Tarot Self-Empowerment Techniques: Scouting Ahead

When doing a Tarot reading for ourselves, we often find that the chatter of our hopes and fears invariably intrudes. Because of this, it is important to find out how we can silence the voice of our rational mind long enough to enable us to hear our intuitive wisdom. To enable you to do that, I have created a variety of non-divinatory techniques for using Tarot cards to empower you to create the future you want. Here is one that I call “Scouting Ahead.”

Note: Before reading this, you might want to read my introduction to Tarot Self-Empowerment Techniques.

This technique is like a scout from an expedition party who is sent ahead to explore the terrain —its geography, its resources, and its impending dangers. It shows you how to overcome potential pitfalls on the way toward reaching your goal, and it helps you see how to reach that goal. It also leads you to a better understanding of what to expect when you finally get there, which is valuable since often our expectations prove to be unsound or unreasonable, and if they are, we may want to adjust them or alter our course so that we will arrive at a different, more satisfactory, destination.

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STEP 1:  Your goal

Consider an area of your life (such as your love life or you career) that seems to have stalled or stagnated. Then quickly go through your deck, cards face up, and use your intuitive reactions to the cards to choose those that depict in some way where you want to be in that area of your life. Next compare the cards you chose and pick out the one best card for this purpose.

Once you have done that, describe what that card says about your goal and consider the ramifications of that description. Is your description of where you want to go what you expected? Is it what you really want? Based upon what you have described, do you want to adjust your goal, your approach toward attaining it, or your expectations of it? On the other hand, does the message of this card merely strengthen your resolve to attain this goal and affirm your line of attack?

Also, write down several words that describe what attributes, qualities, and characteristics this card depicts or indicates. Then write an affirmation that you have those qualities. Use this affirmation with this card for the next week or so.

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STEP 2:  Where you are now

Go through your deck again, choosing cards that somehow depict where you are right now in the area of your life that you chose to consider. Then, as before, narrow it down to the one best card for this purpose. Once you have done that, describe what that card depicts or says about where you are now.

Place this card in front of the one that you chose in Step 1, and compare and contrast these two cards. Write a paragraph discussing what the two cards together have to say about how far you have yet to go and about what problems or blocks you are experiencing in reaching your goal.

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STEP 3:  The road between

Choose a card to suggest how you can reach your goal. For this card, you can either use the divinatory method of shuffling the deck and dealing yourself a card, or you can pick a card intuitively as you did in the prior steps. I have found both methods to work well, although they work in different ways. You may want to experiment to see which way works best for you, or you can even use both methods, which will yield two cards to help you find “the road between.”

Place the card you picked between the two cards you chose in the prior steps. Consider what this card suggests you can do to get from where you are (as depicted by the second card you chose) to where you want to be (as depicted by the first card you chose). List a few specific, concrete actions you can take, as suggested by this card, and make a commitment to do at least one of them in the next 24 hours.

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STEP 4:  Visualize your goal

Relax and do a guided visualization into the first card (i.e., the goal card). Once you have entered this card, approach the character with whom you most closely identify as exemplifying the attainment of your goal. Imagine yourself melding with this person, becoming one with him or her. Then consider the following questions:

• What are you thinking and feeling?
• What are you doing? What do you plan or expect to do next?
• What thoughts or ideas occur to you about what you need to do? For example, what obstacles to your goal do you perceive? What specific remedies for them come to you?

If there is another character in the card, you may want to discuss these issues with him or her as well.

As an alternative to melding with the person in the card, you may want to converse with him or her, asking the questions indicated above, or merely asking for advice on how to achieve your goal.

After the visualization, write down all that you can remember about this experience. This is to keep the experience from evaporating from your consciousness like an elusive dream.

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The Tarot card image on this post is from my RWS 2.0 deck.

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