(We have a guest post today from Sophia of TimelyTarot.com! YES, we DO have guest posts on occasion, here, and I really love this one, so enjoy!)
Are you struggling to get meaningful answers from your tarot? The chances are it’s because you’re not asking powerful questions – the type of questions that focus on producing practical, actionable and insightful answers.
In my career as a tarot card reader I’ve had a large number of tarot questions. Some of them are good, very specific and extremely personal, but others are so vague that even if I had all the tarot and psychic power in the world, I would not be able to provide an accurate and meaningful answer. It’s just the kind of questions that cannot have a real answer.
Asking the right kind of questions can make your tarot card reading experience positive, insightful and most importantly can enable you make the right life choices. Badly thought out and ill phrased questions, however, will always lead to low quality, obscure and confusing answers. As they say, “Rubbish question in – rubbish answer out”.
So that’s why I’m writing this article. I want to help people who are seeking answers to get what they are looking for. In almost all cases they just need to take a little bit of time to think about their question and formulate it in the way that gives a direction for the tarot, so they can gain insights and uncover reasoning.
Here I will be taking you through some of the “rules” to consider by when requesting a reading. These will dramatically improve the quality of the answers you get at the end of your tarot reading experience.
How to formulate your tarot question
Ask open-ended questions
Always, always try to ask open ended questions unless you specifically want to get a yes-or-no answer. The yes-or-no questions, in my view, are a wasted opportunity to get guidance on the issues you’re facing in your life. They limit you getting useful information from the reading.
❌ Don’t: “Will I ever get this job?”
-Well, if the answer is yes for example, where do you go from here? Does it give you any clarity on what your behaviour should or should not be to get this job? Or if this is even a job that you should be pursuing? No. There are no insights, no guidance, no advice.
✅ Do: “Is getting this job a right career decision for me?”, or “What can I do to ensure I get the dream job?”
– In contrast, these questions are openly begging for a piece of guidance and allow to delve deeper into the cards’ symbolism in search for reasoning. After all, tarot cards are not designed to give a clear yes or no answer.
Small tip: I like a suggestion from a fellow card reader, who advised to rephrase the beginning of the question with “Give me a reflection of…”, which I think is a brilliant way to open up a limiting question.
More tips: To phrase an open-ended question, instead of starting with “Should”, “Will” or “When”, go with “How”, “Why” and “What”.
Ask about yourself
Avoid asking questions about third parties. Apart from a number of ethical reasons like privacy invasion, asking tarot about someone else is also another wasted opportunity. It is wasted because it is supposed to be about your own personal and spiritual journey and a chance to gain a unique perspective on your life.
Questions about other people are often about what you can get out of them. Because you cannot really control other people, same as you cannot control external factors, it would be far wiser to follow the old Irish serenity prayer:
Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
Remember, you can always be in charge of your own choices and your own perception of a given situation. Therefore, to get most of the tarot, focus its power on the question about yourself, your life choices and your behaviour.
Having said that, I know it can be a bit tricky, especially if your question is about love and relationships. Here are few examples you can use to phrase your question effectively:
❌ Don’t: “Is my boyfriend going to break up with me?”
✅ Do: “How can I save the relationship with my boyfriend?”
❌Don’t: “Will my girlfriend marry me?”
✅ Do: “How can advance the relationship with my girlfriend?”
Don’t focus on the past or future – ask about present and how present behaviour/attitude can influence your future
Choices made in the past are behind you, and there is nothing you can do but reflect on what went right or wrong. And the future is going to be influenced on the actions you take today, in the present.
In spite of tarot’s reputation for fortune telling, I think too often people are waiting to be happy in the future when they should be focusing on the present. The best way to achieve a happy future is to find ways to be happy living in the now, because the future is always a day away.
When you think about what is going to happen next month, next year or several years from now, you need to remember that the life choices you make today shape that future. Tarot can help bring clarify and advise on what choices to make.
Don’t use tarot to ask about what could have happened if you did this or that. Those are the things you can no longer control. Focus on the present.
❌ Don’t: “Did I do the right thing for my career?”
✅ Do: “What can I do right now to improve my career prospects?”
❌ Don’t: “Will I ever win lottery?”
✅ Do: “What should I do to improve my financial situation?”
Examples of powerful tarot questions:
General
What lessons do I need to learn to overcome this challenge?
What do I need to do right now to make the situation a positive experience?
What is the biggest influence on my life right now?
How can I stay positive in this situation?
Love and relationships
What am I doing that might be pushing my friends away?
What can I do to improve the relationship with my girlfriend?
What is standing in the way of me finding love in my live?
How can I best overcome the challenges in my marriage?
How can I strengthen the relationship between me and my husband?
Work and career
Why am I feeling so unsatisfied in my current job?
What should I be doing to improve my chances of getting a promotion?
How can I better communicate with my manager at work?
When is the best time for me to make a career change?
What is stopping me from achieving my professional goals?
What career should I choose that will be most fulfilling?
Business and finance
How can I improve my current financial situation?
How can I better my financial prospects?
How can I find financial success?
What is my biggest challenge when it comes to money?
How can redefine my thinking about money in the most helpful way?
Final thoughts and recap
Hopefully the above gives you an idea on how to formulate your tarot questions to get the best out of your reading. So next time you sit down with a tarot card reader or order an online tarot reading, make sure your question is powerful by following these three rules:
- Is it an open-ended question?
- Are you asking about yourself?
- Is your question concerning your present?
If the answer to all three question is “YES” then you nailed it and the tarot answer you get has a very strong chance of being meaningful, insightful and one you can action upon. If no, try phrasing it in a way that gets to the core of what you really want to learn about.
About the author
Sophia – a theology graduate and a tarot card reader with over a decade’s experience who runs TimelyTarot, an online tarot card reading website. She discovered the interesting world of tarot at university while studying my theology degree. She was fascinated by the cards and how directly accessible their power was.
