Cult of Tarot Forum

Hi there!
I wanted to get some of your tips to best interpret card combinations.

Sometimes the message is piercing and clear, but some combinations are complete oblivion to me, that’s the main struggle I encounter in my journey.

Hi Mercurian. I'm not sure how you prefer to read, so the following may be of no interest. I'm sure you already do some of this, but it also includes astrology, hermetic Qabalah, etc. Feel free to skip this if it's not your thing.

In linking cards, I look for shared colors and symbols, whether the figure in one card is facing another, whether it's more or less crowded on a card, etc.

I look at where the suits and associated elements might be the same or how they might combine with one another. (I don't read with elemental dignities, but that could be part of it.) And the suit(s) that aren't in the spread - what energies are either irrelevant or missing?

I look at the numbers and whether they're close to one another in sequence or far away.

Then I notice the correspondences that went into the creation of the RWS and Thoth.

For example in the 4 of Pentacles and 6 of Cups --
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The RWS 6 turns its back on the 4. In the RWS the disks were held tightly while the cup is given to another.

The yellow of the RWS pentacles becomes the yellow all over the 6 of Cups as though through connecting, we paradoxically have more instead of less. In the Thoth the flat, gold background of the earth becomes flowing, gold lines and water - changing from stillness to movement.

On the Thoth you see the ⊙ symbols that show that both cards are associated with decans ruled by the Sun (more yellow/gold). Sixes are also associated with the Sun. So the influence of the positive and rational Sun is increasing. (If the question were "What should I avoid?" then the Sun's potential for excessive ego would come to mind.)

We go from Capricorn (4P) at the beginning of winter when you traditionally needed to store what you had, to Scorpio (6C) in mid autumn when the harvest has just come in. So we could say there's less pressure on us in the 6 than there was in the 4.

Both cards are numbered in the middle of the suit rather than a beginning/end. The fours to me are temporarily stable but eventually hit the challenging fives before reaching equilibrium in the sixes. In this pair, though, we have the 4 and the 6 without the hardship of a 5 between, which bodes well for an easier transition. There's no fiery Wands card that could bring to mind a lot of energy expended, or a Swords card that could point to choices and planning.

(I might also consider the Hermit as a connection between the two cards, because in the Qabalistic correspondences for the RWS and Thoth, the Hermit represents the path between the fours and the sixes. I'd ask how the Hermit might be the force that gets me from the 4P to the 6C. I'd look at his lamp, like he's got a little bit of the sun he carries with him.)

Anything can be helpful. And at the very least, it is still interesting to discover the many different tools that you can include in your reading practice. I do use astrology while reading, not a 100% of the time, but sometimes it is quite startling how it will literally align with the charts of the people concerned by the reading in question, sometimes even with the up-to-date astrological transits! Also for someone like me, who started off with astrology before becoming fond of tarot, it makes it easier to identify the traits that certain cards embody. I've taken notes of the tips you gave me. I pay attention to numbers when they're repetitive and when they follow each other, when there's a striking pattern. But I'm definitely still learning about the meanings of the numbers and what they represent, so it doesn't come naturally to me yet.
Thank you for sharing your precious knowledge with me.

I read very similarly to Rose Lalonde, although I don't pay much attention to colors. I came to Tarot with a strong interest and some background with astrology but far from well versed in it. I dipped my toe into tarot with my limited astrological knowledge as the guide, but as I dove deeper into the tarot studies I found that the numbers made it much easier for me to connect cards within a spread and to read a spread. This might be because I am not a very visual thinker and numbers are very straightforward for me.

I think of the cards in terms of a story arc first and that is where the numbers come into play. Specific plot points in the story arc.
If you are trying to understand the number significance better lay out all of your pip cards in number order in an array, each row being one suit.
Then tell your self the story of each suit from one through 10. You will notice a pattern across the numbers.
Here is how I came to identify these patterns in a way that makes sense for me.

1: is the seed of the suit being planted.
2: is a pairing that sets things in motion.
3: is the creation brought about from that pairing
4: is the stability as the creation grows
5: is a change that shakes up the stability
6: is a rebuilding and fortifying in response to the change
7: is the challenge that tests the fortification
8: is the steady flow of the things set in motion
9: is the accumulation of the things
10: is the resolution--which of course resolves itself back to the 1.

Seeing pattern in the numbers that appear in a spread helps me identify a stage in a process, or I might see that things are moving backwards or forwards, or perhaps I might see a lot of balance or a lot of discord based on the numbers.

As I started honing my visual skills I started paying attention to the direction the characters on the cards were facing--what other cards were they looking at or the suggested visual direction the artist to guide me to cards that might be connected. That my alter the order of how I read the cards in a basic 3 card spread, or in larger spreads--after doing the initial positional reading I will revisit those visually connected cards in the spread for further insight.

If I am doing a spread with positions of course I will make associations to cards based on how their positional meanings are connected to each other--for example if more than one card had to do with an aspect of the past I will connect those cards to form a more complete picture about the past.

Thank you for your reply, they’re very good tips
I have to pay way more attention to numbers when I read!
And looking at which way the characters in the cards are facing is also a brilliant idea. I’ve done it before but I still need to build those instinctive reflexes.