Tarot Overload
A 31-Day Challenge to Get Clear
Recently I’ve been focused on helping people release themselves from the burden of divination by focusing on the information they need to know to actually take action in their lives, shifting from information gathering to application of that information. When the future has yet to be written, examining all the possible paths is just too much to process. Too much information can be paralyzing. I know from first hand experience, and I’ll share some of my own experiences over the coming month. But suffice it to say that we can easily become overloaded, at which point the circuits just break down.
For those who have been in a similar situation, I wanted to create a deep, 31-day tarot challenge: #tarotOverload. The idea for these particular questions came about as part of the preparation for my new small-group coaching program, Tarot to Transform Your Life. Given its small size and the commitment required in time and resources, not everyone will be able to enroll in the program. But everyone can benefit from bringing some related big-picture questions to the cards.
These aren’t the questions that we will ask and examine in the program, but they’re important for converting haphazard information gathering into something more profound and, fundamentally, more actionable. And if you’re one of the folks who needs and/or wants help getting deeper with these sorts of questions and readings, then just know that I’ll be ready on standby for coaching.
The other part of this challenge comes from my recent interest in randomness as an important part of divination and the idea of repeatability in divination. As I’ve recently posted, randomness seems tied to, yet also somewhat counter to, intuitive readings and divinely guided readings. Many of us want to make sure that we’ve shuffled our decks long enough to let fate intervene. And if we don’t, the reading can feel false or uncertain. But why? Those things aren’t random; they’re guided. And if we’re open to any messages that need to come through, why would it matter if the card was randomly chosen or not?
So that’s an area of inquiry that has been sticking in my mind. It has no correct answer. It’s open for debate and reflection. But it got me thinking, and I realized that having multiple cards that speak to, against, with, and over each other offers a mechanism for a different kind of “tarot overload.” It also ties in subtly with some of the concepts we’ll explore in Tarot to Transform Your Life.
Practice with competing messages and looking for the synthesis of potentially contradictory ideas is a valuable skill in tarot and in life more broadly. It’s how you can take the multiple competing messages you experience in tarot overload and come to understand the core truth of them.
Let’s release that fear of tarot overload, step into the storm of competing messages, and come to understand that core truth nestled safety in the eye of that storm.
For this challenge, you will use different techniques for finding the card or cards that answer your question for a given day. Please pay attention to the difference and follow along if you want to get the most out of the experience. The structure is not arbitrary.
Week 1
In Week 1, you will draw two cards for each day. One should be drawn randomly, and one should be selected by some sort of guided experience.
We’ve been taught to think of shuffling a deck as introducing randomness. But it’s often an intuitive act that can feel energetically guided. Shuffling is not enough.
Deciding to riffle-shuffling exactly N times and pulling card number X is random if you use a random number generator to determine N and Y. (That’s assuming you don’t know how to trick shuffle to get the cards in a certain order.)
On the other hand, shuffling until you feel the right card has found its way into your hands or has flown from the deck is a form of “guided” card selection.
These aren’t the only ways to introduce randomness or open yourself to being guided to the card meant for you, so I encourage you to explore options this week.
You might find yourself rolling dice or choosing a random number between 1 and 78 and finding which card that is in your deck’s original ordering (e.g., 1 is the Fool and 78 is the King of Pentacles in many Rider/Waite-Smith decks).
You might find yourself energetically drawn to a particular card when you lay them out in a fan pattern, or you may be guided to stop shuffling your cards when you see a flash of light (as I did when first connecting with my spirit guide).
Whatever it is, let the randomness be truly random and mechanical, and let the guided experience really feel special and energetically, spiritually, or divinely right.
Remember, for each day, you are going to pull two cards in response to each question. Your single answer will come from both of the cards.
1. What am I here to do in this life?
2. What gift have I been given to help do this?
3. When in the past have I used this gift toward my purpose?
4. What lesson am I learning through this life journey?
5. What recurring life wound is at the root of this lesson?
6. When in the past have I let my wound interfere with my purpose?
7. What do my gift and my wound share?
Week 2
In Week 2, you’ll re-examine these deeply important questions and the cards that you drew in answer to those questions. But instead of drawing a card at random and/or as guided by some energetic impulse, you will intentionally choose a card that you believe best represents the intersection of the cards from Week 1.
