In this chapter I talk about the nuts and bolts of reading tarot cards to identify health issues.
The Traditional Way
Before I start talking about using tarot to identify health issues, it might help to think for a minute about what a doctor does when somebody comes in with a problem. First the doctor asks questions like: Where does it hurt? How long has it been like that? Have you been running a fever? Can you keep food down? Any digestive problems? Do you feel faint? Any history of a problem in your family?
Then a physical exam is done and tests are ordered: white blood cell count (to check for infection), red blood cell count, occult blood in stool, X-rays, scans, sonograms. The doctor has been trained to know the magic number for white and red blood cells, what it can mean if there’s blood in the stool, and so forth. To the doctor, a little too much of this or that is a marker for a specific illness.
So, at last, the doctor puts together what you’ve told him with what he’s found in the exam and the results of the tests, and he is able (with luck) to give your problem a name and a fix.
The Tarot Way
Using tarot to do this is much the same, except that with the tarot we may be able to see the answers without even asking the questions. A good reader may be able to see what the lab tests and X-rays and exam can lead to. And a good reader can put all of this together with what he or she knows about life, from experience, and come up with a pretty good description of a medical problem.
Do you need to know the word “colitis” to tell somebody about a problem with the digestive system? No. You don’t need to know the name of a thing to see it. You don’t have to know about cardiology to warn about heart disease or high blood pressure or high cholesterol.
All of this is predicated, of course, on the idea that the reader has the “doctor muscle.”
But many do. It’s these people who’ll tend to attract the patient-clients.
Card Smart
What you do have to know, though, is which cards relate to which parts of the body as a rule, and which cards—usually the Major Arcana—describe the various diseases and problems. (See the next chapter for details.)
For example, if you know that Strength reversed is infection and the Devil means chronic, then these two cards together can mean chronic infection. And if you know that the Knight of Cups reversed is seduction and the Seven of Swords is guilt or deception, then you can put all of this together. Someone seductive lies to you (or omits the truth) and that person has a chronic infection. This is how HIV appears for me in a reading. And when I see it, I warn my client to be careful. No unprotected sex and no sex with strangers, because somebody around you may not be telling you the truth about his or her health picture.
In the next chapter we’re going to look at which cards—and which combinations of cards—can indicate to me specific medical problems. These you too can learn, memorize, and, with luck, use effectively.
As time goes on, you can add your own to the list.
Suppose your Aunt Harriet had diabetes and lost her foot to gangrene, and you remember your mother saying that your aunt’s foot turned black before she lost it. And suppose now you’re reading for someone and you see a black foot (or think you do). Right off, your Aunt Harriet is going to come to mind, and you’ll be jumping to diabetes before you know it. I myself associate diabetes with injections, so I see a Sword reversed and Temperance reversed (imbalance) and I read it correctly as diabetes.
The point here is that a tarot reader’s own life experience is crucial. Always. Whatever you associate with certain things will trigger thoughts you might otherwise never have had! So we both get to the right disease by two different roads. Sort of like the acupuncturist who sticks needles in somebody to relieve pain and the doctor who prescribes aspirin for that pain. Both are right, and maybe one is no better than the other, but they both sure are different approaches!
Bottom line here: You can learn from me, but you don’t have to be limited by what I tell you. The people who need you in particular will find you in particular because you’ll be somebody who knows what they need to hear. Trust me on this.
And one final, very important point I have to make again: I am not a doctor. I do not practice medicine. What I do is try to give people information they can use to pinpoint and resolve the problems their bodies and minds are having. Before somebody with a problem leaves my table, I always encourage the person to seek professional help. This I cannot repeat enough: Always send potentially sick clients to doctors.