How to Read Tarot Intuitively - No Memorization or Guidebook Required
- Meredyth
- Sep 3, 2024
- 9 min read
Updated: Aug 22
When I began my Tarot journey, it was because I thought the Tarot was neat and it might be fun.
That is all that anyone needs to begin working with the Tarot.
You don’t need to have someone gift you a deck, you don’t need magic or psychic powers, and you don’t need to have a specific goal in mind.
If you get a deck because you think it might be neat, you are now a Tarot reader. Ta-da!
Since discovering my love of Tarot, I have become a professional Tarot practitioner and a teacher. If you are interested in learning how to work with the Tarot yourself, that's why I wrote this article!
If you'd like to learn Tarot with me, I would be delighted to teach you.
Start With the Deck Every Other Deck Is Answering
I especially recommend the centennial edition; the printing and the colors are the best in my opinion.
It’s the OG deck that has been popularized for over a century, and it’s the foundation for most Tarot scholarship.
If you wanted to become a great contemporary artist, you’d study art history to understand the language of artists. Similarly, if you want to read Tarot intuitively, begin with the Smith Rider Waite (SRW).
There are thousands of decks out there, and since the Smith Rider Waite came out, they are all based on what Pamela Colman Smith did.
Pamela Colman Smith and her family moved from England to Jamaica when she was around eleven, and she grew up between Kingston, Brooklyn, and London. Her multicultural upbringing shaped her in ways that set her apart from most of her contemporaries.
There’s a reason this deck is the OG. It’s clear that each card tells a story, and there’s enough space for interpretation that readers have used it for over a century.
Why not use a guidebook?
When you get an SRW deck, it comes with a tiny little guidebook. My advice is to put that book on top of your refrigerator and don’t revisit it until you have given yourself permission to come up with your own understanding of the cards.
The issue with relying on the guidebook and keywords is that they are restrictive, prescriptive, and frequently contradictory. Additionally, they complicate the process by introducing the reading of reversals, which can be extremely confusing for beginners.
Most importantly, they prevent you from trusting your intuition, which is the entire point of Tarot!
If you are looking to understand the universe by plugging rules into equations, I hear algebra has some fans. If you want to explore your connection with Spirit via tarot, you’re going to need to develop and trust your intuition.
If you take a spread that someone has created, plug cards into that equation, and then consult the web or a guidebook to hear what someone else has said those cards mean, adjust the meaning by the variant of a reversal, then try to equate some profound meaning about a question in your life, you are bound to get frustrated and feel like you aren’t an intuitive reader. It’s not an intuitive way of reading!
You will only be a true beginner at the beginning.
Your personal discovery of a card is what will give your readings their unique meaning.
After you learn the history, symbolism, scholarship, and teachings of a card, you cannot unlearn them.
The discovery phase of learning Tarot is one of the most precious stages.
It might be tempting to listen to someone else's interpretation of a card to confirm if you're understanding it "correctly," but I assure you that your perception and intuition are entirely valid and correct.
How I Teach People to Read Tarot Intuitively
There are no Tarot rules. Every reader has their own approach and style. Without question, many readers would disagree with my approach. I’m speaking for myself in the hopes that it will serve you as a reader. Take what you like and leave the rest behind.
1) The voice of intuition will never lead you into fear.
The voice of intuition is the voice of your highest self. Learning to differentiate what that voice sounds like, versus the voice of the thinking mind/ego, takes time and patience. Be kind and generous with yourself.
2) Tarot is not a tool to predict the future.
Whenever we ask a question about what will happen in the future, there is an inherent fear that something bad will happen.
That is the language of the ego. You will never visit the future or the past. You are always and at all times in the present. Allow the Tarot to meet you and aid you in this moment, for it’s all there truly is.
3) All the cards are for you, and never to you.
If your interpretation is based in fear, it’s based in ego. Spirit will never drop you or punk you. If you pull a card like The Tower or the Ten of Swords, don’t worry. You are not in peril; there are no ‘bad’ cards. Every card offers supportive medicine and wisdom.
4) There are no ‘good’ cards either.
Just like we all have a rainbow of emotions, our feelings themselves aren’t good or bad. We may prefer to feel happy, but we are not bad for feeling sad.
5) The cards' medicines belong to us all.
If your understanding or interpretation of a card excludes some people, your understanding is incomplete.
For example, the Two of Cups is often described as a card about beginning a romantic partnership. But not everyone who comes to the Tarot is available for that narrow experience. The Two of Cups certainly can include the experience of new romance, but that is not the core of its gift.
When you ditch the keywords and the guidebook, you’ll naturally gain a truer breadth and depth of meaning to your deck.
Pulling a Card
1) Pull Your Card at the End of the Day
There is no right or wrong way to practice. You don’t need to have a special pillow or light a candle. You don’t need to feel any one way. It’s fine to pull a card if you are really upset, happy, or whenever.
I think that most beginning readers start their practice with a daily card pull in the morning. That’s how I started. It’s a fine practice, but it comes with some challenges.
When you are first learning, and especially if you are willing to trust yourself and ditch the book, it can be confusing to pull a card with no context.
It will be difficult to resist the temptation to look at the guidebook for advice on what to prioritize during your day.
You'll then go about your day, wondering how an Ace of Swords insight might apply to you. This method forces you to shoehorn your experiences into someone else’s card description.
This inevitably results in a mode of predicting the future. You might not have felt that you received a profound truth from a higher power that day, and perhaps the experience left you feeling contrary to what an Ace of Swords day is 'supposed' to be.
