This book focuses on the Waite-Rider version of the Tarot.

I believe that studying and working with the Tarot is an effective way to develop your intuition, to help your process of self-discovery.

Studying my interpretations of the cards will not teach you how to predict the future. It will give you a much firmer sense of your own “Now”. Your future is always yours to invent, and the power is not in the cards. It is within you. Just as you can jump in any direction from a firm footing, details in the cards often bring into view aspects you may otherwise overlook.

I do not believe there is any power in the cards themselves. The power stays where it always is – in you. The cards are tools for accessing that which you know but don’t know you know.

It is important not to use the cards to develop limited “Yes” or “No” interpretations, which would take away your own decision-making power. What works best is to ask the cards for “more insight.” Depending on how you respond to the images, using this approach, the reading then provides choices for your consideration.

In addition to the images on each card, there are other layers of symbolism. Each of the suits was the ancestor to current playing card suits. Even more important, each suit relates to a different “Department of Life.” This means that when you look at a card, you consider not only the image which first catches your attention, but also where that image impacts in your life. Does it have to do with your Skills and Talents, your Feelings, your sense of Conflict, or your deeper Values?


Sample Card Interpretation

ACE of Cups

ACE: Triumph (also ONE: Initiative,
Leadership, Control)
CUPS: Emotions


See the card accurately

A radiant right hand emerges from a puff of gray clouds. It bears upon its open palm, a cup in the form of a golden chalice which is embossed with tiny bells at the top of the stem. From its depths five streams rise, fountain-like, and cascade into the pond below where water lilies are floating. A white dove is descending into the chalice, bringing in its beak a wafer of bread imprinted with a cross which is used in celebrating the Eucharist. Twenty-six white drops representing light, not water, shower down around the pond also.

Consider the implications

Clouds indicate a situation characterized by doubt and confusion. The hand emerging here is glowing with energy, reflecting the power that comes as a result of the choice for emotional openness. Not only is the spirit of giving expressed through the fountains which seem to flow endlessly and effortlessly, but also the willingness to receive is indicated by the upturned open palm. This reciprocity is echoed by the open top of the chalice and by the surface of the pond which absorbs the drops and streamlets flowing into it. There is an emphasis on Christian symbols in this card to a greater extent than in many of the others, although John the Baptist used water in his rites because it already a spiritual significance to his pre-Christian followers. The reversed M on the cup signifies the Virgin Mary, the receptive vessel in which the Holy Spirit in the form of a dove will deposit the Bread of Life. M could also represent the French word Mer, or the sea which was the mother of all life. In the number code, FIVE is the vibratory frequency of creativity and self-expression, and the flowing fountains illustrate the spontaneous nature of our self-giving when these are at a peak. The Yod, or drops of light accompanying the streams, number TWENTY-SIX in all, which is the numerical value assigned to the sacred name of Jehovah in Jewish lore. They symbolize the “fall-out” blessings which are the sign of this Presence. Thus, a human expression of spontaneous creativity draws to itself powerful additional blessings from other realms.


What is your inner knowing trying to communicate?

You can triumph in this complicated emotional situation by putting your own energy into unconditional love. That may seem easier said than done, but one of the paths to that inner state of generosity might be taken by interacting with two of the symbols within this picture. Mentally erase everything but the bird and the open hand. Have you ever been in an enclosed space with a small trapped bird? You sincerely wished to be helpful but every time you approached it, it fluttered away in fright. Now close your eyes and visualize yourself there with the bird. Extend your hand, palm up before you, and try to tune in to the bird, sense its fear, and reassure it silently. Seek within yourself that which binds you and the bird in Oneness and from the center of all that love which the One surely has for this small creature, offer it safety. If you are successful, the bird will alight on your palm. But what would happen if you started to curve your fingers inward? The bird would react to that move as an effort to trap it and become frightened again and fly away. Now, if you can feel that much love toward a small fellow creature like a bird, how about extending that same degree of feeling toward a fellow human being? Recognize that one of your own kind can feel trapped by a love that clutches.


Key insight

Make yourself into a safe place for someone to be; permitting that person to come and go as his/her own needs dictate. Loving means risking, but unconditional love expands our capacity to risk triumphantly. Be open-hearted as well as open-handed, and your CUP, too, will runneth over.