Facing Yourself:
Tarot for
Self-Discovery
During the 1990s, Marcus experimented with a method called the Inner Guide Meditation, from the book of the same name by the late Edwin Steinbrecher. In this method of inner exploration, tarot cards are used to create an illustration of a personal birth chart, allowing one to work with the tarot as a powerful and personalised self-change method. As a development of Steinbrecher’s original system, Marcus added the esoteric technique of using “coded questions.” These are used by another person to question a person’s inner guide in such a manner that the person being asked—or, technically, their visualised inner guide or visualised tarot archetypes—could not know what was being asked of them.27
An example would be asking the meditating person—who is visualising a scene, perhaps, where he is standing with his inner guide and a representation of the High Priestess card—the question, “Ask the High Priestess: M. D. N?”
The person might reply, “The High Priestess is giving me a silver coin and telling me—this is odd—to bury it, by the fence outside the house.”
Unknown to him is that the question was a coded version of “How should Marcus deal with his noisy neighbours?” This was an issue Marcus (as an example) had raised some weeks prior in another context, and the questioner thought it would make a good test, since Marcus would not have expected him to be asking that question.
When Marcus went and buried a silver coin by the fence, the neighbours suddenly moved out within the following week.
The moral of this story is that inner exploration with the tarot is the same as outer. The cards do not know they are only in our imagination.
In this chapter, we will explore various ways in which tarot can be used to map out the landscape of our own self. We’ll look at dream work with tarot, and we’ll use a helpful spread to reach a personal goal. We’ll also take a ride on a “ghost train” in a gated spread. In this latter exercise, we will connect to our own history, using tarot to illuminate our past as well as our future. Few people come to a tarot reading to ask the question, “What was going on when X happened to me a few years ago?” However, the cards can discover the very patterns that created the present, empowering the individual to create a more fulfilling future.
The Nature of Unconscious Communication
The tarot creates a living landscape, with innumerable variations, of metaphors and symbols. This landscape may be populated by unicorns and faeries, or by dark figures and living statues. It may resemble medieval Europe, a Victorian city, or an alien world. It may even be the recognisable streets of present-day New York City or London.
In this sense, the tarot is similar to a dreamscape—a window into whatever lies beneath and beyond the symbols, a message given through metaphor. We must be aware of how this dreamscape works, for it is a tricky place where time can flow backward as well as forward, characters can change appearance on a whim, and literally anything can happen.
When you examine your dreams or visualisations, keep an eye out for any of the following. You can see how many of these also apply to tarot.
- Visual puns (“running around”)
- Literal puns (“beside yourself”)
- Ambiguous words (“spirit,” “matter”)
- Body language puns (“heartbroken,” “a pain in the neck”)
The Garden Walk
For this exercise, you’ll get best results from using a deck that is either your most favourite or least favourite; using one you are not particularly interested in will be less provocative and engaging.
Shuffle the cards whilst thinking of all the times in your life when you have felt creative, imaginative, and playful.
When you’re ready, take the top ten cards from the deck, turn them face-up, and throw them to the floor or onto the table! Spread them out a little; they should be slightly scattered.
Turn the rest of the deck upside-down to reveal the base card, and place that somewhere suitable to act as the “garden gate” into the spread.
Next, we simply go for a metaphorical Tarot Walk to discern the relationship between the various cards. You can choose any route at all, starting from the gate card and meandering through the other cards in whatever order you like. Sketch out the route you take in your journal, and stop when you feel you have exited the garden through another card.
For example, we walked from the Star gate to the Empress, the Two of Wands, the Five of Pentacles, and then exited with the Magician. We therefore read these five cards as a 5-card walk through our 10-card garden. We can take any route we wish. Number these routes (it is best to have at least three connections) and write down the connecting cards. In this example:
1. The Star: The Empress
2. The Empress: Two of Wands
3. Two of Wands: Five of Pentacles
4. Five of Pentacles: The Magician
Now write a brief impression of the nature of the route or connection between each pair of cards. This should take into account everything you know about the cards, such as Kabbalistic or numerological associations, astrological correspondences, keywords, your intuitive impressions … anything.
