Liz Worth ~ Tarot

People are often attracted to esoteric practices like tarot because they want to know the fastest way to get from A to B.

And the occult seems to promise short cuts and hacks to fast-track your success.

While I don’t think it hurts to throw in a little bit of magic into your life now and again, it’s important to remember that spells, prayers, meditations and affirmations can only get you so far.

If you don’t have the right attitude, mindset, or structure in place in your life to hold onto what you want to create, then all the magic in the world won’t save you.

This is a big mistake I see tarot readers make when they are trying to build their skills.

Whether you’re brand new to tarot, or you’ve been studying for years, if you’re relying too much on the “woo” to do the work for you, then you might not be seeing the progress you want.

There are three things I think everyone needs to nail if they want to get good at reading tarot...

Happy New Year!

I hope you are doing well, all things considered.

Thank you so much for joining me here. I’m excited to start the New Year off with you!

What intentions, hopes, dreams, and changes are you bringing with you into 2021?

Personally, I’m bringing in a few new and old plans: I’m going to take clarinet lessons, for one.

Two, I’m bringing back my annual resolution to read all the un-read books I have at home before buying new ones. (It’s the third year in a row I’m setting this resolution – let’s see if I can keep it this time around.)

There are also a few spiritual trends and beliefs that I would be happy to see disappear in 2021:

1. The belief that tarot readers, energy healers and other intuitive workers shouldn’t charge for their “gifts.” This idea only serves people who don’t believe in paying someone for their labour.

Energetic and intuitive work are skills like any other, and many people who...

If you’ve spent any time at all following new age practitioners, you’ve likely heard the phrase, “Go with what resonates with you.”

This saying permeates new age spiritual culture of all kinds: It shows up in tarot workshops and healing sessions. You see it in books and hear it on YouTube channels.

It’s meant to be taken as guidance or advice to help a student or client figure out what their next step is. Sometimes, it’s given during times of confusion, as though to say, “Just go with what you feel.”

Confusion itself doesn’t get us very far, does it? When you’re not sure whether you’re coming or going, and you’re unclear as to whether you’re supposed to do this or that, things can go one of two ways:

You stay stuck and keep repeating the same old patterns, knowing you need to take different actions but you’re not sure what they are, or…

You act on emotion, impulse, or intuition and hope...

“How long will it take to learn tarot?”

I often hear this question from new tarot students, and aspiring readers who want to go from beginner to pro fast.

Truthfully, there is no one answer to this. How long it takes to learn something like tarot depends on a lot of factors, such as:

What your goals are as a tarot reader;

How much time you put into learning; and

Your methods of study and practice.

I spent about 7 years studying, learning and practicing before I launched my tarot business.

To some, that might sound like an awfully long time. To others, it might not sound long at all - I know plenty of people who still consider themselves tarot beginners after studying for longer.

It's not a race and there is no definitive timeline to follow. How long it takes it relative to who you are, how you approach your tarot studies, and how proficient you become in your card reading skills.

I didn’t start out with business as an end goal, and that influenced my path - because I...

One of the most problematic beliefs that comes from the spiritual industry is that everything is your fault.

If you’re not happy enough, successful enough, or in love enough, then it must because you’re not thinking the right thoughts.

Or you’re not raising your vibration high enough to attract what you really want.

Or you’re just not putting in the work to be who you want to be.

Sometimes there are things that are holding us back that we did not – and would not – choose for ourselves.

For years, I struggled with crippling shyness when I was growing up. It held me back from opportunities that I desperately wanted – but I couldn’t bring myself to be the way I wanted to be.

But that shyness wasn’t just mine. It was part of a coping mechanism that I’d developed over the years, and it was a behaviour that I’d been programmed to adopt into my identity.

The environments I’d grown up in had told me that girls should be...

“You’ve got to be willing to do the work.”

We’ve all heard this kind of advice before.

It applies to pretty much anything in life, such as goal-setting: If you want something, you need to put the effort in to get it.

It also applies to personal growth. We say things like, “He’s done a lot of work on himself,” or, “I’m taking some time away to work on myself.”

What this “work” looks like is so varied and personal that it’s not always easy to know exactly what it is everyone is working on, or how they are doing it.

The work of your life may be very different than mine. We all have our own lessons, journeys, and gifts. We also have our own challenges to overcome.

Some people figure out what their “work” is sooner than others. And some of our work may be work that takes a lifetime to understand.

There is no way to rush through it, no arbitrary deadline you can reach where you suddenly become an...

One of the most common questions I get from other tarot readers is, “Do you read reversals?”

It comes up whenever I teach a class, whether it’s to a group of beginners or advanced readers.

(And for anyone not familiar with reversals, it’s when a card is upside down in a reading.)

I don’t read reversals – but I used to. I picked up the technique when I was studying tarot, and used it regularly by the time I started reading tarot professionally.

But I gradually stopped reading reversals.

Why? It’s not because they don’t work – they do (if you’re clear and consistent in how you’re using them).

The reason reversals dropped out of my tarot practice is that I just didn’t need them anymore. I had started to develop new styles of card reading and the way I was working with tarot didn’t require reversals anymore.

I started to see that the way I was looking at a reversed card – whether it was a challenge,...

“Asking the right question can change your life.”
- Wald Amberstone

Think about that quote from Wald Amberstone for a second. We’ll come back to it.

When people first come to me for a reading, I always ask them if they have a question, or a topic they’d like to focus on.

“Should I tell you what it is?” People often ask.

“Of course!” I say. Being clear about what someone wants to know helps me to deliver a clear, relevant reading. It also helps me to ensure you get the most out of the experience.

But this is also where communication can become a challenge for tarot readers, astrologers, and other folks who are doing this kind of work.

Not everyone is willing to put a question on the table – even if they have one. I think part of this comes from still viewing tarot as a parlor trick. People want to test the reader to see how good they are, which can turn the reading into a guessing game.

But why waste your time and money...

Are you struggling to connect with the court cards? You’re not alone. They are some of the hardest tarot cards to interpret.

But once you start to click with them, you’ll see how layered their messages can be.

“What are the court cards supposed to be, anyway?” A student asked in a tarot workshop I ran earlier this year.

The truth is, they can be many things, just like any other card in the tarot.

Here are five different ways to look at a court card. I hope some of these inspire you to see the courts in a new way:

1. Read the court cards as people. Traditionally, this has been a standard interpretation for the courts, and it’s completely valid. We are constantly engaging with other people. One thing I do stress, however, is that the courts are not necessarily tied to gender and appearance.  Instead, look at the cards for the energies they bring.

2. Read the court cards as aspects of yourself. We all have different sides of who we are. We all...

So you want to learn tarot – great! Personally, I think everyone can benefit from learning how to work with the cards, or from exploring other divinatory systems. It all leads to deeper self-awareness and unexpected awakenings.

As an aspiring reader, you might be wondering if taking a tarot workshop or course will be a good investment.

The short answer is: Yes. Taking tarot classes with the right teacher can absolutely improve your skills. 

But do you need to take a tarot certification program specifically? My short answer on that is NO.

Here's why:

There are a lot of options out there to help you learn. But like anything, it’s smart to know who’s teaching the class, and what they’re promising you’ll get from it.

There is no one, true governing body for the tarot world. Unlike academic institutions that can create standards and processes, tarot is different. This is work that has been handed down through the centuries. It’s intuitive,...