Card of the Day Practice

The best way to develop a personal relationship with a deck is to give yourself a short reading every day and record it in a tarot journal.

I like to do my reading first thing in the morning using two or three cards. I jot down a few notes in my journal about the cards’ meaning and how it relates to my life. Then in the evening, I review the spread to see how it actually played out during my day. Sometimes I’m surprised at how well the cards described an incident that happened.

A while back I pulled the 7 of Swords on the day of a dental appointment. I couldn’t help but see the vertical sword as a drill!

The day my best friend died, the 3 of Cups was my card of the day. I don’t like to transfer meanings from the Waite Smith deck to the TdM, but in this case, the image was very apt. In her final month in the hospice, my friend didn’t want casual visitors, so her three closest friends sat with her daily, bathing her in love and healing light.

If your mornings are frantic, do your reading in the evening when you have some quiet time to review your day. Ask yourself if the cards describe anything that happened during the day, reflect the emotional tone of the day, or if the cards are pointing out a lesson you need to learn.

When using the Tarot de Marseilles or any other NSP (non-scenic pip) deck, I always use multiple cards. Just one card from a TdM deck (especially if it’s a pip card and you aren’t experienced reading them) can just lie on the table with all the energy of a dead fish. Put it next to another card, and they both come alive and start singing.

In upcoming posts, I’ll show you some methods for pulling two and three cards that I especially like for my daily reading.

Read about setting up a tarot journal here. 

The cards illustrated above are from the Pierre Madenie deck printed in Dijon in 1709; the earliest example we have of the standard Tarot de Marseilles (what’s called the TdM II style). Yves Reynaud of Marseilles makes beautiful facsimile editions of this and other historic decks. You can see and purchase them at his website http://www.tarot-de-marseille-heritage.com/