So, for example, we might write:
1. Falling from the heavens. Sky to earth. The drop.
2. Son sets sail, leaving home.
3. Hard times from hopeful beginnings.
4. A mentor teaches those who come inside. Choices.
Repeat this path-walking to discover other connecting paths in the garden. See which cards always seem to lend the same meaning to their connecting paths, and which cards appear to mean very different things when connected with different cards. Most importantly, see what themes emerge in common across any or all of the paths.
The Ghost Train (A Gated Spread)
In this next activity, we’ll use another gated spread to connect with our ancestors. Whilst it can be performed at any time, it is particularly attuned to the week that ends on Hallowe’en or Samhain night.28
This is a personal spread, and you need not share any of what follows unless you find it supportive and helpful to do so. Our gated spread experiences often go deeper than we might imagine, so please hold tightly onto the handles at all times.
Gate 1: Carriage Card
Select out the major arcana cards from the deck and shuffle them. Consider all that has carried you through life, what you have clung to when things have been bad. Choose a card and look at it. This is your Carriage Card. What does it mean to you in terms of resources to carry you through a difficult or challenging time? How does the energy or lesson(s) pictured by your Carriage Card assist you in your life? Allow a day to pass whilst you consider this, and don’t forget to write about it in your journal.
Gate 2: Sepia Photographs
At the next gate, the carriage starts up and we enter into the darkness … the lights dim, the train clatters and clanks, and we are soon engulfed by the acrid smell of smoke and dust. Then we turn a corner and to our left an eerie scene unfolds, sepia-coloured: an old Victorian parlour, with photographs on a mantelpiece and a piano. All of a sudden, the piano starts to play a haunting tune, and the photographs come to life, all speaking in whispers. They have something to tell us, if only we can hear them …
Firstly, you will need to list the names of a number of your ancestors (ten at most). These are family members who are no longer with you. If you can, find a photograph of each. If not, simply use a small card or piece of paper with each name written upon it. Take a day to locate photos or make named cards; you can also use old letters, jewelry, or other objects that connect you to those ancestors. If you do not know of any family ancestors, you can simply write “Father,” “Grandmother,” and so on. Lay out the photos and objects where they won’t be disturbed.
To complete Gate 2, remove all the court cards from your deck and place at least one next to each of the photographs or name cards. Select them based on your intuition; allow your hands to automatically draw certain cards together with their appropriate ancestor. Open yourself entirely to the process.
When you feel like you’re done, leave the cards and photos spread out. You’ll return to them tomorrow.
Gate 3: Spooky Pipe Organ Music
The next day, as the carriage rounds another bend, and with the memory of those photographs still in our hearts and minds, we see a ghastly organist playing an ancient pipe organ, with discordant sounds echoing in the dark as we plummet farther into the tunnels of the Ghost Train.
Take your tarot deck, minus your Carriage Card and the court cards, and shuffle it. Now go through it and select out the cards that, to you, seem to embody the darker side of life—the mistakes, regrets, and fears in the night. These are the notes of the pipe organ, echoing discordantly in our lives.
Whether you’ve chosen one card or many, fan them out in front of the layout of your court cards and ancestor items.
In our next gate, we will start to really see how a gated spread works, with our first real-world activity bridging two gates.
Gate 4: The Planchette
With the shivers from the spooky pipe organ music still running down our spines, the Ghost Train picks up speed and careens around the next dark turn. We can hear the shrieks and gasps of our companions as the train hurls us into the darkness. Then suddenly we emerge into a huge space, dimly lit, full of cobwebs brushing on our faces and candles burning. In the centre, we see a table surrounded by Victorian women and men—we can tell this from their clothes, at least, as their bodies have long since turned into skeletons.
They are holding a séance, and we see that above them hovers a spectral presence—a ghost of times past, an ancient voice, a call to our own ancestors. It is pointing at us, asking us something, demanding something … but what?
Take your Carriage Card and place your finger on it.
Gated Spread Ghost Train Layout
Gated Spread Ghost Train Layout
Sliding it around like a planchette, allow it to move so it points to any or all of your “regrets and mistakes” cards. Gaze at your ancestor cards. Allow the Carriage Card to stop when it is pointing to the “regrets and mistakes” card that seems most powerful to you at this time.
Now consider together the Carriage Card, the “regrets and mistakes” card, and the ancestor card(s) you were gazing at when the Carriage Card stopped.