A logical conclusion might be, “I suppose I’m not skilled at this, as I didn’t predict anything correctly.”
Instead, I suggest pulling a card at the end of the day.
Moving your card draw to the end of the day allows you to interpret the card's meaning through your personal experiences, which is the essence of the practice.
The Ace of Swords would likely feel like a mysterious and possibly ominous card first thing in the morning, but after a full day of interactions and activities, you’ll be able to assign that card some meaning from your empirical reality.
2) Start with the Drop-In
A drop-in is just what it sounds like. We begin by centering ourselves and dropping into the present moment.
Again, you can do this in your car, on a beach, or in tears in a bathroom stall. You don’t need to be or feel any one way before pulling a card, but you do want to give yourself a moment to adjust your focus to Spirit-led listening.
Begin by closing your eyes and taking slow, deep breaths. Focusing on your breath helps you attune your listening to your spirit.
Raise your awareness of your body, quiet the chatter in your mind, and just follow the breath.
3) Gently Lift Your Intention
Once you feel grounded and connected to the present moment, gently lift your intention for this card pull. For example:
What card wants to volunteer for my learning and curiosity today?
I feel some discomfort in my gut. What might inform what that discomfort wants me to be aware of?
Is there anything that might contextualize my concern about work?
Once you're prepared, shuffle the cards in a way that feels natural to you, and then draw a single card.
Interpreting Your Card
1) Ignore Reversals
If you are new to the tarot, I encourage you to ignore reversals altogether.
Once you’ve created an understanding and a relationship with the cards, then the nuance of a reversal may add context to your readings, but until then, just place the card upright. While you are new, keep it simple.
I will assert that a card in reverse is never the opposite of what it means upright.
I know that goes against what most literature says, but why would a card bring a specific message and wisdom one way and say the opposite on opposite day? Volumes could be said on this topic, but I’ll leave it there.
2) Look at the Card
What do you see? What are the colors? What is the story of the picture? Does it remind you of anything? What does the name of the card suggest? How does it make you feel? Are there figures? If so, what advice might they give?
3) Write Down What You Noticed
This record of your instinctual, intuitive knowing will be a goldmine for you as your practice expands.
I strongly recommend that you keep your notes in a three-ring binder or a disk-bound dot journal.
When I began keeping Tarot notes, I used lots of different journals and notepads, but it was hard to keep track of while I was in the flow of recording my thoughts.
If I had already written about one card, there wouldn’t be enough space on the page to revisit it, so I’d start in a new journal.
When we work with the cards, we don’t work with them in order, so recording your thoughts in a format that you can shuffle around as much as your deck, but still keep organized, will come in handy as your practice grows.
Let Me Show You With The Hermit
I’ll ask The Hermit to be our demonstration volunteer.
Observations:
I see an old man with a long beard in a hooded grey robe. He is carrying a lantern and a long staff.
There are four colors: a blue background, a white surface, black outlines, and a yellow staff with a star-shaped light.
He is standing on a small spot. It’s white with grey beneath it, so perhaps it’s a snowy peak. He is looking down, but he doesn’t seem afraid of falling. His expression is calm and inquisitive.
Associations:
He makes me think of a lighthouse keeper or a wizard.
Hermits are recognized for their solitude and reclusiveness. This individual appears solitary, yet not isolated. Hermits are often seen as enigmatic, similar to witches dwelling in the forest.
I know that hermits are often perceived as weird since they choose isolation from society, but since this is Tarot, I can assume there is nothing weird, wrong, or dubious about this image.
Since this is Tarot and the figure looks a bit like a wizard, I can go ahead and assume that his wand isn’t just a long cane, but rather a magic wand. That makes sense given that there is a whole suit of wands in the deck.
Interpretations:
If he were to impart some advice, I bet it would sound like something Gandalf or Merlin would say. It might be more mysterious than instructive. He’d want me to think about his wisdom and come to my own conclusion. He would very likely tell me not to run to the guidebook.
Given the presence of a lantern with light rays extending from it, I can infer that my attention is meant to be directed there.
The lantern reminds me of the Statue of Liberty, or again, a lighthouse keeper. There is some great truth or principle that requires some tending to safeguard. It’s not a bright sunbeam.
There is a wick, oil, and a glass container to keep the fire safe from the elements. It’s enough light to see by, and maybe possibly enough light that someone could see from far away, but it’s a little vulnerable too.
Personalization:
I am in the process of taking a big step forward in my romantic partnership; I'll be moving to be closer together. I'm excited for where we are headed, but there are also some unknowns about what that will be like once we get there.
Like The Hermit, I'm a Virgo. I like order and organization. It would delight me (and my partner!) to have all the facts. But the reality is we can only see so far ahead from this present moment.
It’s easy to get into the weeds of details and logistics. I also know that all the logistics in the world can be organized and there will still be surprises and unknowns. That's the variety of life!
The Hermit is showing up for me to remind me to stay present and centered in my own gravity. If I stay curious in this process, I stand to learn something more about inner light.
And there you have it!
You just had your first lesson. If you would like the next one with me, I teach private Tarot lessons, and I would love to meet you and support your practice.
This initial exploration of the Tarot without any guidebook is where all my teachings begin. No memorization whatsoever!
Ultimately, your practice will benefit from listening to others and grasping the formal meanings of the symbolism, but no matter how much you learn, YOU continue to be the most crucial element of your practice.
You are unique. What you see is what fills your cards with meaning.
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