver the truth when it will cut? It seems that the rewards for learning how to better cope will be great, and I should continue to study this. I say study intentionally because of the page of pentacles. The pentacles for me bring this out of the realm of though and into the more tangible world – putting things into practice.
Future: High Priestess, The Hanged Man, Page of Swords
It seems more challanges are coming my way (what a surprise, lol) as heralded by the page of Swords. If I look at the imagery it gives me the sense that I am in the cocoon (hanged man) and that I will soon emerge now holding some secret knowledge that I’ve learned while resting. I will be transformed. Being the High Priestess is in the background I can’t help but feel that I will somehow wind up in better touch with my intuition – something I tend to be quite fearful of (and the page is quite appropriate here again, I stand with my sword drawn in my own protection). Maybe it’s time to put the sword down and stop holding myself back.
Not ironically, the next card on my deck happened to be the Ace of Wands.
After having thrown cards a few times and getting what I felt were appropriate responses to what was in my mind, I decided to ask the Petit Lenormand the aforementioned question….
Here was what I got:
It’s really kind of amusing, but here’s what we have:
Whip+clouds – discussions that go no where. This has been the state of my relationship with my husband. I feel like he rarely (if ever) listens to me, and it can be quite aggravating (and occasionally costly). For example we had a discussion about the roast chicken I was going to make for dinner. I had just finnished preparing it – butter under the skin and lemons and rosemary in the cavity in addition to a few other things. We hung up. My husband called me back not more than 20 minutes later to ask if I wanted to go out to eat tonight. I think I was silent for a full 30 seconds before I reminded him about the discussion we’d just had. Sometimes I wonder if it might be more fulfilling for me to talk to my dogs. At least they have an excuse – namely that they can’t speak English.
Clouds+Moon – depression. Ah yes, it has reared its ugly head. This is nothing new for me – I deal with it every year during the fall. Fortunately it hasn’t been too bad this time around, but then I have been preoccupied with other things.
Moon+Anchor – this combination intrigued me. According to some schools of thought it can represent addiction. Thankfully that is one problem I don’t have! If we consider that some people believe that the moon is representative of fame, it could be fame through work (again, not a likely option for the lowly Countess, lol). OR it could be emotional work – working with people’s feelings. That’s what I was doing with my readings, and it’s quite emotionally draining as well (which could also be another meaning if we look at the moon as feelings and thoughts and the anchor as “tieing one down”).
Finally Anchor+Birds – Work+worries? Yes, that does fit. Weighted down by worries? Check. Working with phone calls? Check again. It all depends on how we choose to view the birds.
This seemed to work on so many levels. So I flipped the deck over, and what did I find?
Indeed!
Card reading was a hobby of mine until I recently decided to read for others. When you start reading for others, it’s a little bit less funny and slightly more serious (especially when the cards are ugly) because you have a responsibility to the person that you’re reading for.
The first time I read for someone it was a former boss of mine, and it was many years ago now. She had gone through a very bad breakup with someone she’d dated for many years. I read tarot cards and saw someone coming in to her life that she didn’t know. She had been hoping to become involved with a man we worked with, but I didn’t think it was him. A few months later she met the person I described (the details were correct) and they eventually wound up getting married. At that point, I retired my cards and didn’t read again for many years. The experience frightened me.
It’s not always a blessing to get a glimpse of the future. I tend to work very hard to block a lot because it tends to leave me unsettled. I’ve made tepid explorations of what my gifts are, and very quickly retreated from them.
I took now as an opportunity to write about this subject because it seemed appropriate. I predicted something, and I was wrong. It kind of makes me feel bad, but the good thing is I was reading for my husband and it was a frivilous question. But it’s important to note that there is no such thing as being 100% accurate in predicitng anything.
I often see claims like this and I can recall contacting people who made such claims (many of whom had sparkling feedbacks full of accolades). The person I was speaking to may have been very pleasant, but I didn’t get the impression that they were sharing anything with me that I didn’t tell them, or anything that was specific enough where they could make a mistake. It’s a matter of “buyer beware”.
Tarot readers, psychics and fortune tellers often get a bad rap – they’re viewed as fringe elements and charlatans. In some cases they are. In a lot of cases, they’re not. Many of people I have “met” over the years who also are enthusiastsof the esoteric tend to be caring souls. They have different personalities – some are rather ethereal, some quite down to earth. But they tend to share a desire to help other people. That’s why predicting the future becomes such a tricky business. Especially when you’re wrong.
I’ve withdrawn from reading for a little while because I need to re-group. It’s something to think about, and something I have discussed with several trusted friends. I have been having great difficulty because I am so very concerned about the possiblity that something I say might cause someone to make a decision that they later regret. Because I am not going to be right all the time, and many times people call looking for hope….
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