Consider what this combination of cards is asking you to do now in your life, before Hallowe’en is upon us. How can the Carriage Card carry you through resolving the negativity shown by the “regrets and mistakes” card? How does that relate to your ancestry? Perhaps it may simply be a case of sitting down for five minutes and remembering good times and honouring a memory. Perhaps you need to write an e-mail or a letter, or go see someone. Perhaps you need to do something to celebrate your living family members, or something entirely unexpected. Let the cards (and the ancestors) talk to you.
Here we’d like to give you an example. When Marcus last performed this gated spread, his Carriage Card was the Devil. In Gate 4, it pointed to the “regrets and mistakes” card of the Tower. He was looking at a group of his ancestors, seven sons/brothers, when the Carriage Card stopped, so it indicated not one particular ancestor, but all of them together.
He took this to signify that his real-life activity that day would be to hold tight to his direction (the Devil) and do something dramatic and instant (the Tower). However, the day turned out to be full of emotional shocks (the Tower), against which the best course of action was to keep true to himself (the Devil). He really felt the Ghost Train during the day, with lots of Tower-like events threatening to derail him. He felt lucky that he saw it this way round; otherwise he might have done something in reaction, which would not have been the best way to handle things.
What has this to do with the ancestors? Well, here’s the weird thing. He was explaining this to someone and said, “I guess it’s like some sort of fairground ride, holding onto the handles tight whilst there’s all hell breaking loose around you—especially as the apparent chaos and danger is not real.” Then he went on to say, out of the blue, “Perhaps it’s what those men felt in the Great War, just holding tight to whatever they could to get through it, whilst the horrors unfolded about them.”
All of a sudden all the hairs went up on the back of Marcus’s neck as he felt an instant emotional connection and sense of respect for the bravery of those men, his ancestors. It was a visceral surge, and very profound. He realised that he should learn to honour and respect the sacrifices they made by ensuring that he lives his life to the fullest, in whatever way he chooses, since some of his own ancestors did not get such a choice. It helped him see a little deeper into the world and gain a better viewpoint on his own problems.
This is what a gated spread is all about: engaging with life on deeper levels and in profound ways, which we may not have done otherwise. If you are doing this exercise in the week before Samhain, the final gate should take place on Samhain night itself. It will require that you have completed the activity from Gate 4. The purpose and uniqueness of gated spreads is that they are interwoven with real-life activities.
Gate 5: Emerging Whole
Here we arrive at our final gate in the Ghost Train, on Hallowe’en night itself, the end of the Celtic year, the time when the veil between worlds is thin, and nature itself begins the descent into healing darkness.
On our train, we emerge through a forest scene, a long path with trees closing in on each side. In those wilds we see dark shapes, moving shadows, bats flitting, red eyes balefully glaring—primitive horrors and dangers interwoven with the webs of spiders.
But we hold on fast, because ahead of us we see a door opening, the end of the ride. We know our friends and family, those who haven’t taken this ride, are waiting for us beyond it. Take the rest of the deck (from which we have taken out the Carriage Card, the court cards, and the “regret and mistake” cards) and shuffle it whilst considering your family, friends, colleagues, and coworkers. Also consider the future, and the children of whom you are or will be an ancestor.
Consider particularly the action you took at the previous gate. You are in a place in life where you can do things, where you can affect the outcomes of the world. What did you do to respond to the voices of the past? What can you do?
Now take three cards from the deck without looking, and lay them out, face-up, in front of the Carriage Card (see Gated Spread Ghost Train Layout). These are the “legacy” cards, showing your inheritance, your present situation, and your legacy that you leave to those who follow you.
With those lessons in mind, connecting all the past with all the future, we ride our carriage into the light, beyond our most primitive fears, to a place where we may someday come face to face with our ancestors.
The Miracle Card Method
This method is taken from solution-oriented therapy methods, where all self-discovery is utilised to access resources leading directly to a stated solution. In effect, it is as if in a tarot reading we determine the outcome card for ourselves, and then the reading is done to demonstrate how we reach that self-selected outcome.
It is particularly useful as a method for those already reasonably sure in their life choices and path, but who require additional insight to reach an already determined goal or to resolve a difficult situation. While it is demonstrated here as a reading for oneself, it can also be an effective tool for quick readings, as in a social setting.
