Things to know when choosing or becoming a good tarot reader

The first question my grandmother challenged me with many years ago when I asked her to teach me to read Tarot was: ‘What makes a great card reader?’  I was young and inexperienced and believed many false hoods about much of what I wanted to learn.  Most of these ideas I had gotten from what was little more than fantasy books. I went through a litany of answers to answer her question, psychic ability, long hours of study, dedication to the art, years of practice, and on and on, most of the answers not so much wrong as just not the answer she was looking for. She just sat at the table her old lined face somber, her head nodding with each answer letting me know that though I spoke in English and not Cajun French she understood what I was saying. She gave no answer of her own, instead when I ran out of answers and fell silent she sent me out on a small quest.

She told me “In the next three months go to every card reader you can find in the city and surrounding towns and get a reading. When you finish come back and we will see if I can teach you to read cards.”  Being young and arrogant I was actually a bit put off over the request.  I wanted to learn to read cards not have cards read to me. I wanted to know the ‘secrets’ I wanted to have the ‘gift’. I wanted the ‘power’ of knowing. Yet I knew my grandmother, and I knew she would not change her mind, what’s more I knew that she would know if I lied. She would know if I didn’t find every reader that I could. She would know if I tried to cheat. So I did as she asked and search out all the card readers I could find. It was no easy task. Back then card readers didn’t advertise, some in fear of losing their place in society, others in fear of laws forbidding such workings.  But I was persistent and I found many of them.

When I returned three months later she asked “Who did you like the best?”  I told her. Then she asked “Why?”   I wasn’t sure that I knew. I had no solid answer. The reader had been good, patient, insightful and gave me excellent advice, but so had some of the others, some had been awful, even frightening but the majority were similar.  I had no reason to choose the person other than the feeling that she actually seemed to care that I make the right decision.  I told this to my grandmother and she smiled. “That’s it,” she said, “that is what makes a great card reader. You have to actually care; you must want the person to make the right decisions for their life.” She pulled the cards from her apron and turned over the first card. This card means…. my education began.

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