OverFlow: What My Daily Tarot Pull Does for My Psyche
It is the most abundant magic of all. When you invest in yourself, there is no other place to go but up.
OverFlow is what happens when I overthink, overflow, and over-everything. When my feelings have nowhere to go, I write about them.
Practicing tarot is half of my mental health maintenance. Meditation is the other part. But my relationship with tarot as a practice is… complicated. I think it gets to a point where my intuition—who’s in charge of the cards—is showing me so much more than what I can accept as my reality at the moment. When that happens, I subconsciously fall out of the habit of reading for myself.
I can get by without being in contact with my intuition for a while, but the impact of the lack of guidance builds up. Some people like having no rules, but I am not one of them. Last April, I started pulling a single card for myself daily—something I’d done in the past but stopped suddenly. The results have been life-changing, and it’s made me more consistent regarding meditation.
How Does a Daily Tarot Pull Work?
I think the core of the daily tarot pull is the choice of tarot deck. For me, the deck I use carries significance—whether it’s where and how I got it, what it reminds me of, or even the specificities of card designs. Sometimes, I feel like decks get “tired,” especially if they haven’t been cleansed or charged in a while. It gets hard to shuffle, and cards fly out as if to take away the act of pulling from you. When this happens, I change decks. I always start the habit with the standard Rider-Waite. The one I’m using now is the Pinoy Practical Magic tarot deck.
I assume that my intuition is speaking to me through the tarot deck. This means the card’s meaning could be advice for the day, advice for a longstanding problem, or even a comment on something that happened recently—like a conversation with someone or a work event. I think of pulling a card as myself replying to someone I love on a messaging platform—just a continuing conversation with someone important.
I take the tarot deck and shuffle it three times, each time saying, “Listen to yourself.” Then, I cut the deck three times, saying the same sentence each time. Finally, I draw a card while saying the same thing. I read the card according to my intuition—paying close attention to details like whether it’s upright/reversed, a repeat card or suite of a previous pull, and my associations with it.
Why Does It Feel Like Talking to Yourself?
Because it is. Everyone’s tarot practice is different, but I have to assume that anyone who reads tarot regularly has some relationship with their intuition.
Like witchcraft, tarot isn’t all about looking cool and unaffected. It is a practice that demands attention, time, and effort. I often describe tarot reading as creative storytelling but without fiction. You are telling your own story when you read for yourself. That’s the magic you’re doing when you’re learning how to read the cards. Tarot cards help you step out of time to communicate with yourself properly and see your life and reality in more than three dimensions.
How Does Honing Your Intuition Help Improve Your Life?
Compare yourself to who you were 10 years ago. If you could redo the last 10 years of your life with the knowledge and skills you have today, you would probably do better. That’s sort of what listening to your intuition is like, only it’s not just 10 years of experience that you’ll build on. Your intuition has access to all of you—I believe this includes all versions, all lifetimes, and all timelines. Your intuition connects you to the rest of the Universe and your part of ancestry or godliness.
There is a certain power in having no rules or regulations to stick to, but I believe that having more information and knowing the lay of the land improves your life. At the very least, it removes regret from the picture.
If You Don’t Want to Use Tarot, Can You Use Other Cards?
When I was much younger and hadn’t discovered tarot cards, I would pull playing cards to answer yes/no questions. My reading was simple—red for yes, black for no. The point I’m making here is that you can use whatever you feel would connect with your intuition the best, cards or not. Some people new to developing a relationship with their intuition may find it easier to use oracle decks. Others may connect differently, like dancing or making music.
Will You Practice Listening to Your Intuition?
Let me know what happens when you start listening to yourself. Remember, listening to your intuition goes with prioritizing yourself, saying “no” sometimes, and learning to love yourself completely. It is the most abundant magic of all. When you invest in yourself, there is no other place to go but up.
Photo by petr sidorov on Unsplash
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