Select out the sixteen court cards and go through them, face-up. Choose one to indicate who you would be on the other side of your problem or after you’ve reached your goal.
Here are some questions to consider as you make your choice: “What would it be like, and feel like, if you waved a miracle wand and your issue was resolved? How would you know? What would be happening in your life? Which of these cards illustrates that the most?”
Next, select out all the minor cards and go through them, face-up. Choose one to show the external situation on the other side of the problem—the solution reached, or the goal achieved. This could be, for example, the Ten of Cups, showing a contented domestic situation, or the Ace of Pentacles, showing a new business opportunity.
Next, select out all the major cards and go through them, face-up. Choose one for the “miracle card” that would get you to that chosen destination, as the person you chose from the court cards. Lay out these three cards in a row.
Now put the remaining cards back together in one single pile, and shuffle whilst considering your desired outcome card, your resulting state card, and your miracle card.
When you feel ready, take the top three cards and lay them, face-up, on top of the three already selected cards. This three-card reading shows exactly how you can reach the goal or solve the problem.
The miracle card, we always say, is in a person’s hands—the trick is discovering how to open our hands to receive it, which is what the three drawn cards will illustrate.
Tarot in Your Sleep
In this section, we present a few ways by which you can incorporate your tarot learning into dream work. In the ancient Greek oracular tradition at Delphi, this was called Eghimiseos. It was said that if you slept at the site of a particular shrine, the god of that shrine would present you an oracle in your sleep. In the exercises that follow, you will see how to encourage these oracular visitations. As with many of the methods in this book, you will build up to the full experience by practising skills first, then the method that uses these skills.
Dream-walking the Suits
Our first exercise is simply to practice the skill of visualisation. As we discussed previously, this is not just to say that we see things inside our head; our representation of the external world can also be composed of sounds, feelings, scents, even tastes. Which tarot card embodies the taste of success? And when you have tasted that card, what does success taste like? Can you hear the pipes in the Six of Pentacles, the tumble of the coins in the water, and can you taste the water in the air? What about the rich scent of the fruit in the Seven of Pentacles, and the touch of morning dew on your face as you look at the delicate web in the Eight? As we approach the Nine of Pentacles, what music fills the glade? In which card in the Waite-Smith deck can we smell a rat, even if one is not illustrated?
6, 7, 8, 9 of Pentacles (Shadowscapes Tarot)
6, 7, 8, 9 of Pentacles (Shadowscapes Tarot)
With these sensory impressions in mind, take your tarot deck and choose any one of the suits. If you choose to do them in a Kabbalistic order, follow this sequence: Pentacles, Swords, Cups, and Wands.
Pull out the numbered cards in that suit from ace to ten. Take a good look at them, and place them in a pile beside your bed.
As you go to sleep, visualise the ace of the suit. What details can you recall? Don’t refer back to the card; keep your eyes closed. If all you see is a general blur of the “ace-ishness” of the “Pentacles-thingy,” that’s fine. Step into that detail, or peer through it, no matter how undefined it is. Then start to sense the two of the suit. This may bring to mind immediately some particular detail of the card, perhaps a ship in the distance. That’s great.
Now see whatever else you can recall about the card—the detail, the colours, the artwork—along with any other impressions of feeling, touch, scent, or taste.
Then move on to the next card in sequence. The aim is to be able to walk through the entire suit, in crisp clear detail, with every card fixed in your mind. This is an exercise Marcus did for over eight months when he was first learning tarot, when he was fifteen—although he says he still gets the Sixes and Sevens of Swords confused sometimes!
When you have mastered all four suits, you can try walking through the entire fifty-six cards of the minor arcana in sequence. This is something Tali found very useful when undergoing a routine CAT scan recently; it ensured that her mind was occupied with something far more engaging than the clunking of magnets and machinery in an enclosed space for an hour. And although many of us are more or less familiar with the imagery of the major arcana, you will benefit by doing this exercise with them, too.
Lucid Dreaming the Cards
If you use tarot regularly, you may find that you dream entire spreads. These can appear not just as abstract imagery—“I dreamt of a boat, just like the boat on the Six of Swords”—but as actual readings or combinations of cards that are significant in some way.
