What makes for an empowering tarot reading?

What does it mean to give an empowering tarot reading, and what role does intuition play in the process?

Empowerment has long been a big buzz word in the world of tarot reading.

One of my first tarot teachers strongly emphasized the importance of making a tarot reading empowering, especially as a way to move beyond predictive readings.

The push towards empowered tarot readings has been an important one, I think. Because so many of us – especially those of us who came to tarot before social media – are introduced to tarot as a strictly predictive tool.

But we also know that tarot can do so much more than that.

And so to see tarot’s usage expand beyond that has been important, and continues to be important as more and more people tune into tarot as a practice.

An empowering tarot reading is meant to help clients find confidence in their decisions. It is meant to give them authority or autonomy over their path.

But what I learned when I started taking on tarot clients is that not everybody is looking for empowerment. Many clients already come to readings feeling empowered in their lives.

One humbling lesson for me has been not to assume that all tarot clients are shrinking violets who need help standing out in the world. Or who need help standing strong.

It’s important for tarot readers to give their querents credit for what they already know, and what they are already capable of doing.

And I realized that some of the ways I had learned tarot early on didn’t account for that.

Instead, it came from a place of assumption that everyone who got a reading wanted or needed some kind of help with their confidence.

But that can feel patronizing in certain contexts.

What this realization brought me to was how important it is to really listen to what a querent will find most helpful. And I am not sure what kind of takeaway someone is looking to get from a reading, I will ask:

“What are you hoping to walk away with today?”

Sometimes people want advice.

Sometimes people want a read on the energy of a situation.

Sometimes people want a sounding board.

Sometimes people want another perspective.

Whatever the intention of a reading ends up being, it’s important to aim to deliver that.

For example, if someone is looking for advice, then they are going to expect to receive a tip, a strategy, or some kind of tangible step they can take in their life.

This means offering specifics. But it also means offering something that is relevant and useful to the querent.

It can be challenging to move past some of the inspirational generalities that we tend to pick up in tarot language, especially when working from common tarot guidebooks.

I found it very difficult to break out of inspiration-speak at first. I remember one time, I was reading for a friend of a friend. The question had been, “How can I move forward this year?”

The Ten of Pentacles had shown up as a challenge. My first instinct was to say that it looked like there was an issue with an inheritance, and that was causing her to feel stuck.

But I ignored my intuition, afraid of being wrong, and offered up a vague message about focusing on abundance.

And wouldn’t you know it, but a couple of minutes later, the querent started talking about her concerns regarding an inheritance that was causing a major family rift.

That reading came as a big lesson to me. First, it taught me to pay attention to my first impressions with the cards. Second, it taught me that saying things like “focus on abundance” or “manifest your goals” or “trust your intuition” are common things we learn to say to clients, but don’t resonate with everyone.

This querent wanted a clear, down-to-earth reading that didn’t go into vague inspiration or spiritual notions.

They needed sound advice that they could act on.

I think sometimes, tarot language leans towards the nebulous because tarot readers want to put decisions into the querents’ hands. And I think that’s important: Querents are responsible for their own paths.

But sometimes we end up swinging too far in the other direction, where we leave querents puzzling through vague, inspirational statements when they really need something concrete.

We can leave people feeling empowered and autonomous while still being specific, strategic, and clear.

Don’t be afraid to dig deep into your readings, especially when querents are facing specific scenarios.

Remember that sometimes, the empowerment you are looking to offer will come from the clarity your reading can provide.

Until next time,

Liz

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