Each day, as you review the question and cards from a week before, you choose a single card to represent the dual message. You can ask the question again and re-interpret it through this new card, but it should not be necessary since you will have thought about it already. You may want to spend some time journaling about those thoughts and that experience.
8. What am I here to do in this life?
9. What gift have I been given to help do this?
10. When in the past have I used this gift successfully toward my purpose?
11. What lesson am I learning through this life journey?
12. What recurring life wound is at the root of this lesson?
13. When in the past have I let my wound interfere with my purpose?
14. What do my gift and my wound share?
Week 3
In Week 3, you will be asking new questions and drawing individual cards in response, but they develop from the wisdom of the previous weeks.
Select your favorite method from Week 1 and use that all week as you draw a new card each day in response to the question.
In addition to drawing new cards, you will also bring back the cards from the week before as a way of situating the related energy and connecting what you’ve uncovered about the past and present to help you activate your future.
15. Place down the Day 8 card you chose and ask, What opportunity will I soon have to align with my purpose?
16. Place down the Day 9 card you chose and ask, How can I use my gift to make the most of this?
17. Place down the Day 10 card you chose and ask, How will this help me evolve even beyond past alignments?
18. Place down the Day 11 card you chose and ask, What aspect of my life lesson will be activated by this opportunity?
19. Place down the Day 12 card you chose and ask, Where will my recurring wound be most vulnerable during this period for healing?
20. Place down the Day 13 card you chose and ask, How can I prepare myself so that the life wounds am I healing do not reopen during this experience?
21. Place down the Day 14 card you chose and ask, What more can I learn about the light and shadow of this card?
Week 4
In Week 4, you will look back to the questions from Week 1, but you will now have greater knowledge and insights from deep within you and from outside of yourself. With that, you will get to take control of your own responses and create a new way of being and doing for yourself.
Repeat Questions 1–7, but instead of drawing two cards, choose one card that best represents what you wish were the answers to those questions.
22. What am I here to do in this life?
23. What gift have I been given to help do this?
24. When in the past have I used this gift successfully toward my purpose?
25. What lesson am I learning through this life journey?
26. What recurring life wound is at the root of this lesson?
27. When in the past have I let my wound interfere with my purpose?
28. What do my gift and my wound share?
Finale
For the final three days, you are bringing it all together in summation in order to reveal new guidance to help you make important shifts in your life.
You will place cards from previous weeks in a line or square (your choice as the cards allow) and read them as a coherent sentence. You may have only 2 cards (if there were duplicates) or as many as 5 (or more if you had multiple jumpers). The number of cards is not important as you will distill them to a single sentence.
29. Place cards from Days 1, 8, 15, and 22 down in front of you and read them as a sentence. This is guidance on why you need to take advantage of this opportunity. Reflect on this sentence and journal for 15 minutes about the fire of purpose within you.
30. Place cards from Days 4, 11, 18, and 25 down in front of you and read them as a sentence. This is guidance on why you might be hesitating to take advantage of this opportunity. Reflect on this sentence and journal for 15 minutes about the void that threatens to keep that light from flaring to life.
31. Place cards from Days 7, 14, 21, and 28 down in front of you and read them as a sentence. This is guidance on how to overcome your fears and make the next move. Reflect on this sentence and journal for 15 minutes about what you will dare to do and how you will stay accountable to your courageous soul.
After you’ve done all of this, you will have quite of lot of information, and you will be able to act on it. You don’t have to—the cards can’t make you do things—but you should have what you need to start making important changes for yourself that are in alignment with who you are and want to be in this life.
And of course, if you want to go deeper with me as your guide, then we should talk about coaching and Tarot to Transform Your Life.
Did you learn something?
If so, you may love my intensive fundamentals course for new and experienced tarot readers, Read Tarot like a Nerd. A new 5-week live session of the course is starting up January 18, and the self-paced version is available all year-round.