One dream recently had Marcus on a pirate ship, along with comedians performing a Shakespearean play. This was probably because he had been discussing the Pirate Tarot and the William Blake Tarot decks the night previously. Within the dream, he was handed a wooden tray in which were slots, and pegged into those slots were wooden blocks, each painted on four sides with one tarot image. The four images were the Moon, the Hermit, the Six of Wands, and the Four of Wands, from the Druidcraft Tarot deck. These had direct relevance to an upcoming trip the following week, and the fact that they were to do with travel was illustrated by the pirate ship.
In order to encourage lucid dreaming, here are several of our favourite techniques.
Hand Observation
As you get ready for bed, for about thirty minutes prior, watch your hands carefully. This may be whilst you are washing or folding clothes, tidying up, or other tasks. You may watch your hands closely whilst you have a drink or eat. Pay particular attention to your hands as often as possible—which is not something you will usually find yourself doing at any other time.
You may not notice anything for a few nights; however, if you maintain this practice, you should find yourself suddenly coming awake a few times during the night, every few nights. (Of course, do not continue the practice if you have difficulty getting back to sleep or if it impacts your waking life.) What is happening is that you are noticing your hands in your dream, and because you have also been doing so with your conscious attention, it anchors you to that conscious, attentive, waking state. This usually brings you briefly and sharply to sudden wakefulness.
After about a week, start to “gently” observe your hands. This is a hard state to describe; however, imagine that your mind is dancing in harmony with your hands as you observe them before bed. There is a soft and gentle flow of activity, ceaseless and continual, and all is well. There is no particular beginning or end, there is no aim in mind, just the constant presence of your hands and your awareness of your connection to them.
After a couple of days (or maybe longer) of this observation, you may find yourself coming to lucid attention within your sleep, without waking up! This is a curious state, and it is possible that the first time you experience it, you will be so amazed that you wake right up in surprise. Return to the gentle flow of your hand observation, and after a little bit more practice you will be able to maintain the lucid dream state for quite some time.
Constant Enquiry
A second useful method is to constantly ask yourself, before and during your preparations for sleep? “Is this a dream or am I awake looking at (whatever you are looking at)” This can have the same results as the previous technique, and works for some who don’t have success with that technique. There are many more methods for reaching the lucid dreaming state; have patience and experiment until you find the right one—it is worth it.29
Taking Your Cards into Your Dream
Once you have experienced a little bit of lucid dreaming, simply write the word “tarot” on the palm of your hand before sleep. Ensure that you write it in such a way that you can feel the marker pen on your hand; it must be a “felt” sensation that you can recall when asleep. You can also place a bangle around your wrist or a similar “feeling” item that you associate with tarot. It has to be something that prompts your body or your memory whilst you are asleep.
You can then continue your usual lucid dreaming practice, and add the “Dream-walking the Suits” method as you have already practised. Because you have now added a physical anchor to the idea of tarot, it is usually only a matter of a week or so until you will have your first tarot dream—and it may even be lucid, so you can engage and interact with the actual cards and figures.
It’s an excellent idea to have a really good question to hand in case of any lucid encounter of a profound and powerful nature. We have known many students who worked very hard to gain this skill, mastered it, and then finally, after a year or two, had the Hierophant or the High Priestess show up in a lucid dream and proclaim, “What is it you ask of me?” only to have the student reply, “Oh, gosh, er … I’m not sure, I wasn’t really expecting you.”
Don’t forget to keep a journal by your bed to record your dreams over this time, even if you don’t remember them in detail. You can always write “no dreams recalled,” or write about a vague sense of a semi-recalled dream—“Something about flowers or a garden, maybe. I felt a bit sad when I awoke but I think it was about the past…” Just making the effort to do so will help you learn to remember your dreams.
The tarot serves us as a pack of possibilities, a divination of the divine, a dynamic reflection of the psyche, a search engine of the soul, a GPS of the spiritual journey, and a mirror to our dreams. In coming face to face with the seventy-eight images of a tarot deck, we are coming face to face with ourselves. We may be surprised, then, to see in those very depths the same heights our soul seeks, reflected endlessly in a single universal face with seventy-eight diverse expressions.