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Your Tarot Touchstone

July 6, 2022 by Barbara Moore No Comments

Will You Give Me a Reading? What You Need to Read Tarot with Confidence by Jenna Matlin

 

All new tarot readers will face that question someday: Will you give me a reading? No need to panic, Jenna Matlin has you covered. This incredible book guides you through the process, including how to handle common challenges. You learn to both connect more deeply with the cards as well as to wield them with grace and efficiency.

Here is an example of an activity that helps you understand yourself and your relationship to tarot better, leading to opportunities to work through your own blocks and shine through your own gifts (from the book).

Activity: Touchstone Tarot

The touchstone is a black slab of stone that was used in ancient times to test for purity in metals such as gold. Metallurgists and merchants would take a coin or a nugget and scratch it on the touchstone. The kind of mark it left would indicate the purity of the metals in the item.

Similarly, most readers have one card in the deck that they identify with. We use that one card to determine whether we will buy or work with a given deck. While deciding on a deck, if that card does not resonate with us in a way that strikes us as true, we keep walking.

Your touchstone is the one card that speaks to you most deeply. This card acts as home base for you as you tour through the images and stories within tarot. It is the card that you will scratch all the other cards against to see how true they are. It often acts as a gateway to the various images of the deck.

Your activity is to create a mini reading using your touchstone card. You will reserve your touchstone tarot card and pull one other card from your deck to create a two-card dialogue for each question. Write the reading as if your touchstone is interacting with the other card. If you are brand new to tarot, feel free to use the book that came with your deck or any other tarot book with meanings, but also feel free to add your own meanings. Ask questions like these (I’ll give an example of a mini reading below.)

  • What personal strengths do I bring to the world as I come out as a reader?
  • What limiting belief do I have that will block my capacity to emerge as a reader in the world?
  • What tools do I have that will help me make this journey as a tarot practitioner?
  • How do I let go of what people think about me being a reader?

Example

My personal touchstone card is Strength.

Question: What personal strengths do I bring to the world as I come out as I truly am?

Cards: Strength and Ace of Swords

Strength: I learned to wield power with force, loyalty, and affection. My power lies in the balance of the mind and the heart, but I also must pick up the sword. What gifts do you bring to me?

Ace of Swords: When you wield me, I add boundaries, intellect, and clear communication to your cause. Through me, you learn to speak your truth. I add precision to your world of force. The lion’s teeth are a fierce thing, but my power is in cold calculation. Wield me with great care.

Your turn!

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Written by Barbara Moore
The tarot has been a part of Barbara Moore’s personal and professional lives for over a decade. In college, the tarot intrigued her with its marvelous blending of mythology, psychology, art, and history. Later, she served as the tarot specialist for Llewellyn Publications. Over the years, she has ...